Description
Book SynopsisA study of the ladies’ garment industry in northeastern Pennsylvania between 1945 and 1995, featuring sixteen selected oral histories conducted with workers, shop owners, and others with knowledge of the industry.
Trade Review“A detailed yet readable study of the lives of the garment industry. This is a fine social history of ordinary people that brings the past to life.”
—Richard A. Greenwald,author of The Triangle Fire, the Protocols of Peace, and Industrial Democracy in Progressive Era New York
“An important contribution to US labor history and twentieth-century US history. The interviews offer nuanced views and multiple perspectives on labor struggles in the region, offering particularly new and valuable views of the influence of geography on industrial development and the growth of the trade union movement and showing why we need a broad view to understand even local industrial history.”
—Thomas Dublin,author of The Face of Decline: The Pennsylvania Anthracite Region in the Twentieth Century
“Taking the measure, Wolensky has produced a valuable and informative work. It will serve as an important primary source, giving insights into not only the Wyoming Valley but also eastern Pennsylvania, its economy, its people, and the mores of the era it covers.”
—Richard P. Mulcahy Pennsylvania History
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations
Preface
Acknowledgments
List of Abbreviations
Introduction: Northeastern Pennsylvania and the Garment Industry
1. Dorothy “Dot” Ney: Garment Worker, Union Organizer, and Business Agent
2. William “Bill” Cherkes: Garment Shop Owner and Garment Association President
3. Minnie “Min” Matheson: Labor Leader, Social Activist, and ILGWU District Director
4. Angelo “Rusty” “Bill” DePasquale: Mineworker and ILGWU Organizer and “Enforcer”
5. Anthony “Tony” D’Angelo: Garment Presser and Barber
6. Alice Reca: Garment Worker, Union Organizer, and Business Agent
7. John “Johnny” Justin: Garment Worker, Labor Organizer, and ILGWU District Director
8. Clementine “Clem” Lyons: Garment Worker, Business Agent, and Chorus Performer and Director
Image Gallery
9. Helen Weiss: Garment Worker, Business Agent, and Chorus Performer
10. George and Lucy Zorgo: Union Printers and Labor Advocates
11. Philomena “Minnie” Caputo: Garment Worker, Union Activist, Chairlady, and Floorlady
12. Dr. Albert Schiowitz: Physician and Director of the Wyoming Valley ILGWU Health Center
13. Leo Gutstein: Family Garment Shop Owner and Garment Association President
14. Pearl Novak: Garment Worker, Union Organizer, and Social Activist
15. Betty Greenberg: Mother, Spouse, Activist, and the Mathesons’Daughter
16. Labor, Working-Class, Gender, and Oral History
Appendix 1: The Wyoming Valley Oral Histories
Appendix 2: Glossary of Selected Terms
Appendix 3: Biographical Sketches
Notes
Bibliography
Index
