As we come up to the IAM’s 125th anniversary in Canada, a number of projects are under way to collect and share our history.
In January, active and retired members from 13 Canadian Local Lodges participated in the first-ever Canadian Local Lodge History Project planning session at the Winpisinger Center at Placid Harbor.
With assistance from the Placid Harbor staff, Professor Rachel Bernstein from New York University, and Traci Drummond, the Archivist from the Southern Labor Archives in Atlanta, Georgia, the Project participants made plans to collect and share their local lodges’ history through collecting archival materials, interviewing active and retired members and making presentations to their membership.
The work is happening. Find out what is happening in your local. If it isn’t, maybe you can be the one to start making it happen.
In March and April, the IAM had another first – a partnership with the History Department at Ryerson University in Toronto to record interviews with active and retired IAM members from southern Ontario. In all, Ryerson students interviewed 27 IAM members about their life in the union, with the recordings being saved in the IAM archives in Atlanta, as well as Canada.
The students found it a valuable experience. It was a unique chance to understand history as human stories, rather than just dry textbooks. For many, it was the first time they had any contact with union history.
For the participating IAM members, it was an opportunity to have their contributions recognized, to pass on the essential lessons of experience to current and future generations.
We hope this is only the first of many collaborations with Ryerson and other Canadian institutions to preserve and use IAM history in the future.
