• In this Issue >
  • Features
    • From the President
    • World Class Fine
    • House busters
    • Landmark Voting Rights Act
    • Fight to increase minimum wage
    • Power to the people
  • Union Front
    • Auto glassworkers dog-tired
    • AK Steel workers OK new contract
    • Member minute
    • Local 1968 workers stay strong
    • Federal agency's e-mails show bias
    • Delphi Update
    • Ask a Working Woman survey
    • One on one with General Holiefield
  • Departments
    • From the Readers
    • Safer Work
    • Still Solid
    • Skilled Trades
    • Workers' Words
    • Phipps' Tips
    • Solidarity Index / Past Issues

WORKERS' WORDS

Don Corn, UAW Local 737 retiree, Nashville, Tenn.

UAW: Loud & clear

I remember the day I signed my UAW authorization card like it was just last month, although I fully realize that day was many moons ago: March 7, 1957.

“Gate Mouth” Jones, an overhead crane operator with construction union experience, came up to me and said, “Good buddy, how about signing this UAW organizing card? We need a union here like the one in Detroit.”

I didn’t know what to say or do, but for some reason I trusted this total stranger and signed that green card.

The National Labor Relations Board came in and held our recognition election. We received every vote but one, and UAW Local 737 was born on May 21, 1957, in Nashville, Tenn., representing hourly workers at the Ford Motor Co. Glass plant.

I attended monthly union meetings regularly, and I got involved. I served on the election committee for our first election of officers. I was later elected district committeeman, served on the bylaws committee and was editor of our local union newspaper. I was elected president and served five terms.

My first years as Local 737 president were not easy. The South was in the middle of an awakening during the civil rights movement. Our plant was still basically lily white in the mid-1960s regarding the “better jobs,” and a few members wanted to keep it that way.

Job posting boards finally opened up to all employees, and in a short time resulted in opportunities for everyone. Our shop committee deserves praise for this massive transition.

I always believed that all dues money was green, not black or white.

I also maintained that everyone walked the picket line side by side, went out together and returned to work together. We had no room for a racist – black or white – in our union hall.

Other than my family and my church, the UAW has been my best friend for 49 years, and my personalized Tennessee license plate proclaims that message loud and clear.

Given the chance to do it all again, this old retiree wouldn’t change a single thing.