About the Lucy Parsons Project

The Lucy Parsons Project is an online educational resource designed to publicize the life of Lucy Parsons and the struggles she championed.

There is a rich and vibrant history of anarchist, labor and racial and gender struggles for social change which have been ignored by conventional histories of the United States. Lucy Parsons, a poor woman of color who took great risks engaging in revolutionary worker-led movements for justice, is a part of this enormous history. She is a unique figure even within the anarchist movement, as one of the only known African American anarchist women of her era. Many of the struggles in which she took part are responsible for the freedoms and privileges Americans enjoy today. The fight for the 8-hour workday, for example, led to the passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, which guarantees minimum wage and overtime pay and prohibits child labor in the USA. Yet there is very little information available about Lucy Parsons or the movements of her era, although her legacy continues to grow.

When this web site was created in 2003 there was only one full length biography about Lucy Parsons: Lucy Parsons, American Revolutionary, written by Carolyn Ashbaugh (published in 1976). Since then two more books about Lucy Parsons have been published: Lucy Parsons: Freedom, Equality & Solidarity, Writings and Speeches, 1878-1937 by Gale Ahrens with Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz (2004), and Goddess of Anarchy: The Life and Times of Lucy Parsons, American Radical by Jacqueline Jones (2017). All three of these books are essential reading for anyone who finds the information provided in this web site compelling.

Lucy Parsons has been featured in other publications as well. In 2003, she appeared in Latina Style magazine in an article titled "Our Hidden Story" by Julia Young. In 2004 she was featured in Latina magazine in a full-page article titled "A Fiery Crusader". Historically, she has appeared in major newspapers, including the Washington Post (as early as 1915), the New York Times (starting in 1886), and many other publications nationwide. In 2010, Dynamite and Roses by Robert Benedettia was published as a fictionalized interpretation of the life of Albert and Lucy Parsons. She has also been written about in The Haymarket Tragedy by Paul Avrich, The Haymarket Scrapbook by Franklin Rosemont and David Roediger, and more recently in Radical Sensations by Shelley Streeby, and other writings.

Beginning in 1986, actress Alma Washington portrayed Lucy Parsons at various union events, schools, and other venues. In 2019, she performed in the play "The Trial of Lucy Parsons" at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago, which explored Lucy's life and activism.

In Boston, the Lucy Parsons Center has successfully operated a bookstore and meeting space in her name since 1992. In 1997, the Labor Art and Mural Project unveiled an 8'x30' mural in Mexico City featuring Lucy Parsons (along with Albert Parsons and Emiliano Zapata). A few months later in Chicago, a larger 20'x130' mural featuring Lucy was revealed to celebrate the historic UPS strike. In 2004, the city of Chicago designated one of its public spaces as Lucy Parsons Park, a 0.32 acre gathering place on Belmont Avenue for community residents of all ages. And in 2022, a new housing development (in Logan Square, Chicago), with 100% affordable units, was named the Lucy Gonzalez Parsons Apartments.

New organizations have also emerged honoring the legacy of Lucy. In 2016, a black/queer direct action group was formed in San Francisco, aptly named the Lucy Parsons Project (no relation to this web site). In 2018, the Alliance for Global Justice began operating The Lucy Parsons Popular Human Rights School, an initiative offering courses aimed at educating and empowering individuals in progressive politics, human rights, and grassroots organizing. In 2019, a technology-focused org known as Lucy Parsons Labs was established to expose the surveillance overreach by governments and corporations. And in 2021, the Lucy Parsons Institute for Social Research was founded to provide workshops and classes on labor history, social movements, and community organizing in more than a dozen cities across the U.S.

The Lucy Parsons Project was launched on June 9, 2003, at lucyparsonsproject.org, and has since moved to lucyparsonsproject.com. It was last updated on November 23, 2024.