The Special Collections and University Archives has embarked on a new collection development initiative in the area of American Labor History from the 19th through early 21st Centuries. The flagship collection of this new collecting effort will be the records of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
Special Collections will begin to actively collect valuable materials from all aspects of U.S. labor history that will benefit labor studies in history, law, political science, business, and other academic disciplines. The department plans to collect primary documents, photographs, and recordings that document the role of organized labor over the past 150 years.
International Brotherhood of
Teamsters Records
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters has contributed $2 million to The George Washington University to create an endowed archivist position at GW and establish an exhibition of its archives for public display to enhance research on 20th century U.S. labor relations. The Teamsters Records, which date back to the early 1900s, will reside at GW on permanent loan.
The records include presidential papers from James R. Hoffa and James P. Hoffa; autographed political cartoons from the early 20th century; and several hundred photographs and memos from the labor and civil rights movements, such as a photo of Jimmy Hoffa with Martin Luther King, Jr.; telegrams from President Franklin D. Roosevelt; and an extensive collection of wire spool audio recordings.
The archivist will be responsible for cataloging the archives and acquiring additional important historical labor documents through GW’s Gelman Library System. These initiatives will arrange the Teamsters archives, making public never-before-seen documents, letters, and photographs and provide access by researchers and labor history professionals to these records.
The Teamsters Union was established in 1903 and represents more than 1.4 million men and women throughout the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico.
Existing Labor Collections
In addition to the Teamsters Collection, this program includes the records of other labor unions, professional associations and self-help organizations, some of which were precursors to later unionization efforts; the papers of various union organizers and labor leaders; political cartoons from the the late 19th and early 20th Century; as well as a variety of other printed materials from the same time period, including pamphlets, flyers, etc.
Current collections in this area include the:
- American Association of University Professors Records, 1915-1998
- American Labor History Resources in the Special Collections Research Center: a Bibliography
- American Veterans Committee Records, 1940s-1990s
- Clifford C. Berryman Collection, 1899-1949 [digital collection] [finding aid to physical collection]
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace pamphlet and microfilm collection, 1817-1950
- Coffin (George) Papers, 1858-1896
- Halperin (Samuel) Puck and Judge Political Cartoon Collection, 1879-1903
- Latimer (Murray Webb) Papers, 1930-1980
- Oliver (Eli L.) Papers, 1927-1968
Research Tools
The Special Collections and University Archives Department provides various access tools that allow researchers to locate useful materials. The tool used to locate non-book materials such as manuscripts, maps, and photographs is GENIE. To locate books and maps related to your topic use the Library’s online catalog ALADIN. Each processed collection has a finding aid. These finding aids describe the types of materials, subjects, and date ranges found within the collection.
In addition to these tools, Special Collections staff members are available for reference consultations to discuss a research topic, help formulate search strategies, and locate useful materials.
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Search Archives and Manuscripts:
• Visit the Genie Search page for additional information.
Search Books and Other Formats:
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To limit your Aladin search to books housed in Special Collections, use the "Set Limits" button found on the right side of the page and choose "GW: GELMAN Special Collections" as the location field.
To further limit your results to books related to Labor, use the "Guided Keyword" search, using Labor as a keyword in addition to the other keywords or subjects in your search. An example is a search for books about the history of the police department in Washington, D.C. If you do a keyword search for police having already limited the search to Special Collections the search result is 71 items. If, however, while using the keyword police also use the keyword Washington, D.C. then the results are lowered to 36 items.
For additional guidance use ALADIN help.
