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Progressive Action Roundtable: A forum for progressive groups in the Greater New Haven Area where actions and ideas may be publicized so that others are aware of peace, health, justice, energy, environmental and other issues for the common good.

Posts Tagged GNHLHA

Labor History Association Annual Meeting June 3 to Feature Special Guest John Wilhelm, President of Unite Here

May 2

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– By Joan Cavanagh, Archivist, GNH Labor History Association

The annual conference and meeting of the Greater New Haven Labor History Association will be held on Sunday, June 3rd from 1:30-5 p.m. at the New Haven Labor Council/ Teachers Building, 267 Chapel Street, New Haven.

This year’s two Augusta Lewis Troup Preservation Award winners are the late Vincent Sirabella, long time leader of the Hotel and Restaurant Employees union and the struggle to unionize workers at Yale University in the 1970s; and Anthony Riccio, author of ”The Italian American Experience in New Haven” and “Cooking with Chef Silvio.” John Wilhelm, president of UNITE HERE, will give the posthumous award to Mr. Sirabella, along with a presentation about his role in labor history. Steve Kass, member of the GNHLHA Executive Board and coordinator of the labor history in the schools legislative initiative, will present the award to Mr. Riccio.

The event will also include a tribute to the late David Montgomery and a preliminary conversation about the pros and cons of transitioning to become the Connecticut Labor History Association.

The event is free to all current GNHLHA members with a $10 suggested donation from all others. More details will be posted on our web site (www.laborhistory.org) and sent by email and postal mail closer to the event. In the meantime, please take this opportunity to join GNHLHA or to renew your yearly membership (due May 1, 2012 and renewable April 30, 2013) by making your check out to GNHLHA and mailing it to 267 Chapel Street, New Haven CT 06513.

Dues are: $25 for individuals; $100 for organizations of 100 members of less; $250 for organizations of 101—300 members; and $500 for organizations with over 300 members.

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Family Work History Project, Phase II

Oct 4

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– Paula Panzarella, Project Coordinator, Family Work History Project

Last Spring, Christine Saari, the Outreach Coordinator of the Greater New Haven Labor History Association (GNHLHA), initiated a wonderfully successful labor history program with students from Worthington Hooker and Katherine Brennan schools.  Almost one hundred sixth and eighth-grade social studies students learned how to conduct interviews with their parents and elders about work and wrote essays based on the interviews. The essays were used to create a composite performance piece with music and song by Mike Kachuba, which was performed by the students on the New Haven Green on May 1.

GNHLHA will be building on the success of last year’s program and has revised the Family Work History Project in order to reach a greater number of teachers and students. As the project coordinator, I will visit fifteen social studies classes in Connecticut to introduce the teachers to the Family Work History Project and provide them with material so they can create a Family Work History Project with their students.

I look forward to helping the students discover their “inner journalist” as they gain an understanding and appreciation of labor history. If you have suggestions of social studies teachers for me to contact, please e-mail me at paulapanzarella@gmail.com or call (203) 562-2798.

In other labor history news: PAR readers may remember that in the September issue of this newsletter, Steve Kass of the executive board of GNHLHA wrote about the plan to develop legislation that would mandate the teaching of labor history in Connecticut’s public schools.  The first meeting of the task force will be held on Wednesday, Oct. 5 from 4 to 5:30 p.m. at the Labor Council/ Teachers’ Building, 267 Chapel Street, New Haven. To get involved in working on legislation, contact Steve Kass at steve@laborhistory.org, or call the GNHLHA office, (203) 777-2756, ext. 2 and leave a message for Steve.

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Labor History In The Schools

Aug 31

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– Steve Kass, Exec. Board Member, GNH Labor History Association

“The history of the American labor movement needs to be taught in every school in this land…. America is a living testimonial to what free men and women organized into free democratic trade unions can do to make a better life…. we ought to be proud of it.” – Hubert H. Humphrey, Vice President 1965-69

Following the lead of the Wisconsin labor history association that organized the passing of the historic Wisconsin legislation in 2009, mandating the teaching of labor history in the public schools (first in the nation), the Greater New Haven Labor History Association (GNHLHA) is introducing the same legislation in Connecticut.

The purpose of the legislation is to get labor’s untold story told. According to a poll by the independent Hart research, 54 percent of adults said they know just a little or don’t know much about unions. They said their chief sources of knowledge were personal experience (37 percent), people in unions (26 percent) and the media (25 percent). Significantly, learning in school was not even mentioned.

The implications of these numbers are clear. To a very large degree, Americans are uninformed or misinformed about the labor movement and the role that workers have played, and do play, in our nation’s economic, political and cultural life.

Academic standards and curriculum resources such as textbooks have historically ignored or been deficient in their treatment of workers and the labor movement. Significantly, many teachers want to cover this history in their classrooms, but there are few written curriculum standards by local and state educational institutions to encourage the teaching this material.

Therefore, the GNHLHA proposes legislation that sets standards to teach labor history in the public schools of Connecticut.

The first meeting of the task force to work on getting this legislation passed in Connecticut will be held on Wednesday, October 5 from 4 to 5:30 p.m. at the Labor Council/ Teachers Building, 267 Chapel Street, New Haven. Join us in the effort to pass legislation implementing the teaching of labor history in Connecticut public schools. To get involved, contact Steve Kass, Task Force Committee Chair: steve@laborhistory.org, or call the Labor History office and leave a message for Steve, (203) 777-2756, Ext. 2.

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Labor History In The Schools

Mar 1

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– Christine Saari, Greater New Haven Labor History Association

In December 2010, the Greater New Haven Labor History Association (GNHLHA) began gathering support for a legislative initiative, called Labor History in the Schools, with endorsement by the Connecticut AFL-CIO Executive Board. On February 1, the GNHLHA officially began work on a new pilot program called “Family Work History Project” in collaboration with two New Haven public schools teaching labor history as part of  this initiative.

The Family Work History Project is a school-based residency in which students will learn to conduct oral history interviews with a mentor in the labor force and develop these interviews into essays. The collaboration continues with the development of a commissioned musical composition inspired by the student stories, as well as the development of a spoken-word piece to be read publicly by students, based on their collective stories. The student piece and the musical composition will be performed on May 1, 2011, as part of the May Day Festival on the New Haven Green.

The GNHLHA will collaborate with teachers of 8th grade students from the Katherine Brennan School and 6th and 8th grade students from Worthington Hooker School, both in New Haven, CT. Sheryl Hershonik, Principal at Worthington Hooker, jumped at the chance to collaborate on the project: “We’re so glad to have the Greater New Haven Labor History Association work with our students. New Haven has a rich history of labor organizing from factory workers and dress shop seamstresses to teachers and other professionals. It is important for students to understand that working together for a common goal demands commitment and perseverance which can then lead to an improvement in the lives of individuals and families.”  Adds Principal Karen Lott of Brennan School, the collaboration will “connect students’ learning to the larger community in which they live.”

The study of labor history in the schools not only ties in with already-mandated educational standards, it is an important component in preparing students for the work force. The CT AFL-CIO has endorsed the Labor History in the Schools legislative initiative and has aided in beginning to gather popular support. 

Local professional musician Mike Kachuba, known for his curriculum-based work with children across Connecticut, will develop a song based on the student stories. He will perform the song to accompany the student readings on May 1, 2011, as part of the May Day (International Workers’ Day) Celebration on the New Haven Green.

For more information about Mike Kachuba’s work with children, visit http://web.mac.com/mikekachuba.

For more information about GNHLHA programs, visit www.laborhistory.org.

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We Are The Union: Celebrating Labor History At Yale With Yale’s Unions And Greater N.H. Labor History Association

Oct 24

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By Joan Cavanagh, Archivist/Director GNHLHA

Commemorate the anniversary of the Yale workers’ first union effort; learn about the long history of labor struggles and victories at New Haven’s largest employer; and engage in a lively discussion about their impact on our community.

On Nov. 10, the Greater New Haven Labor History Association and HERE Locals 34, 35 and GESO host “We are the Union: Celebrating Labor History at Yale” from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at Linsley Chittenden Hall, 63 High Street, Room 211. Professor Jennifer Klein will present opening remarks, followed by representatives of Locals 34, 35, GESO and the Labor History Association board.

The event takes place on the 69th anniversary of the first union strike at Yale. In her 1995 doctoral dissertation, Labor and the Left: the Limits of Acceptable Dissent at Yale University, 1920s to 1950s, Debbie Elkin gave the history of that strike.

On Oct. 17, 1941, Yale’s service workers, guards, maintenance and powerhouse employees had voted to join Local 142 of the United Construction Workers, C.I.O.  Although the Yale administration had agreed to recognize the union if it won the election, this did not automatically guarantee a contract. Elkin explains: “Negotiations broke down, in part over the issue of whether or not there would be a union shop, and in part [because] it seemed…that the administration still was not taking workers’ goals seriously.” Union organizer John Clark told Yale that Local 142  would not be demanding a union shop had its members not been the target of “intimidation and threats” both before and after the election.

Four hundred workers struck on Nov. 1 for one day. Elkin records that “the agreement to end the strike contained nothing about the union shop, but answered the union’s concern about threats by providing that any cases of intimidation, as well as other non-wage grievances that were not resolved through negotiations between the union and the administration, would be arbitrated by the Connecticut State Board of Mediation and Arbitration.” 

This was a small but significant victory in a struggle that spanned the 20th century and has now entered the 21st.

For more information about the Nov. 10 event, contact info@laborhistory.org; (203) 777-2756 Ext. 2; or visit www.laborhistory.org.

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CT Humanities Council Awards Grant To Labor History Association For First Phase Of Winchester Workers Exhibit

Oct 3

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By Joan Cavanagh, GNHLHA Archivist/Director

The Connecticut Humanities Council has awarded a $6000 planning grant to the Greater New Haven Labor History Association (GNHLHA) to prepare images for its upcoming exhibit on workers at the old Olin-Winchester Plant in the Newhallville section of New Haven.

The images, including photographs and newspaper articles, will be digitized and re-mastered to exhibit quality by internationally acclaimed new media artist Cynthia Beth Rubin.

The plant closed in 2006, but the stories of its workers throughout the 20th and early 21st centuries have yet to be told. These stories–of labor struggles, workers’ culture within the plant, and the impact of the plant on the larger community–will form the raw material for the exhibit.

GNHLHA Board members Lula White, Dorothy Johnson, James Hoffecker and Mary Johnson have been conducting oral histories with retired Winchester workers since the early spring of this year. Information from those interviews will help create the text of the exhibit, which will be produced by the end of 2010.

The core of the exhibit will be based on photographs and documents from the International Association of Machinists Local 609 collection held in the Labor History Association’s archives. Local 609 represented workers at the plant from 1956 until its closure. Images from earlier years as well as from workers’ lives in the community will be culled from personal memorabilia.

The Association encourages anyone with relevant photographs, documents or newspaper articles to be in contact sending an email to joan@laborhistory.org or by calling (203) 777-2756, Ext. 2. Please be in touch as soon as possible as we are currently in the process of digitizing the images and writing text for the exhibit. GNHLHA’s website is www.laborhistory.org

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Remember The UFW Boycott Actions In New Haven?

Aug 31

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by Mary Johnson, GNHLHA

The Greater New Haven Labor History Association (GNHLHA) hopes that you do.

In the 1960s, the United Farm Workers of America (UFW) launched a grape boycott that inspired New Haven area residents (as well as people throughout the world) to join and help win good contracts in most of California’s vineyards. In the mid to late 1970s, a UFW Boycott staff person came to New Haven to organize boycott committees in Connecticut.

Almost immediately, the New Haven committee began picketing and leafleting at supermarkets urging customers to boycott fruits and vegetables grown by producers who refused to negotiate contracts with the UFW. All of these were successful.

Most memorable was the Gallo Boycott. The efforts of the New Haven Committee not only attracted a great deal of community support but received a very negative response, including physical violence, unfortunately initiated by some members of a rival union.

The California Agricultural Labor Relations Act, which became law in 1975, guaranteed farmworkers the right to bargain collectively. Gallo Wineries decided that it preferred its known adversary, the Teamsters, to the more militant, independent UFW. Gallo collaborated with the Teamsters to suppress the UFW.

The UFW called for a nationwide boycott of Gallo Wines. The New Haven UFW Boycott Committee, after months of picketing liquor stores on Orange Street, convinced three owners to remove Gallo Wines from their shelves.

When the picket lines moved to a liquor store on Whitney Avenue, Gallo salesmen as well as groups of men wearing jackets identifying themselves as supporters of a Teamsters Local, began observing us for several weeks. This culminated in the brutal beating of a 16 year UFW advocate. That incident and a tremendous show of community support for the boycott resulted in nationwide news coverage.

If you remember any of these and later activities, please call Mary at (203) 387-7858 or send your stories to info@laborhistory.org. GNHLHA would like to share them on its website. New Haven’s UFW boycott activities were part of a powerful and inspirational social change movement and we cannot afford to lose that history.

Please help. Thank you.

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