This photograph, published in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Weekly in October 1902, shows a crowd outside a coal yard in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. This neighborhood in New York City was home to hundreds of thousands of Jewish residents at the turn of the 20th century.

The crowd gathered as the first anthracite coal was coming onto the market after negotiations ended the Coal Strike of 1902. People raced to their nearest coal dealer as soon as coal was shipped from Northeastern Pennsylvania to fill their bins as the temperatures dropped and biting autumn winds arrived.

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Read more about the 1902 Coal Strike

“Among the Pennsylvania coal-strikers” – A dispatch from the 1902 Coal Strike

A Thanksgiving sermon in the aftermath of the 1902 Coal Strike

Coal Region Books: Theodore Roosevelt’s leadership during the 1902 Coal Strike

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