Collection Profile: Catholic University's Gilded Age and Progressive Era Labor Collections

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2 Collection Profile: Catholic University's Gilded Age and Progressive Era Labor Collections William John Shepherd Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies, Volume 85, Number 3, Summer 2018, pp (Article) Published by Penn State University Press For additional information about this article Access provided by Catholic University of America (29 Jun :45 GMT)

3 collection profile catholic university s gilded age and progressive era labor collections William John Shepherd Catholic University of America abstract: Now available online in digital format are the papers of John Mitchell, Terence V. Powderly, and John W. Hayes, three Gilded Age and Progressive Era labor leaders of significant national importance with strong ties to Pennsylvania. Powderly was active in union work, eventually rising to national leadership; in addition, he served as mayor of Scranton, practiced law, and became a Republican Party operative before working for the federal government. He was also a world traveler, talented photographer, and author. John William Hayes also became active with unions and was an ally of Powderly until 1893 when Hayes joined with the socialists and populist agrarians in order to oust Powderly from his leadership role in the Knights of Labor. John Mitchell began working as a farm laborer as a child, then became a coal miner. He was first a member of the Knights of Labor and then, successively, legislative agent, organizer, vice president, and president of the fledgling United Mine Workers of America (UMWA). keywords: Terence V. Powderly, John W. Hays, John Mitchell, Catholic University Archives, labor history Now available online in digital format are the papers of John Mitchell, Terence V. Powderly, and John W. Hayes, three Gilded Age and Progressive Era labor leaders of significant national importance with strong ties to Pennsylvania. This research extravaganza is thanks to a partnership between the host repository, The Catholic University of America, and ProQuest, via the latter s History Vault subscription service. The original papers of these three men, housed at CUA since the 1940s in relative obscurity, have slowly increased in accessibility, first due to a microfilming project in the 1970s. Since 2001, detailed finding aids and digital scanning via the Washington Research Library Consortium pennsylvania history: a journal of mid-atlantic studies, vol. 85, no. 3, Copyright 2018 The Pennsylvania Historical Association

4 collection profile (WRLC) of Mitchell and Powderly photographs have been available. 1 The current ProQuest digitization project, based on scanning the microfilm, is a culmination of over seventy years of archival processing and outreach of these valuable collections documenting a critical period in American labor history. The Catholic University of America (CUA), founded in Washington, DC, in 1887, had no archival program until The newly created archives sought a viable collecting scope beyond the university s institutional records, including not only major Catholic organizations such as the National Catholic Welfare Conference (NCWC, the predecessor of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops) and the National Catholic Education Association, but also movements of great significance to American Catholics, especially labor history. The presence at the university of the so-called labor priests, John A. Ryan, Francis J. Haas, and George G. Higgins, greatly catalyzed securing the collections of notable Catholic labor leaders like Mitchell, Powderly, and Hayes. 3 These priests not only wrote about labor relations but also worked to facilitate worker- management negotiations. Most important, they were committed to documenting for posterity the pro-labor legacy of the American Catholic Church. Powderly, born in 1849 and the son of Irish immigrants, came from Carbondale, Pennsylvania. He had seven brothers and four sisters and little opportunity for more than a rudimentary education. Employed at a young age as a railroad switchman, he later apprenticed as a machinist. He joined the International Union of Machinists and Blacksmiths in 1871, later becoming local president. His union activities and the Depression of 1873 left him out of work and blacklisted as a union agitator. He joined the Scranton Local Assembly No. 88 of the Knights of Labor in 1876, where he rose to national leadership as Grand (later General) Master Workman, The Knights came into prominence during his tenure but a divisive power struggle led to Powderly s removal and eventual succession by John William Hayes. Powderly also served as a progressive mayor of Scranton, , practiced law, and became a Republican Party operative. From 1897 to 1901, he served in the federal government as Commissioner General of Immigration, then Special Immigration Inspector in He followed these duties as Chief of the Immigration Division of Information, , and finally became Labor Department Commissioner of Conciliation, Beyond these professional positions, Powderly was a world traveler, talented photographer, and author of Thirty Years of Labor (1889) and his memoirs, The Path I Trod (1921, 1940). The US Department of Labor's Hall of Honor honored him as 407

5 pennsylvania history an inductee in 1999, joining familiar labor figures such as Samuel Gompers, Mary Harris Mother Jones, Philip Murray, and William B. Wilson. After Powderly s death in 1924, his papers remained with his second wife, Emma Fickenscher, who later transferred them to her sister, Daisy, who survived her. In a legal document signed September 9, 1939, Daisy transferred all rights to Powderly's niece, Mary. Through the influence of Monsignor Haas and Rev. William J. Kerby, Miss Powderly donated the papers to CUA on November 7, The Powderly Papers richly detail the organization and development of labor, immigration policy and practice, and political patronage and infighting in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century America. Major series of files include the Knights of Labor, Immigration, Personal Papers, Printed Matter, and Photographs. The Knights and Immigration figure 1 Group portrait (left to right): William Bauchop Wilson, first Secretary of Labor, , Anthony Caminetti, Commissioner of Immigration, , and T. V. Powderly. Courtesy Powderly Papers, Catholic University Archives. 408

6 collection profile series are treasure troves of primary source material while the photograph series is a multifaceted wealth of cultural imagery and geographical landmarks. In the 1950s and 1960s, CUA microfilmed on campus various parts of the Powderly Papers, including letter press copy books and Knights of Labor proceedings, generally undertaken piece-meal in response to researcher requests. Thereafter, CUA began to consider a more formal microfilming project, perhaps funded by the NHPRC or the AFL-CIO. In , CUA adapted and used a microfilming and indexing proposal developed by Professor Jonathan Garlock of the University of Rochester, who had used the papers extensively for his own research. In 1974 work was undertaken (94 reels) and funded by the Microfilming Corporation of America. The editor of the project was John A. Turcheneske Jr. and his printed Guide to the Microfilm Edition incorporated the text and research of Dr. Garlock. Born in 1854 in Philadelphia to Irish immigrants, John William Hayes went to Illinois in 1871 and worked first as a farm hand, then as a brakeman for the Dayton and Michigan Railroad. In 1872 he worked as a brakeman with the Pennsylvania Railroad at Trenton and Philadelphia, but in 1878 he lost his right arm in a railroad accident and thereafter learned telegraphy. He joined the Knights of Labor in 1874 and became a delegate to the national telegraphers convention of 1883, which called a strike for better wages. Blacklisted after this, Hayes operated a grocery store in New Brunswick, New Jersey. However, in 1884, he was elected to the General Executive Board of the Knights of Labor and soon became an ally and confidant of Terence Powderly. Hayes became General Secretary Treasurer in 1888 and continued to work closely with Powderly until 1893 when Hayes joined with the socialists and populist agrarians in order to oust Powderly from leadership of the Knights, already in decline This gave way to the emerging American Federation of Labor (AFL) under the leadership of Samuel L. Gompers. Hayes remained in control of the fading Knights, first as General Secretary Treasurer until 1902, then as General Master Workman until the closure of the Knights headquarters in Washington in Thereafter, Hayes mostly involved himself in business promotion as well as publishing the National Labor Digest. The Hayes Papers (49 boxes; 24.5 linear feet) are almost equally divided between official Knights of Labor correspondence with district and local assemblies and his personal affairs. The former also includes records of the General Executive Board and the membership. CUA received the Hayes Papers from his family in 1943, the year after he died. The Hayes Papers were microfilmed (15 reels) together with the Powderly Papers in Unlike 409

7 pennsylvania history the more voluminous Powderly and Mitchell Papers, the Hayes Papers were microfilmed in their entirety. John Mitchell, born in 1870 in Braidwood, Illinois, was a legendary leader of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA). His mother died shortly after his birth and his father, an immigrant from Ireland, died when the boy was only six. Reared by his father s third wife, Mitchell had little opportunity for education and assisted his stepmother in doing the neighborhood washing. He left home at age ten and began working as a farm laborer and later a coal miner. Though mostly employed in Illinois, he also toiled in Colorado and New Mexico. He was first a member of the Knights of Labor and then, successively, legislative agent, organizer, vice president, and president of the fledgling UMWA. Mitchell s leadership in the momentous Anthracite Coal Strike of 1902 resulted in significant gains for coal miners and greater recognition for the UMWA. Often in poor health, he stepped down as UMWA president in 1908 and died in He was also vice president of the American Federal of Labor (AFL) and member of the National Child Labor Committee, the National Civic Federation, Federal Milk Commission, Federal Food Board for New York City, New York State Labor Industrial Commission, New York State Food Administration, and the New York State Council of Farms and Markets. He is buried in Scranton. His published works include Organized Labor: Its Problems, Purposes, and Ideals (1903) and The Wage Earner (1912). figure 2 John Mitchell at his desk, circa Courtesy Mitchell Papers, Catholic University Archives. 410

8 collection profile In 1942 Rev. Raymond McGowan, affiliated with both the NCWC and CUA, met with Rev. Thomas Darby at an industrial conference in Brooklyn. Darby informed him that Mitchell s children had preserved his papers and wanted to gift them to CUA. McGowan referred Darby to Monsignor Haas, who in 1943 contacted the family and arranged for these materials to be donated to the university. The Mitchell Papers reflect his myriad labor and civic affiliations. The correspondence includes drafts of articles and speeches, minutes of meetings, financial reports, and convention resolutions. Significant people, events, and conditions of the Gilded Age are revealed, especially in the UMWA material, regarding such watershed issues as standardized wages, safe working conditions, and collective bargaining. Over the years the Mitchell children and his secretary, Elizabeth Morris, donated additional material. In 1975 the Mitchell Papers, sans most clippings and many photographs, were microfilmed (55 reels) and a printed guide prepared by the editor, John A Turcheneske Jr. ProQuest, including companies and affiliates Ex Libris and Alexander Street, is well known in the world s research and learning communities for curating an archive of billions of vetted, indexed documents connected via a variety of research communities. The ProQuest History Vault debuted in 2011 and is constantly adding new archival collections documenting widely studied topics in American history. A particular strength is the coverage of social movements, especially racial justice, women s rights, and organized labor. The racial justice collections include essential content like the NAACP Papers and FBI files on the civil rights movement, with the former being named a Library Journal Best Reference Pick for History Vault also contains unique slave petitions in Slavery and the Law and Plantation Records in Southern Life and African American History, winning a Library Journal Best Reference Pick for History Vault s content contains such thematic categories as Civil Rights and the Black Freedom Struggle; Southern Life, Slavery, and the Civil War; Workers and Labor Unions; American Politics and Society; International Relations and Military Conflicts; American Indians and the American West; and Women s Studies. Institutions can build collections over time to provide research access for students and faculty who would otherwise be unable to access materials held at geographically dispersed archives. The collections can be purchased either as a perpetual archive or as a subscription. All have harmonized metadata with enhanced search features. The Powderly, Hayes, and Mitchell papers are part of a module entitled Labor Unions in the US, : Knights of 411

9 pennsylvania history figure 3 President Woodrow Wilson depicted on the cover of a war-time labor pamphlet, Courtesy Mitchell Papers, Catholic University Archives. 412

10 collection profile figure 4 Original records, microfilm, and finding aids to the Powderly, Mitchell, and Hayes papers. Photograph by the author. Labor, AFL, CIO, and AFL-CIO. This is the second module in the theme of Workers and Labor Unions. Collections from other institutions in this, such as the University of Maryland at College Park and the Wisconsin Historical Society, and include American Bureau of Industrial Research, AFL President William Green Papers, and the CIO and Industrial Unionism in America, Adolph Germer Papers. Because the History Vault digitization project scanned the 1970s microfilm, there are portions of the Powderly and Mitchell papers that are not represented, as the microfilm project managers decided to omit certain files deemed duplicative or unprocessed but also printed materials and photographs that did not show up well on microfilm. The nonmicrofilmed portions are so noted on the Powderly and Mitchell finding aids and remain open to traditional archival research as is also the case with all the original materials. Additionally, the majority of the Mitchell and portions of the more substantial Powderly photographs are freely available on line via WRLC. 413

11 pennsylvania history william john shepherd is a Pennsylvania native, descendant of generations of coal miners, graduate of the Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP), and member of the editorial board of Pennsylvania History. He has worked as an archivist at Catholic University in Washington, DC, for many years, processing many of the labor collections as well as creating the blog The Archivist s Nook. He is currently Catholic University s acting university archivist. He is also a freelance writer for magazines such as America s Civil War and Military History and a regular contributor to The Churchill Project website at Hillsdale College. He lives in suburban Maryland with his wife and son. NOTES 1. See finding aids at archives.lib.cua.edu/findingaid/hayes.cfm; and findingaid/mitchell.cfm. See Washington Research Library Consortium digital collections at and See also the author s two articles about the Powderly photos: The Photographs of Terence V. Powderly, Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies 81, no. 4 (Autumn 2014): , DOI: /pnh , cua.edu/res/docs/article-tvp-photos-wjs-pa-hist-fall-2014.pdf; and (with Mary Beth Corrigan), Becoming a Capital City: The Photographs of Terence Vincent Powderly, Washington History (December 2012): , archives.lib.cua.edu/res/docs/article-tvp-photos-wh-2012.pdf. 2. For more on the founding of the CUA Archives see my (with Timothy J. Meagher), The Local Church from the National Perspective: Collecting American Catholic History at The Catholic University of America, U.S. Catholic Historian 16, no. 1 (Winter 1998): , res/docs/tjm-wjs-local-church-1998.pdf. 3. For more on labor priests see the blog post from The Archivist s Nook: What the Heck Is a Labor Priest? by Dr. Maria Mazzenga, March 3, 2016, at and Joseph Turrini, Catholic Social Action at Work: A Brief History of the Labor Collection at The Catholic University of America, American Archivist 68, no. 1 (Spring/Summer 2005):