11913 to 2013

100 Years of a Powerful Partnership

International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local No. 48

and

Oregon-Columbia Chapter of the National Electrical Contractors Association (NECA)

Written and researched by

Alan Guggenheim

Produced for

The Barnes-Allison Labor Management Cooperation Committee of NECA/IBEW Local 48

Project managed and published by

Pac/West Communications8600 S.W. St. Helens Drive, Suite 100

Wilsonville, Oregon 97070

2014

2PROLOGUE

In 2012, the Barnes-Allison Labor Management Cooperation Committee (BALMCC) undertook historical research of one of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers most influential and powerful local unions, Local No. 48, and their signatory contractor partner, the Oregon-Columbia Chapter of the National Electrical Contractors Association. The objective of the BALMCC was a public exhibition in the museum of the Oregon Historical Society (OHS) that would honor the legacy of that powerful partnership on its 100th anniversary, in May 2013.

The OHS museum exhibit opened to public fanfare and was extended because of its popularity through November 2013. At that time, the exhibit including custom designed and fabricated panels, cabinets and pedestals, was moved to a permanent home in the NECA/IBEW Electrical Training Center.

The exhibit itself tells the story of the partnership between three generations of IBEW electricians and their NECA contractor partners, who by working together for mutual gain, generated profits for the companies, and created jobs and guaranteed job security for the workers. In the course of their uncommonly harmonious relationship the past century, the powerful partnership of NECA/IBEW Local 48 avoided labor-management strife to a degree that by any standard is remarkable. They wired Oregon and southwest Washington, and improved the quality of life in the Columbia River Basin and Oregon coastal community for themselves, their neighbors and future generations. That is indeed a legacy worthy of note.

As project managers for the BALMCC research and resulting exhibition, Pac/West Communications presents here the Final Report with sources that will form the basis for future research and the preservation of the legacy of the men and women of NECA/IBEW Local 48.

Chris WestVice President of OperationsPac/West Communications8600 S.W. St. Helens Drive, Suite 100Wilsonville, Oregon 97070(503) 685-9400www.pacwestcom.com

Researched and written by Alan GuggenheimExhibit design by Fig. Studio Architecture + InteriorsExhibit fabrication by FAB PDXExhibit printing and vinyl graphics by Markon Signs, IUPAT Local 1094Exhibit signage and past/present wall section by NIETCExhibit companion video by Galaxy Sailor ProductionsFinal Report cover and design by Pac/West Communications

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CONTENTSIntroduction 4

100 Years of a Powerful Partnership 6

Early 1900s Portland Loves Its Lights! 16

1910 Formative Years of NECA and IBEW Local 48 19

1920 Contractors and Local 48 Cement Their Partnership 29

1930 The Depression 35

1940 Wartime Shipbuilding 41

1950 Postwar Boom 47

1960 Modern Times 51

1970 From Lumber Mills to Computer Chips 54

1980 Crisis in the Economy 57

1990 Dawning of the Digital Age 66

2000 Education, Diversity and Technology 71

NECA/IBEW Embrace Electric Future 75

Works Cited 80

4INTRODUCTION

This is the story of the past 100 Years of a Powerful Partnership between the Oregon-Columbia Chapter of the National Electrical Contractors Association (NECA) and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local No. 48 in Portland, Oregon.

Since 1913, more than 50,000 union electricians working for hundreds of contractors electrified the homes and businesses, shipyards and bridges, and lumber mills and computer chip manufacturers in the greater Portland area of Oregon and southwest Washington. Those electricians were members of IBEW Local 48. Their employers were likewise organized for social, political and economic reasons under different names the past 100 years but most recently, since 1943, as the Oregon-Columbia Chapter of NECA.

The working relationship of NECA/IBEW Local 48 through 10 decades and 18 economic recessions the past century was one of relative harmony. They wired the Portland region largely without rancor or strife. They played a crucial role in electrifying Eden. Yet, this relatively strikeless industry has gone largely unrecognized in books, articles and programs about the development of Oregon and southwest Washington. The news media, historians and the public have largely overlooked the labor-management harmony and the achievement of this powerful partnership between NECA and IBEW Local 48.

To remedy the oversight and honor the legacy of NECA/IBEW Local 48, the Barnes-Allison Labor Management Cooperation Committee (BALMCC) undertook research necessary to form the basis for an exhibit in the Oregon Historical Society. The result was a six-month exhibition in the North Mezzanine gallery of the Oregon Museum, entitled 100 Years of a Powerful Partnership. Upon completion of its museum run, the exhibit was permanently relocated and installed in the entry foyer of the NECA/IBEW Electrical Training Center in Portland, Oregon, where future generations of electricians can glean their industrys history between their classes.

The exhibit was based on research conducted between August 2012 and January 2013. The exhibit panels included 10 large-scale Timeline wall panels spanning a century of NECA/IBEW Local 48s history, and eight History Boards addressing bridge building, tools of the trade, gender and racial diversity, The Great Light Way, World War II shipbuilding, Portlands light rail and streetcar system, education and community service.

The research that formed the basis for the Timeline and History Boards was built on previous research, information and ideas that are documented in this final report, published here as a Final Report.

This final report is divided into three major sections.

Section I a narrative of the NECA/IBEW Local 48 history the past 100 years. Historical references that form the basis for this narrative can be found in Section II and Section III.

Section II summarizations of NECA/IBEW Local 48 history and historical context, divided into 11 decadal chapters (1900, 1910, 1920, 1930, 1940, 1950, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000).

Section III all Works Cited, as well as works consulted but that may not have been specifically cited in Section II or in the Oregon Museum exhibit. Section III is divided into chapters (Books, Articles and Reports, Internet Sources, Official Documents, Internal Documents (unpublished), Labor Agreements, Interviews, and NIETC (Apprentice School) records, minutes and letters.

This report generally adheres to Modern Language Association (MLA) documentation style to acknowledge sources. Brief parenthetical citations are keyed directly into the text of the 11 Timeline

5chapters in Section II. The following sentence exemplifies the parenthetical citation of this report:

But in April 1903, fair management authorized an open-shop policy, denying any such commit-ment to using only union labor (Wollner 44).

The parenthetical reference (Wollner 44) tells the reader that the information in the sentence was derived from page 44 of a work by an author named Wollner. The full reference can then be found in Section III, Works Cited, as follows:

Wollner, Craig E. The City Builders One Hundred Years of Union Carpentry in Portland, Oregon 1883-1983. Portland: The Oregon Historical Society, 1990.

If there are two or more sources, they are all included, separated by commas.

Interviews with Edward L. Barnes, Rod Belisle, Brian Christopher, Clif Davis, Timothy J. Gauthier, Bob Gotham, Max Landon, Gary Price and Bob R. Shiprack are referenced in Section II with the last name of the interviewee listed within parenthesis. Full contact information of interviewees is listed in Section III, Works Cited.

Section III contains the list of all works cited in Section II, including books, articles, Internet websites, and published and unpublished sources. Section III is further divided in chapters for the types of sources used. Entries are arranged by author, alphabetically, and listed in a format using hanging indentation. If the author is unknown, the title of the article, book, or otherwise unpublished document is used, ignoring any initial A, An or The, or the equivalent.

In the process of mounting the exhibit, the Pac/West research team considered hundreds of photographs, graphics and other artwork, as well as archival movie footage for a video on the history of NECA/IBEW Local 48. These visual artifacts are available in electronic format but because of publishing constraints and the purpose of this report, are available from Pac/West Communications, but not included in this publication.

The absence of a comprehensive work for Oregon, with its rich history of labor-management relations is noticeable. The building trades in general, and the NECA/IBEW Local 48 partnership, specifically, have played a crucial role in the growth, development and electrification of the region, including southwest Washington. The rich history of the building trades tells us where we are headed in the 21st Century. This is invaluable to business, government policymakers and the public, especially young people seeking a career in a growth industry.

This Final Report spotlights the 100-year partnership between one of the IBEWs most influential and powerful local unions and their signatory NECA contractors. Together, they helped electrify Oregon and southwest Washington.

While this is the Final Report for the exhibit research undertaken by the BALMCC two years ago, it is by no means the final word. Instead, the summaries and list of sources are intended to be a starting place for further exploration.

Labor history is history and should not be overlooked or under-reported just because of the union orientation of the people who contributed so much to the development and electrification of Oregon and southwest Washington. This report is an exhortation to others to add to the story.

Alan Guggenheim2014

6100 YEARS OF A POWERFUL PARTNERSHIPInternational Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local No. 48

andOregon-Columbia Chapter of the National Electrical Contractors Association (NECA)

Electricity was the Internet of 1900. Electric lights were the rage in Portland. Telephones and Wireless signs lured Portlanders into Stubbs Electric and electrical equipment suppliers. In 1905, thousands of electric light bulbs lit Portlands skyline over the Lewis and Clark Centennial and American Exposition and Oriental Fair.

Portland embraced everything electrical that the Twentieth Century had to offer. Soon, more than a quarter-million passengers were commuting to work and play onboard Portlands 526 streetcars each day, crossing the Willamette River or visiting friends or picnicking atop Council Crest. Homemakers eagerly used labor saving electric irons and washing machines, chafing dishes and curling irons. Portlanders loved city lights.

To wire schools, houses, buildings and factories, people contacted electrical contractors who in turn employed electricians to do the work. Public concern for uniform building codes and electrical safety took a backseat to surging demand for the transformation to everything electrical. To meet the surging demand, hundreds of people, both skilled as well as those who were utterly inexperienced, declared themselves electricians. They hopped Portlands streetcars to work, some wearing bowler hats and ties, their pockets stuffed with tools. Both the skilled electricians, but also some less competent in the newly emerging craft, wired homes and offices, factories and bridges spanning the Willamette River. Codes and standards were new and the wiring in homes and businesses was as varied as the personalities of the electricians who did the wiring.

Out of this milieu, emerged a cadre of ambitious men attracted to the new field of electrical contracting. Typical of the new breed was John R. Tomlinson, a division storekeeper for the Southern Pacific Railroad in Portland who quit his job to work for a Portland electrical dealer. In 1911, Tomlinson partnered with T.F. Pierce, himself an electrician, to form Pierce-Tomlinson Electric Company. That same year, Tomlinson helped form the predecessor of NECA, the Electrical Contractors Association of Portland. He was elected treasurer and later served as a director of the national association.

Also attracted to this new industry, in 1904, were a handful of electricians who organized themselves into a labor union, chartered as Local No. 317 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW). The members of Local 317 chose as their business agent an electrician named John D. M. Crockwell. Crockwell was active in the American Federation of Labor. An organizer, Crockwell quickly assumed the unpaid roles in 1908 as financial secretary and business agent of Local 317. His brother Frank was president. There were nearly 100 members, including apprentices and helpers, many of whom would emerge in the coming decades in local, regional and national IBEW positions of leadership or as electrical contractors themselves.

One such future leader in 1906, was George Pettingell, initiated that year as an apprentice member of IBEW Local 317. Pettingell advanced to journeyman status but left the rank-and-file in 1929 to become an electrical engineer and a contractor. Ten years later, in 1939, Pettingell would represent the employers of NECA in successful negotiations with Local 48 to recapture market share lost during the Depression. Pettingells career path, from union apprentice electrician to union contractor, was typical of the pattern for many Portland area electrical contractors who assumed leadership roles in NECA.

1913-2013

7In 1907, Local 317s Crockwell increased membership in the union by organizing the picture machine operators. He chaired the Labor Day Committee that organized a parade, picnic and festivities for the 1908 Labor Day celebration in Portland. That same year of 1908, Crockwell (with C.M. Rynerson and W.H. Fitzgerald) circulated a manifesto calling for organized labor in Oregon to vote for William Jennings Bryan for president of the United States. The Oregonian editorialized against Crockwell, Rynerson and Fitzgerald for their impudence, advocating for a political candidate as somehow a violation of labor unionism.

In 1909, the Central Labor Council [Building Trades Council] elected Crockwell to a six-month term as one of its reading clerks, representing the Electrical Workers. He was also elected to serve on the organizing committee and as a delegate to the Ministerial Association.

Local contractors, like Tomlinson, hired the union electricians for their competence and experience in exchange for a fair wage and safer workplace, back in a time when there were few workplace regulations. Like Tomlinson, others skilled in business, electrical and mechanical engineering, joined the ranks of Portland contractors, including Samuel I. Bud Jaggar and Jud F. NePage.

Jaggar had apprenticed and quickly attained journeyman status in 1904, helping to wire the Forestry Building at the Lewis and Clark Exposition with 3,000 light bulbs. In 1907, he established his own firm, the Morrison Electric Co., in 1907.

NePage, like Jaggar, rose through the ranks with a respect for the IBEW as a source of competent teams of electricians who could fish wire through pipe and install power panels and electric equipment, lights and appliances, efficiency and safely. While not unique, the relationship between Portland union contractors, like Jaggar, NePage and others was uncommonly harmonious compared to the anti-union sentiment of many in the Portland business community, including the press and city government through 1914 and World War I.

During the second decade of the 20th Century, there was, perhaps ironically, less strife between Portland area electrical contractors and the electricians of IBEW Local 317, than there was among the rank and file of Local 317.

The internal strife in Portlands IBEW Local 317 mirrored the fight for control at the International level of the IBEW. Between 1908 and 1912, a faction of the members of the International IBEW, led by J.J. Reid and J.W. Murphy, attempted to secede from the union and wrest control from International President Frank J. McNulty and Secretary Peter W. Collins. The American Federation of Labor (AFL), led by President Samuel Gompers, attempted to reconcile the factions. Gompers and the AFL eventually sided with McNulty-Collins as the legitimate Brotherhood. A court decision, in February 1912, declared the Reid-Murphy secession illegal and restored the Internationals union funds to the McNulty-Collins faction. Finally, in September 1913, McNulty won the endorsement of members attending the 12th Convention of the Brotherhood in Boston to repress the secession movement.

In Portland, IBEW Local 317 splintered into factions along the lines of those at the International level. But rather than reform the Reid-Murphy Local 317, members in Portland who were loyal to the NcNulty-Collins faction formed a new local. In 1912, the International recognized these loyalists to the McNulty-Collins faction of the IBEW, as Local 480. On May 21, 1913, the International formally chartered IBEW Local No. 48.

In that summer of 1913, at the request of the International, the Portland Building Trades Council unseated Local 317, further legitimatizing IBEW Local 48. The Reid Local 317 tried to compete against Local 48 by offering to work for $.50 an hour less,

8but without AFL support, failed and gradually disappeared from the workplace.

By 1911, local union contractors were meeting to socialize and to work out industry issues under the aegis of the Oregon Association of Electrical Contractors and Dealers, the predecessor of NECA. During these formative years of 1913 and 1914, IBEW Local 48 negotiated contracts with NePage-McKenny Co., the M.J. Walsh Electric Co., and other union-contractor members of the Oregon Association of Electrical Contractors and Dealers.

The organization of the electrical contractors who employed IBEW electricians was not smooth or consistent. The affiliation of Portland area contractors and their national organization may have dated to 1911. But in reality, the affiliation was on-and-off during the next three decades, possibly because of the distance between Portland and the East Coast, or simply the maverick nature of western contractors. East Coast electrical contractors had formed the predecessor of NECA with their New York counterparts in 1901. Some Portland contractors joined individually, but membership in the national office lapsed during World War I, resumed in the 1920s, lapsed but resumed twice during the 1930s.

Throughout the Roaring 20s and the Great Depression, the Oregon Association of Electrical Contractors and Dealers maintained robust ties to IBEW Local 48. They adopted their respective national organizations agreement, on January 26, 1920, to establish the Council on Industrial Relations (CIR) in Washington, D.C. The CIR no-strike agreement stabilized union shops and gave them an edge over nonunion shops. Instead of strikes costly to both labor and management, the parties agreed to submit the disputes they could not resolve themselves to the national CIR panel comprising twelve members, six representatives from the IBEW and six representatives from the contractors organization. The CIR would serve for the next 90 years as the supreme court of the electrical construction industry. It would settle more than 8,000 disputes without a labor strike, earning for the NECA/IBEW partnership in North America the title ``strikeless industry.

In Portland as in the rest of the nation, the postwar period in 1920 was hard on the electricians and contractors alike. Shipbuilding dried up. Unemployment rose. Increasing numbers of women entered the workplace. Child labor was commonplace. Political change, for good and ill, imposed itself on the workplace. By 1923, the Portland areas economy started turning around and with it, demand soared for electric service in homes, buildings and factories.

That same year, IBEW Local 48 celebrated its 10th anniversary with a gala dinner on October 3, 1923, in Portlands new Labor Temple building at the corner of Fourth Avenue and Jefferson. The program included speeches by state and national officers of the AFL and, significantly, IBEW President James P. Noonan and former IBEW President Frank McNulty. In 10 years, the membership of IBEW Local 48 swelled from the original 14 charter signers to some 250 in 1923.

In 1925, the economy in Portland roared. Both labor and management profited from major construction projects. Education had always been key to labor-management success, but it was primarily through on-the-job training. In 1929, with the Portland Public Schools as their partner, NECA/IBEW formalized the programs under the aegis of the Portland Apprentice School. That same year, the economy turned down, abruptly, with the crash on Wall Street, yet the labor-management consortium with the school system continued in the teeth of the oncoming Depression.

With the downturn in the economy, the union contractors and Local 48 renegotiated their agreement. They rolled back union wage scale 25 percent, from $1.375 per hour to $1.00, in order to help the union contractors recapture the residential market. The market recovery program presaged similar strategies decades later, in the mid-1980s and into the 21st Century.

9Times were tough for both labor and management during the Depression Era of the 1930s. Thousands of electricians hit the road for work out-of-state, as travelers. Many contractors consolidated, sold out or simply disappeared before the Roosevelt Administration could launch its series of jobs programs that included construction of Bonneville Dam and Timberline Lodge. Despite the odds, the Apprentice School continued to educate future electricians. The union worked closely with contractors to procure work, including reconstruction of the Oregon State Capitol after it burned in 1935. They also attended each others picnics and meetings.

At the start of World War II, the union contractors formally affiliated with the national office of NECA, only to drop out for a year in 1942. In 1943, they resumed their affiliation, as the Oregon-Columbia Chapter, which has continued to this day. The first president was R.C. Kenney, owner of what today is McCoy Electric Co., himself an electrician.

During the war years of 1942-1945, IBEW Local 48 swelled to more than 21,000 members, making it the largest such union local in the nation, primarily because of the need for electricians in the six largest shipyards in Portland and Vancouver. Demobilization wracked the union organization, which would need help from the International office adjusting to postwar realities.

From 1945 to 2013, the NECA contractors and the IBEW members of Local 48 jockeyed through a dozen economic recessions, and negotiated Oregons tortuous 30-year transition away from timber towards high technology.

The economic downturn in 1982-83 forced the NECA/IBEW to reach out to educators for help. The partnership learned new perspectives on labor-management negotiation, how to work together for mutual gain. During the recession that gripped Oregon and the nation in the mid-1980s, NECA/IBEW Local 48 and what would become their Barnes Allison Labor Management Cooperation Committee (BALMCC), broadened the diversity and improved the educational programs that underpin their partnership and take it to new heights during the dot.com boom of the 1990s.

The partnership endured the economic bust of 2001, followed by the Great Recession of 2009, still shoulder-to-shoulder, today, working together on projects such as the Intel construction and facing the technological challenges of the emergent Facebook Era of the 21st Century.

The technological challenges included meeting the markets demand for solar photovoltaic systems, net-zero building strategies, advanced fiber optic communications, hydrogen fuel cell technology, wind power, electric vehicle charging stations, energy audits and retrofits, and LEED certified green building compliance, not to mention the singular demands of Intel Corporation and the semiconductor industry. They recognized the reality of the 21st Century was that technological change was here to stay.

To meet the demands of a changing world and the concomitant challenges in the workplace,

the NECA/IBEW Local 48 team of craftsmen equipped themselves with a toolbox to meet the political and economic challenges and lead the public in technological change.

Decade after decade, they added to their tool chest: pay hikes for workers, the apprenticeship program in 1929, a welcoming attitude towards women and minorities during the shipbuilding ear of World War II, and strikeless negotiations that resulted in labor contracts good for all parties. Today, the toolbox of NECA/IBEW Local 48 comprises four strategic initiatives:

Incentives Management for mutual gain Education

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Drive towards diversity

The Depression Era of the 1930s, the shipbuilding war years of the 1940s, the boom years of the 1950s and 1960s, which included construction of the Lloyd Center and the expansion of the Apprentice School programs, invigorated the labor-management partnership between NECA and IBEW Local 48. NECA contractors paid union electricians premium wages. They provided work days that accommodated family life. They ensured a safe workplace, including conditions conducive to good work. They underpinned the partnership with an array of health and welfare benefits, including three pension plans that together with Social Security provide retirees and their families with the income they enjoyed during their working years.

The 1970s presented unparalleled opportunity for both labor and management, even during an era of skyrocketing inflation, high interest rates. Education remained of paramount importance. Through World War II and into the boom years of the 1950s and 1960s, the jointly managed apprenticeship program had grown alongside the need for continuing education of journeymen electricians. In 1963, NECA/IBEW had formed a Training Trust, which hired Dan Faddis the next year as the first Training Director of the Metro Joint Apprenticeship Training Center (JATC). That program outgrew its Benson High School quarters so the Trust, in 1977, acquired a 15,000 square foot former Safeway grocery in northeast Portland. Suddenly, however, the feverish economic growth that fueled the need for more and more apprentice electricians ended, abruptly.

In 1982, Oregons economy collapsed; unemployment was 12.1%. One third of the members of IBEW Local 48 became travelers, forced to seek work out-of-state. The largest NECA contractors pared their own ranks 75 percent. McCoy Electric, for instance, went from 100 employees to 25. Oregons timber-based economy had fallen off a cliff. Desperate, Tim Gauthier, the executive manager of the Oregon-Columbia Chapter of NECA, and Edward L. Barnes, the business manager of IBEW Local 48, sought help from academia. Without a trace of irony, the ivory tower consultants told the labor-management team, what works in the real world is cooperation.

Gauthier and Barnes were both new to their positions but not without experience or enthusiasm for the challenge ahead. They enlisted the union contractors of NECA and the rank-and-file electricians of Local 48 in a sweeping campaign committed not to labor, not to management, but to the customer. Making the customer happy became the game plan that would enable NECA/IBEW to recover the market share lost in the early 1980s. It would create jobs and guarantee job security in the 21st Century. But it wouldnt be easy.

Nevertheless, union rank-and-file, and their leaders, voted for change in the 1980s. The electrical contractors of NECA renegotiated wages, addressed health and welfare benefits, drugs and alcohol abuse, continuing education, diversity of skills, experience, race, gender and ideas, and secure retirement.

To make the customer happy, NECA/IBEW formed a funding and management trust initially referred to as the Labor Management Cooperation Committee. The committee would invest in education, public relations and marketing, to improve the quality of the industry workforce and tell its story. It was renamed the Barnes Allison Labor Management Cooperation Committee, or BALMCC, to honor Barnes who retired in 1995, and Hugh D. Buzzy Allison, former owner of Allison Electric and Sunset Electric as well as Oregon Electric Construction, now deceased, but who at the time was one of the more-involved NECA contractors. During his career as IBEW Local 48 president, and before that, dispatcher and business manager, Barnes co-chaired the Metro Join Apprenticeship Training Committee (JATC). On the opposite end of the handshake, Buzzy Allison not only served as president, governor and member of the board of directors of the Oregon-Columbia Chapter of NECA, he was cofounder of the Metro JATC facility in 1977.

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In 1995, Metro JATC found itself running out of classroom space in 1995, prompting the training program, now directed by Ken Fry, to expand into Whitaker Middle School and Portland Community Colleges Cascade Campus. In 1998, independent of the Portland school system, and any other governmental agency, the BALMCC partnership invested $6 million into construction of a new Electrical Training Center, adjacent to Local 48s offices just east of Portland International Airport. Today, under Training Director Rod Belisles leadership, the NECA/IBEW training center is meeting the demand for a diverse, motivated and highly educated workforce.

In addition to its role in promoting education, BALMCC also provided for a Code of Excellence that is, today, inculcated at every level of the NECA/IBEW partnership.

The bottom line is that since the formation of BALMCC in 1983, and the implementation of the unique market recovery program implemented by NECA/IBEW in 1986, the uncommonly harmonious relationship has won more than 18,000 projects that required 15 million hours of work for members of the union. The value of those jobs exceeded $1.5 billion for their employers. The payoff has been employment the past 30 years of the equivalent of 325 journeymen electricians all because of the uncommonly close cooperation of the members of NECA and IBEW Local 48.

With the 100th Anniversary of NECA/IBEW Local 48 in May 2013, the unions membership

verged on 4,000. The NECA chapter membership approached 120 electrical contractors.

In 2013, NECA/IBEW Local 48 celebrated 100 years of their powerful partnership by earning their share of the $1 billion electrical construction market in Oregon, from The Dalles to the northwest coast, across the Columbia River to Vancouver, Kelso-Longview and southwest Washington.

On behalf of the 7,000 families of their members, the NECA/IBEW Local 48 partnership managed with a watchful eye more than $1.5 billion dollars in assets. Those assets in 2013 included three pension trust funds, a self-insured health, and welfare trust fund, and the priceless asset of education the NECA\IBEW Electrical Training Center.

Concern for safety, fair compensation, education, competitiveness and an abiding sense of always trying to do whats right made for the uncommonly harmonious partnership between the men and women of the Oregon-Columbia Chapter NECA and IBEW Local 48. That is their story and it lives on.

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PORTLAND LOVES ITS LIGHTS!Oregon Census 413,536

Electricity was the Next Big Thing at the turn of the Twentieth Century in Portland, Oregon.

Most everybody in greater Portland wanted electricity to light their homes and power their shops and factories, to light their schools and churches and attract customers to their stores, hotels, movie houses and amusement parks. George A. Hughes manufactured the first practical electric range. Hurley Machine Co. introduced the amazing Thor Washer, one of the first electric washing machines. Consumers eagerly embraced the new electric appliances (50th Anniversary NECA program).

To meet the demand for a people hungry for electricity, the numbers of electricians in Oregon tripled from an estimated 276 in 1900 to 879 in 1910 (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Bulletin No. 439, Handbook of Labor Statistics 1924-1926, 419-421).

Though their numbers were small, electrical workers talked among themselves about their wages, their long hours and their work

conditions. Two men were electrocuted on the job in 1904 and the State of Oregon recognized the need for regulations, including a safety code.

The knowledge of how to transmit and control this great and mysterious force is also becoming, greater every day and it is only a question of time when electrical power will be so cheap that steam as a motive agency will be crowded out entirely. Legislation on this subject should keep pace with electrical development.

Report to the Oregon LegislatureBureau of LaborState of Oregon(50 Years of Progress Bureau of Labor, 25th Biennial ReportState of Oregons Bureau of Labor)

1902-1903Lewis and Clark Exposition management wanted to present a first class spectacle at discounted

labor costs. The exposition association solicited trade unions to buy blocks of exposition stock. The Portland Labor Press (March 10, 1905 issue) reported that for their subscriptions, the unions received promises that all work on the grounds would be done under union conditions with union men. But in April 1903, fair management authorized an open-shop policy, denying any such commitment to using only union labor (Craig E. Wollner, The City Builders, 44).

1904A handful of inside electrical workers in Portland formed a union and chartered themselves to the

International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) as Local Union No. 317. Their growth was slow, meeting when and where possible. Though they numbered about 15 members, they included some of the most experienced electricians of the day (IBEW Local 48 website; and Golden Jubilee remarks by Historian John Clothier, undated but presented at a gathering of 720 NECA/IBEW Local

EARLY 19

00S

The Electrical Worker January, 1893The Electrical Worker January, 1893 #1

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48 members, families and guests at the Sheraton Hotel, November 2, 1963. IBEW Local 48).

1905Angry Building Trades Council unions, led by the painters and carpenters unions, threatened to

strike for a minimum wage of $3.50 per day (standard West Coast rate). But many union members hesitated, unwilling to jeopardize the opening of the Lewis and Clark Exposition in June 1905. Exposition management embarked on a PR campaign to quiet the labor unrest (MacColl, 339, quoting Wollner, 44).

John D.M. Crockwell, born in Salt Lake City in 1879 (Oregonian, March 7, 1954, p 18), moved to Portland between 1903 and 1905, and immediately found work as a union electrician and member of IBEW Local 317. He was active in the American Federation of Labor, gained a reputation as both a labor organizer and an event organizer (Labor Day festivities), and was a time business manager of the electricians union (For the 1903 date, see Oregonian, April 27, 1940, p 16; for the 1905 date and business manager reference, see Oregonian, April 4, 1946, p 13).

1906IBEW Local 317 initiated a young electrician, George Pettingell. He would advance to

journeyman status, leave the rank-and-file in 1929 and become an electrical engineer (Bauder, Journal 35, September 1963). Ten years later, in 1939, Pettingell represented NECA in successful negotiations with Local 48 that cemented the cooperative relationship between labor and management (Pettingell letter, dated September 1, 1939, to NECA contractors).

The contractors in Portland who employed the union electricians of Local 317 formed loose-knit associations, to talk about their work and to socialize. Among those early contractors, NePage-McKenny Co. out of Seattle was largest. Jud F. NePage employed apprentices and journeymen in 1906. NePages superintendent was Harry Sroufe. Like many electricians who gained their experience at NePage-McKenny, Sroufe would later form his own company.

1907Samuel I. Jaggar, a union man himself, opened the doors to his own company, Morrison

Electric Co., in 1907 just two years after he helped wire 3,000 lights in the Forestry Building at the Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition and Oriental Fair in Portland in 1905. He too would be engaged in NECA/IBEW events fifty years later, recalling his experiences underscoring the history of cooperation in the electrical industry (Barnes interview 8).

1908The nearly 100 members of IBEW Local 317 selected Crockwell as financial

secretary and business agent. His brother Frank was elected president. Crockwell was very actively involved in organizing the picture machine operators (Portland No. 317, D.B. Brooks, press secretary, The Electrical Worker, March 1908, p 181).

1908Local 317 Business Agent Crockwell chaired the Labor Day Committee that organized

a parade, picnic and festivities for the 1908 Labor Day celebration in Portland (Labor Day Plans Are Completed, Portland Labor Press, Tuesday, September 4, 1908, p 1).

1908Local 317 Business Agent Crockwell (with C.M. Rynerson and W.H. Fitzgerald)

circulated a manifesto calling for organized labor in Oregon to vote for William Jennings Bryan for president of the United States. The Oregonian editorialized against Crockwell, Rynerson and Fitzgerald for their impudence, advocating for a political candidate as somehow a violation of labor unionism (Oregonian, September 13, 1908, p 6).

The Electrical Worker January, 1893

Conductor and motorman of the Williams Avenue electric streetcar in 1904-1905. #2

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1908A four-year legal erupted nationally between two rival factions for control of the

International organization of the IBEW. The struggle would eventually result, in 1913, in the formation of IBEW Local Union No. 48 in Portland, and the demise of Local 317.

1909Portlands Central Labor Council [Building Trades Council] elected J.D.M. Crockwell to a six-month

term as one of its reading clerks. He represented the Electrical Workers. He was also elected to serve on the organizing committee and as a delegate to the Ministerial Association (Oregonian, July 31, 1909, p 3).

1909IBEW Local 317 initiated Clarence Shafer in 1909. Fifty years later, he

would recall his experiences as an electrician during Local 48s annual old-timers dinners in the 1960s (Bauder, Journal 35, September 1963).

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FORMATIVE YEARS OF NECA AND IBEW LOCAL 48Oregon Census 672,765

1911Several electrical contractors in Oregon decided it was time to form an industry organization.

Although the National Electrical Contractors Association (NECA) was operating at that time (it had been formed in 1901 in New York), affiliation with the national association was not important enough to the Portland businessmen. NECA was located on the East Coast. Instead, the contractors formed their own loose knit organization, the Oregon Electrical Contractors Association (OECA). With the help of Fred Weber, inspector for Underwriters Equitable Rating Bureau, the handful of Portland-area contractors met informally at first, to discuss contracts, settle their differences, promote their industry, and to socialize (50th Anniversary NECA program).

In 1911, John R. Tomlinson and T.F. Pierce formed Pierce-Tomlinson Electric Company in Portland, immediately ranking them among the leading and responsible firms in Oregon. Tomlinson took an active role in OECA, both as an organizer and also as its first treasurer, and later as its director with the national organization of contractors (Google Books: John R. Tomlinson, Electrical Review and Western Electrician, June 27, 1914, p 1289).

1912Portland was booming. More than a quarter-million passengers rode Portlands 526 streetcars

each day, to work or shop, to cross the Willamette River to visit a friend or go on a picnic atop Council Crest (Arietta-Walden 42). A gallon of gas cost 7 cents while electricity was an expensive 15 to 20 cents per kilowatt-hour. Electricians kept Portland lit up and on the move

To wire a house or building, people contacted electrical contractors who in turn employed electricians to do the work. Together, they had the skills, the tools and the expertise to wire and install motors, electrical equipment and home appliances safely! Though like any building trade, they were competitive, the contractors and the electricians they hired discovered early on that cooperation was mutually useful.

1912The courts resolved the four-year dispute between International IBEW President Frank J.

McNulty and Secretary Peter W. Collins and a rival secessionist faction led by J.J. Reid, president, and J.W. Murphy, secretary. The court decision, in February 1912, declared the Reid-Murphy secession illegal and restored union funds to the McNulty-Collins faction, which was endorsed by the American Federation of Labor led by Samuel Gompers (Electrical Workers Endorse McNulty, Portland Labor Press, October 13, 1913, p 1; also IBEW History and Structure, Carrying the IBEW Dream into the 21st Century. Web: September 2012.)

In response to the 1912 legal decision and in support of the McNulty-Collins leadership of the International IBEW, local union electricians in Portland left Reid-Murphy Local 317 and formed IBEW Local 480 (Golden Jubilee remarks by Historian John Clothier, undated but presented at a gathering of 720 NECA/IBEW Local 48 members, families and guests at the Sheraton Hotel, November 2, 1963. IBEW Local 48).

December 17, 1912The Oregon Electrical Contractors Association conducted their first convention in Portland.

Members attending the two-day meeting include well-known contractors of that era, Jud F. NePage, Frank Pierce, A.E. McCoy, Harry Clapp, W.O. Fouch, John Tomlinson (first secretary-treasurer of the association), Ed Pierce, O.B. Stuffs, Harry Sroufe, O.A. Penrose, William Lord, and Elmer Maxon

1910S

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(50th Anniversary NECA program. See also wide-angle photo on NECA chapter office wall).

1913On March 4, 1913, Congress created the U.S. Department of Labor. Incoming President Woodrow

Wilson appointed a United Mine Workers official as the first Secretary of Labor (Shmoop Editorial Team).

May 21, 1913Members of the Reid-Murphy Local 317 sought membership in Local 480, formed the

year before, and in the spirit of reconciliation, requested an election. After much debate, they compromised and formed a whole new chapter, IBEW Local 48 (Golden Jubilee remarks by Historian John Clothier, undated but presented at a gathering of 720 NECA/IBEW Local 48 members, families and guests at the Sheraton Hotel, November 2, 1963. IBEW Local 48).

Fourteen members resolved their differences and merged their union interests with their signatures on the charter of IBEW Local Union No. 48. Signers of the new Local 48 charter were,

Andy PeacherH.L. AverillH. DickmanHomer GiffordW.H. EmrichJ.D. HarkleroadP.A. SpireB.E. MooreGeorge CollinsM.A. RhodesH.Q. GannonW.J. LeDoutJ.M. AhearnJohn Goodwick

In the summer of 1913, at the request of the McNulty-Collins leadership of the International IBEW, the Portland Building Trades Council unseated remaining members of the Reid-Murphy Local 317 and recognized IBEW Local 48 (nee Local 480) (L.U. No. 48, Portland, Ore, by W.H. Emrick, Business Agent, The Electrical Worker, March 1914, p 129; Our Fight In the City of Portland, by L.C. Grasser, International Vice President, The Electrical Worker, p 135; and Our Pacific Coast Trip, The Electrical Worker, May 1913, p 931).

Before the Building Trades Council ousted the Reid-Murphy Local 317, the union had maintained offices in the Labor Temple at 270 Alder Street. They had met at 8 p.m., Tuesdays, in Hall 401, with Crockwell presiding as its business agent (Directory of Local Unions, Portland Labor Press, November 11, 1912, p 7; also, see the Directory of Local Unions in just about every issue published in 1912-1913).

After the ouster that summer of 1913, the Portland Labor Press dropped all references to Local 317 and Business Agent J.D.M. Crockwell (Directory of Local Unions, Portland Labor Press, September 15, 1913, p 7).

In September 1913, McNulty won the endorsement of members attending the 12th Convention of the Brotherhood in Boston to repress, once for all, the secession movement (Sources: Electrical Workers Endorse McNulty, Portland Labor Press, October 13, 1913, p 1; also IBEW History and Structure, Carrying the IBEW Dream into the 21st Century, available as PDF on the IBEW Internationals website).

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October 5, 1913Typical of some of the increasingly busy contractors, Beaver Electric Co. landed contracts

for small motors and lighting that underscored the industrial vitality of Portland. Their electricians did work in the shops of McDougall & Overmire, the Jeffery Aeroplane Co., and the new aeroplane addition of the Nicolai Door Co. They also announced a contract for the installation of motors at the new factory of Western Foundry Co., to operate machinery and a 4-ton electric crane (Electrical Review, October 5, 1913, Vol. 73, No. 14, p. 553).

November 17, 1913Oregon Governor Oswald West proclaimed the enactment of the states Workmens

Compensation Law after a near-unanimous vote of the Oregon Legislature, and the subsequent majority approval by 39,206 Oregonians who cast votes in favor of the progressive measure in a special election held on November 4, 1913. The law will create a State Industrial Accident Fund, and a Commission to administer it, for the sole purpose of compensating people injured in the course of employment (State Industrial Accident Commission, First Annual Report 1-3).

1914In its February 16, 1914, issue, the Portland Labor Press commenced listing of Local 48 (nee Local

480) as the inside electricians union representative, meeting every Wednesday at 8 p.m., in the Labor Temple Hall 304; Owen Osborne, recording secretary, P.A. Spice, financial secretary, and B.H. Emrich (sic), business agent (Source: Directory of Local Unions, Portland Labor Press, February 16, 1914, p 7).

Among the original charter members, Peacher, Gifford and Hackleroad would live long enough to celebrate Local 48s Golden Jubilee 50th anniversary. Peacher and Gifford attended the Golden Jubilee dinner party, November 2, 1963, at Portlands Sheraton Hotel, and were warmly applauded by more than 700 IBEW members, wives, guests and 50 NECA electrical contractors, all of whom had contracts with Local 48 (Barnes, Electrical Workers Journal 51. Also, see remarks by John Clothier during IBEW Local 48s Golden Jubilee, undated: files of IBEW Local 48).

1914From its beginning, IBEW Local 48 sought to provide the OECA contractors with workers who

were better qualified than nonunion electricians. With encouragement from the union contractors, especially Harry Sroufe, superintendent of NePage-McKenny Co., Mud Crockwell negotiated Local 48s first agreement, to commence in 1915 (Clothier, Golden Jubilee 2 Clothiers statement flies in the face of facts regarding the secessionists in IBEWs national Journal, referenced below), with terms that did in fact improve members wages, hours and work conditions:

First contracts: Jud F. NePage for the employment of union electricians by the highly esteemed NePage-McKenny Co. out of Seattle, and M.J. Walsh, owner of M.J. Walsh Electric Co.

Journeymen wages: 22 per hour. Workweek: 40 hours. Overtime: 33 per hour. Helpers wages: $1.00 per day.

(Sources: IBEW Local 48 History 1; and Golden Jubilee remarks by Historian John Clothier, undated but presented at a gathering of 720 NECA/IBEW Local 48 members, families and guests at the Sheraton Hotel, November 2, 1963. IBEW Local 48 this information is suspect see IBEW Journal references, Oregonian, and Labor Press from this period.)

In the spirit of cooperation, Local 48 officers and its business manager attended meetings and conventions of the OECA. Union members (including, unexplainably, former Local 317 Business

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Agent J.D.M. Crockwell) even appeared in wide-angle group photographs taken of OECA conventions, in support of their efforts to win jobs in what was even then a highly competitive industry.

A Local 48 journeymans pay was one-fourth of the $3,000 in salary paid in 1914 to Oregons Republican Labor Commissioner, O.P. Hoff, and three-fourths of the $900 paid to his stenographer. Hoff and his stenographers salaries are listed in pages 65-66 of the Blue Book and Official Directory 1913-1914. State of Oregon. Compiled by Secretary of State Ben W. Olcott. Salem, Oregon: Willis S. Duniway, State Printer, 1913.

Several dozen Portland-area union electrical contractors employed more than 200 union

electricians on a wide-ranging series of projects in the booming river city of Portland. Four dollars per day and an eight-hour day were deemed achievable for the membership of IBEW Local 48 as demand for their skilled craftsmanship increases along with their experience and education.

Contractors like Sam Jaggar worked with the union electricians during his half-century career in Portlands electrical contracting industry. He was known to be helpful to apprentices and amenable to journeymen, improving their lot with higher pay and safer work conditions. He employed them on his projects that, at the time, included the new Multnomah Athletic Club and the third home for the venerable Arlington Club, both on southwest Salmon Street (Barnes interview 7-8).

Typical of other projects won by contractors are the following:

A.I. Parkhurst, two-story brick building on northwest corner of Couch and Second Street North. NePage-McKenny & Co., electrical work on building at southeast corner of Fourth and Burnside. Fred H. Koltz, electrical contract for store and garage on

northeast corner of Broadway and Everett Street. Vanderlip & Lord, electrical contract for Olson & Rowe Transfer Co.

on the southeast corner of Hoyt and 15th Street North.

Construction in Portland continued unabated, despite the growing clouds of war in Europe. Bids were let, in 1914, for much construction, including the following projects:

New lighting system in Portland City Hall. Construction of the Portland Ice Hippodrome on the southwest

corner of Northrup and 20th Street North. New movie theatre on the south side of State Street between Park

and 7th Street, with a seating capacity of 2,200. New telephone switchboard system for Northwest Steel Co.s new plant in south Portland.

(Journal of Electricity, Vol. 32, No. 2, January 17, 1914, p 66)

June 1914Saturday, June 6, with a flick of a switch at Northwestern Electric Co. at precisely 8 p.m., a blaze of

light from thousands of electric bulbs lit up 10 fashionable shopping blocks of downtown Portlands 3rd Street. IBEW Local 48 electricians working for the W.A. KRANER & CO constructed what local Third Streeters touted as The Great Light Way. Each of the illuminated arches comprised a concrete base on from which exposed steel archways spanned the corners of the street intersections diagonally from Yamhill to Burnside. The union construction crew included Local 48 Business Agent W.H. Emrich and Local 48 President H.L. Averill, both of whom were charter members of Local 48 the year prior (The Electrical Worker, p 278; Engineering News, April 1, 1915, p 638; Local 48s May 1913 charter from IBEW). The lighted archways distinguished 3rd Street for the next 20 years, including the Depression, until the power was turned off, in 1937 (Abbott, Gateway 174-175; Engineering

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News, Vol. 73, No. 13, p 638; Oregon Encyclopedia; Forbes September 1, 1926). [See also Fig. 2. Two Derrick-Trucks Erecting Second Arch of a Pair and Fig. 1. Illumination Arches, Portland, Ore. In Engineering News, Vol. 73, No. 13, New York: Hill Publishing Co., April 1, 1915, p. 638; also, OHS OrHi 17573 (neg. no. 13630a) Third & Morrison, night; and OHS OrHi 17573 (neg. no. 142) #1573, looking north Lion Cloth Co. Morrison and Third. Also, check Forbes magazine, September 1, 1926.]

Monday, June 8, the Oregon Electrical Contractors Association convened their second convention, a two-day affair in which they had a wide-angle group picture taken on the street in front of the new offices of Northwest Electric Co. in the Pittock Block, West Park and Washington streets at 9:30 a.m. Republican nominee for governor Dr. James Withycombe gave opening address with the response by R.G. Littler, president of the association. National Electrical Contractors Association President Ernest Freeman presented the paper, the Electrical Contractors Association (Oregonian, 31 May 1914, p 12; also Program NECA 50th Anniversary. See wide-angle photo on NECA chapter office wall).

July 28, 1914World War I started in Europe. The Great War increased defense industry production, especially

shipbuilding, in Portland, effectively doubling the numbers of electrical workers employed locally (R.C. McKenny, quoted in Electrical Review, Vol. 73, No. 14, p 542, Oct. 5, 1918).

October 15, 1914Clayton Act exempted labor unions from the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. (However,

courts would later void many union protections, making the Clayton Act less effective than intended by President Wilson.) (Shmoop Editorial Team)

1915Safety paid off for electricians and their employers during the first full year of Oregons

implementation of the Workmens Compensation Law, in 1913. Only one of the 60 workers killed on the job was an electrical worker. Only 39 of the 2,622 workers injured on the job were electrical workers. Forest products emerged as the most dangerous occupation in the state during that period with almost half of those killed or injured employed in Oregons largest industry (State Industrial Accident Commission, First Annual Report 31).

1916Keating-Owen Act established an eight-hour maximum workday for children, 14-16 years

of age, prohibited factory work for those under 14. [Two years later, the Supreme Court would deem this impermissible regulation of interstate commerce in Hammer v. Dagenhart, 247 U.S. 251 (1918). In 1941, however, the Supreme Court will overrule Hammer v. Dagenhart, 247 U.S. 251 (1918) in a decision that year that included unanimously upholding the constitutionality of the Fair Labor and Standards Act of 1938.] (BOLI Administrative Overview, March 2009)

The Electrical Worker January, 1893

June 28, 1916 Oregon Association of Electrical Contractors and Dealers, taken in front of Stubbvs Electric Co. SW 8th and Pine Streets, Portland, OR #3

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June 1916Oregon Electrical Contractors Association convenes third convention (Program NECA

50th Anniversary). The contractors hired a photographer to take a wide-angle photo that hangs today on the NECA chapter office wall in Portland. The windows of Stubbs Electric in the background of this photo advertise Mazda Lamps and Wireless supplies for sale.

Oregon Electrical Contractors Association reorganized as Electrical Contractor and Dealer Association, more of a fraternal organization rather than a union electrical contractor trade association (Program NECA 50th Anniversary).

In 1916, Reid Local 317s Business Agent J.D.M. Crockwell was included in the group photograph of the Oregon Association of Electrical Contractors and Dealers at S.W. Sixth and Pine streets in front of Stubbs Electric, above. I cannot find any explanation why, or in what capacity A. Guggenheim.

On page 15 of the December 23, 1916, edition of the Oregonian, Crockwell was listed along with 13 other deputy-coworkers in the Multnomah County Clerks office. He and his coworkers presented a silver loving cup in appreciation of the services of County Clerk John B. Coffey who was retiring at the end of the year. (Interestingly, that same year, Crockwell interceded for a friend who was charged with check-forgery and who subsequently betrayed Crockwell. The friend, J.C. Dyer, had been paroled to Crockwell in June 1916, after promising to pay back $200 to a local bank. In September, Dyer allegedly forged Crockwells name to

$75 in checks and stole a ring and other property from his benefactor, and fled town. On October 15, 1916, the sheriff s office arrested Dyer in Camas, Washington (Oregonian, October 17, 1916, p 13).)

1916The Conference Club, a small group of electrical contractors in New York led by an engineer

named Louis Kossuth Comstock, met to socialize but also to discuss concerns they have for their rapidly expanding industry. During one of these meetings, Comstock proposed working with the IBEW to draft a National Labor Agreement. The idea would germinate over the period of several years and, in 1920, result in the creation of the Council on Industrial Relations (CIR), to prevent labor union strife and disruption (About CIR. Council on Industrial Relations, Office of the Secretary, 900 Seventh Street, NW Washington, D.C. 20001; CIR is co-sponsored by the IBEW and NECA. http://www.thecir.org/About.htm).

February 14, 1917The Interstate Bridge was dedicated (Arietta-Walden 43). It is the fourth such moveable

bridge, requiring intensive electrical contracting services, to be built over the Willamette River since 1910. The other three bridges were the Broadway Bridge (1913), Steel Bridge (1912), and Hawthorne Bridge (1910). All of them were vertical lift drawbridges except for the Broadway, which was a bascule seesaw design (Wortman 13).

The Electrical Worker January, 1893

The original 14 signers of the IBEW Local 48 charter included Andy Peacher, H. Dickman, Homer Gifford, J.D. Harkleroad, P.A. Spire, B.E. moore, George Collins, M.A. Rhodes, H.Q. Gannon, W.J. LeDout, J.M. Ahearn, John Goodwick, H.L. Averill and W.H. Emrich. #4

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April 1917United States entered World War I.

Local Union No. 48 grew in the past six months, from an organization of one-dozen to approximately one-hundred and eighty members and we expect to have two hundred and fifty members in the next thirty or sixty days . . . Portland has the shipbuilding fever, and wood and steel shipbuilding plants are springing up over night. So far labor has gained very little . . . The inside wiring business is not very prosperous yet.

Fred L. Bourne, PresidentFrank Manin, SecretaryIBEW Local Union 48The Electrical Workers Journal, May 1917

May 18, 1917United States starts drafting men with the newly implemented Selective Service system in

preparation for possible service in World War I. This concerns Portland area electrical contractors who see the ranks of union electricians double from 200 to 400 in three years, but who worry that those same ranks will be thinned by the implementation of the draft (R.C. McKenny, quoted in Electrical Review, Vol. 73, No. 14, p 542, Oct. 5, 1918. Google Books Search. Web. August 2012).

The success of Germanys U-boats prompts the U.S. Emergency Fleet Corporation to order nearly 100 steel-hulled and wooden-hulled ships to be built in Portlands burgeoning shipyards. More than 28,000 people employed in the shipyards and another 5,000 in related industries will work around the clock to meet wartime demand by the end of 1918. Many of those workers will be electricians (Abbott, Three Centuries 97).

President (Frank J.) McNulty (head of IBEW international from 1903-1919) was in our city at our last meeting . . . McNulty talked on cooperation. We also had with us the president of the Oregon Electrical Contractors Association and several of the contractors of this city, and the occasion was a very popular one because it will do a vast amount of good in the future. After several vaudeville performances the entire membership and friends adjourned to the banquet room where lots of eats were in preparation and all sat to an enjoyable time.

F. L. Bourne, PresidentPress SecretaryIBEW Local Union 48The Electrical Workers Journal, June 1917

1918Members of Local Union 48 IBEW Now With the Rainbow Division in

France photograph is published by The Electrical Workers Journal, January 1918, page unknown. A rough photocopy is n file at IBEW Local 48.

Samuel C. Jaggar and Harry Sroufe, together with shop foreman Arthur Tobey, start Jaggar-Sroufe Co. They join the Portland Chapter of the Electrical Contractors Association (Program NECA 50th Anniversary).

World War I shipbuilding requires new transmission line from Portland across the Columbia River to Vancouver to supply power to the Standifer wooden-ship and its steel-ship yards, as well as a government spruce cut-up mill (Electrical Review, October 19, 1918, Vol. 73, No. 16, p. 625).

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Construction of new homes, offices and factories is curtailed because of the war. Portland suffers a shortage of buildings and residences, thus driving up prices and rents. This wartime shortage is nationwide; it will be 1922 before new construction of homes, businesses, offices and industrial plants can match the demand of the growing population of Portland (U.S. Department of Labor, Building Permits 9-11, 37, 51, 65).

September 20, 1918Oregon Association of Electrical Contractors and Dealers meet in Portland, Oregon. Presiding

officer is P.W. Paul. Secretary, J.W. Oberender reported 33 members are also members of the national association. He said a good many members had resigned within the past year because of war service. He also reviewed liability insurance rates. Jaggar-Sroufes Sam Jaggar, chair of the Committee on Industrial Development, discussed relations with jobbers and how recent cooperation improved contractors competitiveness. NePage-McKenny Companys R.C. McKenny, a member of the Labor Committee, said there are between 450 and 500 skilled electrical men in the industries compared to 200 before the war. He said all were fully employed in shipbuilding primarily. He said that if 50 percent are drafted into military service there will be a scarcity of skilled workers. He told contractors to report to the government the essential nature of the work their workers were doing. Contractors are fully engaged and a considerable amount of new wiring must be done if a proposed 2,000 new houses are built for employees drawn into wartime production. The group talked of maintaining patriotic ardor and fair competition and helpful cooperation between the branches of the industry (R.C. McKenny, quoted in Electrical Review, Vol. 73, No. 14, p 542, Oct. 5, 1918).

November 11, 1918Armistice Day World War I ended.

1919Strikes broke out across the nation, among 40,000 coal workers and 120,000 textile workers. The

labor unrest prompts public suspicion of labor radicals and leads to the Red Scare (Shmoop Editorial Team), and what University of Oregon Professor Richard Maxwell Brown called the antiradical vendetta of the era of World War I in the Pacific Northwest and nationally (McClelland xi).

Oregon created State Board of Conciliation and Arbitration as an aid to keeping industrial peace. It is the first of its kind in the nation (BOLI Administrative Overview, March 2009).

March 1919IBEW Local 48 initiated H.A. Pop Reik. Fifty years later, he would

recall his experiences as an electrician during Local 48s annual old-timers dinners in the 1960s (Bauder, Journal 35, September 1963).

November 11, 1919Wobblies of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), slew four members of local American Legion

during an Armistice Day parade in Centralia, Washington, prompting mass arrests, reprisals, and the lynching of an itinerant logger thought to be the business secretary of the union (McClelland 59-86).

March 1919Representatives of the IBEW and the predecessor of NECA, the National Association of

Electrical Contractors and Dealers (NAECD) met to work out principles of agreement that would form the basis for improved management-labor relations (About CIR. Council on Industrial Relations, Office of the Secretary, 900 Seventh Street, NW Washington, D.C. 20001; CIR is co-sponsored by the IBEW and NECA. http://www.thecir.org/About.htm).

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July 1919The NAECD accepted the Declaration of Principles agreed upon with the IBEW (About CIR.

Council on Industrial Relations, Office of the Secretary, 900 Seventh Street, NW Washington, D.C. 20001; CIR is co-sponsored by the IBEW and NECA. http://www.thecir.org/About.htm).

September 1919The IBEW approved the Declaration of Principles (About CIR. Council on Industrial

Relations, Office of the Secretary, 900 Seventh Street, NW Washington, D.C. 20001; CIR is co-sponsored by the IBEW and NECA. http://www.thecir.org/About.htm).

In 1919, the Oregon Legislature passed landmark electrical safety legislation that would forever affect electricians. The law directed the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Inspector of Factories and Workshops to start licensing electric equipment installers (BOLI Administrative Overview, March 2009), a move that would necessitate training and education, and form the basis for safer work conditions.

A licensing law, passed in 1919, required all men engaged in the business of installing electrical equipment to be licensed by the Bureau of Labor. All wiring installed had to meet a safety code requirement. It was not the labor departments policy to discourage the use of electricity but to call attention to its great dangers when proper precautions were not taken. During subsequent years, the department recommended thousands of changes in the wiring of factories, garages, schools and dwellings. During the last biennium of the 1920s the bureau licensed 819 electrical contractors as being competent to install wires and equipment.

50 Years of Progress Bureau of Labor25th Biennial Report, published in 1952W.E. KimseyCommissioner of LaborOregon Bureau of Labor

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CONTRACTORS AND LOCAL 48 CEMENT THEIR PARTNERSHIPOregon Census 783,389

1920Statistically, Oregon had 1,578 electricians (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Bulletin No. 439,

Handbook of Labor Statistics 1924-1926, 419-421). Roughly, one-third, or about 500, were referenced as being members of IBEW Local 48 by a union contractor familiar with the union membership (R.C. McKenny, NePage-McKenny, quoted in Electrical Review, Vol. 73, No. 14, p 542, Oct. 5, 1918). Because World War I was over, the threat of the draft gone, and practically all of the large buildings and a large proportion of homes in Portland were being equipped with electricity, the calculated numbers of electricians, and IBEW Local 48 members, was probably somewhat higher than 500.

January 26, 1920A committee comprised of five members of the international office of the IBEW and five

from the NAECD adopted a resolution for putting the principles into action by setting up the Council on Industrial Relations (CIR) (About CIR. Council on Industrial Relations, Office of the Secretary, 900 Seventh Street, NW Washington, D.C. 20001; CIR is co-sponsored by the IBEW and NECA. http://www.thecir.org/About.htm).

Sometime in the 1920s or early 1930s [IBEW Local 48 website says 1920s, Tim Gauthier says 1929, Ed Barnes says 1933], the Oregon-Columbia Chapter of NECA and IBEW Local 48 began incorporating the CIR clause in their collective bargaining agreements. The agreement to insert the no-strike clause was intended to stabilize union shops and give them an edge over nonunion shops (IBEW Local 48 History 2). They agreed to submit any disputes they cannot resolve to the national CIR panel made up of twelve members, six representatives from the IBEW and six representatives from NECA. The panelists were chosen for their ability to render fair and equable decisions based upon the facts (Gauthier interview). When the members of the Council are in session, they do not represent either NECA or IBEW, but rather the electrical contracting industry. Their decisions are unanimous before they can become official. Today, the CIR meets four times a year to hear grievances, interpret existing agreements, and to arbitrate contract negotiations. In each case, the parties must have tried to settle their differences at home but have come to impasse. The decision issued by CIR is legal and binding upon both parties, thus replacing the need for arbitration that could be astronomically costly, or labor strikes that could be self-destructive to the industry. Over the course of the next 90 years, the CIR will serve as a supreme court of the electrical construction industry, settling more than 8,000 disputes without a labor strike, earning for the NECA/IBEW partnership in North America the title ``strikeless industry (About CIR. Council on Industrial Relations, Office of the Secretary, 900 Seventh Street, NW Washington, D.C. 20001; CIR is co-sponsored by the IBEW and NECA. http://www.thecir.org/About.htm).

1920sIBEW Local 48s membership increased with postwar expansion in the Portland area of radio

broadcasting, manufacturing, neon sign, and exterior lighting, and the sale, installation and repair of electrical appliances (IBEW Local 48 History 2). Electrical contractors and the swelling ranks of electricians profited from a building boom in Portland as builders construct 25,000 new houses in vacant lots in east-side neighborhoods of Eastmoreland, Grant Park, Mount Tabor, and towards the north, in Concordia. The citys population surged five to six miles in every direction on the eastside of the newly bridged Willamette River, easily crossed on foot, by streetcar, or automobile. Contractors found work wiring Cleveland, Roosevelt and Grant high schools, as well as new commercial strips along Eighty-second Avenue, Barbur Boulevard, and especially the broad and garish Sandy Boulevard that architect Al Staehli once described as a linear Disneyland of buildings which were also symbols of their function (Abbott, Three Centuries 108-109).

1920

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Oregon-Columbia electrical contractors resumed their affiliation with the NECA. Members included Dimitre Electric, Huenegard Electric, Jaggar-Sroufe Co., E.L. Knight & Co., Morrison Electric Co., NePage-McKenny Co., M.J. Walsh Electric Co., Cooperative Electric Co., W.H. Emerick Inc., Grand Electric, National Electric Co., Peninsula Electric Co., Star Electric & Radio Co., J.R. Tomlinson Electric and Mutual Electric Co. (Program NECA 50th Anniversary).

IBEW headquarters relocated from Springfield, Illinois, to Washington, D.C. (IBEW Carrying the IBEW Dream into the 21st Century).

January 1920The nation slipped into a postwar economic recession that would last

through spring of 1921 (National Bureau of Economic Research).

March 23, 1921Conference Club and IBEW met to discuss financing the National Council on Industrial

Relations (CIR). The Contractors and IBEW decided to appeal to individual contractor-members of the NAECD individually to contribute to the support of the CIR rather than ask an outside organization take over the burden (Electrical World, Vo. 77, No. 16, p. 897, April 16, 1921).

June 13-14, 1921Oregon Association of Electrical Contractors and Dealers held their 10th annual

convention, in Eugene (Electrical World, Vol. 77, No. 24, p. 1391, June 11, 1921).

July 1921The nation commenced economic recovery (National Bureau of Economic Research)

but forest products-dependent Oregon was slow to emerge from the recession.

Local 48 has had their charter closed for the past three months, owing to the number of unemployed . . . the true condition existing here at the present time is deplorable, in so far as work is concerned . . . Local No. 48 has been compelled to accept a reduction in wage from $8.00 per day to $7.20. This we hoped might stimulate the building program in this city.

T.C. Ream, B.A.IBEW Local 48The Electrical Workers Journal, October 1921

July 1924A boom in construction nationwide improved the outlook for

forest products. The nation, and Oregon, would enjoy 27 months of unimpeded growth (National Bureau of Economic Research).

Electricians and contractors alike profited from a building boom of homes, businesses, industry, and bridges linking the surging neighborhood centers of population growth on the eastside of the Willamette River with the business district three to six miles to the west (Abbott, Three Centuries 105-111)

In 1924, the Portland area building trades constructed 4,110 homes, apartments, lodging houses, including two hotels at a cost of $18.4 million. In 1925, they built 3,798 such buildings, including eight hotels, at a cost of $21.8 million, or an 18 percent increase over the previous year (U.S. Department of Labor, Building Permits 37).

Electric demand in thousands of homes in streetcard suburbs on the eastside of the Willamette prompted Northwestern Electrics construction of this Albina warehouse in 1926.#5

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Similarly, in 1924, they constructed 5,207 new Portland area amusement parks, churches, factories, garages, gas and service stations, public institutions, offices, bridges, utility power plants, streetcars, schools, libraries, stables, sheds, stores and warehouses, at a cost of $8 million. In 1925, the number of new nonresidential buildings jumped to 5,504, at a cost of $13.6 million, or a 70 percent increase, largely due to public works construction of a dozen schools, recreational venues and amusement parks (U.S. Department of Labor, Building Permits 51, 65).

Taken together, Portland area residential and nonresidential construction in 1924 aggregated almost $30 million. In 1925, it aggregated $35.4 million, a one-year overall increase of 18 percent a record, and a boom time for the building trades, especially the electrical contractors and electricians now that lighting and power were embraced by just about everyone who could get it (U.S. Department of Labor, Building Permits 51, 65).

The Roaring Twenties boom would turn to bust in less than 10 years. In 1933 and the following year the depths of the Depression for Oregon the aggregate value of new construction in Portland would plummet to $2 million, an amount that was little more than 6 percent of the 1925 record (Abbott, Three Centuries 110).

December 13, 1924Influential labor leader Samuel Gompers died at the age of 74 (Shmoop Editorial Team).

1925Oregon enacted Pay Day law, setting regular wage payments at intervals of no

more than 30 days (BOLI Administrative Overview, March 2009).

U.S. Department of Labor reported IBEW agreements nationwide call for closed shop, 44-hour week, and double time for overtime. No pension, health insurance or other benefits were reported except for funeral expenses and strike and lockout benefits. The national Council on Industrial Relations (CIR) was reported by the federal government to be the conciliation medium of electrical workers and their employers. The CIR was composed of five representatives each of the brotherhood and of the National Association of Electrical Employers (NAEE), to be used when local agreements can not be reached or carried out (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Bulletin No. 420, Handbook of Labor Statistics 1924-1926, 25). [The NAEE appears to be the same at the NAECD, and the predecessor of NECA.]

1926IBEW Local 48 elected E. Russel (sic) as their business manager. He would be re-

elected in 1927 and 1928 (Letter, Jack F. Moore, March 22, 1988).

May 28, 1926Burnside Bridge, a 252-foot, double-leaf Strauss bascule truss span, opened

to much fanfare with lights and other electrical work provided by NePage-McKenny with some subcontract work by Jaggar-Sroufe (Wortman 50, 52).

October 1926The nation slipped into a brief economic recession but would resume the bustling growth of

the Roaring Twenties one year later (National Bureau of Economic Research). Electricians and their contractor employers still had plenty of work with new retailers such as Fred Meyer opening his first stores, and Jantzen Knitting Mills and Pendleton Woolen Mills leading manufacturing growth. But two bank liquidations, Ladd & Tilton in 1925, and Northwestern National Bank, in 1927, and the closure of several lumber mills signaled economic trouble ahead. Building activity dropped, from $38 million in 1925 to less than $15 million in 1929. Even while

Heavy electric demand in 1928 by new buildings in downtown Portland - many wired by Oregon Electric Contractors Association members and IBEW Local 48 electricians - caused smoke to belch from Northwestern Electrics Lincoln Street steam plant. #6

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civic boosters kept hope alive, the city itself added only a quarter of the office space (500,000 square feet) during the 1920s as it had after the 1905 Lewis and Clark Exposition (The Oregon Story 57).

1927Delegates attending the national convention of the IBEW in 1927 created the first pension fund for

retired workers in the electrical construction industry the International Pension Plan. Members who had 20 years of service and had reached the age of 65 were assured a pension of $40 per month. Each IBEW member contributed 37 cents per month to finance the plan. The Great Depression, and then World War II, would force IBEW to reorganize in 1946 (National Electrical Benefit Fund (NEBF). Fund History. National Electrical Benefit Fund (NEBF). http://www.nebf.com/nebf/fund_history/).

1928Twenty-two Local 48 electricians working for Electrical Products Corporation

erected what was reputedly the largest neon sign in the world, for the Richfield Oil Company sign. Each of the nine letters in the company name stood 60 feet high. Each letter was supported by two to four wooden telegraph poles. With each letter set 100 feet apart, the sign stretched 725 feet in length, 1,200 feet above Portland, legible for 20 miles and visible from 100 miles. Together with a Standard Oil Co. searchlight panning the sky nearby, the signage served as an aviation beacon reportedly visible to flyers 100 miles away (Graham, Journal November 1928). In its November 1928 issue, The Electrical Workers Journal published a large group-shot of The boys standing proudly in front of the sign they built.

Local No. 48 is a narrow back organization. We have about 250 members, mostly employed in building construction, some fixture men and quite a number of maintenance men. We meet in the labor temple on the first and third Wednesdays . . . Our wage scale is $10 a day, five days a week and double time for all overtime . . . We have all the important contractors signed up and have had no serious trouble with our bosses for a number of years. All of our boys were busy the first part of the winter and we were able to find jobs for quite a number of travelers.

B.H. GrahamIBEW Local Union 48The Electrical Workers Journal, February 1928

1929Bureau of Labor Statistics and Inspector of Factories and Workshops becomes

Bureau of Labor. (BOLI Administrative Overview, March 2009).

March 8, 1929With the Portland Public Schools and the Oregon Building Congress as their partners, the

Oregon Electrical Contractors Association and IBEW Local 48 started the Portland Apprentice School. The program is overseen by a joint labor-management Sub-commission for Electrical Workers, comprised of E.W. Pierce and J.R. Tomlinson, for the employers, H.W. Boynton, Wm. H. Brust, A.A. Houghton, and C.V. Smith for the employees, chaired by L.E. Brigham, City Director for Vocational Education. (Sub-commission Minutes, March 8, 1929).

April 5, 1929L.E. Brigham, City Director of Vocational Education, selected George Pettingell as the first instructor

for the Portland Apprentice School. The Sub-commission approved his appointment was approved by the Sub-commission. (Sub-commission Minutes, April 5, 1929) Eighteen apprentices signed up for the five-year program. They attended classes at Stephens School located on Southeast 7th Street

PortlandGeneral Electrics store in St. Johns in 1927 featured the latest Thor electrically-driven washing machines and Hotpoints Electric Maid oven and range for the Modern Mothers of the Roaring 20s. #7

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in Portland, now the site of an electric substation. The Portland Apprentice School predated the Oregon Apprenticeship Law (1931) by two years and the Fitzgerald Act of 1937 by eight years.

Other instructors through the 1930s included C.W. Hayes, A.M. McLean, a former city electrical inspector, and Guy Evans. Portland Public Schools paid the instructors and supplies and equipment were paid for through donations from IBEW Local 48 and the Electrical Contractors Association. By 1939, the program will have survived the Depression and grown to 45 apprentices.

School absenteeism was as much a problem then as it is today. The committee tried a number of disciplinary techniques including monetary penalties, committee appearances and letters of reprimand. Additionally, there appeared to be some question as to whom really controlled the program Portland Public Schools and the Oregon Building Congress or the Electrical Industry.

1929Oregon Electrical Contractors Association (NECA) included A.R. Johnson, M.J. Walsh, Huenergard

Electric, Morrison Electric, Jaggar Sroufe, Hawthorne Electric, Harold Electric, Allison Electric, Sutherland Electric, Tice Electric, Greiner Electric, Kinney Electric (McCoy Electric), Hunegard Electric, W.R. Grasle, Grand Electric, Beaver Electric, E.L. Knight Electric, Paramount Wiring Company, Superior Electric, McMillan Electric, Friesen Electric, Montgomery Electric, Nepage McKenny, Electrical Products Corporation, National Electric, and Multnomah County. The secretary for the association at this time was J.R. Tomlinson, himself a contractor. The mission of the association was as follows:

Arrange for and promote meetings of electrical contractors; Promote the welfare of its members; Distribute among its members and assist in its use, fullest information attainable in

regard to all matters affecting the electrical and electrical merchandising business; Assist in marketing high grade electrical materials and apparatus; Elevate the standard of electrical installations; Aid in bringing about more friendly relations between electrical contractors and

electrical retail dealers and others engaged in the electrical industry; Collect and diffuse information affecting merchants, manufacturers, builders,

architects, engineers, and others engaged in erecting buildings; and, Cooperate with the electrical section of Electragists International (NECA) and

conduct all activities in accord with AEI (NECA) principles and ideals. (See principles contained in Bylaws: History of the Oregon-Columbia Chapter NECA.)

1929Fred C. Ream elected as IBEW Local 48 business manager. He would

serve one term, to 1930 (Letter, Jack F. Moore, March 22, 1988).

August 1929The nation began its slide into the Great Depression. The economic downturn

would last 43 months from a technical standpoint but full recovery would take a decade and the onset of World War II (National Bureau of Economic Research).

October 28-29, 1929The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 25% of its value, signaling a loss of faith

in economy and a slowdown in private sector construction that would deeply affect electrical contractors and their members of IBEW Local 48.

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December 20, 1929Apprentice Training Program Sub-commission for Electrical Workers conducted its first oral

exams. The 14 first-semester apprentices were Stephen Rosers, Alex Ebel, A.L. Hein, L.C. Potts, W.F. Nebert, C.R. Thomas, G. Tice, L. Sirianni, S. Adams, D. Boone, J.C. Hudson, M. Pettingell, H.L. Boynton, C. Blomgren. (Sub-commission Minutes, December 20, 1929)

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THE DEPRESSIONOregon Census 953,786

1930The Depression hits the building trades in the Portland metropolitan area particularly

hard. Union electricians and contractors alike find it difficult to keep up with their payment of membership dues to IBEW Local 48 as well as NECA.

. . . work in this jurisdiction has been very quiet for the past 18 months . . . we have 45 idle members . . . While it is very true there have been a number of large jobs erected in the last couple of years . . . 97 percent of this work is done under the most intolerable conditions and all closed shop closed to organized labor . . . They have guards stationed at the gates . . . We have enjoyed the five-day week and needless to say we would never relinquish same . . . Our scale is $10 per day, with double time for all over time, all members are hired through the office and we sincerely hope that the demand for mechanics (electricians) will increase, although the outlook for the immediate future is not promising.

Fred C. ReamBusiness ManagerIBEW Local 48The Electrical Workers Journal, May 1930

The November 1930 Electrical Workers Journal published an aerial photo of the Fir-Tex Insulating Board plant constructed by NECA member Jaggar-Sroufe Company with electricians from Local 48.

During the Depression Era decade of the 1930s, the Oregon-Columbia electrical contractors affiliated twice with NECA but subsequently dropped. Members during that time included Ace Electric Co., Allison Electric Co., Bartlett Electric Co., Bressie Electric Co., Cooperative Electric Co., Dimitre Electric Co., Friberg Electric, Friesen Electric Service, Gildner Electric Co., W.R. Grasle Co., Greiner Electric Co., Huenergard Electric Co., Jaggar-Sroufe Co., E.L. Knight Electric Co., McMillan Electric, Montgomery Electric Co., Morrison Electric Co., NePage-McKenny Co., L.M. Olsaver, Pierce-Mowrey, Inc., George L. Rochat, Sanders Electric, Sellwood-Morland Electric Co., Swigert Electric Co., Tice Electric Co., J. R. Tomlinson Electric Co., and Walsh Electric & Fixture Co. (Program NECA 50th Anniversary)

1930Joe H. Lake was elected business manager of IBEW Local 48. He would serve through

the end of World War II, until 1947 (Letter, Jack F. Moore, March 22, 1988).

Portland boasted two amusement parks in 1930, both installed by NECA/IBEW Local 48 contractors and electricians. Jantzen Beach was the first. Lotus Isle opened in time for the summer season in 1930 (Dalby, Journal, August 1930).

1931Oregon passed Apprenticeship law creating Apprenticeship

Commission. (BOLI Administrative Overview, March 2009)

Oregon consolidated Child Labor and Industrial Welfare Commission with Bureau of Labor. (BOLI Administrative Overview, March 2009)

Oregon enacted Wage Collection law, empowering Bureau of Labor to investigate wage claims and

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file criminal complaints against certain employers. (BOLI Administrative Overview, March 2009)

Congress enacted Davis-Bacon Act requiring federal contractors engaged in public works projects to pay wages and benefits prevailing in the area where they are working. The law is intended to prevent employers from hiring cheaper workers from outside the area. (Shmoop Editorial Team)

Here