The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 106, July 2002 - April, 2003 Page: 535
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Black Texans and Theater Craft Unionism
the 1904 AFL convention in Fort Worth, did Texas's black theater work-
ers gain a voice in the conservative union policies of the IATSE, which typ-
ically viewed the black workers as "a serious menace to the white union
men." Reaction among white theater workers to black workers' demands
was virtually nonexistent. IATSE Local 330 in Fort Worth, for example, re-
mained indifferent to racial outcries, directing its interests toward ensur-
ing its longevity and securing the jobs of its white workers while ignoring
its pronounced racially discriminatory policies. This was a pattern that
persisted throughout the industry for the next three decades.
Local 330 was just one of many IATSE locals targeted by nonunionized
black theater workers from the turn of the twentieth century through la-
bor's most critical decade, the 1930s. Serious challenges to the insensitiv-
ity of white IATSE workers in Texas started when black stagehands and
motion picture operators in Houston, eager to start a union of their own,
began picketing white-owned theaters in the city's predominately black
districts and staging protests outside the luxurious homes of theater own-
ers. These open acts of rebellion, as Andrew Lee Lewis, founder of the
279-A "negro auxiliary," pointed out, were provoked by white workers
from Local 279 and their theater employers who often collaborated to
"intimidate" black workers. Lewis was forced to hire full-time security to
protect himself and his family after the manager of the Washington The-
ater held the labor activist at gunpoint for his role in organizing the city's
black theater workers. "They . . .just weren't bothered about us," said
Lewis who, after migrating from Des Moines, Iowa, to Houston during
World War I, had worked in many of the white-owned theaters in the
black sections of town. To his chagrin, he had discovered that white
unionists had no intention of assisting blacks in organizing their own
union locals.4
The gangster-like behavior of obstinate theater employers and their
equally bullheaded white employees compelled Lewis and his people to
turn to the Congress for Industrial Organization (CIO), a labor federa-
tion formed during the mid-193os as an alternative to the more conser-
vative labor organizations. Prior to Lewis and his men joining the CIO in
1937, the federation had sent a labor organizer to Houston's black the-
aters "practically everyday." Armed with its racial equality plan, which con-
9 Proceedings of the 1904 Texas State Federation of Labor, Texas Labor Archives (University of
Texas at Arlington), (cited hereafter as TSFL Proceedings); 1913 TSFL Proceedings, p. 88 (quo-
tation); "Local 330 Anniversary Speech," International Alliance of Theatrical and Stage Employ-
ees Collection (IATSE Collection), Texas Labor Archives (University of Texas at Arlington), (cit-
ed hereafter as TLA); "Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Banquet and Dance of M.P.O. Local No. 330,"
IATSE Collection, TLA
4Transcribed interview of Lee A. Lewis by George N. Green, Oct. 4, 1971 (cited hereafter as
Lewis interview), TLA, #14.2003
535
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 106, July 2002 - April, 2003, periodical, 2003; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101223/m1/613/: accessed March 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.