"For many decades historians have treated the Knights of Labor as an appendage to history, an organization that showed brief promise, then collapsed, leaving the better adapted American Federation of Labor to carry labor's torch. Labor historians in particular considered the Knights as an organization dominated by an autocratic leader, Terence V. Powderly, the Knights president from 1879 to 1893. Knights Unhorsed examines the internal conflict and external pressures that drove one of America's most promising labor organizations into obscurity less than a half a century later." "This book will interest scholars and students of labor history, nineteenth century studies and American studies."--BOOK JACKET.