Activity

San Francisco's Civic Auditorium was packed the night of June 19-ten thousand in its seats and more in every foot of standing room. (No vessel had sailed through the Golden Gate that day for the first time in forty-five years.) One estimate guessed strikers made up 40 percent of the audience, famil…

Their conclusions stood, at best, on a shaky foundation. Plant and Ryan and the City Hall group had acted on the belief that the agreement was binding, despite repeated assertions that Ryan had no authority to sign on behalf of the district and that the strike would not end without the members' rat…

In the confusion of the attack, the police charge swept over and
injured many bystanders. The newspapers were equally random in
their reports. The News called it a demonstration of "striking long-
shoremen;" it was not, as the New York Times reported. The News
counted one unidentified sixteen-y…

Ryan had gone to work in New York as a longshoreman in 1912. He worked his way up in the union movement to become ILA president, then president of the Central Labor Council of New York City. When he landed in San Francisco in 1934, he stepped into a waterfront world almost totally unlike the one fr…

Three days after its strike action, the ISU asked the Pacific Coast District of the ILA to agree that neither of them would return to work until the demands of both have been met. Within days, the Masters, Mates and Pilots and the Marine Engineers Beneficial Association announced their numbers were…