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Peter Rachleff's new book, Hard-Pressed in the Heartland, covers a tale that is now familiar to most labor historians--the long, conflict-ridden, and ultimately unsuccessful strike at the Hormel meat-packing plant in Austin, Minnesota, in 1985-1986. After lengthy negotiations, the workers of Local P-9 of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) went out on strike to avoid renewed demands for concessions from the most profitable firm in the industry, to address an unfair wage structure, and to call attention to the rates of injury in the new high-tech, high-speed plant in Austin. Despite innovative tactics and a fairly broad national support network, the strikers lost when the UFCW signed a contract with the company. Despite the broad-based and committed struggle of the P-9ers, the outcome...