United Mine Workers of America, Journal Office records

This collection consists of reference and correspondence files from the United Mine Workers (UMW) News Service and the Journal editor; a research card catalog keyed to Journal articles; photographs, a number of which were published in the Journal; original drawings by UMW cartoonists; and a few audiotapes from a rally in UMW District 23 (western Kentucky).

Series 1: General Files was collected and generated mainly by Justin McCarthy. There are two runs of integrated alphabetical subject and correspondence files. The series includes five subseries: UMW News Service; Journal editor; General files; Production correspondence files; and Subscribers correspondence.

Sub-series 1 derives from the UMW News Service, which McCarthy headed; a few of these files were created by and for K. C. Adams, who was Journal editor when McCarthy joined the News Service.

Sub-series 2 dates mainly from McCarthy’s tenure as Journal editor, 1955-1972. In addition, some of the files in sub-series 2 were generated by his assistant editor, Rex Lauck, a small number were carried over from the editorships of Adams and Cecil Owen, prior to 1955, and several were generated after McCarthy left, extending this sub-series to 1980, when the Journal Office gave way to a newly created UMW Department of Public Information. A substantial segment of sub-series 2 pertains to the UMW Safety Division, for which the Journal played a crucial role in publicizing mine disasters and memorial remembrances, accident statistics, safety awards, first-aid and rescue training, Congressional hearings on safety issues, and operations involving the United States Bureau of Mines.

Sub-series 3 of the general files consists of the following: a transcript of a Journal Committee meeting in 1917; statements and speeches of John L. Lewis, and biographical material on Lewis, 1936-1959; documents generated by Adams during his tenure as editor, 1941-1944; press releases, correspondence, and court records pertaining to the union’s dealings with the National War Labor Board, 1944; Journal editorials, also 1944; press releases, speeches by Lewis and other labor or government officials, memos, and further records of court cases, 1945-1959; press releases and court records concerning the National Labor Relations Board, 1949-1950; and extensive portions of the annotated book manuscript Hell in Harlan, by UMW Vice-President George J. Titler, circa 1964, with contributions from Lauck.

Sub-series 4 consists of documents concerning the production of the Journal, including correspondence files, records of payments to contributors, poems submitted for possible publication; deleted (“killed”) material, and “upstuff.” Keyed to particular issues or runs of issues of the Journal, these “upstuff” files, 1961-1962, consist in part of uplifting items such as poems, jokes, and cartoons; many original drawings by UMW cartoonists appear here. Somber material from those same Journal issues is interspersed among the “upstuff,” including safety reports, tabular compilations of mineworker-related Congressional legislation in progress, and obituaries. Also within the “upstuff” are a number of flong sheets (which the UMW editors call “mats”), variously holding columns, cartoons, and photographs.

Sub-series 5 of the general files consists of correspondence with subscribers. For substantial additional correspondence pertaining to the Journal, see folders labeled “Journal” in the alphabetical office files of the UMW President’s Office subgroup in the Special Collections Library.

Series 2: Research Card Catalog consists of nine boxes of index cards keyed to Journal articles and subjects, and one further box holding unidentified cards as well as caption cards for an unidentified photographic collection of 1914-1952 (presumably once a part of the Journal Office photographic archives).

Series 3: Photographs and Cartoons contain photographs which represent only a tiny portion of the images generated for and by the UMW Journal Office over the course of many decades. Apart from still-active photographic files held at the UMW international office, the fate of the remainder of the historical UMW photographic archives is unknown.

The images consist primarily of black-and-white individual prints, contact sheets, and proofs, these last in the form of grainy trial images printed on regular paper. There are also a modest number of black-and-white negatives, color prints, woodcuts, and images on long sheets. Spanning the years 1890 to 1980, the photographic subjects portray factories, mines, and equipment; conventions, banquets, and holiday celebrations; hearings and negotiating sessions; mine disasters and memorial events; health and safety events, including first aid and rescue training; strikes and protests; union officers and miners; government officials; and social life and housing. For a substantial additional body of photographs generated independently of the Journal Office, see the UMW Photographic Collection in the Special Collections Library.

The files hold many original copies of cartoons drawn by contributors to the UMW Journal. These cartoons are variously humorous, wry, and poignant. Some provide insights into mining and miners’ lives in the mid-twentieth century. Others offer a timeless commentary on the human condition.

Series 4: Audio consists of four reel-to-reel tapes of speeches by UMW President William A. Boyle and others at a District 23 rally in Madisonville, Kentucky, in May 1968. Numerous other recordings, possibly generated by or for the Journal Office, but for which provenance is lost, reside in the UMW Audio-Visual Collection in the Special Collections Library.