Guide to the Millie Moser Smith Papers

Special Collections & Archives
University Library
California State University, Northridge
18111 Nordhoff Street
Northridge, CA 91330-8326
URL: https://library.csun.edu/SCA  

Contact: https://library.csun.edu/SCA/Contact  

© Copyright 2020 Special Collections & Archives. All rights reserved.


Contributing Institution: Special Collections & Archives
Title: Millie Moser Smith Papers
Creator: Moser Smith, Mildred, 1919-
Identifier/Call Number: URB.MAMS
Extent: 0.92 linear feet
Date (inclusive): 1971-2003
Abstract: Millie Moser Smith devoted much of her time to social causes, especially those involving farm workers, which she came into contact with through her church membership. The collection consists of articles, booklets, correspondence, ephemera, fliers, journals, membership directories, newsletters, newspaper clippings, pamphlets, photographs, posters, reports, and videocassettes from the National Farm Workers Ministry and related groups that worked on behalf of farm workers.
Language of Material: English

Biographical Information:

Mildred Alice Ross Moser Smith was born in Iowa on August 11, 1919. Graduating from the University of Iowa in 1936, Millie went to work as a teacher at a junior high school in Dysart, Iowa. After joining her sisters in California, she found employment at Lockheed, where she met and married Ray Moser in 1943. The couple had three children. Ray Moser died in 1979.
For the next ten years, living as a single woman, Moser Smith was able to devote much of her time to social causes in addition to substitute teaching. She came into contact with some of these causes through her church membership and eventually became the representative of Church Women United for the National Farm Worker Ministry (NFWM).
In the 1980s the NFWM supported the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC) in a campaign against the Campbell Soup Company. By 1987, the recent increase in birth defects and childhood cancers found in the children of migrant workers forced the NFWM to change its focus once more, this time to an emphasis on the issue of toxic pesticides. In the late 1980s, Moser Smith met and married Sydney Smith, farm worker advocate and author of The Grapes of Conflict. The couple continued to be active in their local chapter of Habitat for Humanity, both serving as officers of the organization.

Scope and Contents

The Millie Moser Smith Papers consist of articles, booklets, correspondence, ephemera, fliers, journals, membership directories, newsletters, newspaper clippings, pamphlets, photographs, posters, reports, and videocassettes from the National Farm Workers Ministry and related groups that worked on behalf of farm workers. Two typescripts by Sydney Smith are also included in this collection, as are items documenting César Chávez's 1988 Fast for Life, and an oral history interview conducted with Moser Smith in 2003.

Electronic Format:

Digital reproductions of selected items in this collection are available electronically as a part of the Latina(o) Cultural Heritage Archives   project.

General

Other Information:
The collection was processed in part under a U.S. Department of Education Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI) Grant.

Conditions Governing Access:

This collection is open for research use.

Conditions Governing Use:

Copyright for unpublished materials authored or otherwise produced by the creator(s) of this collection has not been transferred to California State University, Northridge. Copyright status for other materials is unknown. Transmission or reproduction of materials protected by U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.C.) beyond that allowed by fair use requires the written permission of the copyright owners. Works not in the public domain cannot be commercially exploited without permission of the copyright owners. Responsibility for any use rests exclusively with the user.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Millie Moser Smith and Jan Wilson, 2002

Preferred Citation:

For information about citing items in this collection consult the appropriate style manual, or see the Citing Archival Materials  guide.

Processing Information:

Rebecca S. Graff, 2003

Subjects and Indexing Terms

Documents
Photographs
Audiovisual materials

Box 1, Folder 1

Agricultural Trade Unionism article

Box 1, Folder 2

Agroecology Program Report, University of California, Santa Cruz, 1990

Box 1, Folder 3

American Farmland Trust, No Farms, No Food

Box 1, Folder 4

California Educational Migrant Information Council pamphlets

Box 1, Folder 5

Council of Priests of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles proposals, 1986

Box 1, Folder 6

Farm Labor Organizing Committee, AFL-CIO: Seventh Constitutional Convention booklet, 1997

Box 1, Folder 7

Facts for Life booklet, 1988 August 21

Box 1, Folder 8

Facts for Life fliers, 1988

Box 1, Folder 9

General Board of Church and Society pamphlet

Box 1, Folder 10

General Board of Church and Society staff report, 1990

Box 1, Folder 11

Grape Boycott, "Some Endorsements" booklet, 1988

Box 1, Folder 12

Illinois Conference of Churches fliers

Box 1, Folder 13

Institute of Human Relations, Loyola University, "Blueprint for Social Justice" newsletter, 1988

Box 1, Folder 14

Michigan Farmworker Minority Coalition fliers and pamphlets

Box 1, Folder 15

Migrant Education Program pamphlets

Box 1, Folder 16

Migrant Labor General newspaper clippings and articles, 1980-1993

Box 1, Folder 17

National Farm Worker Ministry anniversary book and pamphlet, 1995-1996

Box 1, Folder 18

National Farm Worker Ministry correspondence, 1982-1992

Box 1, Folder 19

National Farm Worker Ministry ephemera

Box 1, Folder 20

National Farm Worker Ministry, "History of the Church's Ministry with Farm Workers," 1995

Box 1, Folder 21

National Farm Worker Ministry membership directories, 1987-1990

Box 1, Folder 22

National Farm Worker Ministry memoranda, 1988-1989

Box 1, Folder 23

National Farm Worker Ministry newsletters, 1989-2002

Box 1, Folder 24

National Farm Worker Ministry fliers, North Carolina Farm Worker

Box 1, Folder 25

National Farm Worker Ministry pamphlets

Box 1, Folder 26

Pavich Family Farms pamphlet

Box 1, Folder 27

Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noreste (PCUN: Northwest Treeplanters and Farmworkers United) pamphlet

Box 1, Folder 28

Rosales v. United Farm Workers et al memorandum, 1989 November 29

Box 1, Folder 29

Smith, Sydney, Hearing on Resolution of Support for the Boycott of California Table Grapes, 1988

Box 1, Folder 30

Smith, Sydney, The Role of the Churches with migratory Farm Labor: An Overview

Box 1, Folder 31

United Auto Workers, Ammo, vol. 25, no. 9, 1988

Box 1, Folder 32

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO benefits package

Box 1, Folder 33

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO ephemera

Box 1, Folder 34

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO, Food and Justice, vol. 2, no. 5 and vol. 4, nos. 7-9, 1985, 1987

Box 1, Folder 35

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO, Food and Justice, vol. 5, 1988

Box 1, Folder 36

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO, Food and Justice, vol. 6, nos. 1 and 3, 1989

Box 1, Folder 37

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO, El Malcriado, vol. 25, no. 8, 1987

Box 1, Folder 38

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO memoranda, 1988

Box 1, Folder 39

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO pamphlets

Box 1, Folder 40

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO, Solidarity yearbook, 1982

Box 1, Folder 41

United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO, The Wrath of Grapes accompanying materials

Box 2, Item 1

Cassette Tape - Millie Moser Smith, Tape 1

Box 2, Item 2

Cassette Tape - Millie Moser Smith, Tape 2

Box 2, Item 3

Cassette Tape - Oral History Interview with Millie Moser Smith, Tape 1, 2003 February 21

Box 2, Item 4

Cassette Tape - Oral History Interview with Millie Moser Smith, Tape 2, 2003 February 21

Box 3, Item 1

Oral History Interview with Millie Moser Smith - Transcript, 2003

Box 3, Item 2

Photo - people clapping

Box 3, Item 3

Photo - two women

Box 3, Item 4

Photo - man

Box 3, Item 5

Photo - people standing

Box 3, Item 6

Photo - handmade sign "Sisters of Loretto pray for Speedy Response in Kern County Health Department"

Box 3, Item 7

Photo - handmade signs

Box 3, Item 8

Photo - handmade signs

Box 3, Item 9

Photo - handmade signs

Box 3, Item 10

Photo - handmade signs

Box 3, Item 11

Photo - handmade signs

Box 3, Item 12

Negatives

Folder 1

American Library Association, Chavez: Great Minds Meet at the Library poster, 1993

Folder 2

FLOC (Farm Labor Organizing Committee), 25 Years of Struggle poster, 1992

Folder 3

National Farm Worker Ministry, Farm Worker Week Calendar, 1989-1990

Folder 4

United Farm Workers, AFL-CIO bandana

Folder 5

United Farm Workers Organizing Committee, AFL-CIO, History of Farm Workers Struggle Calendar, 1971