I'm not a historian but I'm a philosopher who studies critical theory and Marxism, so I've learned some historical facts en passe while doing research on other stuff. So take my historical knowledge with a grain of salt.

The anarchist movement in the U.S. during the early 1900's and late 1800's was a fairly strong moment in comparison to any anarchist movements that exist today. Anarchists in the U.S. generally practiced a form of trade union anarchism that philosophers now call anarcho-syndicalism. This anarchist movement had a huge impact and influence on the 'workers rights' moments, and they had a great deal of success in getting an 8 hour work day implemented. The U.S. government took the threat of anarchism/communism seriously. The new deal, and all the social programs that came from that, were the result of the government attempting to ease revolutionary activity at the time of the great depression. During that time, there was huge interest in communism in the U.S., so great in fact that a communist school was erected in New York City (link below)

If you're interested in the history of this, you may want to check out the IWW (industrial workers of the world) website, as they are/were the most prominent anarchist worker union in the U.S.

Also below is some primary sources from news papers that I ran across while doing dissertation research. They are interesting if nothing else, but also have potential for a window into a perspective of how anarchism was perceived by popular/media culture at the period.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Workers_School http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_School_(United_States) http://www.iww.org/history http://www.loc.gov/rr/news/topics/anarchy.html