In the year 2010, Labor Day means family get-togethers, picnics, and barbeque, the heralding of a new football season, and the last sweet bit of summer before really getting back into the school grind.

But as you munch on your barbecued chicken, take a minute and consider how Labor Day got to this point.

Peter J. McGuire, a union leader who founded the United Brotherhood of Carpenters in 1881, is generally attributed credit for the idea of Labor Day. (Though some accounts say that Matthew Maguire, a machinist, actually proposed the holiday while serving as secretary of the Central Labor Union of New York.) The CLU of New York were the ones out in force, though, on September 5th 1882. They organized a “parade” of 10,000 workers, under the sponsorship of the Knights of Labor. It was really a not-so-festive protest, with Union members required to march in support of the eight-hour workday.

In 1884, the Knights of Labor resolved that the first Monday in September should be annually recognized as the Labor Day holiday. The date was chosen as roughly the middle point between Independence Day and Thanksgiving.

Oregon was the first state to legally recognize the holiday in 1887. After a number of workers died at the hands of the authorities during the 1894 Pullman strike in Illinois, President Grover Cleveland rushed a bill to make Labor Day a national public holiday in an effort to defuse the situation.

So enjoy the unofficial end of summer, but be thankful for all the hard work by our ancestors that gained us this three day weekend. And remember—no white after Labor Day.

Photo: Library of Congress. A Labor Day crowd, Main St., Buffalo, N.Y. circa 1900.