A Brief Introduction to theTexas Labor Archives

Michael Barera

University and Labor Archivist

University of Texas at Arlington

Photo: United Packinghouse Workers of America union field representative L. R. Hoover, right, gives instructions to picketers (Source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram Collection, available via the UTA Libraries Digital Gallery)

History and scopePhoto: Cooper's Union, Labor Day Parade; Lawrence Barclay (back row, 2nd from left) and Elwin Perry Barclay (3rd from left on front) (Source: Barclay Family Photographs)

Foundation"We have always wanted something like this...now we are getting it."- Delbert Adams, Tarrant County Labor Council president

The Texas Labor Archives were established at the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA) in 1967 by UTA history professors George Green and Howard Lackman along with UTA head librarian John Hudson.

Dr. Green noted that it was inspired by the creation of the Association of Southern Labor Historians at the 1966 Southern Historical Convention in Memphis.

The Texas Labor Archives was both the first repository in the Southwest to systematically collect the history of Texas labor as well as the first archival collection at UTA.

At its creation, John Hudson envisioned the archives as "one center where students, historians, economists, union officials, and other researchers can come to discover the important role of Texas laboring people in the growth of the state."

The archives were well received by the Texas labor community, and by the summer of 1967, the Texas AFL-CIO designated the Texas Labor Archives as its official repository and urged full cooperation between all unions in the state and the archives.

Early developmentDr. Green and Dr. Lackman developed the Texas Labor Archives by contacting 2,500 union locals and regional organizations in Texas, many of which donated their records to the archive.

They both traveled across the state in summer 1967 to solicit materials for the new archive, with a special focus on obtaining the endorsements of central labor councils in cities around the state.

Dr. Green noted they had acquired a significant amount of materials by August 1967.

Dr. Green and Dr. Lackman staffed a booth on the "History of Texas Labor" at the 1967 Texas AFL-CIO convention.

Also in 1967, Dr. Green established an oral history program that was focused on Texas labor history and, especially, elderly, African American, and Hispanic labor leaders and union members.

Early on, the Texas Labor Archives relied on external donations and grants for funding, starting with a donation by the M.M. McKnight Memorial Fund and later a grant from the Zales Foundation of Dallas.

Early operations"What we were trying to do was make some kind of order out of chaos."- Earleen Cook, first archivist of the Texas Labor Archives

Earleen Cook was appointed the first archivist of the Texas Labor Archives in 1967. At the time, she was the only UTA Libraries staff member with archival training.

She served until summer 1968, when history professor Robert Williamson was named the head archivist on an interim basis. His permanent successor was Robert Gamble, who was named as such in fall 1969.

When established in 1967, the archives were physically located in two rooms on the fourth floor of the then-new UTA Central Library. In summer 1968, it moved to the sixth floor of the library, where the Jenkins Garrett Collection was later established.

From the beginning, the archives contained pamphlets, newspaper clippings, and photographs in addition to organizational records such as contracts, correspondence, labor lawyer files, labor newspapers, mediation/arbitration materials, and minutes of meetings.

Ms. Cook established archival principles in operating the Texas Labor Archives, including creating donor files and developing a system of worksheets for providing an overview of the collection as well as accessioning, processing, and providing access to materials.

In 1968, Ms. Cook had a library assistant and one student assistant. By the next year, Mr. Gamble had a full-time archivist assistant and five student assistants. From the beginning, the student assistants played vital roles, gradually learning more skills and ultimately processing collections themselves.

Continued development in the 1970s"I am selling myself, the university...the competence of our archives...[and] the relevancy of preserving history."- Robert Gamble, archivist of the Texas Labor Archives, 1969-84

By 1974, Robert Gamble oversaw what had become the University Archives, which included the Texas Labor Archives.

Under Mr. Gamble, the Texas Labor Archives developed a photographic collection, an oral history program, a collection of labor charters, and a labor political button collection. It also branched out into political and social movements, such as the 1966-67 Rio Grande farm workers strike.

Dr. Green and Mr. Gamble collaborated to bring the oral history program to fruition. Mr. Gamble described its benefit as allowing researchers "the opportunity to gain insight into previously unstudied areas and events."

Together, Dr. Green and Mr. Gamble also did most of the field work for the Texas Labor Archives in the 1970s.

Mr. Gamble emphasized the importance of building trust with unions and labor organizers, due in part to their reluctance to donate records containing personal details and suspicion of the university.

By 1973, the Texas Labor Archives were comprised of over 100 archival collections measuring about 405 linear feet in extent. They also included over 40 oral histories.

Continued development in the 1980sIn 1984, Jane Boley succeeded Robert Gamble as archivist.

In 1987, the American Income Life Insurance Company provided funding for the oral history program that was matched by various unions, which by 1989 had resulted in the collection of 115 oral histories.

By 1989, the largest collections in the Texas Labor Archives were those of the Texas AFL-CIO, the Packinghouse Workers, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO), and the Amalgamated Meat Cutters.

That year, Dr. Green observed that the most common researchers in the Texas Labor Archives were undergraduate students writing term papers and graduate students working on theses, and that the archives were especially frequented by History students. The labor collections were also patronized by faculty members and researchers from around the United States.

By the end of 1989, the Texas Labor Archives had grown to 220 processed collections totaling over 800 linear feet in extent.

Collecting scope and extentToday, the Texas Labor Archives continue to collect, preserve, and provide access to materials that document the history of organized labor in Texas.

The collection includes the records of hundreds of organizations, including union locals, labor councils, statewide labor organizations, union political groups, the district and regional offices of international unions, and legal firms specializing in labor law. The archives also include the personal papers of union officials.

Collections in the Texas Labor Archives are made up of charters, contracts, correspondence, photographs, minutes of meetings, newspapers, pamphlets, and scrapbooks, among other formats.

The Texas Labor Archives contains materials dating from 1870 to the present.

The single oldest item is a typographical minute book from Austin that dates to 1870. Some of the other oldest materials include Carpenters' minutes from Waco, Longshoremen's minutes from Galveston, and the German-language minutes of San Antonio brewery workers.

There are also now more than 200 oral histories with union leaders and labor activists.

Notable collectionsPhoto: Three pickets strolling around the main exchange and business office buildings during a telephone company strike (Source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram Collection)

Dallas Moving Picture Machine Operators Union, Local 249-A

Dallas Moving Picture Machine Operators Union, Local 249-A was chartered in 1949 as a local affiliate of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and Moving Picture Operators of the United States and Canada. It was comprised of African American motion picture operators in Dallas. In 1969, it merged with the previously all-white Local 249.

This collection contains a booklet, legal documents, minutes, newspaper clippings, and photographs spanning from 1949 to 1972.

Photo: S.R. Tankersley and Elmer Joe Martin walking the picket line at the Elite theatre, 1955 (Source: Dallas Moving Picture Machine Operators Union, Local 249-A Records)

International Ladies' Garment Workers' UnionThe Texas Labor Archives has three separate collections documenting the ILGWU: Local 180 (San Antonio), Local 214 (Houston), and a third collection from multiple Texas locals.

The ILGWU represented workers in the women's and children's apparel industries.

Together, the three collections comprise two boxes and 20 folders of correspondence, financial records, newsletters, photographs, and more spanning from 1934 to 1971.

Photo: Two women on strike for ILGWU Local 180, circa 1963 (Source: ILGWU Local 180 (San Antonio) Records)

Mexican American Farm Workers CollectionThis collection contains a great deal of information about the United Farm Workers, which was established by Cesar Chavez in 1962.

It also contains files from groups that supported the United Farm Workers, including the Farm Worker Emergency Relief Fund, Friends of the Farm Workers, National Student Committee for Farmworkers, and the Tarrant County Friends of the Farm Workers.

This collection consists of three manuscript boxes containing correspondence, newsletters, newspaper clippings, and photographs spanning from 1969 to 1994.

Photo: United Farm Workers protestors marching, undated (Source: Mexican-American farm workers movement collection)

Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization

This collection documents PATCO, which was organized in Chicago in 1968 to represent air traffic controllers. In 1981, after a strike, it was decertified by the FLRA and the FAA refused to rehire strikers in what is considered one of the worst defeats for organized labor.

There are six different PATCO collections in the Texas Labor Archives, including those documenting the Southwest Region, Local 332 (Kansas City), Local 442 (DFW Tower Group), and Local 601 (Anchorage). Collectively they contain over 42 boxes of material spanning from 1962 to 1988.

Photo: PATCO strike: air traffic controllers picket near fence at DFW Airport FAA tower, 1981 (Source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram Collection)

Texas AFL-CIOThe Texas AFL-CIO was formed in 1957 by a merger between the Texas State Federation of Labor and the Texas State CIO Council.

It has been depositing its records at the Texas Labor Archives since 1967, and to date there are 38 separate collections of Texas AFL-CIO materials open for research.

Photo: Three possible Texas AFL-CIO members in Austin, Texas, undated (Source: Texas AFL-CIO Executive Board Office Records)

Thurber, TexasThurber was a city in northern Erath County, Texas, that began as a coal mining town in the 1880s. Its land was sold to the Texas and Pacific Coal Company in 1888 and it became an entirely company-owned town, and in 1903 it became a 100% union-shop town after being organized by the United Mine Workers following labor unrest. By the 1930s, it had become a ghost town.

The collection contains articles, newspaper clippings, photographs, a thesis, and more spanning from 1894 to 1983.

Photo: Postcard of the Square, Thurber, Texas, undated (Source: Thurber, Texas Photograph Collection)

United Auto WorkersThe UAW is an international union representing automobile, aerospace, and agricultural implement workers. The Texas Labor Archives holds the records of Local 218 (Fort Worth: Bell Helicopter), Local 276 (Grand Prairie: General Motors), Local 848 (Grand Prairie: Lockheed), and Local 870 (Dallas: Ford Motor).

These collections consist of grievance files, leaflets, letters, meeting minutes, newsletters, newspaper clippings, and more spanning from 1941 to 1990.

Photo: The original shop committee of UAW Local 276, undated (Source: UAW Local 276 Collection)

Bibliography and further readingDepartment of Special Collections, General University Library, University of Texas at Arlington. A Guide to the Labor History Archives. Arlington, Texas: Department of Special Collections, General University Library, University of Texas at Arlington, 1984.

Goodwin, Katherine R. Labor’s Legacy: The Texas Labor Archives at UTA. Arlington, Texas: Special Collections Division, University of Texas at Arlington Libraries, 1992.

Green, George N. “The Texas Labor Archives.” Labor History 31, no. 1–2 (March 1, 1990): 202–7. https://doi.org/10.1080/00236569000890321.

Green, George. “Re: Feedback on My Slides for the Texas Center for Working-Class Studies Conference,” January 25, 2020. E-mail.

Muniz, Many Ann. “The Organization and Development of the Texas Labor Collection.” University of Texas at Arlington, 1974. https://uta.alma.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/openurl?institution=01UTAR_INST&rfr_id=info:sid%2Fsummon&rft_dat=ie%3D2185013740004911,language%3DEN&svc_dat=CTO&u.ignore_date_coverage=true&vid=01UTAR_INST:Services&Force_direct=false.

Saxon, Gerald D. “Special Collections Division, University of Texas at Arlington Libraries.” In Handbook of Texas Online. Texas State Historical Association, June 15, 2010. https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/lcsgn.

Thank you!

Contact information:

Michael Barera

University and Labor Archivist

University of Texas at Arlington Libraries

E-mail: michael.barera@uta.edu

Phone: (817) 272-7511