Vera Rony Papers
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Abstract
Vera Rony was an educator; writer; and labor, union, and civil rights advocate. In 1952, she began her career at the International Ladies Garment Workers Union (ILGWU) and went on to become the executive director of the Workers Defense League (WDL). Additionally, Rony participated in the civil rights movement in the South, publishing a number of articles on the relationships between unions and civil rights. Rony served as the Founding Director and first Affirmative Action Officer of the Labor Management Studies Program at Stony Brook University. She was the Executive Producer of The Uprising of '34, a 1995 PBS documentary that explores the 1934 General Textile Strike in which 500,000 Southern mill laborers walked off their jobs. The bulk of the Vera Rony Papers relate to her work with different labor organizations, the making of the film, and her writing, all of which are closely related because of her focus on the history of labor movements in the South. Materials include correspondence, research material for her writing and the film, drafts and notes for published and unpublished writing, videotapes of the film, and audiocassettes of interviews used in the film.
Biographical Note
Vera Rony (1918-2011) was an educator; writer; and labor, union, and civil rights advocate.
Rony was born in Hungary in 1918. After coming to America in the 1920s, her father, Hugo Rony, became a medical doctor and her mother, Pauline (also known as Palko), took care of the household. Rony received her bachelor's degree from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1940, and her master's degree from the University of Chicago in 1969.
In 1952, she began her career at the International Ladies Garment Workers Union (ILGWU), where she founded the education department of the Beltmakers Union and instituted night classes, a library, and a political action program. From 1956-1964, she was the executive director of the Workers Defense League (WDL), a workers' rights organization founded in 1936; her accomplishments included the organization of a training program to prepare minority youth to enter the building trades and a co-written report on how racism was used in the South to thwart union organizing efforts.
Additionally, from 1965-1969, Rony participated in the civil rights movement in the South, publishing a number of articles on the relationships between unions and civil rights. Also around this time, she worked with various organizations, including the Congress of Racial Equity (CORE), Southern Student Organizing Committee (SSOC), the Middle Tennessee Labor Conference, and the Southern Tenants Farmer Union (STFU). She most likely did not hold paid positions with these organizations, but worked as a volunteer consultant, committee member, and/or editor/contributor for publications. At the Rural Advancement Fund (part of the National Sharecroppers Fund/NSF), she chaired the Education Committee for the Frank P. Graham Rural Training Center in Wadesboro, North Carolina.
Rony began her career at SUNY Stony Brook in 1969, as the first assistant vice president of the affirmative action program. By 1978, she had founded the Labor Management Studies Program, where she served as the director until 1987. Rony also held a visiting scholar position at Georgia State University, from 1976-1978. She was the Executive Producer of The Uprising of '34, a 1995 PBS documentary that explores the 1934 General Textile Strike in which 500,000 Southern mill laborers walked off their jobs. In 1995, the documentary won the Oral History Association Award for Nonprint Media for George Stoney and Judith Helfand, co-directors and co-producers, and Vera Rony, executive producer. Rony died on June 2, 2011, after a brief struggle with lymphoma.
Arrangement
The records are arranged into five series, one of which has been further arranged into subseries. The series and subseries arrangement of the records is as follows:
Series I. Personal
Series II. Academic and Organizational Positions
Series III. The Uprising of '34
Series IV. Writing
Subseries IV.A Published
Subseries IV.B Unpublished
Series V. Subject Files
The contents of each series or subseries are arranged chronologically with the exceptions of Series III (The Uprising of '34), which is arranged alphabetically by topics (such as Correspondence, Fundraising, and Grants, among others); and Series V (Subject Files), which is arranged alphabetically by last name, organization name, or topic.
Scope and Contents
The Vera Rony Papers (1865-2009) consist of materials created and collected by Rony documenting her life as, in her own words, a "participant observer," or someone who alternates between the worlds of academia and grassroots fieldwork. The bulk of the collection relates to her work with different labor organizations, the making of the film, and her writing, all of which are closely related because of her focus on the history of labor movements in the South. She spent many years researching and writing on the topic, beginning in the 1960s, which seemed to culminate in the film and a never-published book, "True South." The collection contains news clippings, publications, printed ephemera, correspondence, and research files related to Rony's work at Stony Brook, the Workers Defense League (WDL), National Sharecroppers Fund (NSF), and other groups; Rony's published and unpublished writings; research, publicity, and administrative files for The Uprising of '34; VHS tapes and audiocassettes of interviews, mostly related to the film; and personal correspondence and photographs.
This collection documents the history of labor, unions, and civil rights movements in the United States, particularly in the South, in the 1950s-1970s. The collection is especially relevant to researchers interested in the activities of organizations such as the WDL and NSF, the agricultural and textile industries, racism, poverty, and the development and curricula of labor management studies programs.
Subjects
Organizations
People
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Donors
Conditions Governing Access
Materials are open without restrictions.
Conditions Governing Use
This collection is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use materials in the collection in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).
Preferred Citation
Identification of item, date; Vera Rony Papers; TAM 593; box number; folder number or item identifier; Tamiment Library/Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives, New York University.
Location of Materials
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Donated by the Estate of Vera Rony Kristein in 2011 and 2012. The accession numbers associated with this collection are 2011.127 and 2012.003.
Audiovisual Access Policies and Procedures
Audiovisual materials have not been preserved and may not be available to researchers. Materials not yet digitized will need to have access copies made before they can be used. To request an access copy, or if you are unsure if an item has been digitized, please contact Tamiment Library/Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives, special.collections@nyu.edu, 212-998-2596, with the collection name, collection number, and a description of the item(s) requested. A staff member will respond to you with further information.
Appraisal
A list of deaccessioned books, journals, and magazines is available in the collection file. One floppy disk was deaccessioned because it was demagnetized.
About this Guide
Processing Information
At the time of accessioning, materials were rehoused in archival boxes, with loose material placed into folders in their original order. Materials were described on the collection-level with a box-level inventory.
At the time of processing, the collection was arranged and described into series and subseries based on the original order and the types of materials. Routine medical and financial statements, duplicate publications and documents (including one on a floppy disk), publications available online, and documents with sensitive personal information were removed. Two floppy disks were forensically imaged and analyzed. New York University Libraries follow professional standards and best practices when imaging, ingesting, and processing born-digital material in order to maintain the integrity of the content.
