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Farm Worker Organizing Collection, 1948-1996

MSS 027

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Table of contents

Collection Contents

Series 1. National Sharecroppers Fund (NSF), 1948-1962

Physical Description: 1 folder

Scope and Content Note

This series is composed of four "condition of the farm workers" reports to the board of the National Sharecroppers Fund, an organization founded in the 1930s to aid farm workers and tenant farmers, particularly in the southern United States.

Box-folder 1/1

National Sharecroppers Fund, 1948, 1955, 1961, 1962

Series 2. Emergency Committee to Aid Farm Workers, 1963-1965

Physical Description: 6 folders

Scope and Content Note

This series includes congressional testimony, reports, proposals, planning documents, internal memoranda, forms, and other administrative documents for the projects developed by the Emergency Committee to Aid Farm Workers. This organization was dedicated to helping domestic farm workers find employment in the Santa Barbara/Ventura region at equitable wages with humane working conditions. Some projects were developed to foster skills development during times between the seasonal farm work.

Box-folder 1/2

Administration, 1964-1965, n.d.

Box-folder 1/3

Testimony, 1963

Box-folder 1/4-1/7

Projects

Box-folder 1/4

Operation Harvest Hands, 1965, n.d.

Box-folder 1/5

Operation Buenaventura, 1965, n.d.

Box-folder 1/6

Farm Workers Opportunity, 1965, n.d.

Box-folder 1/7

New Hope for Farm Workers, 1965, n.d.

Series 3. Howard Richards, 1955-1965

Physical Description: 8 folders

Scope and Content Note

This series includes personal correspondence and writings of Howard Richards, who as a young attorney and philosophy graduate student in the mid 1960s, provided legal services to Cesar Chavez and the Farm Workers Association. At this time, Richards was also the personal assistant to Robert Hutchins at the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions in Santa Barbara. There are a few of his files with documents relating to farm worker issues and organizing work. These include a paper given at the Center by Ernesto Galarza, who headed the National Farm Labor Union in California and AWOC reports on the conditions of farm workers.

Box-folder 1/8-1/10

Personal papers, [3 folders]

Box-folder 1/8

General correspondence, 1964-1965, n.d.

Box-folder 1/9

Cesar Chavez correspondence, [8 items] 1964-1965

Box-folder 1/10

Writings, 1964, n.d.

Box-folder 1/11-1/15

Other entity - documents, [5 folders]

Box-folder 1/11

Various individuals and organizations - writings, 1955-1956, 1965, n.d.

Box-folder 1/12

Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), AFL-CIO - reports and testimony, 1959

Box-folder 1/13

Farm worker unions - documents, 1965, n.d.

Box-folder 1/14

State of California - report and laws, 1961, 1963

Box-folder 1/15

California Counties, various - ordinances, 1964, n.d.

Series 4. Farm Workers Association (FWA), 1965?, 1966

Physical Description: 1 folder

Scope and Content Note

This series includes two documents of the Farm Workers Association, the precursor organization to the United Farm Workers National Union. One is an agreement of cooperation between the FWA and AWOC. The other, Basta!, is a photo essay published by the FWA documenting the plight of farm workers and their struggle for better working and living conditions.

Box-folder 2/1

Farm Workers Association (FWA), 1965?, 1966

Series 5. United Farm Workers National Union - AFL-CIO (UFW), 1959-1988

Physical Description: 12 folders

Scope and Content Note

This series includes materials from the constitutional conventions of the United Farm Workers National Union, AFL-CIO, including the proposed constitution from the first convention. There is a small amount of correspondence and copies of arbitration agreements and a complaint filed by the UFW against the Teamsters Union. The largest portion of the material is literature published by the UFW to rally public support for their organizing, particularly through the boycott of grapes and lettuce.

Box-folder 2/2-2/6

Conventions, [5 folders]

Box-folder 2/2

1st Constitutional Convention, reports, rules, and call to convention, 1973

Box-folder 2/3

1st Constitutional Convention, Proposed Constitution, 1973

Box-folder 2/4

1st Political Endorsement Convention, 1976

Box-folder 2/5

3rd Constitutional Convention, resolutions, 1977

Box-folder 2/6

4th Constitutional Convention, program, 1979

Box-folder 2/7

Legal documents - copies, 1975, n.d.

Box-folder 2/8

Correspondence [4 items], 1970, 1972-1974

Box-folder 2/9

Publications, 1967, 1973, 1987

Box-folder 2/10

Newsletters - actions, initiatives, boycotts, 1967-1971, 1974-1975, 1978, n.d.

Box-folder 2/11

'Fact Sheets' and legal analysis, 1968, 1970, 1973-1974, 1976

Box-folder 2/12

Circular letters, 1965-1967, 1970-1971, 1973-1979, 1988, n.d.

Box-folder 2/13

Fliers and reprints, 1959-1960, 1966, 1972-1973, 1975-1980, 1983, 1986, n.d.

Series 6. Farm Worker Support Groups, 1964-1979

Physical Description: 8 folders

Scope and Content Note

This series primarily includes literature published to involve the public at large in the farm workers struggle to attain better working and living conditions. The material displays the wide range of organizations that were involved in boycotts, strikes and other actions to support the farm workers. The list of organizations includes:

Box-folder 3/1-3/5

Religious organizations, [5 folders]

Box-folder 3/1-3/2

Circular letters, [2 folders]

Box-folder 3/1

California Migrant Ministry, 1967-1970, 1972, and

National Farm Worker Ministry, 1971-1973, 1975-1977, 1979

Box-folder 3/2

Other religious organizations, 1972-1976, 1978, n.d.

Box-folder 3/3

Reports (studies), 1967-1968

Box-folder 3/4

Pamphlet and testimony, 1972, n.d.

Box-folder 3/5

"The Small Farmer in Mexico," Center for Ethics and Social Policy, 1979

Box-folder 3/6-3/8

Secular organizations and individuals, [3 folders]

Box-folder 3/6

Mixed documents (correspondence, circular letters, editorials, press releases), 1965,1968-1969, 1972, 1975-1976, n.d.

Box-folder 3/7

Reports and pamphlet, 1964-1965, 1967, 1973, 1976-1977, n.d.

Box-folder 3/8

Fliers, 1964, 1969-1971, 1973-1975, n.d

Series 7. Other documentation, 1959-1996

Physical Description: 14 folders

Scope and Content Note

This series includes reports, publications, reprints and clippings relating to farm worker organizing activities and issues. Of note is the testimony given to the U.S. Congress by Henry Anderson in 1961. Anderson organized Citizens for Farm Labor as a support organization for farm workers. He did extensive study and publication on the conditions of farm workers in California in the 1950s and 1960s and worked for the improvement of their lives.

Box-folder 3/9-3/11

Reports, [3 folders]

Box-folder 3/9

State of California, 1965, 1981, 1985

Box-folder 3/10

University of California, 1956, 1965

Box-folder 3/11

United States Department of Labor, 1961

Box-folder 3/12

Testimony, 1961

Box-folder 3/13

Teamsters Union, 1970?s, 1974

Box-folder 3/14

CAL-LAW, 1985

Box-folder 4/1-4/2

Photocopies and reprints, [2 folders]

Box-folder 4/1

1959-1960, 1966, 1972-1973, 1975-1980, 1983, 1986, n.d.

Box-folder 4/2

Undocumented migrants, 1976-1977

Box-folder 4/3

Press release and reprints - "Fight in the Fields," 1996

Box-folder 4/4-4/8

Clippings, [5 folders]

Box-folder 4/4

1960, 1963-1966, 1968-1969

Box-folder 4/5

1970-1975

Box-folder 4/6

1976-1979

Box-folder 4/7

1980-1982, 1984-1988, 1990, 1993

Box-folder 4/8

Nds.

Collection Contents

National Sharecroppers Fund (NSF), 1948-1962

Emergency Committee to Aid Farm Workers, 1963-1965

Howard Richards, 1955-1965

Farm Workers Association (FWA), 1965?, 1966

United Farm Workers National Union - AFL-CIO (UFW), 1959-1988

Farm Worker Support Groups, 1964-1979