Van Amberg Bittner (1885-1949), Labor Leader, Papers
Collection
Collection Number: A&M 1698
UMWA international representative and organizer, member of the Steel Workers Organizing Committee, director of the CIO Organizing Committee, and vice-chairman of the CIO Political Action Committee Correspondence, legal papers, diaries, clippings, and other papers relate to Bittner's early career in the western Pennsylvania coal fields; his presidency of District 5, UMWA, 1911-1916; and his organizational activities in southeastern Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, northern West Virginia, Oklahoma, and Kansas, 1916-1928. Subjects include labor strife and strikes in West Virginia, 1912-1913, 1924-1928, Alabama, 1920-1921, Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, 1911, and Oklahoma and Kansas, 1922; UMWA intra-union affairs; relief for striking miners; Kansas Industrial Court; Workers Communist Party; Red International of Labor Unions; American Association for Labor Legislation; National League of People's McAdoo Clubs; labor trouble in Montana, 1920; the railway assigned coal car problem; and Bittner's activities on various state and national labor boards and committees. There are photographs of mining towns, camps, and tent colonies, labor parades, conventions, demonstrations, and strikes; portraits of labor leaders; and pictures of the Irwin, Pennsylvania coalfield strike of 1911, the Ludlow Massacre of 1914, and the northern West Virginia strikes of 1924-1926. Frank Farrington, William Green, Frank J. Hayes, John L. Lewis, John Mitchell, Philip Murray, and John P. White are included among the correspondents. A detailed listing of the correspondence in boxes 1-7 is available upon request.
English
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6.42 Linear Feet (6 ft. 5 in. (13 document cases, 5 in. each; 1 document case, 3 in.; 1 small flat storage box, 3 in.; 1 large flat storage box, 3 in.; 1 unboxed scrapbook, 3 in.))
West Virginia and Regional History Center / West Virginia University / 1549 University Avenue / P.O. Box 6069 / Morgantown, WV 26506-6069 / Phone: 304-293-3536 / Fax: 304-293-3981 / URL: https://wvrhc.lib.wvu.edu/
6 photos separated to A&M 4168, Panoramic Photos Collection:
District 17 United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), Golden Jubilee Convention, Columbus, OH, 1940 January 23-1940 February 01; 1940 January-February
5th Constitutional Convention, Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), Boston, MA.; 1942 November 09
Members Policy Committee, United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), Hollenden Hotel, Cleveland, OH; 1922 August 07
6th Annual Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) Convention, Bellevue Stratford Hotel, Philadelphia, PA; 1943 November 01
1st Constitutional Convention Banquet, United Steelworkers of America, Public Auditorium, Cleveland, OH; 1942 May 20
2nd Constitutional Convention, United Steelworkers of America, Cleveland, OH, 1944 May 09-1944 May 13; 1944 May
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