Rick Halpern examines the links between race relations and unionization in Chicago's meatpacking industry. Drawing on oral histories and archival materials, Halpern explores the experiences of and relationship between black and white workers in a fifty-year period that included labor actions during World War I, Armour's violent reaction to union drives in the late 1930s, and organizations like the Stockyards Labor Council and the United Packinghouse Workers of America.

Rick Halpern is a professor of history and Bissell-Heyd Chair of American Studies at the University of Toronto Scarborough. He is the coauthor of Meatpackers: An Oral History of Black Packinghouse Workers and Their Struggle for Racial and Economic Equality.