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Guide to the Daniel F. Buckley typographical union strike collection
MS0034
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Title: Daniel F. Buckley typographical union strike collection
Dates: 1938-1987
Bulk Dates: 1978-1980
Collection number: MS0034
Creator:
Buckley, Daniel F.
Creator:
International Typographical Union. Local 46 (Central Valley, Calif.)
Collection Size:
2.75 linear feet
(3 boxes)
Repository:
Center for Sacramento History
Sacramento, California 95811-0229
Abstract: The Daniel F. Buckley collection consists of 2.75 cubic feet of documents that span from 1938 to 1987, with the bulk of them
dating from 1978 to 1980. Nearly all of the materials in the collection relate to the 1978 strike of the
Sacramento Bee by the International Typographical Union, of which Dan Buckley was a member. The oversized materials are mostly newspapers
with articles covering the strike's progress. Other oversized material includes posters and bumper stickers related to the
strike. Series include Correspondence, California Democratic Party Convention (1979), Personal, Strike Materials, and Printed
Materials.
Physical location: 28I5, 29C3
Languages:
Languages represented in the collection:
English
Collection is open for research use.
All requests to publish or quote from private collections 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], [box and folder number], Daniel F. Buckley typographical union strike collection, MS0034, Center
for Sacramento History.
Donated to the Center for Sacramento History in 1988 from Daniel F. Buckley, former employee of the Sacramento Bee (accessions
1987/094, 1988/074, 1993/032).
Processing and finding aid by Michelle Wallen, 2009.
Biography / Administrative History
Daniel F. Buckley was born in 1923 and lived in the Sacramento region throughout his life. He graduated from McClatchy High
School in 1940 and became a newspaper printer, a profession which he continued for forty-seven years. At that time newspapers
were not yet using computers or lasers to print their daily editions, so printers were necessary to type the articles, create
the layouts, and work with heavy machinery.
Early in his career Buckley worked for the
North Sacramento Journal. During World War II he temporarily worked for a local Alaskan newspaper. After this he went on to work as a printer for
the
Sacramento Bee. He was a member of the Central Valley Typographical Union No. 46, which was a local branch of the International Typographical
Union. This union was founded in 1852 and included printers, pressmen, photo engravers, and other such newspaper employees
in the Sacramento region. In the mid 20th century this labor union and others like it began to grow, allowing them more bargaining
power against the newspaper owners. This occasionally led to conflicts between the newspaper employees and their employers.
One such conflict between the Sacramento Bee and Sacramento Mailers Union Local 31 escalated to the point of a strike on April
17, 1978. McClatchy Newspapers, which owned of the
Sacramento Bee, and the Mailers Union had reached an impasse during strike negotiations. The printers of the Typographical Union soon joined
the strike and refused to cross picket lines in an attempt to show their support for the Mailers Union. Although these two
groups held different jobs and were members of different unions, they believed that it was important to show their solidarity
against McClatchy Newspapers, who they felt had recently become very anti-union towards its employees.
Dan Buckley, as a member of the Typographical Union, participated in the strike and even joined the picket lines. He took
photographs and made several notes regarding the scabs that crossed the picket lines. He also remained in contact with strike
leaders and other individuals in the community who were sympathetic towards the strikers' cause. To support his family Buckley
began to search for another job, and soon took a printing position with the
Sacramento Union newspaper. However, many of the other strikers had difficulty finding new jobs and feared the economic troubles that were
to come throughout the strike's duration.
The Mailers strike continued until an agreement could be reached in 1981. The Typographical Union did not reach an agreement
with McClatchy Newspapers until 1986. Dan Buckley never returned to the
Sacramento Bee, along with many of his former co-workers. A later legal agreement stated that McClatchy was required to hire back any of
the printers that had gone on strike, but this agreement was often ignored and the issue was tied up in legal battles for
many years to come.
The techniques of the newspaper printing industry began to change drastically during this time. The use of computers has
cut the number of printers necessary for the daily business of the
Sacramento Bee and other newspapers. As a result, the International Typographical Union was dissolved in 1986 and its remaining members
merged into larger, more diversified unions.
Scope and Content of Collection
The collection is arranged in five series: Correspondence, California Democratic Party Convention (1979), Personal, Strike
Materials, and Printed Materials. The first four series compose about .25 cubic feet of the collection. A portion of the
Printed Materials series composes the remaining .5 cubic feet of documents. Oversized material is 2.5 linear feet in size
and includes the bulk of the Printed Materials series as well as a small number of items from the Strike Materials series.
The Correspondence series is made up of Invitations, Union Correspondence, Sacramento Bee correspodence, and General Strike
Correspondence. The date range for this series is 1978 to 1987. Included are event invitations from the Sacramento Bee and
various labor unions; letters exchanged by the International Typographical Union and Dan Buckley, as well as correspondence
between other unions; letters from the Sacramento Bee to various unions, employees, and subscribers; and correspondence related
to the 1978 Sacramento Bee strike, including letters that Dan Buckley wrote to friends and fellow union members about the
1978 Sacramento Bee strike, and a letter from Pat Brown to the strike leaders discussing labor relations.
The California Democratic Party Convention series contains a folder holding several items that Dan Buckley obtained at the
January 1979 Convention that took place in Sacramento. Some of these items are a press badge, a list of committee members,
and a letter to the party from Vice President Mondale.
The Personal series includes two subseries: Reporter Notes and Certificates. It ranges in date from 1960 to 1986. The Reporter
Notes subseries consists of several small notebooks that Dan Buckley used to take notes on news pieces as well as daily events
on the picket line. There are also several papers which include photograph descriptions. Certificates includes a participation
certificate from the 1964 California State Fair and Exposition and certificates from the International Typographical Union.
The fourth series, Strike Materials, includes three subseries: Strike Ephemera, Christmas Parodies, and Legal Documents.
This series contains materials that range in date from 1971 to 1980. The Strike Ephemera subseries consists of oversized materials
such as bumper stickers and posters that are related to the 1978 Sacramento Bee strike. It also contains several flyers used
during the strike. Christmas Parodies includes Christmas songs and poems that were changed to include lyrics about the suffering
of the strikers during the 1978 Christmas season. The Legal Documents subseries consists of contracts between the
Sacramento Bee and local unions, a 1980 Book of Laws of the International Typographical Union, and a copy of a previous strike agreement.
The last series, Printed Materials, consists of several subseries containing different newspapers and newsletters. The bulk
of these are editions of
Catholic Herald,
Sacramento Bee,
Sacramento Union,
Sacramento Valley Union Labor Bulletin, and
The Worker Bee. There are also subseries that contain only one or two editions of newspapers specific to certain regions or subjects; Sacramento
Region Newspapers, Bay Area Region Newspapers, and Labor Union Newspapers. There are several clippings and photocopied stories
that compose an Article Clippings subseries. The number of editions within each subseries varies widely, with the largest
being the
Union Labor Bulletin,
Sacramento Union, and
The Worker Bee. All of the newspapers and newsletters date from 1978 to 1982, with the exception of
The Prospector, contained within Sacramento Region Newspapers, which dates from April 29, 1938. Many editions include articles that Dan
Buckley circled or underlined because of their relation to the ongoing strike.
Series 1. Correspondence
Series 2. California Democratic Party Convention
Series 3. Personal
Series 4. Strike materials
Series 5. Printed materials
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in
the library's online public access catalog.
International Typographical Union. Local 46 (Central Valley, Calif.)
Sacramento bee (Sacramento, Calif.)
Sacramento Mailers Union Local 31
Newspaper employees--Labor unions
Newspaper employees--Labor unions
Newspaper employees--Labor unions--United States
Strikes and lockouts--California
Strikes and lockouts--Newspapers
McClatchy Company records, Center for Sacramento History