Memorial ceremony highlights rise in workplace deaths

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Despite years of promoting safe workplaces, deaths on the job in the U.S. occur more often than ever; more than 340 a day. But how many were saved? That was the question posed at this year’s Workers’ Memorial Day commemoration in Kokomo.

The answer never will be truly known, but dozens of concerned residents attended the long-running ceremony at Rodgers Pavilion in Highland Park on April 28. It served as a moment of solemnity and a reminder that the fight for safe workplaces must continue.

After an introduction and the Pledge of Allegiance led by Glenn Rodgers -- the person responsible for keeping the memorial service going in recent years -- Mark McAlpin gave the invocation. Then, Cheryl Graham, AFL-CIO Labor Director, set the scene for workplace safety.

“I’ve been here for over 30 years, and you would think we’d be declaring some sort of victory, some sort of accomplishment,” said Graham. “We’d be reveling. We’d be thankful. Instead, we’re dealing with the same issues and some new threats in the workplace. Even though we focus on the current struggle, we must also think of what could have been if we didn’t continue to urge people to recognize this day and remember those who have passed.

“In the last three years, some things haven’t changed. The No. 1 hazard has always remained the same: falls, followed by workplace exposure deaths and contact with machines. Why can’t we find victory over these things? Why do they keep happening?

“In 1994, they were reporting that 18 people died daily in America’s workforce. In 2025, that number has risen to 344 workers a day. It seems like the more we attempt to address workplace safety, the more we kind of fall behind.”

Graham had no answer for the steady increase in workplace deaths. There are more chemicals in use today and a greater reliance on machinery, she posited. Heat has become a greater concern as well. But at the end of the day, it is simply being human that creates risk.

“Workers are human, and humans have limits, tolerances, and frailties,” said Graham. “Workplace guidelines are just that: guidelines, not mandates. Sometimes, workers remain in harm’s way by convenience. We need to stay aware at all times of what is as well as what will be. We have the guidelines. We have knowledge of how to stop workplace deaths, but yet it continues.”

Graham also cited decision by employers and government as contributing factors in the rising rate of workplace deaths. For example, there once were 15 Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) inspectors per 1 million workers in the U.S. Today, there are just five. It would take nearly 200 years for those inspectors to reach every workplace. She believes it will take cooperation between all parties to make a real impact.

“Only when people come together to the table with the same will and the same goals will workplaces become safer and put us in a position where we can begin to anticipate new threats rather than react to them,” said Graham. “The nature of today’s fast paced work environment calls for more workplace collaboration and effort to identify and address hazards of the workplace.

“A poster is not enough. All workers require training to know the hazards and how to protect themselves. Employers need to invest in safety and be held responsible for hazardous conditions they allow to exist. Unions must continue to press for better safety protections, and our representatives need to have workers’ needs in the forefront as much as they do profits.”

Midge Collett, retired president of UAW Local 292, spoke next, recounting how Kokomo’s Workers’ Memorial Day came to be. It started with a unionist, Pat Harden, who lost her husband to a workplace accident at Chrysler Corp. prior the start of the memorial in 1988.

“Her husband was decapitated in the plant,” said Collett. “So, she got a check each month that said, ‘due to decapitation.’ There was a little girl here in town who had her left hand cut off in an accident at one of the plants. “Every month, her disability check said, ‘due to the loss of left hand.’

“Pat decided it was just wrong that people had to be reminded every time they got a check due to those losses. Through her legislative process, she got it changed. She also won the first substantial raise in workman’s comp in Indiana. She was a fierce advocate.”

Collett compared Harden to Mary “Mother” Jones, the legendary labor activist who overcame repeated tragedies in her live to advocate for workers across North America.

“She never stopped,” said Collett. “We all have to be Mother Jones. We have to do that and to look out for each other and love our brothers and sisters.”

Dave Trine, operations coordinator for the City of Kokomo, read a proclamation into the record on behalf of Mayor Tyler Moore, and then the group moved outside to the island at Defenbaugh Street and Stadium Drive as Rodgers laid a memorial wreath and held a moment of silence as two trumpeters from Northwestern High School played Taps, ending the ceremony.

See additional photos from this event  on the Lantern’s Facebook page.