Merlyn Stuart Pitzele, labor analyst, had a distinguished career as editor, writer, lecturer, mediator, consultant in labor relations, and advisor to politicians. Born in Chicago on November 18, 1911, he was the only son of William A. and Gertrude Klein Pitzele. William A. Pitzele was an engineer for the Elgin, Joliet, and Eastern Railroad, and secretary for his local of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and Enginemen. Merlyn Pitzele attributes the origin of his life-long interest in labor to the fact that “all my early associations with adults were with his [the father's] friends in the labor movement” (Merlyn Stuart Pitzele to L.E. Perry, February 25, 1949).
After graduating from J. Sterling Morton High School in Chicago in 1930, Pitzele entered Dr. Alexander Meiklejohn's Experimental College at the University of Wisconsin. A fellow student was Wilbur J. Cohen, later U.S. Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, with whom he established a lasting friendship. In August 1932, the two joined twenty-eight other students in protesting the working conditions of miners in the coal districts in southern Illinois.
In the fall of 1932, Pitzele transferred to the University of Chicago where one of his courses was “Types of Economic Organization,” taught by Paul H. Douglas. He later wrote that this gave him his “first critical exposure to Marxist thought.” While at Chicago, he became chairman of the National Students' League, and worked at the Carnegie-Illinois Steel Corporation's South Works to earn money during the summers. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Chicago in March 1934.
In the fall of 1934, Pitzele accepted a fellowship in the Department of Education at the University of Chicago, and in October became a case worker for the Illinois Emergency Relief Administration. At the same time, he wrote feature articles for the St. Louis Post Dispatch. In 1934 and 1935, he was educational director for the Chicago Federation of Labor radio station (WCFL) in Chicago.
In 1935, Pitzele accepted a fellowship at the London School of Economics, and went to Britain to live for a short time in the Welsh coal mining district before taking courses at the London School. He soon returned to Chicago to become director of the Chicago Labor College (AFL), a field representative for the United States Department of Labor, an instructor for the Chicago Board of Education's adult education program, and executive secretary of the Illinois Labor Party. In 1936, he was hired as an organizer and labor education director in the Chicago-Great Lakes region for the Steel Workers Organizing Committee, helping to run strikes, settle grievances, negotiate contracts, and develop an educational program. In March 1938, he became an organizer for the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) in the union of Hairdressers and Cosmetologists.
Mr. Pitzele entered graduate school at the University of Wisconsin in the fall of 1938, where he taught courses in labor problems and British and American labor history, was an instructor at the University's School for Workers, and was director of workers' education for the Steel Workers Organizing Committee Local 1404 at the Gisholt Machine Tool Company plant in Madison. He was active in the University of Wisconsin Teachers Union Local 223, served as curator of the John R. Commons Labor Research Library, and wrote feature articles for the Wisconsin State Journal.
Mr. Pitzele left Wisconsin in February 1940, to become industrial relations consultant for Wilson Oliver and Company in New York. In this capacity he helped write the company's newsletter. On April 8, 1940, he became Labor and Management Editor of the McGraw-Hill publication, Business Week, a position he retained until 1955.
In the fall of 1942, Pitzele taught evening courses in labor problems at New York University's School of Business Administration. During World War II, he also served as a labor relations consultant for the National Foreman's Institute and various government agencies, including the United States Treasury and the Shipbuilding Stabilization Committee.
Mr. Pitzele was labor and civil rights advisor and a speechwriter for Thomas E. Dewey during both the 1944 and 1948 presidential campaigns. He and Dewey had met in the late 1930s through their mutual interest in the Twentieth Century Fund, an agency concerned with promoting better relations between labor and management. Pitzele continued to advise Dewey while the latter remained in office, and in June 1945, Governor Dewey appointed him to the New York Board of Mediation where he helped settle disputes in a wide variety of industries. He was involved in efforts to resolve the New York City building service strike in 1946, avert strikes at Time Inc. in 1947 and the New York City trucking industry in 1948, and settle disputes over union representation in New York City department stores in 1949. In 1950, Dewey appointed him chairman of the Board of Mediation, a position he held until 1956. He was active in seeking solutions to labor problems on the New York City waterfront, serving both in his capacity as chairman of the Board of Mediation and as a special consultant to the Waterfront Commission.
In addition to his work for Business Week, Governor Dewey, and the Board of Mediation, Pitzele became a member of the board of directors of the American Civil Liberties Union in 1946. He frequently discussed labor problems before university and business groups throughout the United States, and in the late 1940s became increasingly concerned about communist influence in the labor movement, a topic on which he lectured annually for several years at the Industrial College of the Armed Forces. Another subject of interest to him was labor legislation, especially the Taft-Hartley Act, to which he was opposed; and in 1949, he aided Senator H. Alexander Smith (Representative-New Jersey) in drafting federal labor legislation. He joined the American Association for Labor Research, and served on national boards or executive committees for many organizations: Junior Achievement, the Citizens Committee for Reorganization of the Government, the American Committee for Cultural Freedom, the Council Against Communist Aggression, and the American Friends of Captive Nations.
In the spring of 1952, Pitzele became involved in a controversy with other members of the board of directors of the American Civil Liberties Union. This resulted from his criticism of the ACLU as being soft on communism because it sponsored The Judges and the Judged, a book concerning blacklisting in the entertainment industry written by board member Merle Miller. Pitzele remained on the board of directors until 1954.
Mr. Pitzele joined Dwight D. Eisenhower's staff in both the 1952 and 1956 presidential campaigns, working in the same capacity he had served during the Dewey campaigns. Probably his most important contribution was in writing the speech Eisenhower delivered to the American Federation of Labor convention on September 18, 1952. After the election, he was seriously considered for appointment as Secretary of Labor, but the post was offered to Martin Durkin. When Durkin resigned in 1953, Pitzele helped to bring about the selection of James P. Mitchell as Durkin's successor. He became an advisor and speechwriter for Mitchell, and was consultant to the Program Planning and Review Committee of the Department of Labor.
From 1953 to 1955, Pitzele was a consultant to Dave Beck, president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, advising Beck on waterfront problems, union publications, union reform, and the elimination of communist influence in the union. He also became chief consultant to the New York Joint Legislative Committee on the State's Economy. In 1955, he was promoted to the position of Senior Editor of Business Week, and also edited the McGraw-Hill Labor-Management Series.
Mr. Pitzele left Business Week in 1957 to become executive director in charge of publications for Retirement Advisors Inc., New York, New York. He ran it until his own retirement in 1975. He had long been interested in pension plans and the problems of older workers, and had published letters and studies concerning retirement and industry. From 1958 to 1961, he wrote the “Jason Scott Letter,” a weekly advisory service for corporation presidents, and produced other newsletters published by the National Foreman's Association and its affiliates. He continued [written in 1969] to free-lance as a labor consultant for business firms and government agencies, such as the Fairbanks Morse Corporation and the New York State Thruway Authority; and pursued an active career as a lecturer, writer, and consultant on retirement problems.
During the period when he was an undergraduate at the University of Chicago, Pitzele met Bernice Fegan, whom he married in 1933. Following their divorce, in 1950 he married Patricia Lowe, editor and translator of French and Italian books. Lowe was the daughter of E.A. Lowe, well known paleographer, and Mrs. H.T. Lowe-Porter, translator of the works of Thomas Mann. Pitzele had one son, Peter Ascher, and two stepsons, Jonathan M. Fox and Matthew H. Fox. Merlyn Stuart Pitzele died August 1996 in Poughkeepsie, New York.
