REPOSITORY CONTACT INFORMATION

Address

Telephone973-595-7953

Access NoteThe American Labor Museum is housed in the 1908 Botto House National Landmark. The Botto House was built for and owned by Italian immigrant and silk mill worker, Pietro Botto and his wife Maria. From the balcony of the Botto House in 1913, labor union organizers of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) addressed as many as 20,000 silk mill workers who were on strike for an eight-hour workday. The Botto House was been placed on the State and National Registers of Historic Sites in 1975, and in 1982 it was designated a National Historic Landmark. In 1983, it opened to the public as a museum dedicated to presenting labor history and contemporary labor issues, with special attention to the ethnicity of working people. The museum features changing exhibits, restored period rooms and Old World Gardens, a free lending library (including books and audio-visual materials), and a small archive mostly devoted to local labor history; it also offers a wide-ranging program of lectures, poetry readings, teachers' workshops and educational activities. Museum hours are 1:00-4:00 Wednesday to Saturday, or by appointment. Email inquiries can be submitted via a form on the museum's web site.