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becomes part of it. It's a tremendous pride workers have. It's like the old chicken soup -- it doesn't hurt.

Although we did have theater parties, at that time I knew people who were theater agents, that is to say, who were booking theater parties. But this is a period when you don't have to pay $70 for a show. I remember there was one woman, and her name escapes me at the moment, she became very excited about the union. I would tell her about it, she would read about it and say, “Oh, I'll always call you.” Invariably, they would find there was a play. “This play is good for you. It's for your members. Here it's about blacks. Not only that, but I can get you a very, very special deal for a preview, three bucks,” or sometimes, “Moe, I'll give you 100 tickets. The producer wants to fill the seats.”

So we go around and say, “Who wants to go? Which organizers want to get tickets for a Broadway show free, or for $3?” Or you work out with her that you can get theater parties, very cheap. So people are going to the theaters. It's crazy. That kind of thing.

I know I keep asking these general questions, but it seems like an appropriate time to ask them. To what extent do you think that this was possible only because you had such a high percentage of black and Hispanic members?

It's hard to say, although remember this, that in the late Fifties, in the Fifties before we became a hospital union, we had programs like this on a much more modest scale. It was a very small union. All these programs require work and pulling teeth. To sell tickets you have to go around and you have to virtually have competition. This area has to compete against this area; we're going to sell more. Very often three weeks before an affair, you come and say, “Doom is here. Tickets aren't moving.” You ask Davis to make a pitch on it, that it's very important. Everybody feels that it's the thing. One thing we're sure of, that if they come, they'll enjoy it. Certain things go like hotcakes, like the boat rides and the dances, no problem. When we started, the Salute to Freedom used to go like crazy.

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