Call Number:

URB 44

Repository:

Temple University Libraries: Special Collections Research Center

Extent:

2 linear feet (5 boxes)

Language:

English

Preferred Citation:

[Description and date of item], [Box/folder number], Metal Manufacturers' Association of Philadelphia (Pa.) Records, Special Collections Research Center, Temple University Libraries, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Date:

1902-1966 (inclusive)

Form:

Administrative records, Articles of Incorporation, Correspondence, Ephemera, Financial records, Ledgers (account books), Manuscripts, Minutes (administrative records), Publications (documents), and Reports

Abstract:

The Metal Manufacturers' Association of Philadelphia began with a circular letter issued on December 4, 1903 by 22 manufacturers concerned with the "various problems which have recently arisen affecting the relations between employer and employee in all branches of trade." The intent was to promote an anti-union open shop. For the next thirty-five years, the Metal Manufacturers' Association attracted a large proportion of the local companies in the trade for the purpose of keeping its members' plants free of trade unionism.

The employers pooled their resources in 1904 to prevent making concessions to the iron molders' union after a request for an increase in wages, and then established a labor bureau which kept members of the Association supplied with non-union workers in times of difficulty. Later, the Metal Manufacturers even developed their own apprenticeship program to remove trade training from the control of the unions. By 1916, when the Association defeated a strike of the International Association of Machinists, the employers had proved largely successful in their open-shop goal.

For the next two decades, the members of the Association, led by Secretary Earl Sparks, were involved in legislative lobbying, vocational education, and insurance for Association members. With Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal administration, however, conditions changed. With government support, industrial unions organized most of the metal manufacturing companies and forced the Association to accept collective bargaining. Just prior to World War II, the Metal Manufacturers replaced their old anti-union employment bureau with a collective bargaining committee. Although the Association did not cease opposing unions, it channeled much of its activity in new directions. Responding to new conditions and new leadership in the organization, the Metal Manufacturers became the Manufacturers' Association of Greater Philadelphia in 1960, and later the Manufacturers' Association of the Delaware Valley.

The Metal Manufacturers' Association of Philadelphia Records include secretary's reports and meeting minutes, as well as contracts, correspondence, and wage surveys.