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under the aegis of Nicholas Murray Butler, who was the president of the university. They had a strike. I remember the speech that he made at that rally that I'm talking about, which is on tape, he said, in his brogue, “I remember when we were organizing Columbia University in 1932 (or whatever it was), Nicholas Murray Butler said that if they signed a contract with the union, the university would fall apart. Well, he signed the contract, and the last time I saw, the university was still standing.” Typical brogue and humor.

But the Meany thing: Van Arsdale was consciously keeping Meany informed to protect himself, that he was doing the right thing as far as the labor movement was concerned. And he was also leading up to a situation where he expected that it would be the first time that George Meany walked a picket line. I'm not kidding you, because I know that. Of course, once he hung up at the Roosevelt Auditorium meeting, of course, he was calling him after the meeting to tell him what a magnificent turnout and what a wonderful meeting it was and how, “George, it would do your heart good to come down here.” When he hung up, he said, “You know, I think it's going to happen.” There were just a few of us around at that time. He normally is very close- mouthed on things like that. On the film --

Did it happen?

No, it didn't happen. The strike went on for a much longer time than that. Maybe it would have happened. But it didn't happen. On the film --

You have a warm spot in your heart for Van Arsdale ever since, it seems like to me.

Van Arsdale is really the patron saint of the union. The union would not exist without Van Arsdale. No question about it. Absolutely no question about it. Of course, I'll come to the settlement at the end of the strike and you'll see what I mean. See, Van Arsdale was getting angrier and angrier at the hospitals because of the way they were acting during the strike, and so he was pulling at every string. The building trades workers stopped work on hospital construction at Beth Israel during the strike. When Tom Mboya came to the United States he was the leader of the African movement. He came to New York. The first thing he did was come to Grand Central Hospital to walk on the picket line for the press. We have the pictures.