Teamsters, striking Minneapolis park workers to mark 90th anniversary of strike that led to the creation of the National Labor Relations Act

Union activists will gather Saturday to commemorate the 1934 Minneapolis truckers strike, a bloody, six-month clash between the Teamsters union and trucking employers that led to the creation of the National Labor Relations Act and established Minneapolis as a city with a strong union presence.

By neglecting to talk about workers’ history, society is forgetting why workers have some of the protections they now have, said event co-chair Linda Leighton, a retired member of the Service Employees International Union and the granddaughter of Vincent Ray Dunne, one of the key leaders of the 1934 strike. “It was because of the Teamsters strike here in Minneapolis, the San Francisco dock workers and the Toledo auto workers, those three giant strikes all in the same year during the Depression, that we have labor laws, and there are really a lot of people in America who don’t have a clue.”

While Minneapolis park workers represented by Laborers Local 363 are about to enter week four of their strike of the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board over stalled contract negotiations, the Laborers have given the commemoration’s organizers their blessing to cook out in Minneapolis’ Minnehaha Regional Park. Saturday’s event will also salute Local 363′s strike, the first in the Park Board’s 141-year history.

Last week the Park Board filed an unfair labor practice charge against Local 363, accusing picketing workers of “unreasonably” interfering with access to park facilities after delivery trucks turned away from picket lines near Sea Salt restaurant at the Minnehaha park and the Bread & Pickle restaurant at Lake Harriet.

“Picketers blocked delivery trucks that were attempting to make essential deliveries at Sea Salt restaurant, and union picketers tried to convince delivery drivers to leave without making their deliveries to the restaurant,” said Park Board spokesperson Dawn Sommers in a news release. “Another driver was intimidated by union picketers and made Sea Salt staff — escorted by Minneapolis Park Police — unload the delivery truck a block away to avoid interacting with the crowd. The same day, July 17, union picketers similarly harassed and blocked essential truck deliveries at the Bread and Pickle restaurant at Lake Harriet.”

The Park Board collects about 12% of gross revenues from private businesses it allows to operate on park land.

Local 363 Business Manager AJ Lange called the allegations “baseless,” saying delivery drivers honored picket lines of their own volition after park workers asked them to.

The city’s records department said there is no police report for the incident at Bread & Pickle, and the 911 dispatcher’s time-stamped notes of the Sea Salt incident make no mention of harassment or violence.

Paul Slattery, political director of Teamsters Local 120 and one of the organizers of the 1934 truckers strike commemoration, said he took calls from multiple delivery truck drivers on July 17 who wanted to know their rights when it came to the park workers’ picket line. Slattery said nearly all Teamsters contracts have picket line language that says drivers can’t be disciplined by their employer for refusing to cross a picket line. If they see one, drivers will typically call their dispatcher to inform the employer that the product will either have to be returned to the depot, or they could send out a non-union manager with proper licensing to drive the truck across the picket line, unload the deliveries and drive the truck back across the picket line.

“It’s very well known that Teamsters don’t cross picket lines,” said Slattery. “I really don’t buy that the Laborers are hassling people.” He added that the Teamsters had equipped the Laborers with copies of a letter from their Joint Council asking truckers to respect the park workers’ strike.

During the Minneapolis truckers strike 90 years ago, also known as the Minneapolis Teamsters strike, its most violent day came on July 20, 1934. Dubbed “Bloody Friday,” police shot at workers armed with pipes, killing two and injuring 67 mostly in their legs and backs as they ducked beneath trucks in a battle in the streets of downtown Minneapolis. The police were partnered with the Citizens Alliance, a employer organization that boycotted fellow business owners who recognized unions, and suffered beatings.

“The kinds of values and practices that the Teamsters in Minneapolis in the 1930s really embodied were not a question of swinging a baseball bat and being willing to be shot in a picket line, but about having the back of the person that works next to you,” said Peter Rachleff, a retired Macalester College labor history professor involved with planning the commemoration. “Folding in the strike of the parks and rec workers is about as appropriate a way to celebrate 1934 as I could imagine.”

Saturday’s event will take place from noon to 4 p.m. in the Wabun Picnic Area at Minnehaha Regional Park in Minneapolis. It is open to anyone interested in local labor history.