"Big Annie" Clemenc

DETROIT, Michigan (September 4, 2012) -- Labor’s International Hall of Fame has announced the 2013 inductees who will be honored posthumously on May 16, 2013.

Viola Liuzzo,  Anna “Annie” Klobuchar Clemenc and Evelyn Dubrow will join more than 100 other working-class heroes enshrined since the organization’s 1973 inception.

“We are extremely excited about this group of extraordinary women who worked tirelessly on behalf of working families and their civil rights,” said the Hall of Fame executive board in a statement. “Viola Liuzzo gave her life marching on behalf of civil rights, while Evelyn Dubrow and Annie Clemenc stood strong against the attack on textile workers and miners during the 20th century.”

Liuzzo, 39, the wife of a Teamster official in Detroit, was murdered in her car on an Alabama highway on March 25, 1965, while driving African Americans home from the peaceful march from Selma to Montgomery.

“Big Annie” Clemenc was one of the most visible leaders of the 1913 copper miners’ strike on Michigan’s Keweenaw Peninsula, many times standing between the miners and police while draped in an American flag.

And Evelyn Dubrow, a journalist by trade and member of the American Newspaper Guild (now known as The Newspaper Guild/Communications Workers of America), also became a organizer, writer, educator and, in 1956, the chief Washington, D.C., lobbyist for the International Ladies’ Garment Workers, which is now UNITE HERE.

“These incredible advocates are so deserving of the labor movement’s recognition and remembrance,” said the Hall of Fame in its statement. “We look forward to the induction ceremony on May 16, 2013, and  making sure the rich histories of sisters Liuzzo, Clemenc and Dubrow are properly remembered.”

The executive board of the Hall of Fame took the action for this group during an Aug. 23 meeting and it was announced on the organization’s Facebook page on Labor Day. The location for the event will be announced Oct. 31.

Sources: New York Times, Wikipedia, Cornell University ILR Program