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Reyes (Ruben) Cannery Workers Committee collection
MS0183
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Contributing Institution:
Center for Sacramento History
Title: Ruben Reyes Cannery Workers Committee collection
Identifier/Call Number: MS0183
Physical Description:
2.5 Linear Feet
(1 half-manuscript box, 1 newspaper box, posters, and photographs)
Date (inclusive): ca. 1969-1980
Language of Material: The collection contains materials in Spanish and in English.
The collection is open for research.
All requests to publish or quote from private manuscripts held by the Center for Sacramento History (CSH) must be submitted
in writing to csh@cityofsacramento.org. Permission for publication is given on behalf of CSH as the owner of the physical
items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by the patron.
No permission is necessary to publish or quote from public records.
[Identification of item and/or item number], [box and folder number], Ruben Reyes Cannery Workers Committee collection, MS0183,
Center for Sacramento History.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Donated by Ruben Reyes in 1984 (accessions 1984/036, 1984/037, and 1984/104)
An oral history recorded by Ruben Reyes in 1983 for the Sacramento Ethnic Communities Survey Collection can be found here:
https://archive.org/details/casacsh_000231. (Accession 1983/146.)
Ruben C. Reyes was a Sacramento leader in the civil rights movement to end discrimination in the California canning industry.
He was a founder and chairman of the Cannery Workers Committee (CWC), which fought for better treatment for Latino and other
minority cannery workers. Reyes worked as a foreman at Libby, McNeill & Libby in Sacramento when he organized the CWC and
began speaking out about unfair treatment of Latino workers. Libby fired Reyes in 1972 after he requested leave to work for
the CWC. He sued the company and lost, but continued fighting for cannery workers' rights by lobbying politicians and civil
rights groups, and filing complaints and lawsuits against canneries and the Teamsters, who the CWC felt did not help its members
at the canneries. The CWC's actions resulted in findings of discrimination at the canneries by state and federal employment
commisions, and a federal case that led to canneries instating affirmative action programs. The group was active into the
early 1980s.
Reyes was born November 13, 1930, in Superior, Arizona. He left school while in junior high and went to work as a fieldworker
in Southern California. When he was 19, he moved to Sacramento and started working at Libbey soon after, where he worked for
22 years. He was married to Hope Gonzalez and had eight children. Reyes died September 12, 2007.
The collection documents Ruben Reyes and the Cannery Workers Committee's activities related to their fight against workplace
discrimination in the 1970s. It includes photographs, posters and bumper stickers, reports and court records, Cannery Worker
newspapers, news clippings, awards, newsletters, and a scrapbook.