Samuel Gompers
Originally uploaded by ericandkatherine
I've been taking a new route to work in the morning, which takes me by this huge statue, kind of in the middle of no where.
The only words on or around it are a name: Samuel Gompers.
You might, as I did, wonder who the fuck Samuel Gompers might be. And what he did to deserve this monstrous statue?
Well, thank God for Wikipedia. Not surprisingly, Wikipedia has a quite exhaustive article on Samuel Gompers.
In short, he founded the AF of L (later the "AFL" in AFL-CIO) and had a lot to do with the evolution of the labor movement in the U.S.
Another interesting tidbit. The otherwise empty plot of land the statue sits on is called Gompers Square (though, to be honest, it isn't a square at all--more like a tiny triangle/wedge between K St. and Mass Ave.). Gompers used to live in the Dupont Circle neighborhood, which explains the location (and might also explain all the shirtless men in the statue).
And if one giant statue tribute to Samuel Gompers isn't enough, there is a second--in Chicago.
So there.
