Labor Archives of Washington: Labor Scholars & Researchers

The collection contains interviews and research materials created and gathered by Paul Apostolidis which formed the basis for his 2010 book Breaks in the Chain: What Immigrant Workers Can Teach America about Democracy.

Paper-based research materials include print transcriptions, newspaper articles, scholarly papers, materials from courses taught by Apostolidis at Whitman College, legal records, and correspondence with Teamsters, Tyson, and research team members.

Audiovisual material consists primarily of original recordings on audiocassettes and minicassettes of about 40 interviews with immigrant meatpacking workers in Pasco who were members of International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Local 556 (the local represented workers at the Tyson/IBP beef plant in Wallula, WA just outside Pasco; in 2005, Tyson destroyed the union through company-engineered decertification elections). Other audiovisual materials include VHS tapes, a DVD of news coverage, and depositions of employees.

The Brand Responsibilty Project was a research project by UW Political Science professor Margaret Levi to document the campaign and dispute settlement between Nike Inc. and the Central General de Trabajadores of Honduras (CGT). Following the bankruptcy and closure in January 2009 of two Honduran factories (Hugger and VisionTex) that were part of Nike's supply chain, the CGT of Honduras claimed that Nike bore some of the responsibility for providing terminal compensation, benefits and priority rehiring for 1,800 factory employees. The plight of the Honduran factory workers came to the attention of various fair labor associations and university licensing advisory committees, including The University of Washington's Advisory Committee on Trademarks and Licensing (ACTL) has commenced an oral and digital history project on the recent and historic ACTL. In keeping with its mission, ACTL proceeded to evaluate whether or not Nike had violated the university's code of conduct (that Nike is contractually obligated to uphold) as the basis for its advice whether to renew or terminate the University of Washington's existing contract with Nike to supply university apparel. ACTL was part of a campaign to pressure Nike to ensure the workers received what was owed them under Honduran law. The dispute was resolved successfully when Nike announced on July 29th, 2010, that it had set aside $1.5 million as part of a compensation package for the terminated Hugger and VisionTex employees.

Professor of history, University of Washington from 1958 until 1993. Burke acquired this collection during his research, which often focused on studies of progressive and radical politics in California and the United States during the New Deal as well as the Spanish Civil War. The Washington Commonwealth Federation was created in 1935 from efforts of the Commonwealth Builders. It was a coalition of organized labor, local Democratic Party clubs, advocates of technocracy, and old-age pension supporters. It operated as a left-wing political organization that sought to control the Democratic Party of of Washington state. For most of its history, it focused on drafting, supporting, and endorsing candidates for local, state and federal public offices, and lobbying public officials in pursuit of its own policy agenda. The Federation was often a center of controversy because of the dominant role played by the Communist Party in setting Federation policy, and because many of its members were also members of the Communist Party. Hugh DeLacy, the Federation's president from 1938 to 1945, was elected to Congress from Seattle in 1944. His election was a high point for the organization, but also left it with a leadership crisis. Having achieved some of its goals in effecting Democratic Party unity and change, the WCF dissolved in 1945.

This collection contains Tom Copeland’s research materials on Elmer Smith, attorney for the Industrial Workers of the World involved in the Centralia Tragedy of 1919. These materials were used by Copeland in the writing of his book, The Centralia Tragedy of 1919: Elmer Smith and the Wobblies (1993). Also included are research materials from his 1986 article, "Wesley Everest, IWW Martyr" published in The Pacific Northwest Quarterly . As a part of his research, Copeland conducted a series of oral history interviews with Centralia residents in the 1970s, including members of Smith’s family, IWW members, classmates, and others who knew him.

Collection contents include Copeland’s research notes as well as reproductions and originals gathered by Copeland from family members and archival repositories of news and magazine clippings, pamphlets, correspondence, and other primary sources, including papers and photographs from Elmer and the Smith family. The collection also contains several scholarly papers and manuscripts, including a draft with notes from Virginia Waddell, Smith’s daughter, of her in-progress biography of her father. Other research materials include correspondence between Copeland and people who knew Smith as well as a large series of oral history interview materials, including correspondence between Copeland and interviewees, paper and digital copies of transcriptions of some of the interviews, and analog and digital audio recordings of many of the interviews.

See the Arrangement Note for a full list of series and subseries. More detailed description of each series is also included in the collection inventory, integrating Tom Copeland’s notes on the collection when available.

Biographical Note

Between 1977-1981, Mary Deaton worked as a free-lance writer specializing in labor, labor history and women's issues. In 1979, The Weekly published her piece on the anniversary of The Seattle General Strike of 1919. Mary Deaton had numerous other publications in local newspapers and history and union journals and in 1981 served as project director for the 1981 Labor Film Festival of the Pacific Northwest Labor History Association.

Deaton was commissioned in 1979-1980 by International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), Local 23, and the Port of Tacoma to write their history under a grant from the Washington Commission for the Humanities to the Working Waterfront Project. Deaton researched and visited the ILWU headquarters in San Francisco and collected oral histories from many of the members and their children. Deaton submitted a manuscript "Hungry Port: A Documented History of Longshoring in Tacoma, WA," to the commissioning board, which they rejected. In the manuscript, Deaton took a pro-Congress of Industrial Organizations position and delved further into the reasons for breaking the strike and the aftermath, going deeper than odd references to communists. The commissioning body then engaged Tacoma longshore historian Ron Magden to complete the work. Deaton's notes and original manuscript comprise this collection.
Content Description

This collection contains research materials and manuscripts about the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), Local 23, for Deaton’s book. Materials include newspaper clippings, International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) and ILWU convention proceedings, waterfront labor contracts, testimonies, and secondary source material.There is also an extensive collection of transcripts of oral history interviews with longshore workers and their relatives conducted by Deaton and Dan Jongeling. Also includes notes, drafts, and index cards for Deaton's manuscript. In addition, this collection contains drafts of Deaton’s book that was rejected by the commission.

Biographical Note

Dana Frank is a professor of history at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Frank used the University of Washington's Special Collections in researching her book Purchasing Power. Frank is also an expert on human rights and U.S. policy in Honduras.


Content Description
Research files including clippings, photocopies, photographs, original materials and ephemera collected and donated by historian Dana Frank. Includes materials related to the history of Seattle labor and women's activism.

Interviews recorded by Gary Greaves in the late-1980s and early-1990s.

The recordings all relate to post-war Seattle history and cover a diverse array of topics -- such as transportation, race relations, housing, city planning and labor -- narrated by an equally diverse group, including well-known politicians such as Cheryl Chow, Martha Choe and Paul Schell; community activists such as Aaron Dixon (founder of the local Black Panthers chapter) and Hazel Wolf (social and environmental activist); and also including everyday people whom Greaves quizzed about the changing face of the neighborhoods. The recordings share the behind-the-scenes and inside stories of issues that have shaped Seattle, reaching beyond the headlines to provide details of subjects such as Seattle’s ongoing challenges with low-income housing, the personal story of a homeless man living on Seattle's streets, relations among different Asian ethnic groups as told by politicians and business leaders, and the planners who have seen roads, bridges and transit plans approved -- and then rescinded.

Ottilie Lou (Kepner) Markholt was a white, female labor unionist, labor historian, and author who spent most of her life in Tacoma, Washington. She was born on February 25, 1916 to parents Alfred Silverthorne Kepner and Clara Reissennweber Kepner in Candle, Alaska. Her family moved first to Chicago in 1919 and then to West Seattle in 1921 where Ottilie spent the remainder of her childhood and adolescence. She attended West Seattle High School, working on the school newspaper, and graduated in 1933 as class Valedictorian.

After high school, Ottilie attended the University of Washington from 1933-1935. It was in college that she became active in leftist political organizing, joining the University Unit of the Young Communist League in 1935. Ottilie did not graduate college, leaving, according to the Preface of her book Maritime Solidarity, “to become a full-time revolutionary.” It was through the Young Communist League that she met her first husband, Bob (Robert) Dombroff. They married on December 7, 1935. Bob was also active in leftist organizing and the labor movement when they met. They were both members of the Communist Party but dropped out in 1936.

Bob Dombroff was a sailor and an active member of the Sailors’ Union of the Pacific as well as the Maritime Federation of the Pacific Coast (MFPC), a short-lived organization founded in 1935 to build solidarity amongst the different labor unions representing maritime workers. During this time, Ottilie helped form the Seattle Women’s Maritime Auxiliary of the MFPC, compiled the Union Labels for Union Men booklet in 1937, and helped recruit author and activist Ralph Chaplin, Jr. to work as Editor of the MFPC’s newspaper, the Voice of the Federation. Both Ottilie and Bob were openly critical of International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) President, Harry Bridges.

Bob and Ottilie had two sons, Bob and Lee. Bob was born in 1937 and Lee in 1939. After Bob Dombroff and Ottilie divorced in 1941, she relocated to Tacoma with her sons and temporarily worked a unionized waitressing job. She began working for the Tacoma Metal Trades Council in 1943 where she joined the Office Employees International Union Local 20360 which later became the Office and Professional Employees International Union Local 23. Ottilie worked for OPEIU Local 23 as Office Secretary beginning in 1949 until her retirement in 1981. She was also actively involved in the union itself, including attending the 1962 international convention as delegate and serving as Secretary-Treasurer in the 1960s.

Ottilie met her second husband, Halvor Markholt through Local 23. He worked as a timekeeper at the shipyards. They married in 1943, and Ottilie as well as her sons assumed the last name of Markholt. The family moved to a farm south of Tacoma in 1945. Ottilie and Halvor divorced in 1953.

Ottilie’s Research & Writing

Ottilie spent many years researching and writing scholarly articles and manuscripts on a variety of topics, primarily related to the labor movement. Her published book Maritime Solidarity: Pacific Coast Unionism 1929-1938 emerged from expanded research beginning with her work on the Sailors' Union of the Pacific manuscript, completed in 1942 and originally credited solely to co-author Peter B. Gill. Ottilie conducted extensive research and worked on multiple drafts of Maritime Solidarity for many decades, including versions detailing earlier time periods. Ralph Chaplin, Jr. was an influence in encouraging her to resume research and writing in the 1950s, and labor historian Archie Green encouraged her to publish it in the early 1990s. After rejection from a number of publishers, the Pacific Coast Maritime History Committee was formed, initially as a part of the Pierce County Central Labor Council and composed of members of the labor community, to coordinate the publishing. Through community donations, including contributions from labor unions, enough money was raised to publish the book in 1998.

In addition to Maritime Solidarity, she researched and wrote several other manuscripts, including The Concern of All: Tacoma Working People and Their Unions, 1883-1895, sponsored by the Pierce County Central Labor Council in the 1980s; a biography of her parents called Alaska Homestead, completed in 1947; Nome, Alaska’s Early Union Movement on early union organizing in Nome; and her autobiography, Against the Current, completed around 2001. She also assisted others in their research, including Ronald (Ron) Magden and A.D. Martinson for their 1982 publication, The working waterfront: the story of Tacoma's ships and men as well as Captain Harold Huycke in the early 2000s in writing a history of ILWU Local 90 in San Francisco, California.

Additionally, Ottilie wrote for a variety of local publications during her lifetime, including the Tacoma Labor Advocate when Ralph Chaplin was Editor in the 1940s. She was also Editor of the Tacoma NAACP newsletter in the early 1960s and the Pierce County Central Labor Council Education Committee’s newsletter, The Labor Educator, which ran from 1985 to 1997.

Activism and Organizational Involvement

Ottilie was active in labor, civil rights, and social justice organizing, participating in a variety of organizations throughout her lifetime. In addition to her involvement in the Communist Party and OPEIU Local 23, she organized against “Right to Work” Initiatives 198 and 202 in Washington State during the 1950s. In 1964, Ottilie traveled to Buffalo, New York for research where she ended up volunteering in the office of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). She later joined the Tacoma-Olympia Branch of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in 1971 and served as Branch Secretary for a number of years.

She was also actively involved in promoting and educating the community on the importance of labor history, including serving as the first Chair of the Pierce County Central Labor Council’s Education Committee and coordinating research and writing for a pictorial history exhibit and the publication of To Live in Dignity as a part of the Washington State centennial celebrations in 1989. Along with her son Bob who was teaching labor studies courses at the Tacoma Community College, Ottilie made efforts to integrate labor history education into community college curriculum in the 1970s and 80s. She was also a founding member of the Pacific Northwest Labor History Association (PNLHA), joining in 1979 and serving as Vice President for several years in the 1990s as well as attending and presenting papers at the organization’s annual meeting.

End of Life

Ottilie passed away on November 25, 2004 in Tacoma, Washington. A memorial was held on January 30, 2005 at the Local 23 hall of the ILWU in Fife, Washington.

The papers of Ottilie Markholt span the years 1888-2005 and document multiple dimensions of her life as a trade unionist, activist, labor historian, writer, mother, and friend.

University of Washington professor of political science, founding chair of the Harry Bridges Center for Labor Studies, scholar on urban and labor politics.
David Olson (Ph.D., University of Wisconsin) was Professor Emeritus of Political Science and Harry Bridges Endowed Chair Emeritus in Labor Studies. He researched state, urban and labor politics in the United States. He was the co-author or co-editor of Black Politics: The Inevitability of Conflict (Holt, Rinehart and Winston) Theft of the City: Readings in Corruption in Urban America (Indiana), Commission Politics: The Processing of Racial Crisis in America (Trans-Action Books), Governing the United States (McGraw Hill), and To Keep The Republic (McGraw Hill). He also published numerous articles on urban politics, state politics, political violence, seaport politics, congestion pricing, living wage campaigns, term limits, and labor politics. In 2005 he received the S. Sterling Munro Public Service Teaching Award and in 2007 was named the inaugural Distinguished Civic Educator Award by the Washington State Senate. In 2006 Olson was knighted by the King of Norway as knight of the first class, order of merit for contributions to US/Norway scholarly exchange relations.

Mr. Stamets was born on April 18, 1949, in Ithaca, N.Y., and grew up in Columbiana, Ohio. Following family tradition, he attended prep school at Mercersburg Academy in Pennsylvania. After graduating from Yale University in 1971, he moved to Seattle in the early 1970s to study neurophysiology at the UW.

But he had already acquired the photography bug at Yale, where he had a chance to study with legendary photographer Walker Evans.

“John was a force of nature,” his brother, Paul, said. “He inspired me on my path into the field of mycology, after his travels to Mexico and Colombia in pursuit of magic mushrooms.”

Back in Seattle, Mr. Stamets drove a cab for several years, taking pictures of his passengers. He also was a photographer for the Seattle Sun, an alternative weekly.

He was most famous for capturing the 1987 collapse of Husky Stadium on camera — a photo he then sold as a nine-shot panoramic postcard titled “Gravity 1, UW 0.”

In 1988, he began shooting the construction of large building projects in downtown Seattle as the city underwent one of its periodic building booms. “I realized it was going to be a very significant time in the city’s history,” he told The Seattle Times in 1992, “comparable to the Denny Regrade.” (The bus tunnel, downtown Seattle Art Museum and five skyscrapers were all under construction.)

In 1992, he joined the UW faculty, where he ran the Architecture Photo Lab. He also became involved in a federal program documenting important historical buildings. His collaborator Susan Boyle, of Boyle Wagoner Architects, noted that more than 350 of his photographs are in the Library of Congress’s Historic American Buildings Survey and the Historic American Engineering Record Collection.

There was little that could stop him from getting the shot he wanted, Boyle said. He even rented the Monorail so he could see into the EMP Museum site during construction, having the driver stop at the best vantage points and open the doors.

A more recent obsession was the Rat City Rollergirls. “In March 2013 I fell down the rabbit hole into modern roller derby,” he said. “I saw it once, and I never left.”

He died the weekend of June 7-8, at age 65, of an apparent heart attack.

Information taken from John Stamets obituary by Michael Upchurch.
Photographs made by John Stamets. Stamets documented architecture around Seattle often making photographs over time that followed the stages of construction of buildings. He also made photographs of historical buidlings for HABS and HAER documentation projects (Historical American Building Survey/Historical American Engineering Record). He also documented Nicaraguan circuses, Fililpino cannery workers, the Rat City Rollergirls roller derby team and other activities.