Bruce Nelson Research Files on Maritime Workers

This collection contains materials compiled or created by Bruce Nelson in connection with his research for his book Workers on the Waterfront: Seamen, Longshoremen, and Unionism in the 1930s (1990). Most of the files are on notable radical maritime activists, and include correspondence with them, detailed summaries (or, in the case of Joseph Stack, transcripts) of oral histories, printed ephemera and internal National Maritime Union documents, in particular from the post-World War II period of internal struggle between the union's Communist and anti-Communist factions. There are also files on the Spring and Fall Strikes (1936-37), the Marine Workers Industrial Union, and the Mariners Club of the Communist Party. Individuals represented by files, many of whom were at one time Communist Party members, include Danny Boano, Johnny Gladstone, Roy Hudson, Charles Keith, Al Lannon, Barney and Greta Lynch, Bob McElroy, Gilbert Mers, Blackie (Frederick N.) Myers, Tommy Ray, Al Richmond, Harry Rubin, Joe Stack, and Arnold Weissflog. Also of note is an incomplete run (1951-1986) of the Dockers News, a rank and file newsletter by members of the International Longshoremens Association in New York. Also included are several typescripts of historical recollections and reminiscences by some of the abovementioned individuals. Throughout are a number of individual and group photographs of radical sailors and longshemen, including Bill Bailey and Harry Hynes.