Mine Mill Fights the Good Fight Part 2

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Earning a safety award (taken from the San Manuel Miner c. 1964)

John Wise was named General Manager of Magma Copper Company’ San Manuel Division. (Taken from the San Manuel Miner c. 1965)

As the year 1965 was ending, Magma showed a substantial gain in net income of $13,984,158 in the first nine months of the year.

The year 1966 began with Magma San Manuel Division announcing six promotions. John Wise became Assistant General Manager of the San Manuel Division; Dave Ridinger, Personnel Manager for all divisions of Magma Copper; G.W. Dopson, Assistant Mill Superintendent; Bill Cann, Division Electrical Superintendent; Earl Snodgrass, Division Master Mechanic and Master Mechanic of the San Manuel Arizona Railroad Company; and Vin Coxon in addition to Chief Civil Engineer of the San Manuel Division and Superintendent of the Railroad Company, became the Superintendent of the Division Ore Transportation Department.

The 1st quarter of 1966 showed a net profit of $1,182,318. On May 28 an explosion killed three miners at the Magma mine in Superior. The three veteran miners were Marvin Thompson (48), Frank Ruiz (44) and Joe Diaz (45). John Wise, General Manager said, “The three, all drift miners, were working at the 3,600 foot level and blasting a tunnel when the explosion occurred.” Roy Santa Cruz, Jr., Business agent for Mine Mill said he feels that “defective fuses” were at fault since all three were experienced miners. A coroner’s hearing held a few weeks later reported that “death was the result of an accidental blast, cause unknown.”

In 1966, the first federal statute directly regulating non-coal mines was made law. The Federal Metal and Non-Metallic Mine Safety Act of 1966 was written with the help of Mine Mill. It provided for the setting of safety standards and called for more safety inspections of mines. It came at a badly needed time. In 1965, 181 miners had been killed in accidents nationwide. Fred Sanchez said that they had been trying for years to get Senator Barry Goldwater to introduce safety legislation but he never did anything. Fred added, “Goldwater was a rat, lousiest senator we had.” Mine Mill helped get Morris Udall elected and he worked to get the legislation passed. Fred said that after Udall was elected, while at a victory rally jokingly told the crowd that “I am supported by one of the best communist unions in the country.”

In June, the legal case that Mine Mill had been fighting since 1956 finally ended when the United States Supreme Court threw the case out of court. After 10 years of legal struggles, constant harassment by the federal government and membership raiding by the Steelworkers, the union and the leaders that had been tried and convicted were finally vindicated. The “witch hunts” were over, but the cost would be high for Mine Mill.

During the first week of October, a wildcat strike at the mine in San Manuel shut down production for two days. The Miner newspaper reported that no one seemed to know the reason for the strike but rumors were that it was a “sympathy walkout connected with the Miami-Christmas strike, to safety conditions underground, to forcing men receiving lesser pay to perform jobs usually done by miners at a higher wage scale.” Mine Mill and Magma met and agreed that the strike was illegal and violated the no-strike clause of their contract. Workers were ordered back to work.

The Miami-Christmas strike was called against Inspiration Copper after the death of a miner underground at the Christmas mine. Mine Mill had called the strike which lasted 20 days and affected 1,650 workers. The contract with Inspiration and Mine Mill did not include a no-strike clause. About 50 of the Christmas workers lived in the Tri-Community. The Christmas mine permanently closed their underground operations following the strike. Many of the underground miners were able to transfer to positions at the Inspiration mine in Miami. The open pit mine at Christmas continued to operate.

In October Mine Mill sent William “Nick” Key to Chicago to attend the International Union of Mine Mill and Smelter Workers conference and the Industrial Union Department of AFL-CIO Copper and Brass Conference. The reason for Key attending both conferences was to prepare for coordination of the upcoming bargaining talks for the 1967 contract; 1967 would be an important year for Mine Mill, the Steelworkers, the national copper industry and Magma Copper.

In January at a convention in Tucson, the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers agreed to a merger with the United Steelworkers of America, their bitter enemy since the 1940s. Apparently the Steelworkers weren’t worried about joining with a “communist” union after Mine Mill was vindicated by the Supreme Court. The International President of the Steelworkers said, “We used to call them Red, now we call them red blooded.”

The Steelworkers gained nearly 40,000 members in Canada and the United States. Only one Mine Mill Local refused to join the Steelworkers. Mine Mill Local 598 in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada had managed to hold on to their union at the Falconbridge Nickel Mines. In 1993, they kept the Mine Mill name but merged with the Canadian Auto Workers union. They are now known as Mine Mill/C.A.W. and continue to successfully fight for their workers.

Thirty-one San Manuel mine workers were laid off in February. They were underground laborers. At the time more than 2,000 workers were employed by Magma Copper San Manuel Division.

Former Mine Mill President Fred Sanchez said of the merger, “I didn’t approve of it. I hated it! Mine Mill was a fighting union. I didn’t believe the Steelworkers belonged in the copper industry. Victor Borboa, a long time resident of the area who worked 40 years with Magma and was a Mine Mill member said he didn’t agree with the merger but he joined the Steelworkers “because I was a union man.”

The first joint meeting between Mine Mill and the Steelworkers union since their merger was held at Salt Lake City, Utah in March. Attending for Mine Mill Local 937 were Eddie Jackson, President, Rudy Garcia, Business Agent, and James McKissick, union Vice-President of the smelter division. Over 250 local unions attended with the main objective being to lay the groundwork for upcoming negotiations with copper companies nationwide.

On June 20, members of the Mine Mill-Steelworkers union unanimously voted to approve a strike if negotiations fell through. The Miner reported that “Negotiations over the past two months have not produced the desired results. Since this is by far the largest union negotiating with the Company here, and if they are having trouble coming to terms, then like the rest of the mining concerns and towns in Arizona, the people of this area have a right to be worried about a long, hot, and perhaps money less summer.”

The Miner also reported that the government had been “stockpiling more than its usual amount of copper for many months now because of a strike threat. It has been reported that the war in Vietnam and other military needs account for 29 percent of all the copper produced.” It was thought that the government could force strikers back to work if the strike interfered with the war effort and national defense.

John Wise was named General Manager of Magma’s San Manuel Division effective July 1. Mr. Wise had been associated with Newmont Mining Corporation since 1943.

The Mine Mill-Steelworkers agreed to a two week extension of the contract. Following the day shift on Friday, July 14, Magma locked out the workers with the contract deadline to expire at midnight. The strike – lockout had begun with little hope of an early settlement. Families began moving out of the area. By August it was reported that 20 percent of the houses in San Manuel were empty. It was also reported that $2 million in sales tax, corporation and individual taxes were lost to the state every month during the strike.

In September, 310 students in the Mammoth-San Manuel School District failed to enroll, a drop of 20 percent from the previous year. November brought a sad “what if” story. Jack Mullins, an underground miner, had left San Manuel when the strike began to find work. While working for another mine in California he was killed in a fall. His wife Bea and two kids Jack, Jr. and Jeanette were still in San Manuel when they received the news.

The 1967 – 68 strike would last nine months finally ending in March. A few weeks later Magma announced that they had purchased the Kalamazoo ore body for $27 million.

The International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers was no more. The fighting union descended from the Western Federation of Miners and the Industrial Workers of the World had fought the good fight not only for the betterment of the working man but for civil rights and social justice. John R. Salter (Hunter Bear) said of this union: “Mine Mill was always and consistently racially and ethnically egalitarian. Its visionary commitment, basically socialist democracy always remained strong. And at every level, Mine Mill blazed new trails and fought collateral and very tangible struggles for social justice in the United States and Canada.”

“Take a good long look at the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers. Never forget it, always remember it, consistently emulate it.”

If you missed the first part, you can read it online at the following links:

Mine Mill Fights the Good Fight http://bit.ly/1jL3XXU

John Hernandez (785 Posts)

John Hernandez lives in Oracle. He is retired and enjoys writing and traveling. He is active in the Oracle Historical Society. He covers numerous public events, researches historical features and writes business/artist profiles.


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