USW About Us

History of the United Steelworkers

First USW Union Hall

The creation of the modern United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union (USW) is part of the long-sought goal of creating a single union to forcefully represent the interests of industrial workers and other North American workers as well.

The USW today has substantial membership and jurisdictions in metals, chemicals, energy, paper, rubber, mining, glass, aluminum, stone work, upholstery, and at many more industrial and service employers. It is heir to an age-old tradition of union activism that dates to the earliest days of North American democracy.

For generations before the Great Depression of the 1930s that brought forth the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) and the modern industrial union movement, it was the hope of millions of ordinary working people of North America to gain a fair share of the wealth that flowed from their labor.

The unions that now comprise the United Steelworkers exemplify this spirit of collective activism. Ours is a legacy inspired by the commitment to extend the blessings of freedom, justice and prosperity to all North American workers and their families.

Some of the unions now part of the USW date back to the mid- and late-19^th Century, including the iron puddlers’ Sons of Vulcan, the Oil Well Workingmen’s Association, and the paper machine tenders’ Brotherhood of Papermakers, which was formed in1872, two years before the American Federation of Labor was even organized.

These early unions often had a variety of social components for the benefit of working families: auxiliaries for women; children's’ groups; sports leagues; dances; parades; language and leadership schools. They were social organizations as well as cultural oases for the poor and low income workers often living in difficult conditions.

By the 1930s, a large number of working people had had enough of the endemic social inequality they and their families faced, and were ready for a new type of unionism that offered a greater level of equality and social justice. Many found what they were looking for in one of the largest unions organized by the new Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), the United Steelworkers of America (USWA).

Formed in 1942 after several years as the Steel Workers Organizing Committee, the USWA’s first president was Philip Murray, and veteran of the coal fields and their turbulent labor scene. For more than half a century, the USWA has been a major force in the North American labor movement.

It is a testament to USWA union members and the standards they project that throughout this union’s history, other labor organizations have come to join our ranks. On many fronts, the USWA has lived by its motto and advanced the interests of union members. This union responded when workers called for organizing assistance. The USWA blazed new trails in negotiating company-paid health care insurance and retirement plans, and helped lift many who were previously considered to be working poor firmly into the middle class. The union helped black workers gain a greater degree of social and economic equality, helped introduce women into the workplace at many companies, allowing them to compete for the good-paying jobs. And the union has fought for full citizenship rights for Hispanic workers and other minority groups.

The United Steelworkers of America was born from the smoky steel town but soon moved to all corners of the North American continent, manifesting the hopes, desires and fighting spirit of the working class people.

By the time another strong industrial union, PACE, joined forces with the USWA in 2005, a long line of former labor organizations had merged their traditions with that of the Steelworkers.

These include:

Amalgamated Association of Iron Steel & Tin Workers (1876-1942)

Amalgamated Association of Iron & Steel Workers (founded 1876)

Sons of Vulcan, Grand Forge of the United States (1862)

Iron & Steel Heaters, Rollers, Roughers, Catchers & Hookers of the U.S. (1872)

International Association of Tin Workers (1898)

Tube Workers Union (1902)

Steel & Metal Workers Industrial Union-TUUL (1929)

Aluminum Workers of America-CIO (1937-1944)

Intl. Union of Mine, Mill & Smelter Workers (1893-1967)

Western Federation of Miners (1893-1916)

United Stone & Allied Products Workers of America (1903-1971)

Quarrymen’s National Union of the USA (1890)

National Slate Quarrymen’s Union (1895)

Quarry Workers International Union of North America (1903-1941)

District 50, Allied and Technical Workers of the U.S. and Canada (1968-1972)

National Council of Gas & By-Product Coke Workers-CIO (1936-1942)

UMWA District 50, Gas, Coke & Chemical Workers (1942-1968)

Upholsterers International Union (1883-1985)

United Rubber, Cork, Linoleum & Plastic Workers of America (1935-1995)

Knights of Labor Rubber Workers Union (1880)

Amalgamated Rubber Workers Union of North America (1902)

IWW Rubber Workers Industrial Union (1913)

Aluminum, Brick & Glass Workers Intl. Union (1982-1997)

Aluminum Workers Intl. Union (1953-1982)

United Brick & Clay Workers of America (1901-1982)

International Alliance of Brick, Tile & Terra Cotta Workers (1901)

Knights of Labor Brick & Terra Cotta Workers (1885)

United Glass & Ceramic Workers of North America (1954-1982)

Federation of Glass, Ceramic & Silica Sand Workers of America (1940)

Federation of Flat Glass Workers of America-CIO (1934)

American Flint Glass Workers Union (1878-2003)

United Flint Glass Workers (1878-1917)

International Woodworkers Alliance (Canada) (1938-2004)

International Shingle Weavers Union (1887)

IWW Timbering & Foresting Workers Industrial Union (1905)

Saw Mill & Timber Union (1933)

International Woodworkers of America (1938)

National Union of Furniture Workers & Allied Crafts-Canada (1947)

United Fish & Allied Workers Union (Canada) (1937-2004)

Canadian Railroad Workers

Transportation Communications International Union (Canada) (1999)

(including the locals and railway workers of the following union traditions: Brotherhood of Railway, Airline & Steamship Clerks, Freight Handlers, Express & Station Employees; United Transport Service Employees-CIO; International Brotherhood of Red Caps; Order of Railroad Telegraphers; Railway Patrolmen's International Union; Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters; American Railway and Airway Supervisors Association; Western Railway Supervisors Association; Brotherhood Railway Carmen, Federation of Business Machine Technicians & Engineers, and; the American Railway Union.)

Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees (Canada) (2004)

Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers Intl. Union - PACE

United Paperworkers International Union (1972-1999)

Pulp Sulfite & Paper Mill Workers of the U.S. and Canada (1909-1972)

United Papermakers & Paperworkers (1957-1972)

International Brotherhood of Papermakers (1902-1957)

United Brotherhood of Paper Makers of America (1884)

International Paper Machine Tenders Union ((1898)

Paper Machine Tenders, Beaters & Engineers (1893)

United Paperworkers of America-CIO (1946-1957)

United International Union, Paper, Playthings & Novelty Workers of America-CIO (1938)

Allied Industrial Workers (1956-1994)

United Auto Workers-AFL (1939-1956)

Independent Workers of North America (1986-1991)

United Cement, Lime & Gypsum Workers Intl Union (1939-1984)

Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers (1955-1999)

Oil Workers International Union-CIO (1937-1955)

International Brotherhood of Oil and Gas Well Workers (1899)

International Association. of Oil Field, Gas Well and Refinery Workers of America.(1918)

Oil Well Workers Protective Association (1878)

Oil Well Workingmens’ Association (1872)

United Gas, Coke & Chemical Workers-CIO (1942-1955)

National Council of Gas & By-Product Coke Workers (1935-1942)

The article below is a story about the first local union hall which was dedicated by Eleanor Roosevelt on April 10, 1948 and appeared in Steelabor.

Great Lakes Steel Local To Hear Murray April 10

Union’s Home, Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial Hall, to Be Dedicated at River Rouge, Michigan

President Philip Murray will speak at dedication ceremonies at Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial Hall, the new home of Great Lakes Steel Local 1299, River Rouge, Michigan, District 29, on Wednesday, April 10.

The hall, one of the most handsome structures erected by any labor organization, is a two-story building topped by a steeple and cost $70,000. The architecture is the modern-colonial style.

U.S.W.A Local 1299 Union Hall River Rouge, Michigan

Located at Jefferson Avenue and Florence Street, the new building is only four blocks from the main gate of the Great Lakes Steel Corp., a subsidiary of National Steel, employer of the nearly 7,500 members of Local 1299.

The type of construction is a steel frame with brick facing and inside walls of cinder blocks. The more than 12,000 feet of floor space provides an auditorium seating 500, smaller meeting room, a board room, three main floor offices for local union business, office space for the Great Lakes Steelworkers Federal Credit Union, five smaller offices on the second floor designed for private grievance meetings, a projection room for movies, a fireproof vault for union records, and a basement with sufficient space for eight bowling alleys and a grill-bar.

Among the modern touches are the built-in public address system, an acoustic ceiling in the auditorium, fluorescent lighting throughout, and a Dravo Co. furnace – a USA-CIO product.

The building is 100 percent union-produced. Local 1299 assigned one of its members full time to observe its construction.

A large bronze plaque of Franklin D. Roosevelt hangs on the wall of the entrance hall.

“It is no accident that Great Lakes Steel Local 1299 now has a home second to none,” commented Director Thomas Shane of District 29. “This local is the best organized integrated basic steel unit in the USA-CIO with better than 98 per cent of those eligible holding membership. Furthermore, Local 1299 has a dues schedule of $1.50 which made the financing of the building possible.”

Officers of Local 1299 are: Fred A. Boomer, president; Charles Younglove, vice-president representing the Great Lakes Steel Division; Earl Loyer, vice-president representing the Hanna Furnace Division; Henry Wingard, vice-president representing the Michigan Steel Division; Harvey Bowman, financial secretary; Herman Fansler, treasurer; James Crutcher, recording secretary; Al Woodbury, guide; Dave Castleman, inside guard; Phil Bada, outside guard; Kai Nielson, Alex Fuller and Arthur Bishop, trustees, Chief grievancemen are August Krieger and Mike Brown.

Eleanor Roosevelt speaking at the dedication ceremony

The Knoch Florists of River Rouge volunteered to do the landscaping around the building.

Leo Cummings of Local 1299 photographed the building for Steel Labor.

The building committee of Local 1299 is headed by Neal Stumpff. Lester Hidusky was the full-time “watch-dog” during the construction period. Other committee members are Harvey Bowman, Fred Boomer, Thomas Scarbrough, William Welch, Herman Fansler and Alex Fuller.

A district-wide conference of local unions is scheduled for Thursday, April 11, the day following dedication ceremonies.