J. Howard Pew, chairman of the Laymen's Committee of the National Council of Churches; courtesy of Grove City College
NAM flyers charged that the newly merged AFL-CIO was a powerful labor monopoly that trampled on workers' individual rights. National Association of Manufacturers Records; courtesy of the Hagley Museum and Library.
AFL-CIO lithograph, 1957; courtesy of the George Meany Memorial Archives.
During the 1958 election, six Catholic bishops issued a statement opposing the proposed right-to-work amendment. John Ramsay Papers; courtesy of the Southern Labor Archives, Georgia State University.
Flier distributed by the United Organized Labor of Ohio during the 1958 right-to-work campaign. Sam Pollock Papers; courtesy of the Archives of Urban and Labor Affairs, Wayne State University.
This more balanced structure carried over into the Joint Council's activities. One of the Council's important early programs was sponsoring university-based summer workshops for teachers. Over the first three years of the program, thirty-five hundred high school teachers participated in forty-eight workshops that sought to increase teachers' understanding of economics and to produce resource units and study guides. The workshops were deliberately designed to present teachers with differing points of view. Over the course of three weeks, teachers listened to professional economists as well as representatives from business, labor, and the government present competing analyses of the structure, operation, and problems of the American economic system.54
These workshops posed a sharp contrast to those run by the NAM and AEF, which excluded organized labor and limited discourse, offering only one legitimate way to think about economic problems. Indeed, by 1957, the NAM was so disturbed with the Joint Council's workshops it resolved to "step up" its activities to counteract what it considered "unsound" economic education. George Fern of the NAM Education Department charged that NAM speakers and materials were excluded from workshops. Moreover, during the sessions, the staff of the Joint Council was "extremely effective in creating economic impressions in the minds of teachers . . . more akin to the philosophy of labor union economists and advocates of bigger and bigger government than to the beliefs of NAM." To neutralize the influence of "liberals," the NAM increased its participation in Joint Council workshops. Moreover, the NAM placed pressure on the Joint Council by informing industrialists who contributed support to Council efforts "of the economic philosophy their money is helping to spread."55
Organized labor could not match business's resources in promoting its interpretation of economics, but its vocal opposition posed another impediment to conservative business dominance of the schools. Beginning in the late forties, unions began protesting corporate efforts to tie industry and education together. Labor papers published articles exposing the campaign to "influence the mind of the youth," criticizing such mechanisms as corporate-sponsored teaching aids and Junior Achievement. Particularly galling for labor were Business-Industry-Education days, which unions felt were merely a medium for spreading anti-Labor propaganda to captive audiences. During the 1950s, the AFL regularly passed resolutions condemning "the use of propaganda" and the "in-roads that industrial groups have made in shaping school curricula." In 1954, the AFL Executive
Council warned that "there was a movement well planned by certain industrial leaders to indoctrinate teachers and pupils with a belief that our nation's future rests upon the acceptance of the status quo/' and upon the repeal of "most social legislation which has been adopted for the common good."56
While both the AFL and the CIO evinced concern about the heightened business presence in the schools, the Federation gave the issue greater attention, mostly because its ranks included the American Federation of Teachers. The AFT constantly rallied Federation opposition to business propaganda in the public schools. The teachers' union questioned the sincerity of the business community's concern about the financial problems of public education, arguing that corporate leaders simply sought to subvert federal aid. Moreover, the AFT accused business of joining with administrators in the National Education Association to stem the growth of unionism among teachers.57
AFL objections frequently fell on deaf ears, however. In 1950, the Peoria Trades and Labor Assembly complained to the superintendent of schools about the circulation of NAM comic books among the city's students. Local unionists particularly disliked "Watch Out for the Big Talk." In the comic, a union organizer promises a crowd "cradle to grave" security. A skeptic in the audience challenges his promises, recalling that America's heroes like Benjamin Franklin, Daniel Boone, and George Washington Carver achieved success through individual initiative. "Folks," the skeptic urged, "Don't ever believe this 'Big Plan' malarkey—this something—for nothing idea— it's the oldest confidence game in the world." Promises of security, he reminds, led to Hitler, Mussolini, and Stalin. The comic concludes with the audience rejecting the labor organizer and vowing "None of those 'planned economy' pipe-dreams for us." Despite labor protests, the Peoria schools continued to distribute the NAM literature. In Akron, Ohio, unionists unsuccessfully fought the introduction into the schools of a history text that was written and published by the Chamber of Commerce. This text ignored unions and devoted fifty-four pages to the rubber companies and a whole chapter to the Quaker Oats Company.58
Organized labor also fought BIE days. In 1950, 25 percent of Minneapolis teachers registered opposition to the city's first BIE day by refusing to participate. Detroit trade unionists formed a committee to investigate a program of "Trips to Industry" sponsored by the Institute for Economic Education. The Detroit Teachers Federation reported that the Institute used funds, contributed by sixty Detroit firms, to "wine and dine teachers, and to tour school children through the plants," where they were "given the anti-union company point of view." The teachers union distributed flyers to Detroit workers asking, "Do you want your children to be educated—or hypnotized" into "Docile—Anti-Union, Anti-Fair Deal Company Stooges."59
The record of unions in stopping BIE days was mixed, but perhaps the most fierce struggle occurred in Pennsylvania. In 1949, an organization called the Americans for the Competitive Enterprise System (ACES) began sponsoring BIE days and other programs designed to demonstrate the superiority of the free enterprise system over all forms of collectivism, including unions and the welfare state. The Pennsylvania CIO Council and the state Federation of Labor denounced the program, but ACES succeeded in establishing programs in school systems throughout the state. In 1953, however, when ACES set up shop in Reading, a city with strong socialist and trade union traditions, its effort to "mold the pliable mind of school children," sputtered. The labor and socialist press blasted ACES, and the Central Labor Union lodged a strong protest with the superintendent of schools and the school board, which included members sympathetic to organized labor. Labor's influence in the community was powerful enough that the ACES program was halted in Reading. However, it continued in outlying school districts, which unions charged were controlled by representatives of big business. In these communities, a few unionists and socialists refused to permit their children to participate.60
A small segment of the labor movement critiqued the rapprochement of educators and businessmen. Unions complained that while business was glorified in the classroom, workers and their organizations were either neglected or maligned. Schools, they contended, had an obligation to teach students of workers' contributions and why unions were socially necessary institutions. Instead, according to AFT President John M. Eklund, "the rights and privileges of monopoly, of Big Business, of the A.M.A. are rarely challenged; the rights of labor to organize for collective action are constantly attacked."61 Such attitudes, unionists cautioned, threatened labor's "long and impressive record" as the "most powerful, loyal and true friend of the public schools and of teachers." Moreover, the AFL and the CIO reminded educators that unions were among the strongest proponents of federal aid to education.62
A few unions, including the AFT, the ILGWU, and the UAW, more vigorously competed with business in shaping students' and teachers' attitudes toward labor. In 1948, the United Electrical Workers Union, seeking to counteract the NAM's influence in the schools, began offering a "teachers kit," including publications and films. It included the comic book "Chug-Chug: A Children's Story for the Whole Family/' which recounted how only after their father's factory organized could Donnie and Susan buy a much coveted toy train. Similarly, concerned that too many students left high schools "with hostile and erroneous views about trade unions/' AFL and CIO central bodies convinced the Newark, New Jersey, school superintendent to allow labor representatives a week to meet with the senior American history classes. The event was so unusual that it was widely reported in the press. The UAW in Michigan and the ILGWU in New York City also reached out to students as part of their commitment to strengthening relations with the community. The UAW encouraged the development of labor curricula and ran one-day institutes for teachers, while the ILGWU hosted student visits at its New York City headquarters and regularly sent speakers into the schools.63
Ultimately, labor had neither the resources nor the commitment to match business in the schools. Teachers who wished to balance material from business with literature from organized labor found unions unable to comply with their requests. The AFL's Committee on Education admitted that labor "could not possibly hope to compete with the N.A.M. in this propaganda by sheer force of money resources." Although the labor press routinely railed against "attempts to alienate their sons and daughters from the trade union movement," union resistance was mostly paltry. Even in the Joint Council of Economic Education, where labor's voice was welcomed, few unionists took seriously the opportunity to challenge business. In 1952, Solomon Barkin, one of the few labor people active in economic education, commented on labor's weakness in the Joint Council, observing that unions could "leave a mark on these institutions if we were more adequately manned." Their failure "must be charged to our own account rather than to the other party."64
* * *
On the whole, competitors to the business community were faintly heard in the schools. Most unions tended to focus on the more immediate conflict in the political and economic realms, conceding to business the longer range ideological struggle carried out through education. As a result, labor would continue to complain that the "atmosphere in our schools, as a whole, is anti-union." Through the fifties, without a strong competitor, business was often the sole outside voice in shaping the educational climate in the schools. Conservative and moderate business leaders might struggle over the details of the business message but agreed on certain fundamental principles, particularly the need to emphasize individualism and freedom. While evidence concerning the reception of this message is fragmentary, some educators were well aware of the implications of the business campaign to recapture the schools. In early 1957, educator Lloyd P. Williams wrote of the overwhelming corporate influence over education, arguing that business leaders sought to purify school and university faculties, screen campus speakers, censor textbooks, and control curriculum. The business presence was so pervasive that "business philosophy has become orthodox and, hence delimits the concept of truth." By 1963, economics professor Daniel R. Fusfeld could also testify to the impact on students of the business community's free hand in the schools. He found that many students were "captives of the ideology of the right," having been successfully "indoctrinated" with an economic interpretation that taught that the American economy was "free, competitive and individualistic" and must be retained without change.65
Notes
1. Frank Abrams, 'The Businessman's View/' in Committee for Economic Development Board of Trustees minutes, May 18-19, 1950, Box 78, Lou E. Holland Papers, HST.
2. Joel Spring, The American School, 1642-1985 (New York and London: Longman, 1986), chaps. 4-8, esp. p. 228.
3. Julia Wrigley, Class Politics and Public Schools: Chicago, 1900-1950 (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1982); Spring, The American School, pp. 156-58, 259-66.
4. Spring, The American School, pp. 269-73; Marjorie Murphy, Blackboard Unions: The AFT & the NEA, 1900-1980 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990), pp. 133-37; S. Alexander Rippa, "Retrenchment in a Period of Defensive Opposition to the New Deal: The Business Community and the Public Schools, 1932-1934," History of Education Quarterly 2 (June 1962): 76-81.
5. Gerald L. Gutek, Education in the United States: An Historical Perspective (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1986), pp. 226-27, 247-51; Diane Rav-itch, The Troubled Crusade: American Education, 1945-1980 (New York: Basic Books, 1983), pp. 85-89.
6. Spring, The American School, p. 270; Prentis quoted in S. Alexander Rip-pa, Education in a Free Society: An American History (New York: David McKay, 1971), p. 271.
7. Stodard Rippa, Education in a Free Society, pp. 258-76, quoted on p. 275;
Colleen A. Moore, "The National Association of Manufacturers: The Voice of Industry and the Free Enterprise Campaign in the Schools, 1929-1949" (Ph.D. diss., University of Akron, 1985), pp. 533-58.
8. Robert L. Lund to Jasper E. Crane, Dec. 15, 1952, Box 2, Jasper E. Crane Papers, HML.
9. Morris Mitchell, "The Battle for Free Schools: Fever Spots in American Education," Nation, Oct. 27, 1951, pp. 344-47.
10. William T. Gossett, Speech at the University of Michigan, Oct. 2, 1947, Ford New Bureau release, Box 54, AOF I, LMDC; Frank G. Schultz, "Horse Sense and Buggy Economics," School and Society 11 (June 3, 1953): 373.
11. Ravitch, The Troubled Crusade, pp. 12-14, 183-84; Gutek, Education in the United States, pp. 282-87.
12. Morrell Heald, The Social Responsibilities of Business: Company and Community, 1900-1960 (Cleveland: Press of Case Western Reserve University, 1970), pp. 211-12; "Should Business Support the College?" Fortune, Dec. 1951, p. 74.
13. Frederick DeW. Bolman, Jr., "A Romance Between Colleges and Industry," Educational Record 36 (Apr. 1955): 150; "The Corporate Citizen," Over-view for All Educational Executives 1 (Sept. 1960): 48-49; "Trends in Corporate Aid to Education, MRev 44 (June 1955): 389-90.
14. Frank W. Abrams, "Growth of Corporate Giving to Education," School and Society 86 (Jan. 18, 1958): 28-30; A H. Raskin, "The Corporation and the Campus"; "The Tuition Plan's Forum on 'Education and Industry/" School and Society 11 (Feb. 21, 1953): 120.
15. "How to Support Higher Education," MRec 21 (May 1959): 173-74.
16. On the growing research ties between business and higher education see David F. Noble, Forces of Production: A Social History of Industrial Automation (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986); Harry A. Bullis, "Should Business Support Higher Education?," Education Digest 20 (Feb. 1955): 17.
17. Heald, The Social Responsibilities of Business, pp. 212-17; Olds quoted in "Should Business Support the College," p. 74; "Business Aid for Our Colleges—Voluntary or Involuntary?" FMM 113 (Feb. 1955): 145-46.
18. "Business Is Just That Practical," Nation, Feb. 21, 1953, p. 159; Pollard quoted in "How to Support Higher Education," p. 178; F. Gano Chance to William Grede, Feb. 27, 1957, Grede to Chance, Mar. 6, 1957, Box 4, William Grede Papers, SHSW; "Should Business Support the College?" p. 74; General Electric, "One Viewpoint on Corporate Aid to Education," Harpers, Dec. 1957, reprint in Box 11, Mark Starr Papers, ALUA.
19. "Professors: Learn from Industry," Iron Age, Nov. 4, 1954, p. 71; Community Relations Bulletin, Sept. 1953, Box C8, Ace. 1631, AISI.
20. "Industrial Relations Forum Meets Again at Goodyear," AB, Aug. 1950, pp. 54-55; "Industry Achieves Better Understanding Through Company-Educator Seminars," POII, Nov. 1953, pp. 10-31.
21. Howard Horsford, "A Du Pont Precept," Princeton Alumni Weekly, Oct. 28, 1955, pp. 8-11; Public Relations Department to Executive Committee, Dec. 30, 1955, Box 846, Series II, Walter S. Carpenter, Jr. Papers, Du Pont Records, HML.
22. Jasper E. Crane to Gordon O. Andrews, Apr. 22, 1947, Box 1, Crane Papers; "Professors and Scholars Intern in Corporations," AB, Feb. 1953, p. 34; Richard H. Leach, "Attacks on the Ivory Tower," Journal of Higher Education 25 (Nov 1954): 435; Minutes of the Special Meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Foundation for Economic Education, Nov. 4, 1953, Box 37, Crane Papers.
23. W. M. Curtis to Jasper E. Crane, Aug. 26, 1948, Box 846, Series II, Carpenter Papers; H. R. Arthur to J. Howard Pew, Box 19, J. Howard Pew Papers, HML.
24. "Industry Achieves Better Understanding through Company-Educator Seminars," p. A-2; Grover A. J. Noetzel to Walter S. Carpenter Jr., July 16, 1954, Box 846, Series II, Carpenter Papers.
25. PRN, June 25, 1951.
26. Moore, "The National Association of Manufacturers," p. 711; NAM News, Nov. 1948, June 11, 1949; Jan. 21, July 8, 1950; "Educational Activities," Dec. 1954, Accession 1411, NAM, Series I, Box 51 (hereafter Ace. 1411, NAM 1/51); F. Kenneth Brasted to NAM Educational Advisory Committee, May 31, 1955; Ace. 1411, NAM 1/63.
27. Murphy, Blackboard Unions, pp. 180-81; Ravitch, 77ie Troubled Crusade, pp. 3-15.
28. Ravitch, The Troubled Crusade, pp. 26-42; "Improve Educational Opportunity thru Federal Aid," Economic Outlook (CIO, Department of Education and Research), May 1949, Box 4, Greater Buffalo Industrial Union Council Records, LMDC; "School Days," American Federationist, Oct. 1955, p. 18.
29. Moore, "The National Association of Manufacturers," pp. 688-94; Herbert B. Mulford, "Big Business Wishes to Expand Educational Opportunities," American School Board journal 110 (Jan. 1945): 75-78.
30. Frank W. Abrams, "The Stake of Business in American Education, Madison Quarterly 8 (Mar. 1948): 42-47, esp. 45; Harry A. Bullis, "Should Business Support Higher Education?" Education Digest 20 (Feb. 1955): 17-19; Moore, "The National Association of Manufacturers," pp. 685-88.
31. Ravitch, The Troubled Crusade, pp. 27-28; B. P. Brodinsky, "Better Schools?, Yes!, Federal Aid, No!" Nations Schools 43 (May 1949): 26; Bunting quoted in "NAM and NEA Iron Out Their Wrinkled Relations," School and Society IS (Mar. 29, 1952): 204.
32. Charles Eugene Litz, "The Growth of American Business Interest in Educational Reform, 1945-1968" (Ph.D. diss., University of Michigan, 1970); PRN, Sept. 22, 1947; "Brief Account of Meeting of National Citizens Commission for Public Schools," New York City, Jan. 16-17, 1950, Box 9, Victor Reuther Files, UAW Department of Education Records, ALUA; Advertising Council, Business Steps Up Its Candle Power: The Fifth Year of The Advertising Council, March 1, 1946-March 1, 1947, Box 17, Charles W.Jackson Files, Harry S. Truman Papers, HST.
33. On the growth of business involvement in the teaching of science see Robert Bruce Sund, "The Activities of Business and Industry to Improve Science Education" (Ph.D. diss., Stanford University, 1959); Prentis quoted in Sol Alexander Rippa, "Organized Business and Public Education: The Educational Policies and Activities of the Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers, 1933-1936" (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1958); PRN, Apr. 23, 1951.
34. "Minutes," National Industrial Council Breakfast, Dec. 3, 1942, Ace. 1411, NAM 111/844; Rippa, "Organized Business," pp. 97-112; "NEA-NAM Conferences," NEA Journal 32 (Jan. 1943): 22; Trends Nov. 1944, pp. 1-3. Joel Spring, Images of American Life: A History of Ideological Mangagement in Schools, Movie, Radio, and Television (Albany, N.Y.: State University of New York Press, 1992), pp. 148-51.
35. Henry E. Abt to Walter Weisenburger, May 24, 1943, Ace. 1411, NAM 111/843; Yeomans quoted in Rippa, "Organized Business," p. 103; F. Kenneth Brasted to Earl Bunting, Mar. 23, 1951, Ace. 1411, NAM IH/852.3; American Teacher, Feb. 1952, p. 4; "Education Department Program, History, Present Program and Recommendations for the Future," Sept. 19, 1956, Box 70, Gre-de Papers.
36. B. P. Brodinsky, "Little and Big Business," Nation's Schools 43 (May 1949): 25; PRN, Nov. 22, 1948; J. Fred Essig, "An Adventure in Community Co-operation," Ohio Schools 28 (Sept. 1950): 262-3.
37. Community Relations Department, National Association of Manufacturers, "Influencing the 'Balance of Power' Groups through Opinion-Makers," July 1, 1946, Ace. 1411, NAM 1/109; National Association of Manufacturers, This We Believe About Education (New York: National Association of Manufacturers, 1954); 38-39; Eugene Whitmore, "Why Invite School Teachers to Visit Your Plant?" AB, Sept. 1951, p. 19.
38. Dawley, "B-I-E Day," pp. 384-86; "Teachers Learn about Industry During Factory Tours"; AB, Sept. 1950, p. 54; PR Opportunities of B-E Day," PRf, May 1955, pp. 12-13; "Outline of Business-Industry-Education Day, Lansing Michigan, Mar. 9, 1948," Ace. 1411, NAM 1/15.
39. Hartford Courant, Apr. 13, 1950; Interview with Sophie Chumura, Feb. 23, 1988, Chicopee, Mass.; Carrie L. Clements, "Business-Education Day: A Must for Business Teachers," Balance Sheet 36 (Sept. 1954): 13; Floyd A. Deni-cola, "Teacher-Industry Day: A Once-A-Year Partnership," Business Education World (May 1958): 19.
40. "PR Opportunities of B-E Day," PRf, May 1955, p. 12; NAM News, Oct. 14, 1950; PRf, Mar. 1952, p. 12.
41. PRN, Apr. 13, 1953; B. F. Goodrich Company, A Case History in the Story of Competitive Enterprise in America (teachers' manual for Johnson Makes the Team), n.p., c. 1953, Box 58, AOF IV, LMDC; J. Austin Burkhart, "The Battle for Free Schools: Big Business and the Schools," Nation, Nov. 10, 1951, pp. 401.
42. PRN, Apr. 7, 1947; "St. Louis Businessmen Plan Program to Improve Labor-Management Relations," AB, June 1947, p. 57; "Juniors Learn the Business," MRec 13 (July 1951): 247-49, 269; Blake Clark, "Getting the Facts of Business Life," AB, Aug. 1955, pp. 12-14, 34-35; Labor's Daily, Dec. 15, 1956.
43. Moore, "The National Association of Manufacturers," pp. 213-16; G. A. Rietz, "Industry Lends a Hand," Bulletin of the National Association of Second-
ary School Principals 43 (May 1959): 182; Alan C. Kerchhoff, "Big Business and the Public Schools," Journal of General Education 9 Qan. 1956): 73-81.
44. PRN, May 26, 1947; "Junior Balances the Books," Steelways, Apr. 1957, pp. 14-15; "Juniors Learn the Business," p. 247; NAM News, Feb. 17, 1951; Mary June Burton, "Sponsored School Materials are 'Coming of Age/" PRJ 13 (Apr. 1957): 8; NYT, Jan. 4, 1959.
45. N. D. McCombs and George W. Hohl, "Business Can Help Teach Economics," School Executive 72 (Feb. 1953): 80-82; John Burger, "Steps toward Economic Understanding," AM 19 (Apr. 1954): 24-26; PRN, July 14, 1952; Burton "Sponsored School Materials," p. 8.
46. Fred G. Clark to J. Howard Pew, Aug. 20, Dec. 11 1952, Box 213, Pew Papers, HML.
47. Rippa, "Organized Business and Public Education," pp. 166-71; NAM, "A Resource Unit for How Our Business System Operates," pamphlet, n.d., Ace. 1411, NAM 1/65.
48. American Economic Foundation, "Annual Report to Contributors, Members and Friends," Nov. 15, 1957, Box 2, Crane Papers; NAM Education Department, "Report of HOBSO Activities, Jan. 1, 1956 through Dec. 31, 1956," Ace. 1411, NAM 1/65; Stanley L. Phraner to Ransum P. Rathbun, Dec. 11, 1953, "Report on St. Louis Program for Implementing 'HOBSO' in Schools," c. 1953, Ace. 1411, NAM 1/70.
49. American Economic Foundation, "Annual Report to Contributors, Members and Friends," Nov 15, 1957, Box 2, Crane Papers; Rippa, "Organized Business and Public Education," pp. 163-64.
50. Haig Babian, "Economic Education: How It Began and Why," Challenge 7 (Mar. 1964): 3-4; Alfred C. Neal, "Economic Education: The Businessman's Interest," Challenge 7 (Mar. 1964): 30; Edward Christopher Phren, "The Influence of the Economic Education Movement on the Public Schools of New York City, 1946-1966" (Ed. D. diss. Teachers College, Columbia University, 1968).
51. On CED philosophy see Robert M. Collins, The Business Response to Keynes, 1929-1964 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1981), pp. 83-87, 204-9; Haig Babian, "Economic Education: How it Began and Why," pp. 3-4; Phren, "The Economic Education Movement," pp. 41-49; Summary Report of the Joint Council on Economic Education, 1948-19S1 (New York, 1951), pp. 6-8.
52. Interview with Solomon Barkin, Apr. 7, 1988, Amherst, Mass.; Edward J. Allen, "Program of the Joint Council on Economic Education," Journal of Higher Education 30 (Feb. 1959): 96.
53. Interview with Solomon Barkin, Apr. 7, 1988. Other unionists, however, remained suspicious of the Joint Council and refused to cooperate. For a revealing debate over labor's position, see "Minutes," American Federation of Labor, Workers Education Bureau Fall Conference, 1953, Chicago, III., Dec. 3-4, 1953, Box 439, United Textile Workers of America Papers, SLA.
54. Prehn, "The Economic Education Movement," pp. 41-44, 51-54; Marion B. Folson to Eugene Meyer, Jan. 19, 1953, Box 103, Eugene Meyer Papers, LC.
55. "Memo/' enclosed in George H. Fern to Kenneth H. Miller, Sept. 4, 1957, Ellsworth Chunn to George Fern, Aug. 19, 1957, Fred A. Miller to Don F. Mallerry, July 19, 1957, Ace. 1411, NAM 1/65.
56. Unionists at a CIO Regional Conference in Atlanta, Ga., complained that employers regularly gave "all sorts of talks against organized labor" in the high schools and that "hundreds of thousands of dollars are being spent every year by the Chamber of Commerce, National Manufacturers Association and other anti-Labor organizations for preparing and sending out propaganda material to all the High School teachers and students." Their goal was to "create in the minds of the teachers and pupils an attitude that is reactionary and hostile to the labor movement." "Minutes," CIO Regional Conference, Jan. 22-23, 1954, Box 1556, John Ramsay Papers, SLA; PLN, July 19, Sept. 6, 1946, Feb. 8, 1948, July 21, Nov 17, 1950, FF, Feb. 28, 1948, Guild Reporter, May 12, 1950; Ithaca Labor Union Review, Jan. 1955; Labor's Daily, Dec. 15, 1955; Mark Starr, "The Struggle for the Schools," American Teacher, Mar. 1954, pp. 11-12. Among the attacks on BIE days in the labor press see for example: Reading New Era, Sept. 22, 1955, 719 News, June, July 1950. See also, AFL, Proceedings, 1953, pp. 321, 542-44; AFL, Proceedings, 1950, p. 43; AFL, Proceedings, 1954, p. 321.
57. California Teacher, Nov. 1953; Detroit Teacher, May 13, Sept. 23, 1953; Irvin R. Kuenzli to George Meany, Apr. 29, 1953, Box 28, George Meany Papers, GMA.
58. O. Harold Wade to John D. Connors, Nov. 20, 1950, "Memo: Inre BIG TALK ('comic' book), Nov. 22, 1950," National Association of Manufacturers, Watch Out for the Big Talk (New York, c. 1950); Joseph Mire, "Recent Trends in Labor Education" (Paper presented to the Conference on Labor's Public Responsibility, Nov. 17-20, 1959, Madison, Wis.), Box 99, David J. McDonald Papers, HCLA.
59. "Transcript of the Three Hundred Thirty-Fifth Meeting of the Conference Board, Nov. 20, 1952," Box 42, National Industrial Conference Board Records, HML. Through the fifties, Minneapolis union teachers continued to resist BIE days, American Teacher Magazine, Sept. 1955, p. 5, Dec. 1959, p. 20; "The Corporations Are Undermining the School System!" and "Where Do You Stand," flyers, Box 2, UAW Department of Education Records, 1948-1955, ALUA; AFL News Reporter, Dec. 26, 1951. Also on Detroit labor investigation of the Institute for Economic Education see Economic Club of Detroit folder, Box 5, Series I, Wayne County AFL-CIO Papers, ALUA.
60. Teachers Union News (Philadelphia AFT), June 1954; Benjamin Barkas to Derwood Baker, Mar. 15, 1954, Box 2, Benjamin Barkas Papers, UA; Harry Boyer to All Affiliates, Aug. 3, 1950, Box 54, AUF, LMDC; Reading New Era, Mar. 6, 15, Apr. 24, May 1, 8, Nov 12, 1953, Jan 21, 1954; Aug. 3, 10, 1957.
61. Mark Starr, "Do Schools Teach the Facts of Union Life?" Industrial Bulletin (New York State Department of Labor), Jan. 1959, reprint in Box 11, Starr Papers; Detroit Teacher, Mar. 19, 1956; John M. Eklund, "The School Problem Is Still With Us," American Teacher Magazine, Apr. 1950, p. 13; Ithaca Union Labor Review, Jan. 1955.
62. "The Record of the AFL in Support of Education," American Teacher Magazine, May 1943, p. 2; CIO, Labor and Education (Washington, D.C., n.d.)
63. United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America, Chug-Chug: A Children's Story for the Whole Family (New York, 1947) Box 24, Mark Starr to John D. Connors, Nov. 5, 1956, Box 11, Mark Starr to William D. Boutwell, Mar. 3, 1950, Box 12, all in Starr Papers; David E. Weingast, "A New Way in Newark," Education, Apr. 1952, pp. 526-29; R. Lyle Stone to Edward Coffey, Feb. 20, 1952, Box 3, Ernest Oppman to Brendan Sexton, Dec. 14, 1951, Mar. 18, 1952, Box 2, Ed Coffey Papers, UAW Department of Education Records; Ammunition, Apr. 1949, pp. 52-55; Michigan CIO News, June 2, 16, 1955.
64. George T. Guernsey to Dear Sir and Brother, Apr. 10, 1950, Box 4, Greater Buffalo Industrial Union Council Records; Matthew Woll to William Green, Mar. 17, 1952, Box 8, Series 8, AFL Papers; New Jersey Labor Herald, Apr. 1951; Solomon Barkin to George T. Guernsey, Nov. 13, 1952, Box 6, Series A, Textile Workers Union of America Records, SHSW.
65. Lloyd P. Williams, "The Educational Consequences of Laissez Faire," School and Society 85 (Feb. 2, 1957): 38; Daniel R. Fusfeld, "Economic Education—Or Indoctrination?" Challenge, Dec. 1963, pp. 15-17.