Hello Friends of the Center -- Below and attached is an announcement of
our next program. Hope to see you all there.
www.73.org/3-03BlackHistory.pdf

Bob Bruno
Jamie Daniel
Co-Chairs
Chicago Center for Working Clas Studies

Labor in the
Black Metropolis:
Chicago’s Untold Stories


Saturday, March 1, 2003
2-5 pm
Carter Woodson Regional Library
9525 S. Halsted
Chicago, IL

Since its inception, Chicago’s growth has rested on a diverse
working-class drawn from many countries across the globe. Not only did
these men and women build the “city that works”and keep that city
working, they also built labor unions and labor movements with few
rivals in America. African-American workers were a vital part of both
the city’s labor force and its labor movement, particularly in the
twentieth century. In the city’s stockyards and packinghouses, its steel
mills, its railway yards and cars, and in its restaurants, hotels, and
office buildings, and on its buses and trains, African-American workers
have been crucial participants in efforts to improve working conditions,
ensure dignity on the job, and in many cases, challenge racial
discrimination. Whether they founded and joined all-black unions or
interracial ones, black labor activists established a tradition of civil
rights unionism that is only now being recognized in labor and African
American history. This event, sponsored by the Chicago Center for
Working-Class Studies and the Carter G. Woodson Regional Library, will
explore the rich history of Chicago’s black labor activists in the
twentieth century.

Speakers include:

·Elwood Flowers (Amalgamated Transit Union of the Chicago Transit
Authority)
·Addie Wyatt (Packinghouse Workers of America)
·Curtis Strong (National Ad Hoc Committee in Steel and the United
Steelworkers of America)
·Ola Kennedy (District 31 Women’s Caucus, United Steelworkers of
America)
·Ray Harris (AFSCME)
·Tim Black (American Negro Labor Council)

COME JOIN US FOR AN EVENT CELEBRATING Chicago Black Labor History!

The mission of the Chicago Center for Working-Class Studies (CCWCS) is
to
bring together individuals from multiple institutions to promote
economic
justice and to address class relationships. CCWCS’ participants will be
guided by their commitment to strengthen the political, economic and
moral
power of working women and men, and to expand an understanding of how
other identities intersect with class, including race, gender and sexual
orientation. The Center will focus on the following five types of
activities: Cultural, Educational, Research, Community Organizing, Union
Organizing.

The Center is supported by the following institutions: Roosevelt
University, University of Illinois at Chicago, Institute for Labor and
Industrial Relations of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,
DePaul University, Chicago Federation of Labor, IBT Local 705, IBEW
Local 134, SEIU Local 1, UFCW Local 881, Plumbers Local 130, USWA
District 7, SEIU 73-HC, CISCO . For additional information about the
Center and future activities, or to become a member of the Center’s
mailing list, please call the Chicago Labor Education Program office at
312-996-2491 or 312-996-2623, or email bbruno (at) uic.edu and
Jdaniel (at) uic.edu.