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Transcript on deposit at The Southern Historical Collection, The Louis Round Wilson Library
Citation of this interview should be as follows:
“Interview G-0040-2, in
the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007,
Southern Historical
Collection, The Wilson Library,
University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill”
This is the second interview in a series of two conducted with labor activist Eula McGill. In this interview, McGill focuses on her continuing work in the southern labor movement from the 1930s to the 1970s. McGill begins by explaining her views on workers' education and labor leadership. According to McGill, teaching workers about the history of the labor movement was especially important. In the 1940s, McGill was an active participant in Operation Dixie; she describes in detail labor campaigns in La Follette, Tennessee, (1943) and in Dickson and Bruceton, Tennessee (1947). During this time McGill also continued to work actively with the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union throughout the South. McGill briefly remarried, but for the most part she dedicated her life to the labor movement. Here, she speaks in more detail about what it was like to be a single woman working within the predominantly male labor movement. She emphasizes the transient lifestyle and some of the challenges she faced as a woman trying to organize both men and women.
Southern labor organizer Eula McGill explains her views on leadership in the labor movement and the role of workers' education. After rising through the ranks of the labor movement during the Great Depression, McGill continued to work actively to organize workers from the 1940s to the 1970s. She describes in detail various labor campaigns and strikes in the South, as well as her work with the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union and other labor organizations.
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
I came across a report that Louise Leonard McLaren wrote in '37. She was traveling through the South talking to people and trying to recruit students for the Southern Summer School for Women Workers.
She met you at a State Federation of Labor meeting in Anniston, Ala. and you were one of the people that she really wanted to recruit for the school. She talked to you about workers' education, and said that you were going to try to help raise scholarship money and recruit students to go. Do you remember anything? Do you remember that?
Yes. That was back in the thirties.
Yes, in '37.
Yes.
But you never went to the Summer School yourself?
No.
Did they try to get you to come?
Yes, seems like some girls from Anneston went. You see, a part of that
time we were spending
But were you not interested in going yourself?
I was interested, but I was involved in organizing and I couldn't take the time off to go.
Were you sympathetic toward the idea of residential workers' education at that time?
Yes, yes, I am. I've always been interested, because I don't think these
one or two days' seminars on workers' education really have the effect
What do you think workers' education should accomplish?
Well, I think it should accomplish. . . . So many times the seminars that
I've been to more or less don't give enough labor background history to
make a person feel when they're talking to workers or the particular
leaders of the rank and file workers in the shop— [laughter] [laughter]
In your work have you had the time, or have you tried in your own work to provide that kind of workers' education?
Yes. I think that everyday workers' education, every day if you have time to talk with workers not to always talk about current problems, but to let them know where this movement came from, so that it'll help them overcome the temporary setbacks they have by putting the courage in them to keep on—not to become impatient and give up.
Did you come across any of the WPA workers' education projects in the thirties?
Yes, in Greenville, South Carolina I did.
Oh really?
They had an organization in there, the WPA workers, in Greenville.1Let's see, we used the same hall when I
was working up there. I was up there for a little while on
Yes.
John Bolt was kind of the leader of them, and he was a young lawyer there at the time in Greenville. And he was working with them.
Yes. Did you know Alice Spearman Wright in South Carolina?
No, I didn't know her. I didn't work much in South Carolina. I think that was my only work in South Carolina until the late sixties.
Well, I wanted to just talk about some of the campaigns that you were
involved in after World War II. Could you tell me something about
Well really, we got the first contract in Cluet-Peabody in '41; in
February of 1941 we got the first contract.
So you weren't
Well, not after they got the contract signed. I helped in the organization here in Atlanta with May Bagwell through part of '39 and part of '40. Then it kind of seemed to simmer for a while there; we couldn't get enough interest. And May held it down pretty much alone until the break-through came in '41.
How do you account for how much more successful the Amalgamated was in organizing the South than, say, the TWUA was?
I think that we had. . . . For the main part, companies that we organized during that time were . . . well, Manhattan (including Peabody) had no history of unions. But I think it came through the hard work and the statesmanship of Sidney Hillman; I think a lot of it was due to his personality and the way he was able to, well, sell the union to the employers (or at least to get them to resist). . . I mean, they didn't resist. He was able to persuade them, in other words, that he thought the union should be advantageous to them in certain ways as far as cooperation. If they really wanted the cooperation between the workers and the management which they claimed, I think he finally convinced them (including Peabody and Manhattan) that this was the best way to get it. That's my feeling.
Yes. Also, Amalgamated had a stronger base in the. . . .
Yes, we had a base in the clothing, and we had the financing and the resources, I think certainly more than the textile unions had.
So as the plants started moving south after World War II Amalgamated could organize them as they moved south, before they got too entrenched.
Yes, yes. Well, you take the Publix Shirt
Well, did the Amalgamated make a strong commitment to trying to organize the South in this period, during and right after World War II?
Well, they joined with the CIO in what they called Operation Dixie. I
think we gained more; we pretty much acted on our own. While we wanted
to cooperate with other unions, we have felt that our industry was such
that we had to do it ourselves, because of the type of industry we had.
And we felt that we could do it ourselves better. Although we cooperated
with other unions, we wanted to pretty much run our own organizing
campaigns. And we did have from time to time help from some CIO
organizers in the fields in some of our campaigns, but we always ran our
own campaigns. We felt that our industry was a little bit peculiar in
the type of work they
Tell me a little something about Operation Dixie.
Well, it didn't last very long, and it didn't pay off as well as. . . . There was a lot of publicity.
What do you think went wrong?
I really don't know, because most of the time during that time I was
involved in administration work. And I only came back on the organizing
staff-really not on the organizing staff, but into some organizing
situations—in the latter part of it. I was still primarily a business
agent, and only helped out part-time in some of the organizing things.
And I wasn't as involved in that organizing as the other staff that was
primarily organizing, because I was still doing servicing in LaFollette.
The only campaign that I worked in
Now in
Morgan.
. . . Morgan were threatened by a mob in Knoxville?
No, in Bruceton; it was in Bruceton.
In Bruceton. Oh, she was from Knoxville; Mary Morgan was from Knoxville.
She was from Knoxville, yes.
What was that about? How did that happen?
Well, of course that area was primarily a rural area. Bruceton, Tennessee
was a railroad junction; it was really a railroad town. But most of the
workers in that plant came from neighboring counties where it was
rural—practically no industry whatsoever. And anyone who would have
known that area at the time would have understood the people's fear of
losing the first paycheck [laughter]
So how did this particular incident develop?
They were the townspeople; it was primarily a banker there in the town,
in Bruceton. Of course, he had great animosity for us, because he was
pretty much left holding the bag [laughter]
Well, did a group of people confront you while you were on the picket line?
No. What actually happened in Bruceton was that we had the strike in
Dickson. We had had a union in Dickson for quite some time; I believe it
was about '42 or '43 that I was sitting talking to two people from the
Hall Tate shop one night. They were at my room at the hotel there in
Knoxville. And his brother was a machinist, a sewing machine mechanic,
in Dickson, Tennessee, and he was trying to get in touch with his
brother because they had walked out. We had been in there before and
were unable to organize because those people had also paid for the
building. And they had resisted the union over the years; all during the
thirties we had tried to organize in Dickson and failed. Griselda
Kuhlman and several organizers had been in there, and they had been
framed on charges and things. We weren't able to get anywhere. So I got
in touch with the office, because I was tied up with the situation there
and wanted to know what had happened. And as a result we obtained a
contract in Dickson. So we had to have a strike over there for some
demands that we felt were necessary. And during this time we were trying
to organize the Bruceton plant, and we brought it out in
I saw that at the '48 convention in the proceedings there's a little exchange where it had been rumored that you and Mary Morgan had been run out of town, and you correct that misimpression.
Well what happened, that morning before we were out of bed—in fact it was
real early, I guess it was around seven o'clock—we were living in the
home of a Methodist minister, and he came in there and told me some men
was outside and wanted to talk with me. So we got up and went
Who had wanted the publicity?
. . . the mob—because that's all you could term it, a mob. I said, "How
did you get out here so quick from Memphis?" And he said, "I got a call
this morning at two o'clock." So evidently they just telephoned him and
headed him out there. He kept insisting that he make a picture of Mary
and I with our suitcases. And I said, "Well, I'm not going anywhere." He
kept insisting. And I said, "No, I'm not going to do it." We went to eat
breakfast at a little restaurant up town, and when we came out he made a
picture of us coming out of the restaurant. Then later when the paper
came out he had already written it as if we had been run out of town; so
that's why he wanted the picture with a suitcase, to back up his story.
He had already actually written the story, evidently, because when the
Commercial Appeal came out on the street (we got
it that afternoon) the story was
Well did Hillsman say to you, "Get out of town."
No, no.
Did they actually threaten you?
No, he just come up and said that these men wanted to talk to us, and
that they wanted us to leave town—-now, because he'd been pretending to
be quite friendly with us before, Hillsman Taylor had; and after that,
why. . . . Well, I guess he was pretending, according to the newspaper
man, pretending to see that everything would be peaceful. So actually I
can't remember the man's name that did the biggest talking; (I can look
back through the records or find out) later the company hired him as
their guard up at the plant. He was from the next county too, and he
wasn't very well respected by the people in Bruceton. I cannot remember
the fellow's name; his nickname was "Rabbit" [laughter]
Did you have any more trouble with threats after that incident? Did they just disperse?
Well, after the railroad men. . . . They called a meeting on a Sunday,
and all the railroad men came. And they said they didn't intend to have
that in the town. They called upon, they talked to Hillsman Taylor and
the mayor of the town, and let it be known that they wasn't going to
tolerate anything like that in the town; that we had been behaving
ourselves
Now Gladys Dickason was chairman of the CIO Southern Organizing Committee at that time? Was she involved in Operation Dixie? She was on their staff?
No. At that time technically Gladys was head of the research department. But then she'd taken over as southern director for the Amalgamated.
I see.
Of course she may have been on. . . . As usual they have some people from every union that's involved in a drive like IUD has now. They have people from all the unions participating and helping advise on meetings and planning and things like that. But Gladys was research director and also southern director of the union, the Amalgamated Clothing Workers.
So you were working under her?
Directly under her.
Now the Hall Tate campaign in Knoxville, you never got a contract. That was an unsuccessful. . . ?
We didn't get a contract until another company bought them out, a company
that we had a contract with. They closed down and dissolved the business
as Hall Tate. Then Henley Tate, a nephew of Mr. Sam Tate who was one of
the owners (William Hall and Sam Tate owned the business). . . . They
were making suits for Steins, Steins Stores. Over the labor controversy
Steins, they withdrew their work from the Hall Tate Company after the
strike we had at Hall Tate in '49. And then Sam Tate and a man called
Breezy Wynn
You went to LaFollette, then, in forty-. . . .
I was in Roanoke, Alabama working with the Palm Beach shop. And at that
time John L. Lewis had pulled the United Mine Workers out of the CIO,
and he had set up two groups: one called United Construction Workers,
the other was District Fifty. As I understand it District Fifty was to
organize in byproducts of coal and things more directly associated with
coal, and the United Construction Workers was kind of a catch-all
organization that took in everything else. So they were trying to get
the people in the two shirt factories that we had organized in
LaFollette to join their union, and of course using the mine workers'
name, the United Mine Workers' name to try to attract them to this. And
they couldn't make any success; they couldn't get anywhere with the
people. They wouldn't join. So Franz Daniel and Ed Blair was in there at
the time, and they were attacked and beaten. And Franz was shot; he
wasn't actually shot, but the bullet lodged in a thick wallet that he
had in his pocket, in his coat breast pocket. And Gladys called me to
come up there. And that's how I got involved in LaFollette, because they
felt that a woman would be safer in there than a man, and a woman maybe
could not be openly attacked. However I didn't depend on that. I was
very careful not to be out after dark and
Now this was
Well, they weren't called Atlas. . . . Originally they were called Atlas and Reade. The Atlas plant became Southeastern Shirt Corporation, and it was Southeastern Shirt Corporation at the time. And the Reade plant became Imperial Shirt Corporation; they were bought out by different companies.
They had been organized by the Amalgamated in '37.
Yes, they was organized in the thirties.
Did you know anything about that original drive? Zilphia Horton, I know, was in it.
No. Zilphia and Elaine Wright and Charlie Hand, mainly Charlie Hand and Elaine Wright. Zilphia was in there for a short while after it was organized, for a short while.
I know they tried to put her in as business agent, and the workers didn't like. . . .
No, they felt they ought to have a man. I was the first woman business agent they ever accepted in LaFollette.
Was there any question raised when you came in about your being a woman?
No, no.
Why did they accept you so readily?
Well, I knew the history of LaFollette, being working in around Knoxville
and Middlesboro, Kentucky. I'd met these people at meetings and all. I
don't think they looked to me [laughter] [laughter]
Now a lot of the miners were the husbands of the women who were organized in the shirt plant, isn't that right?
I want to say now that the United Mine Workers, the men in the mines and the representatives of the United Mine Workers, were never in no way involved directly. They stayed clear of it. In fact, I knew some of the representatives, having worked with them all during the years, and they apologized to me for what was going on, because they knew me. And I worked very closely with them on the OPA and the War Manpower Commission; I sat on that representing the CIO in that district, and the representatives of the United Mine Workers. And none of them, I can say that I never saw a representative of the United Mine Workers, and as far as I know no rank and file miner was ever involved.
Well, who were the people who were involved?
There was an ex-sheriff, Clifford Lay, was put on the staff and Silas Huddleston.
Silas Huddleston.
That don't ring a bell with you?
Yes, he was involved in the Yablonski murder, wasn't he? That's the same person?
Same person, Silas Huddleston. Silas Huddleston was a miner from Caryville, Tennessee, and was president of one of the locals down there. And he went on the staff of the United Construction Workers; they put him on the staff. And he was the leader of that, and I'm pretty sure he was the leader of having Ed and Franz beat up. He was the leader and the one I always have done my talking to when it was necessary to talk to him.
What was he like?
He, to me, was, I think—and that's what makes it so sad about what happened later. . . . When I read it in the paper and they mentioned LaFollette his name popped in my head. And one of the friends of mine up in there sent me newspapers and everything, and sure enough, he was involved. When it came on I just said to myself, "I'll bet Silas Huddleston's involved in that in some way." There was another man who was never. . . . Pat McCulley worked for the United Construction Workers, but he was never, I never saw Pat in any of the mobs that tried to rush our union hall or give us any trouble. I never saw Pat in it. I had known Pat; I had never known Silas Huddleston before, but I had known Pat McCulley. He was a miner and they put him on the staff. I never saw Pat; I don't believe that Pat was ever involved in it, because I never saw him. And I did talk to him once after I went to LaFollette.
Now who was the sheriff or deputy?
Clifford Lay. . . .
What was his role?
. . . was sheriff, and he was put on the staff.
While he was sheriff?
No, he got defeated as sheriff, and they put him on the staff for the United Construction Workers. Then he later ran for sheriff and was defeated, later on.
Because of his role?
I don't know. I'd say, I think it had a big part to play among other things (that I can't prove, it's best not to say) involved in some running of whiskey out of Kentucky. It was supposed to have been his automobile that hit the guy and killed him and didn't stop. Anyway, he was defeated as sheriff. He got back in as sheriff; I believe he was elected one time, and then a man named Rose Kitts defeated him. And that was the end, as far as I know, of his career as a law enforcement officer.
Was his involvement in this jurisdictional dispute ever raised as a campaign issue against him?
Not openly. You didn't do things like that in the mining area; in the
mining area you had to have some more subtle ways to actually fight. I
had calls from rank and file miners saying they'd come help me, but my
position was that I didn't want to cause a conflict in their
What happened when the mob broke in the union office?
People told me that there was no miners involved. There were taxi drivers and just anybody they could pick up. I know there was some taxi drivers; they had organized the taxi drivers into the United Construction Workers in that area. They only owned the cabs. In fact, I was afraid to even ride a cab during that time; I didn't know who anybody was. I walked, because I didn't have an automobile. My car had torn up, and I was unable during the war years to get cars. And I didn't have an automobile, so I'd walk anywhere in the town I wanted to go, unless somebody (one of the workers) had a car.
Tell me about this incident when they broke into the union hall. What happened?
Well, they kept trying to get the people to join their union, and they
didn't have any success. A few people would join. They had four or five
of the women who worked in the old Reade shop (which was called the
Imperial Shirt) that was involved, I know. One of them had been a
forelady, and she was afraid of losing her job as a forelady. And I
think she was afraid that the union wasn't going to accept her back into
union membership because of her activities previously. And at that time
we had a
Were most of these workers women in the shirt mill?
Yes, yes. I didn't involve any of the men. I told the men to stay out of it altogether, the few men we had in the plant, because they would be victims of violence. And I told them to stay clear.
How did the women respond to the threats of violence?
They held their heads up and went on, until they started shooting in
their houses and beating up their husbands and threatening. The pressure
got a little bad after they finally put a picket line out and wouldn't
let the people into work. They put a picket line up and [laughter]
Really?
Yes.
How did they beat them?
They sent seven of them to the hospital. They used their scissors on them; a lot of them had their scissors, and they'd cut.
Did any of the women get hurt?
No.
Did the men not fight back?
Yes. They tried to fight, but they couldn't fight. Them women was
terrors. They were trying to get to me. Some of the women took me back
in the back of the hall and made me stay back there. They knew that they
were after me. And I didn't like it [laughter]
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
I didn't see anything. I saw bottles of whiskey in their hands, and I
figured they'd try to use the bottles of whiskey. In fact, there was one
guy there, one of the Musish boys. His father told me later; he called
on me, (his father was a representative of the United Mine Workers) and
he asked me if his son was over there. And I said, "I don't know him,
but I understand he was." He said, "Well I assure you, he won't be
back." And I never saw him at any more of the fracases we had over
there. In fact, the first day they put the picket line at the Imperial
Shirt Plant, that plant had their clocks set to get off five minutes
earlier than the other plant. No, I'm getting that backwards: the
Southeastern Plant (because it was furthest from the restaurants and the
bus station), they had their clocks set to give them equal chance to get
into restaurants and on the bus in the afternoon, to get a seat. For
some reason or other that's the way the people wanted it. So when I came
out at noon, out of the Southeastern shop, there was a man standing out
there, and he said, "We want you all to come over to the other plant at
noon; we're going to organize it." And I said, "Well, I thought it was
organized;" that's what I said. That tipped me off. And as I was going
on to the hall I met one of the city councilmen. He was going home for
lunch; he walked that way every day and went home for lunch. And I told
him I was expecting trouble, so he turned and went back. I went on over
to the big plant (what we called the big plant, the Imperial Plant), and
there was a great gang there. And most of the women stayed in the plant
and didn't come out. And I got in the plant. They didn't know
Do you think the same people that may have voted. . . .
Against.
. . . against the Amalgamated came, and still stayed out of work?
Yes, that's right. They came to the hall instead, they were so upset over
losing. I think they all thought that enough would vote to put it
over—and almost did. We almost did. But there was just enough of them
that was frightened; I'm sure that's what it was. And the plant manager
called me and asked me to tell the people to come to work. And I
Was any legal action taken against the mob at all?
No, no. I'll tell you, I felt then as I feel now (and I told Bro Potofsky when I talked with him). He told me just to leave. When they begin all this fighting he asked me, he said, "Why don't you just leave and let them have it?" More or less that's what he said. And I said, "These people don't want to leave our union, and I don't want to leave. I want to stick with them." And he said, "Well, hire you a good lawyer; that's all I can do."
What did he mean by that?
Well, to protect me in case of any frame-ups or anything. I felt this
way: that I did not want to bring any legal action against another union
member. And that's what I told Silas Huddleston. He came down there
later, he and five men. And I got in the door and I said, "What do you
want?" And he said, "I'm coming in that hall." And I said, "Not as long
as the Amalgamated's paying rent on this hall you're not coming in." He
said, "I represent those people." And I said, "Well, if you represent
them, you go rent you a hall and take them to it and represent them. But
you're not coming in this hall." And I said, "I want to tell you
something, Silas." I said, "You're not going to do me like you did [laughter]
Was this the most violent campaign that you were involved in, the most violent period that you were involved in?
Over a longer period of time.
You said you were living in a Methodist minister's house at first?
In Bruceton.
Oh, in Bruceton, I'm sorry. Right.
Oh, I'd left Bruceton and went to LaFollette.
Yes [laughter]
But, you see, LaFollette happened before Bruceton.
Yes, yes.
You see, after we lost the big shop I had the small shop. So I started helping out in organizing campaigns some, because I just had this one shop.
I was just wondering about whether that was unusual. Was he allowing
Who?
The Methodist minister.
Very sympathetic, and she was too. She had lived there, and he was her second husband. And I cannot remember . . . it's terrible that I can't remember the name.
Did you get any support from the churches like that in any of your. . . ?
Oh no.
Did you get active opposition in your organizing efforts from the churches?
In some areas, especially in the textile. Not so much in the garment
plants. I never had open opposition. Of course, most of the people,
they'd say, "My pastor told me not to have anything to do with the
union." There was some churches back then that called the CIO the mark
of the beast. Well, I think the main thing would be more. . . . Most of
the churches that the workers went to, it was my feeling that they had
to support their church because nobody had money that went there. And
all the money the church got was what these workers got, and they were
afraid of a'losing it.
You were serving on the OPA Price Panel during this time that you were involved.
During the World War, yes.
And Hillman was national co-director, I think.
Of the War Manpower Commission.
Of the War Manpower Commission, yes. What was your role in it?
Well, we more or less, the people who worked in the OPA were a voluntary board. When they couldn't straighten out violations of the code they would bring them to us, and then we would take action. That was what we'd do. We'd have a meeting and take up what the investigators and checkers who checked the stores had. Of course it was labor, the public (whoever that is: housewives), business—a panel. That was the purpose of the OPA, to try to keep everybody in line.
And to try to keep down inflation: was that the overall purpose?
Yes, and to try to keep people from selling tallow for margerine—you'd be
surprised, but that happened [laughter]
Selling what for margerine, tallow?
Beef tallow, or some kind of liquid stuff. I looked at it; I don't know
what it was, but they were selling it for margerine. A lot of things
like that you had to watch.
I noticed that the '46 Amalgamated convention was in Atlanta.
No.
It wasn't?
It never has been, no.
Never has been?
Never has been no Amalgamated convention in Atlanta.
I thought that was unusual. I wondered if they ever met in the South.
There wasn't one in '46. '44, and the next one was in '48. We didn't have one in '46 during the war. Wait a minute now, wait a minute. Had one in '44. No, we skipped from '40 to '44. We did have one in '46; we skipped from '40 to '44 during the war. And in '46, Atlantic City, I guess, yes.
Atlantic City, that's what it was, yes. I looked at some of the proceedings for that convention.
That was right after the LaFollette thing.
And you were speaking in favor of a commitment to the southern drive. Griselda Kuhlman was also talking about her experience in the South. I was wondering whether you felt that the union did not make, whether you were trying to push the union to make a more serious commitment to the South. Was there opposition to that?
No, there's never been no opposition. But at conventions you always feel
like at revival meetings, that you have to keep praising the Lord [laughter]
[laughter]
You always have to keep the members who are delegates. . . . After all, the money comes from the national office, and the delegates in the convention is the supreme voting power. And you're doing that to impress the members, the delegates from the locals all over. We have to get our money to organize the South from the other locals.
Yes. So the question was how much money was going to be there?
To impress the delegates there of the need to organize the South to protect their conditions. That's why we were making the pitch.
You mean delegates from locals outside of the South?
That's right, that's right, because normally that's where they were from. We are the largest single joint board now in the Amalgamated. The membership is beginning to shift, but at that time we had (in '46), I think we had . . . I don't guess we had over eight locals in the South. I may be wrong. It seems you can almost name them because it was not a big thing: Knoxville, LaFollette, Atlanta, Americus, Ga., Dickson, Tenn. I don't know the ones, I didn't work in Mississippi; we had some in Mississippi. We didn't have a single one in Alabama at the time. We had one in Montgomery; we had a shop in Montgomery that was in the Amalgamated (all black). And in Neils: now it's the National Coats out of that shop.
What effect did the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947 have?
Well, let me see. I've got the list somewhere in all them things past.
Yes. I can look that up. What effect did that have on the Amalgamated and on your work?
Well, any time that you have—now this is my experience—once you organize
a shop, most of the manufacturers would rather have everybody in [laughter]
A whole spate of right to work laws were passed in the South after Taft-Hartley, weren't they?
Yes. They had to do that because, see, Taft-Hartley still give us the
right for the union shop if the majority voted for it, and we was
What about the requirement that union officers had to sign anti-Communist affidavits, or affidavits saying that they were not members of the Communist party? Did that have a very negative effect on the union?
At first. Now it's pretty much a routine. People are a little more
sophisticated. But I know the first ones who signed, the workers would
look at you when they was elected officers and you handed them one of
them papers to sign. They wondered, "Lord, what in the world? I am not a
Communist; what do they want me to sign this for?" They felt like I do
about it; "you're asking me to say that I'm not? I haven't even been
accused or suspected, and here I am trying to prove that I'm not." They
resented it. I think it's become a matter of routine now. They
understand better that they're not being accused of anything. But it's
still something that I think [laughter]
You went back on the staff as an organizer in '52.
'52, for straight organizing.
And what was your first assignment? You went to Miami? Gladys Dickason asked you to come back on the staff as an organizer and sent you to Miami in '52.
No, my first assignment was in Livingston, Tennessee; that's the first assignment. I went there and worked with a group on a shirt plant in Livingston, Tennessee. And there we were confronted again with the same group, the United Construction Workers. They came in and got on the ballot, and we lost the election by thirty votes. They used every tactic: called us Communists, used loudspeakers, and threatened to beat us up—the same old routine.
How did you deal with being red-baited, being called a Communist in those different situations?
It never worried me; I didn't let it bother me, because I don't thin the workers paid any attention to them. In the first place to the average worker the Communists is a word to them; it's a dreadful word, but they didn't pay any attention. I think they knew that this group was just . . . that was propaganda they was using against us. We brought some of our, in that campaign at Livingston, members from LaFollette who had confronted this group before. We brought people out of the shop. One girl, the miners threatened to withdraw her mother's miner's pension, and she had to go back to the shop.
Did you prefer being an organizer or being a business agent?
It doesn't make any difference, you know. I think sometimes I [laughter]
Well, you and Ed Blair, then, were assistant organizing directors under Gladys Dickason, right?
We more or less divided up the South.
Two of the strikes that I know about during that time were at Water Valley, Mississippi and Newberry, South Carolina. Were those the two . . . ?
Let's see, Water Valley was first. Well, see, I worked there
Was it at Water Valley that Ed Blair was shot?
No, he was never shot at on an Amalgamated picket line. He was shot on a
picket line with the IUE in Columbus, Mississippi, when he was on the
picket line with them. [Interruption]
See, I didn't work much in Mississippi; I just came to help out when Ed needed it, especially help in a strike.
So he was really in charge of. . . ?
Yes, he was in charge. I didn't have to work much there. He liked Mississippi; he handled Mississippi altogether. I just went in a time or two in Mississippi to help him out. I went in in the Seminole campaign.
What were the states that you were in charge of?
Well, he and I split it. We pretty well worked together, whichever way. I usually worked over this way. I used to kid him and ask him wasn't there no inbetween Mississippi or Miami. He liked it. He took care of mostly Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama.
Were you working out of Atlanta?
Well, we was working out of our car, mainly. Nashville was the southern office. And I just really didn't have an office; technically worked out of the Nashville office, but I was hardly ever there. I was in Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas.
So you really most of the time just lived on the roads?
Yes. I haven't been no one place very long except when I was a business
agent. I was based in LaFollette, then I was based in Huntingdon,
This Newberry contract was one of the first victories in South Carolina, wasn't it?
In Charleston, South Carolina, we had a shirt company which we got without too much trouble. (We had to strike for a contract.) A lot of these companies where we already had contracts for major shops, why, we just had to have a card check. We never signed a contract, though, without having a card check or an election, a card check and getting certification from the board: have an impartial person check the cards against the payroll and certify the signatures. We never just signed the contract.
Publix?
Well, it's the old S. Leibowitz Company;
Did they have plants in other parts of the country and in parts of the South, or was that the only one?
No, not then. They had Pennsylvania and they had one in Knoxville. They
made jackets; things that's booming today, they made them then. Then
they went out for awhile of jackets. And they never could convert that,
never could get a successful conversion from jackets to shirts. So they
built this plant in Huntingdon, Tennessee and started making shirts.
The next campaign that I remember us touching on before was the Majorette Sportswear.
I wasn't involved in that.
Oh, you weren't there?
No, I wasn't involved in Majorette at all. I don't know where I was when that was going on. After I left Tennessee the only organizing in Tennessee I did was at. . . . Ed pretty well handled Tennessee and Mississippi, and what little there was in Alabama. And Miami and pretty well the rest of the area was where I was supposed to be. I didn't work over in Majorette. I worked some in Decherd—that was later years, though—organizing Decherd.
What was the company there?
Let's see, what was that old shop— It's closed now.
Tell me a little about how the structure actually worked. Did you have organizers working under you that you sent out?
Yes.
How many organizers did you have?
Ed usually sent out the organizers. See, he usually had me to go mostly
to places he didn't want to go. To tell you the truth, I mean that's the
way he wanted it [laughter]
What kind of places would that be?
Just, you know, where Ed didn't want to go. He'd call me up and say,
"Hey, how would you like to go over there? How about you handling that?"
I didn't care where I worked. [Interruption]
I think we stopped where you had just come back on staff as an organizer in '52 with Ed Blair. And you went back to Livingston. [Omission]
Which was in progress when I got there. And I headed up that campaign
where we had another run-in with our friends—I don't know if it was
District 50 or the Construction Workers by that time. Sometime during
that time they disbanded the United Construction Workers, and District
50, I think. [laughter]
Then I think I went back to Huntington to start that campaign. No, we went back to Livingston to see; there was some rumblings of people that wanted a union. We went back up to Livingston, and there wasn't enough interest. So then we went into a campaign and a strike at Mt. Pleasant, Tennessee and got a contract at that plant there. From there I was working on Livingston and helped out when they had the strike in Mt. Pleasant; I had to go in there and help with that situation.
And where did I go from there? Let's see. I think that's when I came to
Bremen to start a campaign on the Sewell Manufacturing Company. And I
was in there about two years, and went through about three elections.
Had to have run-overs due to them violating the law. That's when the
Board made the
The NLRB made that decision?
Yes, based on our charges. That's what they used, the race issue.
How did they do that?
They put out leaflets showing black and white people together, saying "Do you want this?". About that time, you know, was when there were the riots of the 1954 Supreme Court decision for integration. And they made it so strong we filed charges and used that as one of the reasons. The Board ruled in our favor. We had another election and lost it. They used the same things again, violated the same laws. So the second time we got it set aside we decided there wasn't no use doing it again. They didn't mind violating the law; they'd just do the same thing again. And during the time I was there then the Decherd situation got hot. I went up there, and we had to strike that plant.
Then I came back and there was a walk-out in. . . .
[END OF TAPE 2, SIDE A]
[START OF TAPE 2, SIDE A]
In '65 or '66, I guess it was about that time, we had contacted a few people at the Warren Sewell Clothing Company in Bowden, Georgia.
People walked out on strike. why the company had paraded us all through those
plants, so they could let the people see Maynard.
Was there a big upsurge in using the race issue against the union after '54, or had that been done all along?
It had been done, yes. Oh, the CIO, we were known as, they called us
Negro lovers and Communists. Even some of the AF of L groups, while we
was separate, used that even in talking to people when they were [laughter]
Why did the United Garment Workers stoop to tricks like that so much?
They needed shops, I guess; they wanted membership. They went everywhere
we went. We'd go start a campaign, they'd be right there the next day or
two. I know for a fact that they'd tell the company, "Look, don't you
want us instead of those Communists?" They'd get the company to help
them. And I think that deal was made with Salant and Salant, because we
were in a campaign with Salant and Salant—had been in a running campaign
with Salant and Salant since the thirties since they come into the
South. We had never been able to make
Well, after World War II the garment industry moved into the South at a rapid rate.
After World War II yes, because a lot of things was changing.
How has that affected the union, the movement of the industry to the
South? How has it affected the union as a whole? Has the union moved
Well, predominantly the heads of the industry are still in New York,
Chicago, Philadelphia, still based there. The plants may be here, but
they're based there, so the union has to be based back there. We have
the largest joint board
But that change has meant that as the industry moved into the South. . . .
Although we're the biggest joint board we're still the poorest [laughter]
Really? Why is that?
Well, we're newly organized. We're so widespread the expenses are more
down here, while the northern shops are pretty well concentrated their
facilities can be used. Down here we have to have almost separate
facilities for every local union. We still have to depend on the
membership in the North to help us; they still are. They're paying
practically the entire expense. They pay all the organizing expense and
the biggest degree of the servicing expenses from
You were saying earlier that before World War II most of the membership, or at least a majority or more of the membership were men who worked in the plants.
Well, I'd say a large portion; if not the majority, darned near it. And in Pennsylvania in shirt plants, they began to go into shirt plants in Pennsylvania. But predominantly it was men's clothing that was made.
Why didn't men move into work in the garment industry in the South after World War II?
I don't think they'd ever been used to that type of work. They'd done
rougher work. As a rule, most of the people who came to this country and
started off in the garment industry had come here for this type of work.
It just don't work out once they've done manual labor with their hands,
farming and rough work; it just don't work out as good. Now, a lot of
young men during the war—and they're beginning to get a few men back on
sewing machines. . . . There are some men now, a few coming in our shirt
plants in north Alabama and taking sewing machine jobs; you're finding
it happening. And there's nothing wrong with it: they make good
operators because they
So what proportion of the membership are women now?
Oh, the overwhelming majority: I'd say ninety percent if you don't count our warehouses. There are a lot of women now, you know, of course since women can't get any jobs they work at jobs that used to be thought of as predominantly men's jobs because of the actual heaviness of it. With technological changes it's easier to do, and women can do them easier than they used to. Certain jobs that I used to think were really too hard for women: those old buck presses and lifting those big heavy cartons of shirts and clothing. A woman's just not as strong as a man, let's face it. But with the new types of equipment being brought into the industry it makes it easier for both men and women. Any more we don't have men and women's jobs, even before the Equal Opportunity in Employment Act.
Well, most of the officers of the union have been men, in spite of the fact that it was a predominantly female industry.
I think that was because the women allowed it to happen and never considered themselves able to lead. I think they felt pretty well content to play the soldier role. I know that most of them that I knew of, most of our business agents (a lot of our business agents) were women. A lot of the leaders on the local and district level were women—well, for the very reason that I tell you, that a lot of the women, they look up to a man.
They do look up to a man?
I think they certainly have, and I think they'll do it to a big degree. They'll feel that a man can deal with another man better—and, too, a lot of the bosses. I guess I was about the first woman business agent in the South. I believe it's safer to say that I was the first one to be taken serious, was able to be treated on an equal basis in dealing with them. I had very few men that I dealt with when I was a business agent that ever tried to belittle me or to think of me as unable to do the job, or felt that they were superior to me, or had any qualms about dealing with me. And certainly Gladys Dickason had the respect of everybody, whether they liked her or not. She was respected for her brains and her ability to do the job by industry.
What about by other people in the union?
Oh, the other people in the union definitely. Sometimes there was a
little even in the union. Men are men [laughter] [laughter]
Do you do that?
Yes, yes. I've always sensed. I had one guy one time. I called Gladys and
I said, "I can get a settlement but he ain't going to agree [laughter]
How could you tell that that was going to be the case?
I just had a feeling. I knew I was winning the arguments. And the plant
manager there, I'd known him for a pretty good while, and I'd always
gotten along with him. Before his superior came in the picture I pretty
well figured that the plant manager thought I was
Do you think that you would be, hypothetically, if you had been a man, in a different position in the union today?
No. No, I don't think so, I don't really think so. I don't think I've
ever been discriminated against because I was a woman in the union. No,
I don't think so, because there were just other women that had more
seniority and were certainly more capable of being on the board than I
was. I feel that way. I certainly felt that those people had been in the
union longer than me. And certainly Gladys Dickason was far more able.
She was a professor of economics; and I'd certainly rather have seen her
sitting on the board than me, although I did have more seniority than
her.
You haven't seen men be promoted over you or receive more recognition than you received?
No, no. No sir, I've always been equal to anybody that's been
This is an impossible question, but you say (and I think this is true) that most women are content to play the soldier role and content to work behind the scenes to make their contribution.
Oh, I've never worked behind the scenes [laughter]
I know. How do you account for the fact that you have not followed that kind of traditional role at all?
Well, I've always had my say. I never stood back. I always opened my mouth, whether it was right or wrong; I had my say. Luckily I've been right more than I've been wrong. And I've never hesitated to speak my mind, and to anybody in this union from Hillman on down. I wasn't fearful of them. And if I had have been I'd have still said it, because I felt it needed to be said. And I have never had anything but cooperation from everybody in the union that I've worked with and talked about.
When you first started out as an organizer, did you have any trouble with
being hassled by men in or out of the union as a young woman traveling
alone
Well not only that, when you're out. . . . I guess I was about the first
woman organizer on the road in the thirties. You had to be very careful
because a lot of women were suspicious of a woman who would get out and
travel alone: "This must be a tough customer to get out and do that."
You had to first win yourself. If I went to visit or talk to a man about
joining the union I first tried to talk to his wife. And I used to have
flack from a lot of the guys when we started organizing women's
auxilliaries, before women went to work like they do now. I used to try
to get women's auxilliaries to help us with the union label movement,
consumer movement and
Did the male organizers have a lot more freedom in that regard?
No. You know, a lot of women hassle men; men have trouble running from women. A lot of the men have that kind of trouble, that have to be very careful not to make a woman mad. I used to see it, you know, and I'd try to help the guys head it off, because it could cause trouble. I used to tell the men organizers, "Look, if you go with one the others'll get mad at you. And you can't go with them all, so it's best to leave them all alone and treat them all alike." Some of the women would join the union just, you know, if they liked the guy's looks or something like that. That's nothing unusual; it happens in everything.
Well, I guess until 1970 or so, for almost twenty years, you pretty much have lived on the road from the time you left LaFollette. Could you tell me a little bit about what your daily life was like?
Well, organizing is pretty much a twenty-four hour job. Of course I had a home, and I took my summer clothes down and left them in the winter or went back in winter and got my summer clothes.
In. . . ?
Birmingham. But I, for the most part, had to take everything I had with me in the car. I might go home once a month sometimes; sometimes it'd be maybe three to six months. I have been away from home six months before I got back home again.
And you'd stay in motels in different places?
Yes. Stayed in the motels most of the time. And you'd be on a lot of campaigns; especially in the early days in the thirties you might get you a furnished room. We had to save money back in those days, and that's the reason that if we was going to be in a place any length of time we'd try to get into somebody's home and rent a room. I lived with a couple of ladies in Middlesboro for a long time; they lived alone and rented out rooms. Then they had a couple living in another one of the rooms, a man and his wife. And I lived in their home just like I was at home—had the run of the house. Then in Huntingdon I lived in the home, because there was no hotel there. I lived in a bedroom in the home of a man who'd been sheriff there for twenty years. He and his wife—-his kids was all gone—they rented me a room. Not that they rented rooms, but I had no place to stay, so they agreed. And I lived in their house for about four years.
Who have your closest friends been over the years? Have they been mostly other organizers?
Mostly the people I worked with, because I never had any time to spend. I
never had time to make friendships outside. In the early days [laughter] [laughter]
What has the nature of your work done to your private life?
Well, it hasn't constricted my private life, because I always found time to have recreation. I've always been interested in music of all kinds. I think it's very bad for a person to get hung into one thing and not have no outside activities. But as far as any other thing other than music or shows. . . .
Have you ever been drawn toward settling down in one place and having a house?
No, no, no, no, never had those desires.
You never have?
No, no.
You never had any regrets about not having that kind of a. . . ?
If I retire I'd have to have something to do; I'd have to have something
to be in. If I ever retire I don't think I could ever really retire from
the labor movement. I might have to retire, to go off the payroll, but
I'd always want to be active in some way—certainly not with senior
citizens though. I don't believe in categorizing people out here. I
think everybody ought to be mixed together. I think putting the old
people out together and the young people out together is the worst thing
I was reading [laughter]
You had a brief second marriage, didn't you?
Yes.
Along in the fifties or something? When you got married were you thinking of getting out of organizing and settling down?
No, no. That was not the intention when I married, but then when I married him he wanted me to quit. And that caused the trouble; I just wouldn't want to do that. I'd been alone too long and worked too long; I would never give up.
Why did he decide after you got married that he wanted you to?
I don't know; who knows? People sometimes change. You think you know
people, but you don't know them 'til you really live with them. I think
he was a little jealous of my activities, [laughter]
[laughter]
No. Oh, I had a long good friendship with one man. It was . . . more
than, I'd say, a friendship, but healthy in a lot of ways. I never had
any intimate relationship with nobody in the labor movement. I felt that
was something that you had to keep apart from your work. I've always
felt that if you want to work in the shop, a lot of the girls tried to
go with the bosses and things like that. Me, I felt that that was
something you had to keep separate from. And I felt that way when I got
in the labor movement. And I wouldn't say I might have found somebody. I
might have found somebody and I would have gotten him, but I didn't. And
I never looked, never tried. I always kept my social life apart from my
work. So because of the fact, though, that you had to be very careful
being a woman of who you made friends with (men friends with), why, the
person I met was through
You never thought of marriage?
Him or nobody else, because I was burdened with a mother and father to help support, and I had a child to raise. And I just couldn't, I didn't entertain ever marrying again until years later.
Did you feel any conflicts about having your parents mostly take
Oh no, it was the best thing that ever happened because, as I said, I've always had to work. And having my mother and father able to take care of him was the best thing that ever happened.
He never felt any resentment?
No, oh no.
Or that you should have been around?
No, none whatsoever.
That's great. Oh, you had not ever been involved in any kind of issues involving women specifically, any kind of women's rights issues?
Not at that time, because, as I tell the people in the Coalition of Labor
Union Women
When was the Coalition of Labor Union Women organized?
When was it organized? Before I got my leg broke. I
didn't get to go to the first meeting because I wasn't able (at that
time my leg was broke and I was on my crutches). I think it was December
'73.
Do you see that as an important or significant organization? What do you think is going to come of it?
Really, I don't know. Really I don't, because the way I feel about it is the way I feel about a lot of the black separatists. They fight for equality, then want to run out and divide themselves. I mean, I just don't see . . . that it's going to. . . . That's not going to be the way they're going to change things, I think—whatever they're going to change. Now, I've worked with them and do what I can to try to help those who think they need it in any way, shape or form. But the main thing that I am going to do, I want to do. I knew it would fail if it kept going like it was, and a real trade unionist had to get in there and try to run it.
In 1970 a new organizational structure was set up, wasn't it? And your position changed somewhat? You became area organizer?
Well, that's because of more joint boards. We set up more joint boards.
The entire eight southeastern states is just too big for one person or
even two people to try to direct. And we got more shops in the union; we
got more joint boards. And all the states had a joint board. Alabama had
two joint boards; Tennessee had two joint boards in it. And they split
it up and put the organizing
And that's when Dickason died at that time and Charles English. . . .
Yes. Well, Charlie had really took over. Gladys had gotten sick and had to retire before she passed away. And Charlie is still southern director and manager of the Southeastern Regional Board, which carries all the eight southern states, southeastern states. And he's over the whole thing. But it's running a lot better. Because traveling's not involved, people can work closer to their home, where it used to be that we had to go from. . . . We didn't know one day where we was going to be the next a lot of the time. We had organizers spread so far out working under the director, and the director couldn't possibly make the situations as often as they should have to help and assist and advise, and to direct wherever necessary. It's working a lot better this way.
Now what is your position exactly now?
Well, I'm still director of organization in Georgia and manager of the north Alabama area joint board. I'm kind of in charge of administration of the locals and organizing in north Alabama.
I see. What is the real difference in your work between these two situations?
Well, organizing is trying to organize new shops. Of course you've got to
deal and know all about the laws and everything that goes with [laughter]
[laughter]
No. Oh, we could talk about a lot of other things, but I think we've
covered it pretty well [laughter]
END OF INTERVIEW
Journal of Negro History 44 (1959), 346-369.