Wayne State University established the Archives of Labor and Urban Affairs in 1960 to collect and preserve the records of the American labor movement, with particular emphasis on documenting the history of automobile workers and their union. The records tell the epic story of workers in a vital industry which still largelydefines the Michigan economy, and comprise the most comprehensive account available. Indeed, the range of UAW and UAW-related collections at the Archives (not to mention the urban collections scholars mine to supplement their labor research), even when circumscribed by the Michigan connection, is far too broad to consider in its entirety here. This discussion focuses primarily on those collections arranged and described since the publication of A Guide to the Archives of Labor History and Urban Affairs in 1974, including a substantial body of records opened for research over the past three years as part of a project to reduce the backlog of unprocessed collections.1
Scholars producing the institutional and event-centered history of industrial unionism continue to plow the fertile fields of UAW sources on the often violent struggle of workers to organize against the overwhelmingpower of the intensely anti-union auto companies.2 However, the broad research potential of the UAW collections' - ensured by the social progressivism and democratic practices of the union's leadership - as well as its hybrid labor/urban identity have made the Archives an incredibly rich source for the "new" labor history that emerged during the 1970s, with its thematic and often interdisciplinary research agenda focusing on community-based working-class culture and on shopfloor power relationships complicated by gender, race and ethnicity.
HEALTH CARE AND HOUSING
The story of the bargaining gains that transformed UAW members into the most affluent blue-collar workers in the world and the periodic strikes necessary to achieve them3 is recounted in the Archives' flagship collection, UAW President Walter P. Reuther [WPR], and the records of Presidents Leonard Woodcock and Douglas Fraser, the Big Three departments and their directors (Reuther, Woodcock, Fraser and Ken Bannon) and in the bargaining committee files of hundreds of local and regional collections.4 Health care and housing, however, were almost as central to Walter Reuther's vision of the good society as job security and a living wage. Several collections offer ample evidence of UAW sponsorship of innovative health care programs for its members:
Michigan's First HMO is documented in the Social Security: Department Community Health Association Collection and in the papers of CHA board members Reuther, Bannon and industrial relations expert Edward Cushman.
UAW-CIO Health Institute (a CHA precursor originally established in 1937 as the Medical-Research Institute) information is located in the files of Secretary-Treasurer and first Health and Safety Department head, George Addes, WPR, Dr. Shmarya Kleinman, Locals 51 [Hamtramck Plymouth], 400 [Highland Park Ford], 650 [Lansing REO Motors], 212 and 742 [Detroit Briggs], the Public Relations and Social Security Departments and the United Community Services of Metropolitan Detroit [UCS].
Health Insurance questions are addressed in the presidential, vice-presidential and Big Three, Social Security and Research Departments collections.
Wartime Housing Scarcity and the Postwar Housing Crisis are revealed in the Willow Run Community Council, Wayne County Council of Defense and extensive District Council files in the UCS Collection; the records of the Detroit Commission on Community Relations [CCR] and the UAW War Policy, Veterans and Research Departments; President and first housing director, R. J. Thomas´s papers; and in the housing committee files of Locals 51 and 142 [Kaiser-Fraser's Willow Run plant] and Regions 1B and 1E, where cooperative housing, rent control and the often racially-charged resistance to temporary worker housing are discussed.
The UAW-Supported Schoolcraft Gardens Cooperative, a controversial interracial housing project, is documented in several collections, including Metro Detroit AFL-CIO, CCR, Local 212 and the Research Department.
WOMEN
Two-thirds of new union members in the United States are women who bring the family and its problems to the workplace. The UAW, a leading advocate of equal employment opportunity, established a Women's Bureau, the first of its kind, in 1944. Earlier, women like Catherine "Babe" Gelles, Lillian Sherwood, Genora Dollinger, Olga Hrabar and Dorothy Kraus had organized women's auxiliaries to feed and help finance the sit-down strikers of the 1930s, memorialized in their personal papers and the UAW Women's Auxiliaries Collection.
Issues Affecting the UAW's Female Membership, both during World War II, when that membership was at its height and in the postwar era when many women lost their jobs to returning veterans are uncovered in the War Policy Division, the Women's, Fair Practices and Unemployment Compensation Departments and the UCS, in War Labor Board and NLRB cases and in the UAW and "Twentieth Century Trade Union Woman" oral histories.
Shopfloor Experience and Special Impact of Industrial Change on Women and Minorities are illuminated by local union files, especially grievances, as they are by no other sources.
UAW's Involvement in the Broader Concerns of the Women's Movement, - ERA, affirmative action, and reproductive freedom - is illustrated in the papers of Mildred Jeffrey (first female department head and organizer of the first UAW Women's Conference), Olga Madar (first woman International Executive Board member and Coalition of Labor Union Women co-founder), and Dorothy Haener (Women's Department director and NOW co-founder).
AFRICAN AMERICANS
The UAW's problematic relationship with its African-American members and its role as labor's champion of the civil rights movement can be examined in the recently processed records of the Fair Practices and Anti-Discrimination Department; the files of local fair practices committees, WPR, Secretary-Treasurers Addes and Emil Mazey, the War Policy, Research, and Political Action/Citizenship Departments and locals, regions and departments representing large numbers of African-American workers (Locals 3 [Dodge Main], 7 [Jefferson Assembly], 212, 742 and 600 [Rouge plant], Regions 1, 1A and 1B and Ford, Chrysler, Foundry and Forge Departments); the papers of Shelton Tappes [Local 600], Ernest Dillard (first African American elected to a succession of leadership posts in Fleetwood Local 15 and editor of the Trade Union Leadership Council's Vanguard) Fair Practices staffers William Oliver and Lillian Hatcher; and the UAW and "Blacks in the Labor Movement" series of oral interviews.
DISSIDENT WORKER MOVEMENTS
A sizable literature already exists on the internecine feuds that marked the UAW's formative period5 and many among the new generation of labor historians, having cut their teeth on the New Left politics of the sixties, exhibit a heightened interest in radical unionism and dissident worker movements of more recent vintage.
Grassroots, Black Power Revolutionary Union Movements (RUMs) that emerged at several plants in the wake of the 1967 Detroit riot are portrayed in the Detroit Revolutionary Movements Collection and a number of others, especially those connected with Chrysler operations where most African Americans worked. The UAW Chrysler department Collection was recently expanded from 7 to 103 linear feet, with the addition of files bringing the documentary record into the 1980s.
African American Protests against unsafe working conditions and the racist attitudes of union and management are featured in the papers of chronicler of Detroit black radicalism Dan Georgakas, Chrysler assistant director Arthur Hughes, Local 3, Regions 1 and 1B, the Concerned Unionists and the journalLabor Today.
Worker Resistance to the UAW's rapprochement with management in the recessionary 1980s is documented in the Labor Notes Collection.
CLASS AND QUALITY OF LIFE
Counterpoised against this picture of the militant worker, however, and no less compelling, is Walter Reuther's vision of the new middle class created by high-paying industrial jobs, the study of which helps to redefine the conventional boundaries of labor history research.
Leisure and the Environment are addressed in the CAP, Conservation, Recreation and Research Department Collections and in the papers of WPR, Madar and John D'Agostino.
Consumer Activism is profiled in Mildred Jeffrey's Community Relations Department and personal papers and in the records of local consumer committees.
The Impact of an Aging Work Force and Retired Unionists on the UAW is explored in the papers of WPR, President Woodcock, Madar, the Research and Social Security Departments, Hudson Local 154 and Regions 1 and 1B.
Continuing Education for Workers is reviewed in the papers of WPR, President Fraser, Region 1B director Ken Morris, the Education Department and staffers Brendan Sexton and Bruce Kingery.
The Growth of Working-Class Suburbs can be examined in the papers of Morris, the Research Department, the Developing Urban Detroit Area Research Project and SEMCOG´s transportation and land use studies.
WORKERS AND COMMUNITY
The wisdom of the Archives' vertical collecting policy, which assigns as much importance to the records of union rank and file as to leadership, is evident in the value of collections like Hamtramck Locals 3 and 51, Locals 602 and 650 in Lansing, Locals 212 and 742 on Detroit´s east side, Muskegon Local 113, and Local 142 in Willow Run for the study of workers in the context of community. The William Kessler and Associates (architects) Collection documents the demolition of Poletown to make way for a new GM plant in 1980. The WPA-Welfare/Community Services Department records prior to the 1980s have disappeared, but the social history of its clients is preserved in the papers of its first director, George Edwards, Jr., and the scores of local community services committees that offered strike assistance, counseling and other support to members. Walter Reuther's and Doug Fraser's involvement in Great Society job retraining and urban redevelopment programs of the 1960s and the activities of the Community Relations Department exemplify the interface between the UAW and urban institutions, also visible in the records of the Local 412 Technical Training Center in Detroit, Region 1B in Pontiac, and Citizens for a United Detroit.
Historians seeking to ground labor in community can find a wide range of material documenting Detroit's working-class neighborhoods in the files of UCS´s District and Suburban Councils and member agencies like the Dodge Community House. Built in the 1920s in the shadow of the Dodge Main plant with money from auto magnate John F. Dodge, the Community House served as an Americanizing agency for immigrant adults and a character-building one for their children. Since its clientele was almost entirely a product of the auto plants, the Community House developed joint educational and entertainment programs with UAW Local 3 and Chrysler's Mutual Aid Department.
POLITICS
UAW collections, which manifest the keen interest of America's most politically active union in Michigan elections and its considerable influence on state Democratic Party politics, have proven a boon to scholars examining the role of political action committees in redefining the state and citizenship. A number of collections reveal the union's belief in the efficacy of government intervention to improve the lives of workers and their families: the Legislative Department files of Samuel Jacobs and Paul Sifton; the records of the president´s and secretary-treasurer's offices and the Political Action/Citizenship/Community Action Program, Public Relations, Research and Fair Practices Departments; the papers of Mildred Jeffrey, Olga Madar, and state Senators Sander Levin and Stanley Nowak; and scores of political action committees at the local and regional levels. 6
WORKPLACE ISSUES
Quality-of-work-life issues, some raised by revolutionary changes forced on the auto industry by foreign competition (see International Affairs Department: Herman Rebhan Files, Ford, Research and Special Projects Departments, Morris, Bannon), are featured in the papers of Vice-President Irving Bluestone, author of the UAW's QWL programs and in several other collections.
Plant Closings and Dislocated Workers are documented in Locals 154, 254 [American Davidson's Dearborn plant], 280 [Kaiser Corporation's Detroit Engine plant], 417 [parts suppliers in Detroit´s northern suburbs], 2093 [Three Rivers GM Hydra-Matic], Regions 1 and 1B and the Ivan Brown and Bannon papers [Ford's Iron Mountain plant].
Occupational Safety and Health issues are addressed in Foundry and Forge, Ford and Social Security Departments, Bannon, Morris, Regions 1A and 1B, industrial nurses´ Local 1650, Midland Steel Local 410, Ford Locals 400 and 600 and local grievance files.
Automation's Impact on the Workplace and "Blue-Collar Blues" are covered in WPR, Bannon, labor sociologist Ely Chinoy, Special Projects Department and director Nat Weinberg, Research, Foundry and Forge and Ford Departments.
AUTO COMPANIES
Ironically, the labor archives is a prime source for the history of the auto companies, whether it be in AMC vice-president Edward Cushman´s board minutes; Doug Fraser's Chrysler bail out and board files; GM economist Andrew Court´s market research; lawyer Sol Dann´s stockholder reports; or the voluminous data on domestic and foreign automobile manufacturing operations (annual reports, market research, press releases, production and sales analyses, auto safety and emissions studies) stockpiled by the UAW´s Research and Special Projects Departments for ammunition at the bargaining table. The contract negotiations files of the Big Three department heads trace the union's unremitting assault on management prerogatives. UAW regional and local collections contain a wealth of information on the plant-level implementation of management decisions in their grievance arbitration files and the minutes of management-shop and bargaining committees.
Appraisal of the research value of UAW collections is ongoing and becomes more critical as resources and shelf space shrink. Changes in production techniques and shopfloor power relationships, union mergers, and downsizing in the auto industry (which has forced the UAW to divert more of its organizing dollar from the industrial sector to white-collar workers, showcased in the Technical, Office and Professional [TOP] Department Collection) will do as much to inform collecting policy as the vicissitudes of labor historiography. Developments over which we have no control, however - the decline of organized labor, a new generation of workers largely unconscious of their place in history, and the proliferation of electronic information technologies - pose the greatest challenge to the preservation of labor's heritage and will shape the UAW archives of the next century.
FOOTNOTES
1. A Guide to the Archives of Labor History and Urban Affairs (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1974). UAW collections typically contain correspondence and internal memoranda, notes, reports, surveys, studies, executive board and committee meeting minutes (sometimes, as in the cases of Locals 49 and 400, on audio tape), financial records, handbills, pamphlets and other printed material related to organizing, contract negotiations, union elections, grievance arbitration, working conditions, health and retirement benefits, political activities and community affairs. Under streamlined processing procedures adopted for the backlog-reduction project, collections are no longer indexed or arranged to folder level. Files are computer-arranged alphabetically in the finding aid, but may actually be dispersed throughout several boxes. Potential researchers should also be aware of the Archives' extensive audiovisual (photographs, audio and video tapes, film and artifacts) and library (books, newspapers, convention proceedings, contracts) holdings.
2. On the pre-UAW-CIO unions, see the papers of economists W. Ellison Chalmers and Phillips Garman; Flint Fisher Body Federal Labor Union officers Alexander Cook and Everett Francis; AFL auto industry organizer Francis Dillion; Labor Research Association founder Robert Dunn; and labor journalist Edward Levinson. On early UAW organizing and the sit-down strikes, see UAW vice president and Reuther nemesis Richard Frankensteen; United Automobile Worker founder Henry Kraus; UAW legal counsel Maurice Sugar; UAW Secretary-Treasurer George Addes; Ford Rouge local president Percy Llewellyn; Flint sit-down publicist Carl Haessler; contemporary chroniclers Joe Brown and Nick DiGaetano; the Flint Labor Collection; and the extensive series of interviews with UAW pioneers conducted by Jack Skeels and others under the auspices of the University of Michigan/Wayne State University Institute of Labor and Industrial Relations.
3. On the 1945-46 GM strike, see President R.J. Thomas, WPR, Addes, GM Dept., Garman, Locals 137 (Greenville Gibson Products), 599 (Flint Buick), 602 and 650 (Lansing Fisher Body and REO Motors) and the Association of Catholic Trade Unionists-Detroit (ACTU). On the 1949 Ford strike, see Bannon, Ford Dept., Michigan AFL-CIO, Shelton Tappes, Public Relations Dept.: Frank Winn and ACTU. On the 1950 Chrysler strike, see Chrysler Dept., Arthur Hughes, Sam Sweet, Locals 3 (Dodge Main), 7 (Jefferson Assembly) and 51 (Plymouth Assembly). On the 1970 GM strike, see Woodcock, Vice President Irving Bluestone, GM and Research Depts.
4. Regional boundaries continually shift to reflect membership changes, but Regions 1, 1A, 1B and 1E have at various times represented workers in southeast Michigan, including the Thumb area; Region 1C, south-central Michigan, including Flint Jackson, and Lansing; and Region 1D, the western and northern Lower Peninsula and the Upper Peninsula.
5. Walter Reuther encouraged the Archives to collect the papers of anti- as well as pro-Reuther forces within the UAW, and we obliged; the WPR, Addes, Frankensteen, Nat Ganley, Kraus, Sugar, Sweet, Thomas, Victor Reuther, Homer Martin, John Craft, Harry Ross, Local 212, IEB Minutes and Proceedings Collections and the Skeels interviews are among scores of sources documenting the factionalism of the union's first decade.
6. A few noteworthy examples are Locals 3 and 51 (Hamtramck, Wayne Co.); Local 212 (Detroit); Local 400 (Highland Park); Paul Parker-Local 659 (Flint, Genesee Co.); Local 650 (Lansing, Ingham Co.); Local 113 (Muskegon); Local 687 (Grand Rapids, Kent Co.); Region 1 (Macomb Co.); Region 1A (western Wayne, Washtenaw, Monroe Cos.); Region 1B and Ken Morris (Pontiac, Oakland, Macomb Cos.); and Region 1C (Jackson).
Reprinted with permission from The Michigan Historical Review 22:2 (Fall 1996) 157-166
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