TO STRIKE OR NOT TO STRIKE
By Maj. Gen. Jerry R. Curry (Ret'd)
CurryforAmerica.com
To him leadership came naturally, he simply stepped
up and others followed, without drawn out discussion
or question, as though it was destined from before
time began that, for over thirty years,
my father, Jesse Aaron Curry, would wear the
mantle of Grievance Committeeman in the United Steel
Worker’s Union of the Glassport, Pennsylvania, Plant
of the Pittsburgh Steel Foundry.
While growing up in the town of Liberty in Western
Pennsylvania, family discussions at the dinner table
generally centered around three subjects: the Great
Depression and how fortunate we were that, unlike
many families, Dad had a good paying job as a steel
worker that put food on the table and clothes on our
backs; the goings on at Bethlehem Baptist Church
where my mother was superintendent of the Sunday
School; and how well my five brothers and sisters
and I were doing in our school work and in
performing the family chores.
Dad worked five days a week as a welder at the steel
foundry, but in the evenings and on weekends he did
truck farming. Each of us children had assigned
chores and we carried them out faithfully or, as our
father promised, “he would tear down a tree limb
across our backs,” and Dad was always true to his
word.
My assigned chores consisted of slopping the hogs
twice a day, cleaning out the hen house, picking up
eggs each morning, and killing and plucking chickens
that Dad had sold to friends in town. It kept me
busy and out of most normal childhood mischief.
Dad was a strong believer in labor unions and had
been an officer, a grievance committee man, in the
local steel workers union all my young life, and
made its affairs our family’s affairs. Around the
dinner table we discussed management labor problems,
sometimes passing memos around the table for comment
and suggested grammatical improvements, occasionally
Dad holding forth on some pet subject of his,
usually having to do with “The Local,” which is how
the steel workers referred to the local branch of
the steelworker’s union.
When my two brothers and I finished high school,
before we left home to do other things, Dad felt we
should spend a year working in The Foundry, not
learning a skill so much as learning how to develop
good adult work habits. Many years would pass before
I fully appreciated the service he had done me that
year, by insisting that I work along side him as a
welder and scarffer.
One winter’s night after work Dad said to me, “Son,
the rank and file don’t know it yet, but next week
they are going to go out on strike. The order to
call a strike has come down from “National.” [He was
referring to the national headquarters of the United
Steel Worker’s
“Now here’s the way it works. The Local will call a
labor meeting at the Union Hall for Friday afternoon
when the shifts change. I want you to sit in the
back of the Hall and observe. No matter how strongly
you feel about what’s going on, don’t say a word,
nothing.
“The President of the Local and some of us officers
will sit up front. The President will read a letter
from National presenting the union’s side of the
issue, saying that
Company and Management have treated us
workers unfairly, tramped all over our rights,
refused to listen to reason, and so there’s nothing
left for us to do but to go on strike. At the end of
the meeting we’ll take a strike vote, and the
majority will vote to strike.
“My role is to stand up and argue vehemently that it
makes no sense to strike and that I think Management
is willing to talk to us and iron out our
differences. Then some of the other local officers
will jump to their feet and angrily condemn me, will
strongly support the President and National, and
will say that only cowards are afraid to strike for
their rights.
“Most workers will go along with whatever the
President says, but there will be about a half dozen
trouble makers in the hall, men who will not easily
go along with the decision to “Strike” and who, if
allowed to be heard, could change some of the other
men’s minds. These trouble makers will jump to their
feet and try to present the ‘No Strike’ side of the
argument. We think we know who most of them are and
will be watching them closely.
“Also we have appointed goons to sit close by each
one of them, when they stand up our boys will grab
them and haul them back down into their seats and
out shout them. It won’t be very pretty and emotions
will run high, but in the end they’ll be intimidated
into sitting down and shutting up. Remember, no
matter what happens, don’t you get involved and
don’t try to protect me.”
Dad called it exactly right and it developed just as
he predicted it would. The President condemned
Management, My father put up a good fight as to why
the workers should vote “No, to going out on
strike.” Some misguided individuals tried to support
him and to rationally present reasons as to why
striking at this time didn’t make good sense, the
goons sitting near them were ready, manhandled them
back into their seats, and shouted them into
silence. At the end of the meeting we all voted,
little slips of paper were passed around, we marked
the ballots “Yes” or “No,” and the “ayes” won.
While we had been inside the Hall practicing labor
union democracy, some of the union guys had rolled
out 55 gallon barrels, placed them at convenient
locations, shoveled them partially full of coal, and
set them on fire so we wouldn’t be getting cold
walking the picket lines. Then the “Strike” signs
for us to carry miraculously appeared from somewhere
and we “Struck”.
There wasn’t much interest or excitement on either
side, Management or
Soon official word came down from National that the