My Life As a Labor Organizer
Part I
I was twenty-one years old. I had just graduated from the University of Michigan, with a major in Sociology. I asked people, “What can I do with a B.A. in Sociology?” They said, “Social work.” I said, “That’s like putting on band-aids. I want to make fundamental changes.” My Aunt Rita asked me, “Why do you hate your country?” I said, “I love my country. I just want it to be better than it is.”
This happened during World War II. I had the idea to go to Washington D.C. and get a job in the State Department. Something overseas. In Washington I met a young woman who had a degree from Mt. Holyoke, but she found herself sorting mail in a basement office. I accidentally met one of my former teachers from the University of Michigan, Dr. E.J. Mill, the political science teacher. He had a big job in the State Department. He and his wife took me out to lunch. It was very nice. He said to me, “Nancy, Washington is the worst place to be. Everyone comes to Washington. Get out of Washington! You could work for a labor union.” I took his advice. I went to visit my aunt and uncle in New York City, and had an interview with the head of Amalgamated Clothing Workers, CIO, at Union Square. Mr. Potofski, a Polish or Russian Jew, looked like God. He was tall, well-built, with black hair, beard and mustache. He had great dignity and presence. He asked me, “Why do you want to work for Amalgamated Clothing Workers?” I said, “I believe in the cause.” He said, “You have the job. You will be a Field Representative.”
He told me what to do, to prepare myself. I called up my Mother, a corporate trial lawyer in Pittsburgh, PA. I said, “I just got a job as a labor organizer.” She said, “You can’t do that!” I said, “I just did it,” and hung up. My first act of rebellion. She wanted me to marry a nice, young man, preferably a lawyer from a well-to-do family, and settle down. That’s what young Upper-Middle Class girls were expected to do. But I wanted to get out of Pittsburgh, far from my Mother’s domination, and our beautifully furnished apartment, without Daddy.
I was staying with my aunt and uncle in their luxurious penthouse apartment on Riverside Drive. Every morning I got up early and took a bus to Elizabeth, NJ, where I spent the day in a small clothing factory. My Uncle Jack, who had his own radio program on WOR-AM, thought I was crazy. In the shirt factory, I was supposed to iron shirts, but I kept burning them because I had never ironed anything in my life! The workers were older women and girls, mostly Italian and Jewish. The only person I enjoyed talking to was the owner, who had previously been a Business Agent for the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union.
My first assignment was in Tyrone, PA, a small town close to the center of the state. When I stepped off of the train, I noticed that the air had a terrible smell. It was from the paper mill. I remember thinking, “These poor people! They are born here, work here and die here without ever breathing fresh air! Not to mention salty ocean air.” That town had two factories, the paper mill and the men’s clothing shop. My job would be to encourage the women in the clothing factory to join the union, to get higher wages and other benefits. There would eventually be a National Labor Relations Board election. Either they would be represented by our union, or the most active pro-union workers would be fired.
I lived in the hotel downtown. I was working under the supervision of Polly, a tough, aging, heavy-set lesbian. She was of medium height, with short-cropped hair. She had been a WAC during World War II and often wore her old Army clothes. She had been a labor organizer for many years, recently in the southern states where conditions were hazardous. Once my Mother paid an unexpected visit to Tyrone. She had some legal business in the vicinity. Or maybe she was just worried about me. I was very happy to see her. I wanted her to met Polly. I knocked on her door. She opened it. She was dead drunk.
I enjoyed the work. I was very conscientious. In the late afternoon when the workers had come home from work, or at night I visited them. They were mostly very polite, inviting me into their modest homes. With my black hair and dark eyes, I looked like them. They were mostly Italians, and second generation Italians. I got a lot of people signed up for the union. In my spare time, sitting alone in my little YWCA room, I did what I used to do as a child. I made paper dolls, with their exquisite evening gowns. How incongruous!
There were actually two seasoned organizers with whom I interacted; Polly and Peggy. The factory which Peggy was trying to organize was on the other side of a mountain. We saw a lot of her. I liked her much more than Polly. She was slim and pretty, though no longer young. We had lots of fun together. She told me about her lover, an Italian man who was old enough to be her father. A married man with a big family. They had been together for ages. She was crazy about him.
I remember one night when Peggy and I were sleeping in a hotel on her side of the mountain. Polly, the drunken lesbian, was trying to get into our room at night. She was banging on the door, kicking it, yelling at the top of her lungs. Peggy pushed a heavy set of drawers against the door, to keep her from getting in. But usually Peggy and Polly were good friends, singing old union songs together, laughing and joking about their experiences as organizers in the south.
Eventually a representative of the National Labor Relations Board came to Tyrone to conduct the election. He turned out to be the husband of my childhood friend, Barbara Shupp. I had been the Maid of Honor at their wedding. I was very happy to see Chuckie, as I called him. He took me out for lunch. I was very impressed by the way in which this tall, skinny, affable young man handled the election……masterfully. He was obviously used to such situations. But we lost the election. A majority of the clothing workers did not want a union. All of our work had been in vain. I was told my someone at headquarters to go to Hazelton, PA for my next assignment.
Part II
Hazelton was a coal-mining town in the northeastern part of Pennsylvania, not far from Scranton. I had never been to that part of my state, having lived in Pittsburgh until I went away to college. They were used to unions there because John L. Lewis had organized all of the miners. There were lots of ugly slag heaps surrounding the town. Dark, triangular forms, against the sky, where new mines had been dug.
We were trying to organize a small men’s clothing factory, as in Tyrone. There was a very nice, hard-working Amalgamated Business Agent, who worked with the workers on details. There was also a fatherly Jewish District Manager. I have forgotten their names, but I remember them very well.
One weekend, after I had been there for a while, I decided to drive down to Pittsburgh to see my Mother and stepfather. We didn’t work on weekends. I just took off in my Mother’s beautiful blue Plymouth convertible, with the top down. My Mother said I looked like a clothing worker. I said “Good!”. She asked me various questions about how things were done, what the Business Agent did, what the show owners did. Innocent questions, which I answered, only to realize later that she was “quizzing me.” She was gaining useful information to pass on to corporate leaders, who had retained her as their lawyer!
When I returned to work on Monday morning, the District Manager hugged me, very distraught. “Where have you been?” he asked. “We were so worried about you!” As if I were his own daughter. I felt very guilty. I didn’t know that I should have informed someone that I was leaving for the weekend.
One weekend while I was living in Hazelton, I was invited to an Italian wedding. It was great fun, with dancing, delicious food, lots of people. There I met a tall, good-looking clothing worker, a man from another town. He was a very good dancer. He was crazy about me. He talked about marrying me! When I finally got to the YWCA where I was staying, it was locked for the night. He invited me to stay in his parents’ house. It was part of a “company town,” on the outskirts of Hazelton. All of the houses were exactly alike. He gave me his bed, which was a narrow cot in the attic. Next morning, I had breakfast with his father and sister. They were very hospitable.
After I had been in Hazelton for awhile, the workers in our shop went on strike. We had a picket line. (I have written about this in another story, “From the Picket Line.”) They were mostly young women. It was summertime. I taught them all the union songs I knew, and I had learned quite a few of them. We had a big picnic.
However, before the strike ended, I had to leave Hazelton and my life as a labor organizer. I still feel guilty about that. I left because my Mother said that she lay awake every night, worrying about me. She wanted me to go to graduate school and get married. I must have applied to graduate school at the University of Chicago, where I had done undergraduate work, but I don’t remember doing so. Suddenly it was time for fall classes to begin. I did meet a suitable man with a law degree and married him later that year. He was a Norwegian political scientist. I received my Master’s degree in Sociology and Labor Relations before leaving with him for Norway.