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Holland, Rebecca (Goldberg) (audio interview #2 of 3)
INTERVIEW DESCRIPTION - This second interview with Rebecca Holland Goldberg, conducted in her home, was part of a UCLA student project. Both the narrator and interviewer speak very softly. TOPICS - Brookwood Labor College, 1923; political beliefs; 1924 general strike in New York; reorganizing Local 100 in Chicago; and the Women's Trade Union League; the left-right factional split in ILGWU during 1922 NY general strike; organizing techniques and strategies to recruit women to the union; 1917 and 1919 strikes in Chicago; election to Joint Board; and gender relations in the union; 11/19/1974
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- 2020-04-03
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- File: lhgwrholland3.mp3 Audio Segments and Topics: (0:00-0:43)... Tape introduction. (0:43-4:22)... <The audio quality throughout this segment is poor> [Note: Holland introduces several photographs, which are discussed; she notes that many of her papers were lost when her house burned down.] One of the photographs she discusses is of two Puerto Rican women who came to Chicago in 1934 to learn about the labor union movement. Holland had a difficult time finding a place for them to live because many of the apartment houses she took them to wouldn't rent to them because they looked Black, and they refused to stay in Harlem. She also had a difficult time finding restaurants where they could eat, too. Ultimately, she housed them at the Amalgamated Union hall. She spent six weeks with these women, introducing them to labor union policies and procedures, after which they returned to Puerto Rico and participated in union activities there. (4:22-8:11)... In 1923, she attended Brookwood Labor College, which was an international and interracial college financed by the union and private funds. The Women's Trade Union League often found wealthy women to contribute to the college and Eleanor Roosevelt also assisted the college with monetary contributions. At the time she attended, A.J. Muste was the head of the Brookwood. Unlike herself, most of the people at the college had no formal education and came from sparsely populated areas of the country. The students were active in their unions and included miners, steelworkers, textile workers, etc. While she was there, there was only one Black woman enrolled. Holland and Muste had to convince this woman to stay in the school after some White women objected to her presence there. (8:11-12:29)... The courses at Brookwood Labor College included the study of anarchism, socialism, and communism. Most of the students had no political background and were at the college on scholarships from their unions or other sources. Many of the students had very poor reading and writing skills, including Julius Hoffman, who later became the Vice President of the Dressmakers Local. Holland met with a group of students every week and taught them reading and writing skills. (12:29-17:22)... Brookwood Labor College was interesting because it gave workers with a lot of potential an opportunity to obtain an education, which was something they would not have access to in their home towns. The course of study also included the IWW theory developed by William Haywood, which suggested that workers control the government, not politicians. Although she did not belong to the IWW, she sympathized with this theory. She does not believe in the "establishment" and considers herself a rebel. Even though she is from a socialist background, most of the radical parties carried some form of an established authority. (17:22-21:55)... In 1924, a general strike was called by the dressmakers to protest poor working conditions and job security. However, the strike was unsuccessful because of poor leadership. In 1925, the union sent her to Chicago to reorganize Local 100. Her activities consisted of visiting women in their homes and recruiting them to form an executive board for the Local. She guaranteed the workers job security if the came back into the ILGWU. (21:55-26:19)... When she reorganized Local 100 after the 1924 general strike, she formed an Executive Board of approximately nineteen women. More than eighty women from different garment shops attended the first Local meeting. She also met with manufacturers to reassure them that the union was the best solution to their industry problems. Committees were established in every shop and there were approximately 5,000 members in Local 100 when she left in October 1925. (26:19-28:21)... Although the Women's Trade Union League was helpful to the working women in many ways, most of the women in the organization did not understand workers' issues. Some of the women were active with the workers, such as Eleanor Roosevelt, who marched on the picket line with the workers during strikes in New York. end of tape File: lhgwrholland4.mp3 (0:00-3:37)... She was a member of Local 91 (children's dresses) when the 1922 general strike was called in New York. This was also the period when the struggle erupted in the ILGWU between the left and right factions within the union. When Sigman assumed the presidency of the union, he discovered that the communists had cleaned out the treasury. (3:37-4:35)... When the split occurred in the ILGWU, she aligned herself with the ILGWU because she did not want to work with the communists. Although, philosophically, her sympathies were with the IWW, she remained an active member of the ILGWU. (4:35-7:10)... She also participated in the 1917 strike in Chicago. The issues in this strike included better wages and job security. She recalls meeting Jenny Matyas, a union official from San Francisco. This particular strike involved a preferential shop. She describes the ILGWU's policy in organizing preferential and closed shops, indicating that the union never managed closed shops. (7:10-12:00)... She began organizing shops in 1916. The first shop she organized with the assistance of her employer, who agreed to unionize if she taught him how to write. When she organized workers, she told them that the union could offer them better wages and job security. At new shops, she found out which women in the shop were pro-union and they would talk about the union and start organizing the workers. If an employee in a shop was fired, she used this as leverage, explaining to the workers that the union would guarantee that they would not lose their jobs. When enough women agreed to go union, they stopped working and left the shop until the employer signed an agreement with the union. (12:00-18:33)... During the 1919 strike in Chicago, she was a member of the Joint Board and worked as the secretary of the strike. This strike was a very successful and was over fast. People referred to the Joint Board as "Rebecca and the five men" because she was the only woman on the board. In general, she was liked and respected by both union officials and workers. She never experienced any problems because she was a woman, which leads her to believe woman have just as many opportunities as men. She noticed problems between the sexes when women used their gender to take advantage of men. (18:33-21:01)... Typically, if a man and a woman ran for the same union position, the man usually won the election. When Rose Pesotta went to the Executive Board and complained about union policies, she was not elected again and the man who replaced her was incompetent, which goes to show that women have to prove themselves more than men. Holland believes that union women are typically more qualified and better educated than their male counterparts. If a male union official is in a clique, his chances of being elected and staying in a union position are very good. However, there are more expectations placed on a woman when she runs for office. (21:01-24:48)... Although society is changing, people expect more from women than men. In terms of her own situation, she did not have any difficulty because she was better educated than most of the men around her. If there were tasks to be done, she took charge and wrote leaflets or took meeting minutes. She was also a very outspoken person and was not afraid to express her opinion within the union. (24:48-25:31)... There is a brief discussion regarding a Zionist magazine she subscribes to. She mentions an article about a labor union committee traveling to Israel to evaluate the labor conditions there. End of tape.
- SUBJECT BIO - Rebecca Holland (Goldberg) was a long time organizer for the ILGWU, beginning in 1912 in Chicago. She was active in the union later in Los Angeles, and although the details of her organizing activities in Los Angeles are somewhat sparse, her interview is interesting because she and the governing clique in Los Angeles are discussed by Anita Castro in her interview. The interview with Holland (Goldberg) was conducted as a student project at UCLA. INTERVIEW DESCRIPTION - This second interview with Rebecca Holland Goldberg, conducted in her home, was part of a UCLA student project. Both the narrator and interviewer speak very softly. TOPICS - Brookwood Labor College, 1923; political beliefs; 1924 general strike in New York; reorganizing Local 100 in Chicago; and the Women's Trade Union League; the left-right factional split in ILGWU during 1922 NY general strike; organizing techniques and strategies to recruit women to the union; 1917 and 1919 strikes in Chicago; election to Joint Board; and gender relations in the union;
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