More info on the 75h Annivesary of the MN Truckers Strike this weekend

[annm4peace]

Street festival, program, picnic and walking tour to commemorate historic 1934 strike
8 July 2009
MINNEAPOLIS - Seventy-five years ago this summer, in grim economic times, all hell broke loose on the streets of Minneapolis. A strike by Teamsters Local 574 shut down all truck traffic in the city.
The business community’s Citizens Alliance, backed by its own private army and police, used violence to try to break the strike. Strikers fought back — ultimately winning recognition for their union.

The 1934 Minneapolis strike, together with workers’ struggles in other cities that year, helped prod Congress to pass the National Labor Relations Act in 1935. The right to organize now strengthened by federal law, a wave of union organizing nationwide helped millions of workers attain a better life.

Those historic events will be commemorated with a special program, walking tour and street festival. The program and tour are sponsored by the Minneapolis Labor Review in partnership with the Hennepin County Library. The festival is sponsored by the “One Day in July” Committee.

All events are free and open to the public.

Here’s the schedule:

July 23: Panel Discussion and Film
On Thursday, July 23, at 7 p.m., a program in the Minneapolis Central Library’s Pohlad Hall will feature a presentation by William Millikan, author of A Union Against Unions: The Minneapolis Citizens Alliance and Its Fight Against Organized Labor, 1903-1947.

Millikan is an independent scholar who lives in Minneapolis. His exhaustively researched book, published in 2001 by the Minnesota Historical Society, details how Teamster organizers used innovative tactics to take on the business-backed Citizens Alliance, which for years had successfully defeated union organizing in Minneapolis. Until 1934.

A panel will respond to Millikan’s remarks, including Mary Wingerd, Associate Professor of History at St. Cloud State University. Wingerd is author of North Country: The Making of Minnesota, to be published in 2010 by the University of Minnesota Press.

Also speaking on the panel, will be Brad A. Slawson, Jr., president of Teamsters Local 120, the successor union to Teamsters Local 574, which waged the 1934 strike. Slawson will discuss Teamsters Local 120’s current union organizing efforts and also highlight the Employee Free Choice Act, current legislation now before Congress.

Labor Review editor Steve Share will moderate the panel. The evening will begin with a screening of a new abridged version of the documentary film, “Labor’s Turning Point,” a film about the 1934 Minneapolis Teamsters strike produced in 1981 by the Labor Education Service at the University of Minnesota. Refreshments will be served.

July 25: "One Day in July” Street Festival
Billed as “A Street Festival for the Working Class -- Remembering 1934, when Minneapolis became a union town,” the festival will run from 2 to 10 p.m. Saturday, July 25, at the corner of 7th Ave. N. & 3rd St. N. in the Minneapolis Warehouse District.

The festival site at 7th Ave N and 3rd St N is one block away from an intersection where Minneapolis police gunned down 67 strikers on Friday July 20, 1934. Two strikers died of their wounds. "We will never forget the sacrifices the strikers made," says Jim McGuire, coordinator of the festival and a union shop steward. "After the strike was won, Minneapolis became one of the strongest union cities in the country. We have been benefiting ever since."

"We call our One Day In July celebration the counter-Aquatennial," McGuire says. "The Minneapolis Aquatennial was created in 1940 by business interests concerned about the tens of thousands of working people who flocked to annual summer picnics organized by the Teamsters union, heard pro-labor speeches and celebrated union culture. At One Day in July, we take back our working class history, culture and traditions."

Over 1,000 attended the first One Day In July celebration in 2004 on the 70th anniversary of the Teamster labor battles. Headlined by The Strike, City Pages named it "Best Street Festival of 2004." Organizers expect a larger attendance this summer as a devastating economic crisis creates a renewed interest in unions on the part of younger workers.

Scheduled performers include Brother Ali featuring BK One, El Guante, Mic Crenshaw, The Brass Kings, Ellis, 2 Tone Runts, City on the Make and Best Bitch in Show. For more information visit www.onedayinjuly.org or contact Jim McGuire [phone], [e-mail].

July 26: Picnic
An anniversary picnic, sponsored by the 1934 Minneapolis Truckers Strike Picnic Committee, will be held Sunday, July 26. It will run from noon to 5 p.m. in the Wabun Picnic Area (Picnic Area No. 4) of Minnehaha Park, Minneapolis. Activities will include speakers, historical displays, food and children’s games. For more information, go to http://1934strike.wordpress.com/

Aug. 6: Walking Tour
Thursday, Aug. 6, at 6:30 p.m., a walking tour will leave from the Central Library to visit sites important to the 1934 Minneapolis Teamsters strike in the former Market District (now Minneapolis Warehouse District).

Meet the tour a few minutes before 6:30 p.m. in the library’s Central Hall.
The tour leader will be David Riehle, local labor historian and member of the United Transportation Union. Riehle regularly leads labor history tours in the Twin Cities.

The tour will proceed rain or shine. Total walking distance: about two miles. The Downtown Central Library is located at 300 Nicollet Mall, Minneapolis.

For more information on the program and tour, or for a reading list on Minneapolis labor history, visit www.minneapolisunions.org, or call 612-379-4725.

Portions of this article are reprinted from the Minneapolis Labor Review.