The American Federation of Teachers was founded and became affiliated with the American Federation of Labor in 1916. That same year it granted a charter to Local #35, Madison, Wisconsin. Membership was open to all public school teachers in the City of Madison; a high of just over 100 members was reached in the mid 1950's. The local was concerned mainly with immediate problems and issues in the Madison schools, though it maintained ties with the general labor movement by belonging to the Madison Federation of Labor.
In a 1972 oral history interview, Garrison Lincoln, a past president of Local #35, described three major accomplishments of the union since 1950. He felt the greatest accomplishment was the 1958 implementation of the John Guy Foulkes report which recommended major salary increases and an end to the City Council's practice of setting the budget's salary totals. Implementation was accomplished when Local #35 gained endorsement of the report from the Madison Federation of Labor.
A second major accomplishment occurred in 1953 when Local #35 negotiated a group health insurance policy for its members. The result was a membership rise and increased recognition of the local as an organization capable of action.
The third accomplishment involved a ruling by the Wisconsin Employment Relations Board. Myron Cook, a teacher in Waunakee, was fired in 1963; he contended that the reason for his dismissal was his refusal to join the Wisconsin Education Association and his membership in Local #35. Local #35 and the Wisconsin Federation of Teachers protested his case to the State Industrial Commission. Though the hearing board ruled against Cook, it also ruled that a school could not require WEA membership of its teachers, the first such decision in the state of Wisconsin.
At this writing [1972], Local #35 is practically non-existent as the result of the 1964 election of the Madison Education Association as exclusive bargaining agent for Madison teachers.
