Introduction

Biographical Background
Scope and Content Note: Born in 1921, in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of a Baptist minister. Raised and educated in Chicago, Illinois. Attended Harvard University, majoring in sociology. During college, was involved in the American Friends Service Committee's Work Camp Movement and with the Civilian Conservation Corps. Finished college shortly before United States entry into World War II. Spent four years in the Infantry and got out in 1945.

How Tibbetts Got Involved in Union Work
Scope and Content Note: “Having lived through the labor turmoils in the thirties,” he was interested in union work. Attended Hudson Shore Labor School where he met Sol Stetin, then TWUA New Jersey director. Stetin offered him a job, which he accepted in the fall of 1946. He was put to work in an Allentown, Pennsylvania, textile plant in order to familiarize him with the industry and to find out if he really wanted to work for the Union. The understanding was that, after a period of time, the Allentown Joint Board would hire him as an organizer and as its education director, which it did.

Duties as Allentown Joint Board Education Director
Scope and Content Note: Ran steward classes, put out a shop stewards' bulletin, did political work, did a couple radio programs, participated in negotiations (mainly as an observer), helped out during strikes (bulletins, etc.), and did a great deal of organizing. He was also elected secretary of the local CIO council.

Transfer to Pittsylvania County Joint Board in Danville, Virginia
Scope and Content Note: TWUA Education Director Larry Rogin suggested the transfer, but Tibbetts was hesitant since he had just gotten the groundwork laid for a good education program in Allentown. TWUA Legislative Director John Edelman, for whom Tibbetts had considerable respect, encouraged him to go to Danville, arguing that the future of the Union was in the South. Also, the people at the Pittsylvania County Joint Board had requested him; so he went. At both joint boards he was paid out of joint board funds. At Danville his duties, initially, were quite similar to those at Allentown - developing an education program, working up a newspaper, involvement in a weekly radio program. As time passed, however, he got more and more into organizing, negotiations, and the work of a business agent (grievance, arbitrations, etc.). The education program suffered as a result; he was never able to get a full-fledged education program going.

1950 TWUA Convention
Note: [See tape 1, side 1, 25 below. Tibbetts is not sure he attended the 1950 convention. He may be confusing the 1948 and the 1950 conventions here. At the 1948 convention Glazer and Knight were active with Baldanzi in an attempt to remove Southern Director Roy Lawrence from the Executive Council. The Administration's retaliation at this convention did not include an attempt to unseat Baldanzi. Whether he attended the 1950 convention or not, Tibbetts' discussion would seem to reflect well the feeling of Danville delegates at that convention.]

Scope and Content Note: Tibbetts had first met George Baldanzi about 1948-1949 in negotiations with Dan River. Tibbetts attended the 1950 TWUA convention, but not as a delegate. He expected the convention to run smoothly and was surprised to hear that the Executive Council was going to try to unseat Baldanzi. Education staffers Joe Glazer and Pat Knight were working to prevent this. Baldanzi won re-election as Executive Vice President, and Tibbetts left the convention feeling “this was an unfortunate aberration which wouldn't do the Union any good, and the issue was settled.” Most delegates seemed to have come to the convention equally unprepared for the political fight. “They had...a great deal of confidence in [Baldanzi]...as a person who was close to them..., who appeared to be a person that would support you through thick and thin, a skilled negotiator, and a person who seemed to understand what I think was a real difference between the way in which you organize in the South and in the North, and the way in which you deal with southern employers as contrasted” with northern employers.

Organizing and Negotiating Differences Between the North and the South
Scope and Content Note: When organizing in the South, one always had to contend with the racial situation. While the pure position of the Union and the CIO was supported, one had to keep in mind that there had to be a union before much could be done about race. Southern workers were more homogeneous than northern workers; they were Scotch-Irish Protestants who took their religion very seriously; organizers had to watch their cursing. There were fewer union standards of comparison in the South because there were few other organized industries there; many southern workers, while working for very low wages, were nevertheless receiving their first cash money, and it looked pretty good. People had to be addressed as “Mister” during organizing campaigns. In the South, organizing basically had to be soft-sell. Southern employers had “a keen sense of their own self-importance,” and labor negotiators could not say anything that would impugn the honor or motives of the employers. The type of screaming and yelling across the table that was common in northern negotiations was not acceptable in the South.

These Differences Accounted for the Southern Support of Baldanzi
Scope and Content Note: Baldanzi and Boyd Payton had an understanding of these differences and the different approaches that were required in the South. Not all New Englanders did. Anecdote about a meeting in Danville of Executive Council members who were pinching the waitresses and generally carrying on in a boisterous manner which was not acceptable in the South. Tibbetts witnessed Emil Rieve and James Bamford in negotiations and noted that their approach was much rougher than was acceptable in southern negotiations. While Baldanzi and Payton were not held back by the International from taking a southern approach to southerners, Union members in the South felt that the defeat of Baldanzi might bring in a person who did not have an appreciation of these North/South differences. Mariano Bishop, who ran for Baldanzi's office, probably would have had this appreciation, but the people, both the workers and the employers, were used to Baldanzi.

Southern Workers Today
Scope and Content Note: While Tibbetts cannot really judge, his limited contact with today's southern workers leads him to believe that there is a carry over of these differences.

There Was No Southern Resentment Against the International Union Simply Because It Was Located Up North
Scope and Content Note: The people in Danville merely felt they needed any help they could get from the International. Even during the internal fight, the feeling remained that they needed help, and the political difficulties seemed incidental. Rieve was in Danville some time before the fight, and it was his birthday. Tibbetts and others celebrated with him and found him to be very pleasant, which made it difficult to understand the hard line he was to take later, and which led them to suspect he was getting bad advice.

Danville People Began to Suspect the 1950 Convention Had Not Settled the Internal Fight
Scope and Content Note: The circumstances surrounding the negotiation of the Danville contracts in late summer of 1950 led many to believe that issues were not being decided as much on their merits as on how they would affect Baldanzi's status in the Union. [Here Tibbetts began to read excerpts from a report he wrote for the 1952 convention entitled, “The Danville Story,” which explained how Danville became embroiled in the political fight. The report, and other materials pertinent to the Danville situation at the time, including a letter he and his wife wrote to “Friends and relatives” shortly after the conclusion of the strike, can be found in Mss 396, Box 672, of the Historical Society's TWUA collection. These materials should be in the researcher's hand when listening to these tapes. While reading the report, Tibbetts began to doubt whether he attended the 1950 convention and came to the conclusion that it may well have been the 1948 convention he attended. It also became clear from the report that the Danville people, at least a few weeks before the 1950 convention, had been made aware of the internal dispute.]

Introduction

Danville Felt It Did Not Receive Enough Direction from the International
Scope and Content Note: [Throughout this and following discussions, Tibbetts continues to make frequent reference to “The Danville Story.”] New England had wage arbitration and the power to strike. Danville had neither of these and thus could not go for a wage increase without direction from the International. On July 5, 1950, a New England Cotton Conference met and voted to pass up wage increases and go for pension improvements when the New England contracts reopened on September 15. The Danville contracts expired August 1. Lew Conn, North Carolina Director, suggested asking for an escalator clause similar to the cost-of-living clause recently negotiated by the Auto Workers. Rieve opposed this and said wage increases should be left for the wage reopening in the spring. The Danville contract was ratified on August 4; it contained no wage increase but did contain gains in the areas of workload and incentive work protections. On August 5, the Joint Board received a communication, dated August 2, from Rieve, calling for a Southern Wage Conference. This caught them completely by surprise.

Textile Labor Article Plunged Danville into the Internal Dispute
Scope and Content Note: A September 2 article entitled “New Language, No Dough in Danville” insulted the Danville negotiators. The article implied that Danville had been delinquent in not asking for a wage increase and that Baldanzi, since he was involved in the negotiations, was at least partially responsible. This sparked a series of letters between the Joint Board and Rieve in which the Joint Board complained of the article, suggested the removal of Ken Fiester as editor of Textile Labor, detailed the problems the Joint Board had had in getting negotiating directions from the International, and defended the results of the negotiations. Rieve's responses upheld Fiester, attacked the Danville negotiations, and claimed that the Joint Board had become saturated with politics. Meanwhile, on September 19, the New England contracts, including a wage increase which was supposedly necessitated by the increased cost of living brought on by the Korean War, went into effect. In response to this, the unorganized southern chains granted an eight percent increase, which put the organized mills in the humiliating position of having to approach their employers for a similar increase. This series of events drove the Danville people into opposition to the International; they felt their integrity had been insulted. They had left the 1950 convention assuming the internal political situation had been settled, but now they found themselves and their negotiations thrust into the middle of the dispute, a very uncomfortable and unwanted position, given the type of employer they had to deal with.

Reaction of the Members in Danville to These Developments
Scope and Content Note: Like most unions at the time, the bulk of the membership was not really active and was thus pretty much unaware of events. The members, however, did know and respect Baldanzi, Conn, and Emanuel (“Slim”) Boggs, and word, no doubt, got around that the International was attacking these people. It was the Joint Board leadership and those members who had been involved in negotiations, however, who were most incensed. The Joint Board was a big one. It held weekly stewards' meetings and these were fairly well attended; so word probably did filter back to the workers. The Joint Board's publication and its radio program, however, avoided the issue, because any hints of internal splits in the Union would only weaken the Joint Board's power in relation to the employers.

Reasons for the Injection of Politics into the Union, for the Attack on Baldanzi
Scope and Content Note: One argument used against Baldanzi was that he was only a good public speaker, not a good negotiator. Perhaps the fight was in part due to jealousy of Baldanzi's speaking abilities, and his ability to relate to the membership. Tibbetts refuses to think that jealousy could have been the main issue. He felt that perhaps Baldanzi's opposition sincerely felt he was not efficient, but the opposition had no one to offer who would have been better. Perhaps they thought Baldanzi was trying to carve out an area in the Union where he would be “top dog,” but Tibbetts never got that impression from Baldanzi.

The Administration Made No Attempt to Take the Fight to the Danville Membership
Scope and Content Note: At least not between the fall of 1950 and the spring of 1951. Probably they were being careful to keep the dispute on the verbal level and the leadership level.

Tibbetts Personally Did Not Get Very Involved in the Fight
Scope and Content Note: As an employee of the Joint Board, he did not have the same direct contact with Union leaders as Boggs did. None of Tibbetts' responsibilities - the radio program, education classes, etc. - were used to attack the Administration.

Tibbetts Began to Feel the Internal Split Was Becoming a North Versus South Split
Scope and Content Note: Although some northern pockets showed strong support for Baldanzi, the South was much more uniformly on his side.

The Issue of the Allegiance of International Representatives, Joint Board Managers, and Regional Directors
Scope and Content Note: If these people were paid by the International, it made little difference until disputes arose in the Union. Then people were expected to either follow the International's wishes or resign. Boggs was paid by the International, and this became an issue in 1952. When Danville switched to the United Textile Workers (UTW) after the 1952 convention, Boggs became an elected officer of the Joint Board.

1951 Southern Cotton Strike - a Wage Reopener
Scope and Content Note: The contract signed in August 1950 was a one-year contract with a no-strike clause, but it provided for reopening the wage clause after six months. If agreement could not be reached on wages, the no-strike and no-lockout clauses would be suspended. Hence, even though the strike was lost, the contract remained in effect until August 1951; but the Joint Board knew, after displaying weakness in the strike, that contract renewal negotiations would be extremely difficult.

1951 Spring Wage Strategy
Scope and Content Note: A national Cotton Policy Committee meeting was held in Danville on January 14, 1951. [This was the meeting Tibbetts referred to earlier where some northerners were pinching waitresses at the Busy Bee Cafe (see tape 1, side 1, 14:10). He notes here that Sol Stetin was as disturbed about this impropriety as the southerners were.] The Wage Stabilization Board (WSB), in February, had set ten percent wage guidelines. The Policy Committee set March 15 as the strike deadline. On March 14-16 the Cotton Policy Committee met in Boston, and on March 15 agreement was reached for the New England cotton mills. On March 16 the Cotton Policy Committee met regarding southern negotiations. Rieve announced that he would personally take charge of this “mopping up operation,” and the strike deadline was extended to March 30. Rieve headed negotiations in Danville on March 27, and further negotiations were scheduled for March 30. James Bamford substituted for Rieve, and Dan River made a six percent wage increase offer, but it came in the form of two percent immediately and four percent later, contingent upon WSB approval. Tibbetts and Business Agent John Crew met after the meeting in the Busy Bee Cafe and agreed that the South had to keep faith with the New England members who were losing jobs to the South, but they also expressed great concern about the ability of Danville to sustain a strike on the basis of the confusing six percent (two now and four later) issue.

Introduction

April 1 Strike Authorization Mass Meeting
Scope and Content Note: The bargaining committee had the authority to reject the company's offer, but this meeting was called in order to get additional confirmation of this authority.

Dan River Management Appeared to Be Unhappy to Find Itself Dealing with Rieve and Bamford Rather Than Baldanzi, Boggs, and Conn
Scope and Content Note: This was not because they felt they would get a better deal from the latter group. It was simply a question of bringing in these outsiders, and a feeling of “we are bargaining with a gun at our head.” This feeling resulted from the different style of negotiating that northerners like Rieve and Bamford employed.

Strike Recommendation at the Mass Meeting
Scope and Content Note: Although Tibbetts, Crew, and Boggs were skeptical about the possibility of a successful strike, they nevertheless recommended a strike to the April 1 mass meeting because they felt they had to keep faith with their brothers in the North. The issue was not the two percent now, four percent later question, but simply that a total package of six percent was not enough since the North had received more. Tibbetts has often wondered since what would have happened, in terms of the future of the Union in the South, if they had at least raised the point with Rieve that they did not feel the strike could be successful. There were political overtones, however, since Baldanzi and his southern supporters would have suffered, would have been called “a bunch of cream puffs,” if they had raised this question.

Why the Joint Board Had Not Prepared for a Strike
Scope and Content Note: The theory was that such preparations would only have made management more intransigent. Once again, this theory is based on the theory of southern negotiating - that the Union cannot appear to be holding a gun at the head of management. Indeed, the six percent offer was only a last-minute offer by the company and probably would not have been made if the company thought the union was preparing for a strike. In the North, strike preparations have the reverse effect; they put pressure on management to make a better offer.

The Mass Meeting's Decision to Strike
Scope and Content Note: It was unanimous and it was made by a pretty well-informed membership. There were about 250 stewards, and steward meetings at the time were well attended. In addition, there were plant committee representatives who assisted the stewards, attended meetings, and reported back to the departments. Also, the radio program kept members informed of the progress of negotiations. The issue was put to the membership strictly on a trade union basis: 1) Dan River can afford to give more than the six percent. 2) The workers need more. 3) Faith must be kept with the North. The stewards were aware of the possible consequences of a strike; memory of the 1930 strike was still vivid and Dan River was powerful. No one thought it would be easy.

The Strike - Beginnings
Scope and Content Note: Tibbetts, at the beginning of the strike, had no idea how long it would be. No one “expected an early settlement, or even any settlement, if you want to know.” After the mass meeting, Tibbetts went to the union hall to hand-letter picket signs and to try to organize picketing. It took a week to get organized for the strike.

The Workers Held Strong for at Least a Week
Scope and Content Note: On April 9 Tibbetts' count showed 1,848 entering the plant for the 8 a.m. shift at Dan River and 629 at the Riverside mill. “That's not bad, out of about 11,000 working, and where we had maybe 8,000 union members.”

Tibbetts Thought the Strike Was in Trouble Immediately
Scope and Content Note: Based on his experiences in Allentown, Tibbetts realized the lack of preparations and the presence of heavy law enforcement would make it very difficult to keep people from returning to work. Also, there was a lack of experience. “How [do] you deal with this mass of people coming from a radius of fifty or sixty miles.”

The Situation Could Have Been Saved with More Money
Scope and Content Note: There were many problems getting money from the International; it came only “in bits and dribbles.” “In retrospect, I think if TWUA had put a million dollars in a local Danville bank...and said 'that's a starter'...; if we had met the basic needs of everybody, I think we could have held it. I think people were driven back in because they couldn't stand it financially.” The people were in trouble instantly from a financial standpoint.

Tibbetts Does Not Agree That the People Were Not Ready to Make Sacrifices
Scope and Content Note: The problem was that they had so little to sacrifice; “had so little to start with.” At the time, Tibbetts estimated it would take $232,500 a week, plus $5,000 for incidentals, “to make the thing go.” “You gotta give people a feeling of security in this strike....” “We were never in a position to establish that we could support these people to any extent at all.”

The Danville Strike Was Crucial to the Future of the Union in the South
Scope and Content Note: If the Union had purchased a victory in Danville, “gotten something from Dan River that the non-union plants would not grant, I think it would have been a foot in the door in organizing campaigns. After this, the non-union people set the patterns.”

The International Was Just as Unprepared as the Joint Board

Danville Leadership Felt the International Was Letting the Local Situation Down, and This Prepared the Way for Their Actions in 1952
Scope and Content Note: In the midst of the strike, Tibbetts, by himself, was wondering whether perhaps a southern union should be formed, or even a separate textile union of Baldanzi supporters. There were reports that Rieve refused to speak from the same platform as Baldanzi during the strike, and that Rieve stated “that he did not want to preside at a funeral.” These attitudes, coming during such a tense situation, “really drove them into the position that they took at the '52 convention.”

The Rank and File, on the Other Hand, Felt Let Down by the Local People, Not the International

“There's Something to Be Said Along the Lines That Danville May Have Been Built Wrong”

Introduction

More on How the Union in Danville Was Built
Scope and Content Note: The NLRB election was won in about 1943 by a relatively healthy margin, about 7,000 to 4,000. Because this was the first major inroad into the South, it was felt that plenty of service from the International should be given. The Pittsylvania County Joint Board was the only one in the Union to have a full-time industrial engineer. The International gave the Joint Board a lot of attention and appointed very competent people as its managers. “This may have resulted in less local leadership developing because it didn't appear to be needed.” Tibbetts felt this particularly after the split from TWUA in 1952, noting at the time that the local people would have to learn quickly how to do things for themselves. After working for some time, after the split, without pay, Tibbetts left the situation. “I don't think that [atmosphere] was so much a Joint Board development as it was the view of the national union.” This atmosphere contributed to the lack of preparation for the strike. [Tibbetts here again reads from the paper documents before him, listing the many things that were needed to prepare for the strike, after the strike had already begun.]

The Purpose of Community Relations
Scope and Content Note: A twofold purpose: 1) simply a matter of principle; the union is a citizen of the community; 2) to build support, or at least a neutral attitude, in the event of a showdown. Tibbetts, in Danville, was active in the Community Agencies Council, “mainly just to introduce people to the fact there's a union in town.” The union was also active in the YWCA and politics and, of course, had its radio program.

Black Militancy and Race Relations During the Strike
Scope and Content Note: Tibbetts was not surprised at the militancy shown by black workers during the strike. “The blacks had everything to gain....” Race relations were improved during the strike; blacks and whites were thrown together with a common interest focused on the employer. There were interracial ball games. White drivers were picked up by the police for transporting black pickets. While there was backsliding after the strike, great progress was made during the strike.

Handling of the Strike Fund Contributed to the Deterioration of the Joint Board's Relationship with the International
Scope and Content Note: The Joint Board put some of the strike fund into the credit union in the hope of having some of it paid back. About one-third of this money was Joint Board money, but the International asked that it all be paid back to the International. “We felt that it was a hostile act....Even the talk of paying back strike relief seemed not to be a trade union position.”

Impact of the Lost Strike on Danville Unionism and the TWUA
Scope and Content Note: Tibbetts stayed in Danville a year and some months after the strike. The contract expired, and workers worked without a contract, but the employers continued to deal with the union; grievances were handled fairly successfully. “I think it made the union effective enough for people not to decertify it and not effective enough for them to join it.” In a broader context, this was probably a missed opportunity for TWUA in the South. If TWUA and the CIO had “really gone after Dan River” and “supported the strike as long as it would take...this might have done it as far as organizing the South.” That, of course, is oversimplifying because of the many factors involved in southern organizing.

The Role of the CIO in the Danville Strike
Scope and Content Note: Charley Weber was the president of the state CIO and led a lay down during the strike. The company then dredged up his alleged Communist connections. The national CIO appeared to be diffident. Perhaps some of the larger unions would have put money into the situation if events had not moved so quickly or if the TWUA had indicated it was putting a substantial portion of its resources into the situation.

More on the Impact of the Strike
Scope and Content Note: It probably served to embolden southern employers. “Dan River was not as nasty a management” as some other southern employers, and “that's what made them so mad at being struck, among other things.”

Danville Delegates to the 1952 Convention Did Not Expect a Full Slate Would Be Put Up by the Baldanzi Faction
Scope and Content Note: Tibbetts went to the convention as an observer. Boggs, Conn, and others who were more politically sophisticated might have thought a full slate was necessary, but they did not share this feeling with the delegates from Danville. The Danville people thought if they could only present their story to the other delegates, present the case of the southern locals, Baldanzi would be re-elected Executive Vice President. Perhaps the dyers locals knew more or had planned further, but the Danville delegates did not know there would be a full slate until after the convention had started. “God, all we wanted was help, support.”

Danville Support for Baldanzi at the 1952 Convention
Scope and Content Note: [Tibbetts took the following from one of the documents he had before him.] Danville delegates went to the convention committed to support three of Baldanzi's positions: 1) election of all business agents, joint board managers, and state, regional, and industry directors; 2) removal of certain controls from the authority of the president and putting them in the hands of the membership and the Executive Council; 3) the philosophy of trade unionism as something more than a business proposition, “a matter which we considered the key to the problem of organizing southern textile workers.”

Tibbetts' View of Events at the 1952 Convention
Scope and Content Note: The Danville people knew the convention would be packed but were still confident they could re-elect Baldanzi if they could tell their story. They never had a chance. Rieve's control of the convention was absolute. There was no debate on the issues as there had been in 1950. The Baldanzi people made no decision at the convention as to a future course of action; this was left up to the people to decide when they returned home. “We were naive.” The hope at the convention was that Baldanzi would be “reinstated,” and Rieve would calm down or get better advice. Tibbetts met with both Boyd Payton and Sol Stetin to see if they could act as go-betweens, but Stetin said the situation had become a confrontation from which there was no backing down, for which there was no compromise. The Danville people, on the other hand, felt some kind of accommodation could be made.

Introduction

Post-Convention Reactions
Scope and Content Note: The Danville people returned home depressed, with no idea what Baldanzi would do. The situation in Danville did not look good because management there was hostile to that faction of the Union which had won at the convention. Without any formal meetings, Tibbetts and others speculated what they might do. They thought of applying to the CIO for a charter separate from the TWUA but quickly realized the CIO could not do that. Tibbetts toyed with the idea of an independent southern textile union which would probably have a strong regional appeal but discarded this idea for fear that such an organization would become a racist organization or a captive of the employers.

Meeting of Baldanzi Supporters after the Vote at the Convention
Scope and Content Note: Tibbetts had the impression that no one knew what they were going to do. If the decision to approach the UTW had already been made, Tibbetts did not know about it, and the fact was not advertised.

The Effort to Affiliate with the UTW
Scope and Content Note: Baldanzi supporters began to call the Joint Board people with the idea. “With a degree of distaste,” it was decided to approach the UTW and tell it to clean house, tell it what kind of union it would have to become in order to acquire disaffected TWUA locals. A meeting was held in Virginia with UTW President Anthony Valente and Secretary-Treasurer Lloyd Klenert at which they were told by southern Baldanzi supporters what kind of union the UTW would have to become.

Danville's Switch to the UTW
Scope and Content Note: Management would not accept the switch on the basis of cards signed, so an election was held. The vote was 7,689 for UTW, 1,624 for No Union, and only 240 for TWUA. Ironically, probably a majority of those voting for UTW had crossed the picket line. They nevertheless still wanted a union. Although the workers would not pay dues, there was still a real feeling for the need for a union in Danville; an organization was needed to deal with Danville management.

Tibbetts Felt the Infusion of TWUA Blood into the UTW Would Change the UTW
Scope and Content Note: He saw the need for an organization in Danville, and UTW seemed to be the only one available; so he worked to achieve a UTW vote in the NLRB election. He felt the UTW could be made a better organization. Whether the introduction of many former TWUA members into the UTW had any effect at the national level of the UTW did not matter much to the local people in Danville. Valente and Klenert would not have much to do with the Danville situation; Baldanzi would be called in when outside help was needed.

TWUA Did Not Put on Much of a Campaign to Retain Danville
Scope and Content Note: Apparently they did not think they had much of a chance there, although Tibbetts did not see it that way at the time. TWUA did take out ads and ran radio programs. “It was an unhappy situation.”

Tibbetts Stayed at Danville for about Three Months after the UTW Victory
Scope and Content Note: The vote was held in September 1952, and he left at the end of December. He left for two reasons: 1) He was offered a job with the University of Wisconsin School for Workers, which “looked like it would provide an opportunity for working with trade union people along the lines that interested me.” 2) He needed to make a living. After the contract expired and the checkoff was lost, he voluntarily worked without pay, partly as a gesture and partly because he could afford to do so, and other staff representatives could not. He hoped this would stimulate some of the 7,689 who voted for UTW to begin paying dues, but there were only about 600 dues payers at the time he left.

Tibbetts Has Been with the University of Wisconsin School for Workers Ever Since