AT&T workers are back on the job today after the company reached a tentative agreement with the Communications Workers of America to end a month-long strike in the Southeast.

The new deal includes a 19.33% pay increase for all workers, and more affordable healthcare premiums.

Wire technicians and utility operations employes get an extra 3% pay increase.

In a statement, CWA president Claude Cummings Jr. praised the solidarity of the striking workers. 

“I believe in the power of unity, and the unity our members and retirees have shown during these contract negotiations has been outstanding and gave our bargaining teams the backing they needed to deliver strong contracts,” he said.

CWA district president Jermaine Travis told Mississippi Today that he and his coworkers are happy to be back at work. 

“It’s been a long month, so everybody is excited to get back to work and get back to taking care of business,” he said.

Travis also noted the significance of the strike, the longest telecommunications strike in the Southeast. 

“I think we’re gonna look back at this strike, at this moment in history, and see it was really important for workers to stand up for the rights and force companies to do right by them, so I think we did a good thing,” he said.

AT&T has also reached a tentative agreement with the CWA in the West.

“As we’ve said since day 1, our goal has been to reach fair agreements that recognize the hard work our employees do to serve our customers with competitive market-based pay and benefits that are among the best in the nation — and that’s exactly what was accomplished,” AT&T said in a released statement. “These agreements also support our competitive position in the broadband industry where we can grow and win against our mostly non-union competitors.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Sept. 16, 1925

“The King of the Blues” was born Riley B. King on a plantation near Itta Bena, Mississippi, the son of sharecroppers. 

While singing in the church choir, he watched the pastor playing a Sears Roebuck guitar and told the preacher he wanted to learn how to play. By age 12, he had his own guitar and began listening to the blues on the radio. After playing in churches, he went to Memphis to pursue a music career in 1948, playing on the radio and working as a deejay who was known as “Blues Boy” and eventually “B.B.” 

Within a year, B.B. King was recording songs, many of them produced by Sam Phillips, who later founded Sun Records. In 1952, “3 O’Clock Blues” became a hit, and dozens followed. 

While others sought to bring change through the courts, King did it through music. The songs that he and other blues artists created drew many listeners across racial lines. One of the biggest fans walked into the studio one day and called him “sir.” His name? Elvis Presley, whose first big hit was the blues song, “That’s All Right, Mama.” 

King explained that music was like water — something “for every living person and every living thing.” His smash hit, “The Thrill Is Gone,” made him an international star and led to collaborations with some of the world’s greatest artists. 

He survived a fire that almost burned up his beloved guitar, “Lucille,” and won 18 Grammys as well as a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 1987, he was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Both Time and Rolling Stone magazines ranked him as one of the greatest guitarists of all time. 

In 2006, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the greatest civilian honor. Two years later, his hometown of Indianola honored him by opening the B.B. King Museum and Delta Interpretive Center. After he died in 2015, thousands flocked to the Mississippi Delta for the wake and funeral. 

“Hands that once picked cotton,” the preacher told the crowd, “would someday pick guitar strings on a national and international stage.” He performed till the end, telling Rolling Stone in 2013 that he had only missed 18 days of performing in 65 years. He died two years later at 89 after battling diabetes for decades.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

State Sen. David Blount sits down with Mississippi Today’s Bobby Harrison and Adam Ganucheau to discuss the push for income tax elimination and how that would affect the state’s budget. He also talks about needed funding for the state’s troubled retirement system and whether Mississippi will soon adopt mobile sports betting.

READ MORE: As lawmakers look to cut taxes, Mississippi mayors and county leaders outline infrastructure needs

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