00:00:00.009 - 00:00:25.629

That was fairly petty. Um, Watsonville has a long, uh, left history, um. Uh, because the shed, because it was the sheds, it was the sheds of the Salinas Valley when before the, before the vacuum tube, the crucial thing is that Watsonville is a railhead. Think, think

00:00:25.629 - 00:00:44.439

about Salinas. Salinas doesn't have a big rail yard the way Watsonville does. Salinas, and so, so when the lettuce and the other. Um, other vegetables, but mainly with lettuce, went from the fields to the places where it was packed in ice before it was put on

00:00:44.439 - 00:01:11.650

railroad cars. It, that was set up in Watsonville. So, um, That doesn't, that starts in the late 20s and goes to the mid-50s. That's a long time. And, um, Watsonville shed workers, uh, like they turned down the 1930, they turned down the 1934 agreement that was,

00:01:12.110 - 00:01:29.309

they, they, they, it was a small It was a big strike in 34 and 36 in the fields and the sheds. That's a long story, a different story. The, um, basically the shed workers went on strike and went to the field workers for support. The field

00:01:29.309 - 00:01:45.599

workers were Filipinos at the time, um, and, um, the, the, um, AFFL sent down a guy by the name of Casey, you probably know his name. Uh, he was the head of the AFL in, in, um, in San Francisco area. I think he was originally a

00:01:45.599 - 00:02:04.779

team somebody wrote a biography of him, Teamster, I believe he was, he was, and he came down and organized, um, a settlement in which the shed workers got union recognition and a wage and the. And the field workers got nothing, and the field workers would have

00:02:04.779 - 00:02:18.940

originally had gone out in support of the shed workers. The shed workers had called on them to go out. There was an agreement that nobody would, everybody would go back together and the and the the shed workers sold them out and that was the basis of

00:02:18.940 - 00:02:37.630

their defeat in 1936. In 1936, which is the big fascism in Salinas, um, the shed workers are then. Uh, Uh, shut out by the bosses and they go on strike and they ask the Filipino farm workers for support, and the Filipino farm workers say, our, our

00:02:37.630 - 00:02:56.850

memory ain't that short, and they continued to work, so there was scab. So anyway, in that fight, the left, the shed workers in Watsonville actually voted. Not to betray in 34 strike, not to betray the field workers, but their vote was mixed in with the shed

00:02:56.850 - 00:03:18.839

workers from Salinas, and the shed workers in Salinas, um, uh, won that battle, um. So Uh, that Watsonville was crucial there and that was sort of left tradition there because it's the railhead. Then the other time that Watson becomes important in working class history is, um,

00:03:19.169 - 00:03:52.350

in the, um. In the uh 79 UFW strike when it's a Watsonville, uh. West Coast Farms, which is based in Watsonville, uh. is the first people to extend the strike against the leadership's wishes, and, and they win the first, the first breakthrough. So yeah, it's a,

00:03:53.110 - 00:04:09.960

it's, it's got a left history then. In dubious battle is based on a strike in um in the Central Valley Valley I think you know Valley, yeah they had all those deportations and stuff yeah, no, it's not in Imperial Valley it's it's it's in the Central

00:04:09.960 - 00:04:25.769

Valley. It's not even Coachella um uh it's a peach strike um that Chambers was involved in. And he took that strike and he transported it to Watsonville because he knew Watsonville. I think I read that we both read the same article about that my recollection is

00:04:25.769 - 00:04:47.640

that they were cotton pickers and hot peers, the peach then became cotton were important in the cotton strike, yeah, whatever the name is. Anyway, so Watsonville, yeah, Watsonville's got a long tradition. Uh, I, I just assumed that Steinbeck located his novel here because he knew the

00:04:47.640 - 00:05:05.940

territory and he didn't know squat about the central he could get good vivid descriptions of the scenery and everything. Um, So did I leave? I, I don't, I don't think I left TDU until I left. Yeah, that was basically what it was about. OK, I asked

00:05:05.940 - 00:05:27.679

this because. You know, Joe has The the sense I get from Joe and his the way he looks at himself in that period he was somebody who was sort of a reluctant reluctantly thrust into a leadership role, uh, for which he was not really prepared, um.

00:05:28.970 - 00:05:45.239

That you were his mentor. Uh Uh, but you know, you were really good at attracting, as he, as he puts it, the angry guys in the union and bringing them into TDU. That he didn't really have as, as he wasn't really as good at relating to

00:05:45.239 - 00:06:04.450

them as you were. And um I guess when you left TDU, it was like he and Joe, he and Jose had a kind of a division of labor, you know, where. Jose dealt with the people in the frozen food plants and and and Joe dealt with

00:06:04.450 - 00:06:23.019

the white truck drivers. And I've, I've always Thought it was kind of strange, um. That Joe wound up playing as prominent role as he did since he wasn't a frozen food worker and he didn't hadn't had any experience in the plant, you know, and, and I'm

00:06:23.019 - 00:06:40.940

talking now right about before he was elected, you know, a business agent. Um In the early weeks of the strike, everybody identified him with TDU. And a lot of that kind of who's this, this white guy doesn't never worked in a frozen food food plant telling

00:06:40.940 - 00:06:52.500

us what to do kind of thing. A lot of that came from that and I'm just thinking it's He shouldn't have been put in that position, you know. Uh, I would love to talk to Jose if I could find him, you know, for the position or

00:06:52.500 - 00:07:26.880

not being not being the frozen food worker or any of that. That's not the problem. The problem is the crucial TDU. of not understanding that TDU couldn't lead the strike and that there had to be a strike committee made up of frozen food workers to lead

00:07:26.880 - 00:07:44.880

the strike and that they could, they could use TDU resources. And they could use, they could, they could TU TDU is crucial in those early years getting it together, but once they're, once people are on strike, they need their own strike committee and TDU didn't understand

00:07:44.880 - 00:08:04.579

that. TDU thought he was going to run the strike and, and we had, you know, a few years of work and, um, and, and we knew people and, and, uh, and we certainly, um, we certainly were in a position to give some guidance, but But how

00:08:04.579 - 00:08:34.229

in the world somebody as um As a politically Sophisticated as I was, didn't understand that we needed a strike committee. I don't know. That's like, that's like. That's In retrospect, That is um double stupid. Mhm. So I don't think, I, I, I don't think the point,

00:08:34.510 - 00:08:50.219

I don't, I don't think the point about And you know this is where I come back to you and my political differences. I don't think the point is that it was is that um is that um Joe was unprepared. Nobody's prepared for something like that um

00:08:50.219 - 00:09:07.390

uh uh and you know, more the people coming from outside, you can make the same kind of arguments about them, but, um, the point is, there need to be a strike committee and TDU didn't call one, didn't call the bass speeding and you know. And um

00:09:07.390 - 00:09:23.270

and have a strike committee, um, elected and I think that if if we had done that early on, it would have been, um, it would have maybe had a very different character, um, but who knows, so that's a mistake and that's a mistake of that's a

00:09:23.270 - 00:10:00.150

basic democratic error. But you did actually, um, oh, here I'll play this. Um, You put something out. Yeah, here we go. This is TBU leaflet. Came out right in the first week of the strike at the bottom says we need an electric strike. Well, it just

00:10:00.150 - 00:10:26.789

never happened. So we did, did you write that or did Jose write it or what? Joe didn't recognize it. Um, this is my writing. That's what I figured. So I wouldn't say you completely missed the boat on that just didn't happen, it didn't happen, um. Wait,

00:10:26.869 - 00:10:45.330

wait a second, I'm gonna finish reading this. It's