Terence Vincent Powderly, the son of Irish immigrants, was born in 1849 in Carbondale, Pennsylvania. Employed at a young age as a railroad switchman, he later apprenticed as a machinist. Powderly joined the International Union of Machinists and Blacksmiths in 1871, eventually becoming local president, then joined a local Scranton, Pennsylvania, Knights of Labor in 1876 and rose steadily until assuming the national leadership from 1879-1893. In addition to his labor connections, Powderly served as a progressive mayor of Scranton from 1878-1884, practiced law, and became a political operative with the Republican Party. From 1897-1901, he served as Commissioner General of Immigration, following these duties with a position as Chief of the Immigration Division of Information, 1907-1921, then Labor Department Commissioner of Conciliation, 1921-1924. Beyond these professional positions, Powderly was a world traveler, photographer, and author of Thirty Years Of Labor (1889) and his memoirs, The Path I Trod (1921). In 1999, Powderly was honored as the newest inductee into the U.S. Department of Labor's Hall of Fame, joining figures such as Samuel Gompers, Mary Harris "Mother" Jones, and Philip Murray. Powderly, a photography enthusiast, took and collected thousands of photographs, nearly 1300 of which are reproduced in this digital collection.
