Education in the Name of the Lord: The Rise and Decline of the Catholic Labor Schools

This article seeks to overcome a traditional disjuncture between labor and religious history by analyzing the role of labor schools as central points of contact between the Catholic Church and workers in the mid-twentieth century. It takes as its primary subject Hartford's Diocesan Labor Institute, which operated from 1942 to 1967. Hartford's program is of particular historical interest due to its longevity, its extensive public reach, and its role as a model for the founding of several other labor schools. The present study argues that gender and class shifts—particularly the increasing entry of women into the workforce and a perceived climb up the class ladder by Catholic workers—together contributed to both the rise and decline of Catholic labor education in Connecticut and the United States.