Rising through the ranks
‘I’ve made up my mind what I want to do with my life’
From his very first days on the job, Doug knew he wanted to be a union activist.
Unfortunately, management knew that, too. Doug was fired from his first two jobs for trying to organize a union.
“At the second place, they broke into my toolbox and found authorization cards, so they found a way to fire me,” he recalled in an interview.
It was at the Ever-Hot Heating Company, his second job, that Doug experienced many of the indignities workers regularly faced on the job before unions and learned the lesson, “Don't forget where you come from.”
“The toilet was square in the center of the shop and from your waist up was plain glass. So when you go in to the toilet ... the boss could see you at all times,” Doug recalled.
In 1936 he found a job at the Chrysler-owned McGraw Street DeSoto plant on Detroit’s west side, where his father, Samuel Douglas Fraser, worked as an electrician. The younger Fraser worked as a conveyor loader and later as a metal finisher, earning $1.15 an hour, 15 cents more than an auto assembler.
During the March 1937 sit-down strikes at nine Chrysler plants in Detroit, both Doug Frasers sat in at Dodge Main.
Meanwhile, young Doug’s co-workers were quickly recognizing his leadership skills, electing him as steward, chief steward and recording secretary before electing him as UAW Local 227 president at age 26 in 1943.
Management was equally impressed with Doug’s leadership skills and offered him a supervisory position. A company official suggested that he take some time to think about the offer.
“It’s no point,” Doug recalled in a 1983 Detroit Free Press interview. “I don’t need any time. I’ve made up my mind what I want to do with my life.”
Having made up his mind, Doug applied all his energy and talent to building a strong local union, a strong UAW and a strong labor movement. After serving three terms as local union president, Doug was appointed in 1947 to the UAW’s International staff and assigned to the Chrysler Department.
During the historic 104-day strike against Chrysler in 1950 that won pensions for autoworkers, Doug’s negotiating skills caught the eye of then-UAW President Walter Reuther who appointed him as his administrative assistant in 1951.
In 1959 Doug was elected co-director of UAW Region 1A. In 1962 he was elected by the UAW Constitutional Convention as an International Executive Board member-at-large, and in 1970 UAW delegates elected Doug as a vice president of the UAW, where he headed the Chrysler Department.
As a UAW officer, Doug stayed closely connected with the UAW’s rank and file. Whenever he conducted factory floor tours, Doug took time out to talk with workers one on one.
Doug was popular with the members, even when the news he brought them wasn’t always good. They liked that he was straight with them, and everyone called him Doug.
Although he never finished high school, Doug was an avid reader. As a union leader, he was known for discussing economics with corporate executives, major social issues with political officials and shop floor concerns with factory workers.
Doug always said he tried to model himself after Reuther’s social unionism style of leadership.
A well-known political activist, he was frequently mentioned as a possible candidate for the U.S. Senate from Michigan, even before he became a UAW vice president.
In 1973 when Coleman Young was elected as the first African-American mayor of Detroit, at a time when police-community relations were an especially challenging issue, he turned to Doug to serve as chairman of the Detroit Police Commission. To unite the city, the new mayor needed someone whose judgment and integrity were universally respected. Doug was the perfect choice.
In 1974 Doug was named chairman of the Detroit United Way, the first labor leader ever to head up the charity’s fund drive in that city.
For his decades of volunteer work in the community, the UAW named the Douglas A. Fraser Community Services Swift Award in his honor.
