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UNIONS OPPOSITE: Deckhands and other explains. “Companies send instructors who come to the union to while they tried to earn a fair living. One of his earliest
“Unions take you back in time,” says Captain Evan Williams. as-needed waterfront employees are hall to work with members. Red and White Fleet does a good employees, William Figari, recalled in an oral history recorded
hired on a daily basis through the
“You show up for job call at 10:15 a.m. each day. The jobs are Inlandboatmen’s Union (IBU). Every portion of the classes. Their managers are hands-on; they for the Bancroft Library, “. . . there wasn’t much of any unions
called out and written on the board. Then people bid on a day, workers show up at the union really want to help. They reward workers who are industrious then. Even with us running the boats, we never had any
job by throwing down their color-coded card in front of the hall at the corner of 1st and Harrison and committed.” union. That’s why we used to work all hours . . . When the
dispatcher, who then picks the highest card.” Streets in San Francisco, where they This is very intentional on the part of the Red and White unions came in, you couldn’t work the men the way you used
Captain Williams spent four years picking up casual work bid on jobs posted by companies like Fleet. “The more we invest in our employees, the more they to work them.”
as a deckhand before securing a full-time deckhand job with the Red and White Fleet that need a value their job and take seriously their responsibilities,” says Labor hero Harry Bridges was instrumental in bringing
particular position filled for the day.
Red and White Fleet in 2011. At the union hall, casual work Joe Burgard. The company even pays senior deckhands in about much of this change. He was a key organizer of the
is picked up daily at the job call, versus full-time work where THIS PAGE: Many Red and White training—provided they go on to work at least forty hours for West Coast waterfront strike of 1934, a three-day strike
the worker is offered a permanent position within a specific Fleet employees got their start by the Fleet. Having a pool of workers that is not only trained in in San Francisco that closed most West Coast ports and
company. Jobs with requirements that are very specific to each picking up casual work through the maritime practice, but in the Red and White Fleet’s practices demonstrated that maritime workers who banded together
company—such as ticket agents and captains—are generally union. Thanks in large part to the specifically, ensures that guests receive the absolute best in were a force to be reckoned with. Bridges went on to create
efforts of activist leader Harry Bridges
hired directly by the companies themselves. (far right), the IBU has become an service and experience. and lead the International Longshore and Warehouse Union
The Red and White Fleet’s crew and captains belong to the important stepping-stone for those When Tom Crowley started working as a Whitehall and remained active in organized labor for most of his life.
Inlandboatmen’s Union (IBU). The IBU recently celebrated its who wish to break into the maritime boatman in 1892, there were no such things as boatmen’s “Bridges [has] done a lot for the unions,” Figari acknowledged.
centennial and is currently led by National President Marina industry. unions. Crowley experienced firsthand the exhausting and Bridges was such an important figure that a young Tom
Secchitano. Maritime industry workers or those with a letter often unfair conditions maritime workers were subjected Escher interviewed him for an eighth-grade term paper.
of intent from a maritime company can join the union, get
their union card, and start attending the job calls in the union
hall to look for work aboard a ship.
National President Marina Secchitano began her career
with the IBU in 1979. “I love working for the union,”
says Secchitano. “I love what I can do for people. I build
relationships based on respect. And I spend a good deal of
time problem-solving, but I am good at that—the union is
a hub of activity.”
The union hall is about more than just finding work
or ensuring fair wages. “We provide job training for new
people who want to enter the maritime industry,” Secchitano

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