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Terence V. Powderly, circa 1886.
flipFlip to Uriah Smith Stephens, founder of the Knights of Labor, circa 1900.
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Pennsylvania native Terence Powderly, one of the pioneers of union organizing, and mayor of Scranton 1878-1884.

Credit: Image donated by Corbis Bettmann

The son of Irish immigrants, Terence Powderly was born in Carbondale, Pennsylvania, and began his work as a labor organizer while working as a machinist. A three-term mayor of Scranton, elected on the Greenback-Labor Party ticket, Powderly led the Knights of Labor, the nation's largest labor union, from 1879 through the 1880s.

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