Home
Search transcripts:    Advanced Search
Notable New     Yorkers
Select     Notable New Yorker

Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
Photo Gallery
Transcript

Part:         Session:         Page of 542

his word he carried it out. He also seemed to have power enough in his own union to have them stand by him. If anyone walked out and laid down tools on a dock, Bridges was on them like a thousand bricks. All you had to do was to call the office and Bridges would be right there, or would send some one over and put them back to work. He wouldn't take any of these sporadic walkouts. That was breaking the agreement, and he wouldn't allow that. They all admitted that about him. He had many good qualities as a union leader.

So I did not have any qualms about him. Of course, he was a mysterious fellow in a certain way. Just as all boys who run away to sea are. If you thought about it, why did they run away to sea? Why did they all of a sudden go to work and settle down? His answer as to why he settled down was that he married somebody. He met a girl in San Francisco, married, and then settled down and took a steady job, keeping it for eleven years. He worked at this same job on the Moore-McCormack docks with an excellent record. Moore-McCormack had him marked up as one of their best. He said he had settled down and that he wouldn't be roaming around organizing a union except that this strike took place, which he hadn't called. It was just a spontaneous walkout, here and there, on different





© 2006 Columbia University Libraries | Oral History Research Office | Rights and Permissions | Help