Scope and content:

The bulk of the RDC Manuscript Collection consists of Redwood District Council records taken out of original order and arranged into artificial series by volunteers before the advent of the project archivist.

The Historical Series contains essentially all of the material in the collection pertaining to Northcoast lumber unionism before and during the 1946 redwood strike. This one box series was created by the archivist for researcher convenience. It is divided into five sub-series according to the provenance of the material. The RDC sub-series consists of the bits and pieces of old records saved by the RDC when it destroyed most of its own records upon moving into a new building in 1958. The material as saved has little in common except for its oldness. Perhaps the most pleasant surprise in the entire collection are the 1917-1919 International Timber Workers Local #12 minutes. They constitute a brief glimpse into an earlier cycle of lumber unionism in Humboldt County that ends in a broken desperation strike to preserve the eight hour day achieved during World War I. The provenance is unclear, as the minutes were stored with fragmentary records of the first 1930s precursors of the locals which eventually formed the RDC. These include Dues Books of the American Federation of Labor Federal Local 19576 for 1934-35 and financial records for its successor renumbered 2563 when it received its charter from the U.B.of C.& J.of A. These include the expense records (but nothing more) from the broken 1935 lumber strike. The local was reorganized and rechartered as Local 2677 after the strike. The Historical Series contains the minutes of this local from late 1935 to September 1937. Two months after it bolted the U.B.of C.& J.of A. to join the International Woodworkers of America, CIO. Stuck into the back of the Minute book and now foldered separately are: A 1935 contract with a small lumber company; a CIO plan to organize the redwoods; and several dues arrears notice forms from the now IWA-CIO Local #78. The box also contained the earliest RDC convention minutes, 1941-42, which have been moved into the RDC Convention Series and certain fragmentary records from the 1946 Redwood Strike.

Part of this series are the materials contributed by local author Frank Onstine. The material on the 1935 strike was used to produce his excellent local history, The Great Lumber Strike of 1935.There is a thick folder of material on the 1946 Redwood Strike, copied from originals then in the RDC office by Noel Harris, and intended for use to produce a projected sequel on the '46 strike. The originals of this material and much more from the '46 strike period subsequently disappeared from the RDC files. The RDC brief for the War Labor Board has also been placed in this series. This box, together with a few files in the 2592 Record Group Early Office Files Series, a very few files in the Ray Nelson Collection, the 1941-42 and the fragmentary 1945 -48 RDC Conventions constitute the sum total of the collection records on the early organizing and Redwood Strike period.

The created RDC Convention Series has been expanded from partial runs in the other Record Groups to constitute as complete a set as possible. It is the best source to chart the overall evolution of the RDC locals from beginning to end with each local giving a short report of its activities --amounting to four snapshots a year per local.

Ray Nelson was the U.B.of C.& J.of A. International Representative attached to the RDC from 1952 to 1978. His duties encompassed organizing and oversight of the U.B.of C.& J.of A. locals (Construction Carpenters as well as Lumber and Sawmill) in the RDC region. The Ray Nelson Series contains three sub-series: the relatively intact Ray Nelson Desk Files consisting of 1970 organizing files; The Ray Nelson Organizing materials, created from a mass of loose material spanning 25 years with islands of original order including the 1961 Correspondence File, the only material documenting his oversight role; and lastly, there are three folders of early material including a photo of his father with a steam donkey woods crew circa 1910 (the photo is being kept with the other Ray Nelson materials as per his request) and the contracts between the Holmes-Eureka Lumber Company and Logger's Local 3061 in 1943 and 1945.

Physical description:

22 cubic feet

Contents

Access and use