Canadian wikipedian assisting with labour history notes, with a focus on food workers.
Dylan-Spanish (talk) 20:19, 25 February 2018 (UTC)Dylan-Spanish
Patrick E. Gorman edit
Patrick E. Gorman | |
|---|---|
| 3rd Secretary Treasurer of the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America | |
| In office 1942–1976 | |
| Preceded by | Dennis Lane |
| Succeeded by | Samuel J. Talarico |
| President of the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America | |
| In office 1923–1946 | |
| Leader | Dennis Lane |
| Personal details | |
| Nationality | American |
| Occupation | Trade unionist |
Anthony "Marc" Perrone is president of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW), one of North America's largest labor unions.[1]
Anthony "Marc" Perrone edit
Anthony "Marc" Perrone | |
|---|---|
 | |
| 4th President of the United Food and Commercial Workers | |
| In office 2014–Present | |
| Preceded by | Joseph T. Hansen |
| Personal details | |
| Born | November 14, 1955 Hearne, Texas, U.S. |
| Occupation | Grocery retail clerk, trade unionist |
Anthony "Marc" Perrone is president of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW), one of North America's largest labor unions.[1]
Activism and Career edit
Perrone first joined the Retail Clerks International Union (RCIU) -- one of the UFCW's main predecessor unions -- as a teenager, working at a Weingartens supermarket in his home state of Texas.[2][3]
Perrone joined the international union's staff in the mid 1970s and quickly rose up the ranks -- becoming a crew coordinator for manufacturing and food processing, executive assistant for the regional office in Dallas, and assistant to the organizing director in Washington by the time he was 28.[4]
When Douglas H. Dority was elected UFCW international president in 1994, he selected Perrone as an assistant, before tapping him shortly thereafter as the regional director for New York. In 2000, Perrone was named the union's collective bargaining director, and a couple of years later he became the union's lead for organizing.
Perrone became the union's international secretary treasurer in 2004, and was re-elected by delegates to UFCW regular conventions in 2008 and 2013. [4]
In 2014, Perrone became UFCW international president, following the retirement of Joseph T. Hansen.[4]
Perrone was arrested in 2015 for joining picketers in civil disobedience and peaceful protest actions against a car wash company in Brooklyn, New York that allegedly owed workers more than $600,000 in unpaid wages and other damages.[5]
Awards edit
In 2017, Perrone was presented with the At the River I Stand Award by the AFL-CIO for his lifelong commitment to civil and workers' rights.[2]
Category:American labor leaders
Category:United Food and Commercial Workers
Category:Living people
Category:1955 births
References edit
William H. Wynn edit
William H. Wynn | |
|---|---|
| 1st President of the United Food and Commercial Workers | |
| In office 1979–1994 | |
| Succeeded by | Douglas H. Dority |
| President of the Retail Clerks International Union | |
| In office 1977–1979 | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 1932 South Bend, Indiana, U.S. |
| Died | February 21, 2002 Naples Florida |
| Nationality | American |
| Political party | Democratic Party (United States) |
| Occupation | Grocery retail clerk, trade unionist |
William H. "Bill" Wynn was the first president of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW), and the the last president of the Retail Clerks International Union (RCIU), after the later voted to merge with the Amalgamated Meat Cutters to create the UFCW in 1979.
Early Life edit
The son of an autoworker, Bill Wynn's union activism began in 1948 while working at the The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company, or A&P, superstore in his hometown of South Bend, Indiana.[6]
Career edit
Wynn was elected the full-time union representative for RCIU Local 37 in 1954, and in 1961 he moved to Washington to serve the union as an international representative.[6]
Wynn was elected the RCIU's international secretary-treasurer in 1976.[6]
The following year he was elected RCIU international president, and began spearheading the merger effort with the Amalgamated Meat Cutters which created the UFCW in 1979, the largest union affiliated to the AFL-CIO at the time.[7]
Wynn was the unanimous choice to lead the new union by delegates to the UFCW's founding convention in Montreal in 1979.
Through Wynn's leadership the UFCW grew significantly – via new member organizing and mergers with other unions in Canada and the United States – and pioneered the use of television advertising as a tactic and medium for comprehensive campaign approaches.[6].
A vice-president of the AFL-CIO, Wynn chaired the labor federation's Organizing Committee, and served on the executive board of the A. Philip Randolph Institute.
Political Involvement edit
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Marshalling the UFCW firmly behind Democratic candidates for president, Wynn served on the committee to elect Jimmy Carter in 1979.
He also led the UFCW's effort on behalf of Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro during the 1984 presidential campaign, becoming one of the first union leaders to encourage and support Ferraro's bid to be the first female vice-president of the United States.
Awards edit
In 1988, Wynn was honored by the National Women's Political Caucus for his leadership in acquiring benefits for women.[6]
Death edit
Bill Wynn died in Naples, Florida in 2002 of a heart attack.[6]
Category:American labor leaders Category:United Food and Commercial Workers Category:1932 births
Douglas H. Dority edit
Douglas H. Dority | |
|---|---|
 | |
| 2nd President of the United Food and Commercial Workers | |
| In office 1994–2004 | |
| Preceded by | William H. Wynn |
| Succeeded by | Joseph T. Hansen |
| Personal details | |
| Nationality | American |
| Political party | Democratic Party (United States) |
| Occupation | Grocery retail clerk, trade unionist |
Douglas H. Dority was president of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW), one of North America's largest labor unions.
Activism and career edit
Dority's involvement with the union began in the 1960s, when he organized the grocery store where he worked in Lynchburg, Virginia.[8]
Dority worked in various roles for the UFCW (and before 1979, the Retail Clerks International Union) throughout the 1970s, 1980s, and early 1990s, eventually become the UFCW's international president in 1994, upon the retirement of William H. Wynn.[9]
Dority intensified the UFCW's comprehensive campaign again Walmart, investing significant resources in the public relations campaign against the retailer, culminating in the "national day of action" in 2002, where rallies where held again Walmart in more than 100 communities across the United States. The action was fully backed the AFL-CIO, where served on the executive-council.[10]
From 2003-04, Dority led the UFCW through its largest strike, involving tens of thousands of grocery store workers in protracted strikes in California, Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia, primarily over the retention of healthcare benefits.[11]
Healthcare advocate edit
Upon retiring from the UFCW, Dority became the president of the America’s Agenda: Health Care for All, an organization dedicated to "winning guaranteed access to affordable, high quality health care for every American."[12]
Clifford R. Evans edit
Clifford R. Evans | |
|---|---|
 | |
| 1st Canadian Director of the United Food and Commercial Workers | |
| In office 1988–1992 | |
| President | William H. Wynn |
| Preceded by | Position established |
| Succeeded by | Thomas Kukovica |
| Personal details | |
| Born | June 23, 1937 Guelph, Ontario, Canada |
| Died | February 14, 2018 Buffalo, New York, U.S. |
| Political party | New Democratic Party |
| Occupation | Grocery retail clerk, trade unionist |
Clifford Russel "Cliff" Evans, OOnt (June 23, 1937 – February 14, 2018) was a Canadian trade unionist, pension plan innovator, and a key player in the creation of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union.[13][14]
Activism and career edit
Evans became a member of the Retail Clerks International Union (RCIU) in 1957 when he organized the workers at the Dominion Store in Guelph, Ontario, where he was employed.[15]
That same year he was elected vice president of RCIU Local 206, and two months later, at the age of 19, he became its full-time secretary treasurer.
In 1960, he was appointed international representative for the RCIU, focused on southern Ontario, and in 1969 he returned to Local 206 to become its president.
In 1970, Evans was elected Canadian director of the RCIU.
When the RCIU merged with the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen in 1976 to create the UFCW, Cliff was elected director of region 19, and an international vice president, at the new union's founding convention.
As director of region 19, Evans set a new standard for worker organizing in Canada, scaling the region's total membership from 5,000 in 1957 to 65,000 in 1986.[16]
Food retail contracts edit
training and education
"Fish wars" edit
Awards edit
In addition to ..., was an innvator ... in benefit ... structuring and provision in Canada .. CCWIPP ... Past Canadian chairman of the International Federation of Employee Benefit Plans (IFEBP).
Order of Ontario ... for the ... and his role in creating the Canadian Commercial Workers Industry Pension Plan, which has become Canada's largest multi-employer pension plan with more than XXXX in assets and XXXX beneficiaries.
Romeo Mathieu edit
Romeo Mathieu | |
|---|---|
| Canadian Director of the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America | |
| In office 1973–1979 | |
| President | Patrick E. Gorman |
| Preceded by | Fred Dowling |
| Succeeded by | Position dissolved |
| 1st Secretary-General of the Fédération des travailleurs et travailleuses du Québec (FTQ) | |
| In office 1957–1963 | |
| Preceded by | Position established |
| Succeeded by | unknown |
| 1st Secretary-General of the Fédération des unions industrielles du Québec (FUIQ) | |
| In office 1952–1957 | |
| Preceded by | Position established |
| Succeeded by | Position dissolved |
| Personal details | |
| Born | blank5 1917 Montreal, Quebec, Canada |
| Died | April, 1989 Montreal, Quebec, Canada |
| Resting place | blank5 |
| Political party | Co-operative Commonwealth Federation New Democratic Party |
| Spouse | Huguette Plamondon |
| Parent |
|
| Occupation | Trade unionist |
Romeo Mathieu, CM (1917-April, 1989) was a Canadian trade unionist, progressive political activist, and solidarity builder par excellence for the Quebec labour movement. He is best associated with his leading role in expanding the efforts of the United Packinghouse Workers of America (UPWA) into Quebec during the 1940s and 50s, and facilitating the merger between the UPWA and the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America in 1968. Mathieu also made a pivital contribution to the creation of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union in 1979.[17] In addition to his outstanding contributions to the labour movement, Mathieu was a standing member of the Quebec intelligensia of the 1950s and 60s, and served as a formidable presence in advancing many of the province's social movements, including the Quiet Revolution.
Early life edit
Mathieu was born in Montreal, Quebec in 1917 and displayed a natural appetite for politics at an early age. Unlike most other boys in Quebec during this period, he had no interest in hockey or sports in general. Instead, Mathieu fixated on politics and envisioned himself as his uncle's protege, who was a professional organizer for the Liberal Party of Canada.
He was educated at the Technical Institute of Montreal, where he learned mechanics and technical drawing, and graduated on the eve of the Great Depression. The experiences of the Great Depression had a profound impact on Mathieu and compelled him to reconsider his politics. Consequently, he abandoned his childhood affiliation to the Liberal Party, and, instead, embraced the emerging, and more radical, views of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF).
Packinghouse worker organizing edit
One day in 1938, while on lunch break from his job in the credit department of a Montreal store, Mathieu dropped-by a union meeting and listened to an organizer from the garment workers. From then on his life was with the labour movement.
His first project was organizing workers at the Dominion Engineering Works in Longueuil, Quebec for the International Association of Machinists. After the dust settled, Mathieu became the local's full-time president.
It wasn't long before Mathieu gained a reputation for being a highly effective and, indeed, fierce union mobilizer, and quickly earned the attention of Quebec's labour leaders, especially at the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada (TLC), where Mathieu served on the executive throughout the mid-1940s.
As such, TLC president Percy Bengough requested Romeo to lead the packinghouse worker organizing effort across the province, and with Mathieu at the helm, the campaign succeeded.
The newly organized packinghouse workers needed a place to call home, and the Packinghouse Butchers and Allied Workers Union was created, and immediately chartered as a TLC affiliate.
Master bargaining in meat sector edit
Mathieu was a staunch supporter of the "One Industry, One Union" movement and in 1946 he led the Packinghouse Butchers and Allied Workers Union toward a merger with the United Packinghouse Workers of America (UPWA).
Mathieu soon put the full might of the UPWA to the cause, when in 1947 he led the negotiating committee that went on strike against Canada's three largest meat packing companies, Canada Packers, Burns, and Swift: forcing a settlement that provided for master agreements covering UPWA members from coast-to-coast.
The model won through Mathieu's leadership eventually became the standard across Canada, and ushered in a new era of higher living standards for generations of packinghouse workers. The system eventually collapsed in the 1980s when Burns Meats started a decade long strategy of brinkmanship that resulted in some of the largest and most violent strikes in Canadian history, and ultimately led to the end of pattern bargaining in the country's meat sector.
Beyond the meat sector, Mathieu was often called upon by other unions or central labour federations to get the parties beyond impasse, including the nationwide postal strike in 1968, which was ultimately resolved by him after the Canadian Union of Postal Workers invited Romeo to act as their chief negotiator.[18]
Building solidarity in Quebec edit
Through the 1940s, dual federations and unions competed for affiliates and sectors, which thereby allowed employers to pit one union against another.
Mathieu, in addition to crafting mergers within his own unions and sectors, played a key role in merging Quebec's labour federations. In particular, he made a significant contribution to the creation, expansion and development of the province's main labour body today, the Fédération des travailleurs et travailleuses du Québec (FTQ)/Quebec Federation of Labour (QFL].
The FTQ/QFL was the result of the 1957 merger of the Provincial Federation of Labour of Québec (PFLQ) and the Federation of Industrial Trade Unions of Québec (FITQ}/Fédération des unions industrielles du Québec (FUIQ), where Mathieu served as the secretary-general, and displayed tremendous leadership in spearheading the effort to bring the two federations together.
As the FTQ's first secretary-general, Mathieu helped orient the new Quebec labour federation toward a more militant approach favoured by the industrial unions of the FITQ (i.e., in contrast to the less militant approach of the craft unions of the PFLQ). Unlike the CSN, the FTQ kept its distance from the Maurice Duplessis government, took some militant stands – in keeping with its industrial tendancies – like the Murdochville Strike in 1957, and, eventually, supported the New Democratic Party of Canada, once it was founded in 1961.
Mathieu was undoubtedly also played an important role in the creation of the Canadian Labour Congress in 1956, following the merger of the TLC and the Canadian Congress of Labour, where Romeo served on the executive council. From 1956 until his retirement in 1983, Mathieu served as a vocal and highly-respected member of the CLC's executive board, the Canadian council.
ftq article: https://translate.google.ca/translate?hl=en&sl=fr&u=https://ftq.qc.ca/romeo-mathieu-1917-1989/&prev=search
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/union-centrals-quebec/
Quiet Revolution edit
In the political arena, and in the leading intellectual and social movements of his day, Mathieu joined other young activist – such as Pierre Trudeau, Gérard Pelletier, Jean Marchand, Philippe Vaillancourt, Jean-Paul Lefebvre, and Rene Levesque – in pushing for the fall of the Maurice Duplessis regime, and the rise of the Quiet Revolution, which began in the 1960s and left an indelible impact on Quebec.
Firmly committed to his belief that political action and trade unionism were, and must be, interwoven, Mathieu is quoted as saying. "A worker is every bit a citizen too and the two can never be separated. It is sheer irresponsibility for unions to concern themselves with only work-place problems." ... taken from the butcher workman
Merging the food workers edit
In keeping with Mathieu's life-long commitment to the "One industry, one union" mantra, he played a pivotal role in the merger between the United Packinghouse Workers of America and the Amalgamateted Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen (AMCBW) in 1968, creating the Canadian Food and Allied Workers (CFAW) in Canada for political reasons; however, in the United States UPWA ceased to exist as a brand, and its members became members of the AMCBW. Following the merger in Canada, the CFAW was led by the indefatigable Fred Dowling as its leader, and Mathieu serving as the obvious second in command and heir apparent. Upon Dowling's retirement in 1972, Mathieu was the natural choice for leader, meaning he effectively became the Canadian director of the AMCBW.
Seven years later, Mathieu, once again, played a defining role in yet another major merger. This time with the creation of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union in 1979, which, most certainly, would not have been possible without Romeo's very seasoned and sage hand leading the way in Quebec.
From 1979 until his retirement in 1983, Mathieu served the UFCW as international vice-president, and as the director of region 18, which included all of the new union's Canadian members who once belonged the Amalgamated Meat Cutters.
Awards edit
On October 5, 1983, Mathieu became one of a select few of labour leaders to be invested into the Order of Canada for his role as "the former regional director and vice-president of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union and founder of the Fédération des Unions industrielles du Québec. In recognition of nearly a half century of hard work on behalf of his union brothers and sisters as a labour leader and negotiator." https://www.gg.ca/honour.aspx?id=13820&t=12&ln=Mathieu
In appreciation for his role in creating the union – and the five decades of activism and commitment that helped make it possible – UFCW Local Unions in Canada, by way of the UFCW Canada national council, established an annual scholarship in Mathieu's honour, which awards 18 $1,000 prizes to UFCW Canada members or their children to assist with post-secondary tuition and associated costs.
Romeo Mathieu died in Montreal in April, 1989.
- ^ a b "[1]", ufcw.org, retrieved April 18, 2020
- ^ a b "[2]",aflcio.org, retrieved February 25, 2018
- ^ "[3]",nwaonline.com, retrieved April 18, 2020
- ^ a b c "[4]", ufcw.org, retrieved April 18, 2020 Cite error: The named reference "Marc Perrone Elected" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
- ^ "[5]",laborpres.org, retrieved February 25, 2018
- ^ a b c d e f "[6]", washintonpost.com. Retrieved February 25, 2018
- ^ "[7]", retailwire.com. Retrieved February 25, 2018
- ^ "A new chapter in our union's history" (PDF). Retrieved 1 March 2018.
- ^ "A new chapter in our union's history" (PDF). Retrieved 1 March 2018.
- ^ Featherstone, Liz (2004). Selling Women Short: The Landmark Battle for Workers' Rights at Wal-Mart.
- ^ "Douglas H. Dority". Retrieved 1 March 2018.
- ^ "Mission". Retrieved 1 March 2018.
- ^ "Clifford Russel Evans" (web). ObitTree. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
{{cite web}}: Check|url=value (help) - ^ "Clifford Evans" (web). ufcw.ca. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
{{cite web}}: Check|url=value (help) - ^ "Clifford Evans" (web). ufcw.ca. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
{{cite web}}: Check|url=value (help) - ^ "Clifford Evans" (web). ufcw.ca. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
{{cite web}}: Check|url=value (help) - ^ Lazarus, Morden (1977). Up from the ranks: trade union vip's past and present. Co-operative Press Associates. p. 79.
- ^ Freeman, Mike (April 1989). "Remembering Romeo Mathieu". Action. Toronto: United Food and Commercial Workers.
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