Public Employee Press

Book review
Out in the Union: LGBTQ workers fight for dignity

Frank interweaves hundreds of vignettes and her oral histories of rank-and-file workers in retail, construction, telephone, postal, civil service - including DC 37 - and other fields to bring alive their complex struggles for survival on the shop floor level

Miriam Frank begins her new book "Out in the Union: A Labor History of Queer America" with the story of Bill, an early 20th century St. Louis woman who lived her life as a man, hiding her sex and sexual orientation. Working as a locomotive engineer repairer, she even was elected secretary of her union.

Like Bill, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) workers for most of the last century hide their true selves from their bosses, coworkers and union coworkers, always testing the waters to see who it was safe to trust in a culture dominated by sexism and homophobia. Frank interweaves hundreds of vignettes and her oral histories of rank-and-file workers in retail, construction, telephone, postal, civil service - including DC 37 - and other fields to bring alive their complex struggles for survival on the shop floor level.

Change accelerated in 1969 with the Stonewall Uprising, when police invaded a gay bar in the West Village and "Queer America" fought back. A new period of militancy propelled a gay pride movement that extended to giving support to LGBTQ workers fighting for pride at work and to form caucuses and committees in their unions, like DC 37's LAGIC, to make changes at work.

LGBTQ workers often fought alongside civil rights and other labor insurgents, which invigorated a conservative labor movement. Increasingly, gay union leadership emerged such as Judy Mage, a leader in the 1965 Welfare Workers strike and Mary Kaye Henry, now president of SEIU.

They won crucially important contractual victories to protect themselves against harassment and discrimination, especially important given the lack of federal legal protections; domestic partner benefits and AIDS education. Increasingly LGBTQ workers demanded respect in the workplace, and for their unions to fight for their rights at work and in society at-large. This strengthened both the labor and gay rights movements.

NYU Prof. Miriam Frank was one of the most popular teachers in the Cornell Union Womens' Studies program at DC 37. In telling the story of the LGBTQ workers struggle she uses her teaching skills to weave together multiple stories illustrating their amazing progress in the labor movement and beyond. But she also points out that much work still needs to be done, especially in strengthening anti-discrimination legislation and transgender rights.

— Ken Nash, DC 37 Education Fund
Library, Room 211, www.dc37library.org