Packinghouse Daughter

By Cheri Register,

Book cover of Packinghouse Daughter: A Memoir

Book description

A unique blend of memoir and public history, Packinghouse Daughter, winner of the Minnesota Book Award, tells a compelling story of small-town, working-class life. The daughter of a Wilson & Company millwright, Cheri Register recalls the 1959 meatpackers' strike that divided her hometown of Albert Lea, Minnesota. The violence that…

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

Why read it?

1 author picked Packinghouse Daughter as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Cheri Register grew up in Albert Lea, Minnesota in the 1950s and 60s, in a working-class home.

When she was 14, a strike in a meatpacking plant created deep divisions within the town and brought national attention when the National Guard was called out to maintain order. As a teenager Register felt acutely the social tensions and class conflicts inherent in such a situation.

In this book she elegantly weaves together her personal coming-of-age story and her own family’s history with details of the strike gathered from archives as well as conversations with those who lived through it.

With sensitivity,…

From Janet's list on literary memoirs from the Midwest.

If you love Packinghouse Daughter...

Ad

Book cover of Tap Dancing on Everest: A Young Doctor's Unlikely Adventure

Tap Dancing on Everest by Mimi Zieman,

Tap Dancing on Everest, part coming-of-age memoir, part true-survival adventure story, is about a young medical student, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor raised in N.Y.C., who battles self-doubt to serve as the doctor—and only woman—on a remote Everest climb in Tibet.

The team attempts a new route up…

Want books like Packinghouse Daughter?

Our community of 12,000+ authors has personally recommended 53 books like Packinghouse Daughter.

Browse books like Packinghouse Daughter

Book cover of Leaning Into The Wind: A Memoir Of Midwest Weather
Book cover of Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth
Book cover of Family

Share your top 3 reads of 2024!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,888

readers submitted
so far, will you?

Ad

📚 If you like Packinghouse Daughter, you might also like...

Book cover of Geri o Shimasu

Geri o Shimasu by Alia Luria,

Geri o Shimasu: Adventures of a Baka Gaijin invites readers on a witty, unfiltered romp through 2008 Japan as experienced by Alia Luria, a self-proclaimed "clueless foreigner." Luria dives headfirst into the quirks and challenges of Japanese culture, from decoding onsen etiquette and enduring public embarrassment to exploring the oddities…

Book cover of A Long Way from Iowa: From the Heartland to the Heart of France

A Long Way from Iowa by Janet Hulstrand,

This memoir chronicles the lives of three generations of women with a passion for reading, writing, and travel. The story begins in 1992 in an unfinished attic in Brooklyn as the author reads a notebook written by her grandmother nearly 100 years earlier. This sets her on a 30-year search…

5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in Minnesota, the working class, and childhood?

Minnesota 73 books
The Working Class 111 books
Childhood 200 books