Madison Press Connection

Last updated

Madison Press Connection was a newspaper formed in Madison, Wisconsin in October 1977 by striking union employees from the two dominant daily newspapers, the Wisconsin State Journal and The Capital Times . [1] The Press Connection began as a weekly but became a daily early in 1978 in an effort to intensify pressure on management of Madison Newspapers, Inc. to make concessions to the union. The Press Connection was published through early January 1980 [2] and is available on microfilm, along with 9 boxes of archival business records and photographs, from The State Historical Society of Wisconsin. The archival records document "the survival struggles of this unusual strike newspaper and the operation of this worker-managed cooperative". [3]

Contents

The Press Connection provided serious competition by scooping the larger papers on numerous stories, and by publishing controversial articles and cartoons. It evolved from a strike paper to one of the few cooperatively organized and owned daily newspapers ever to exist in the United States. The Press Connection's cooperative structure was credited as the reason for numerous journalistic risks that corporate media avoided, including the publication in 1979 of an article purporting to provide the "secrets" of building an H-bomb. [4]

Ron McCrea served as editor of the Press Connection. [5] The staff was initially made up entirely of striking employees of MNI, with the exception of cartoonist Pete Wagner, whose controversial work spurred his firing within two weeks of being hired, but who was rehired when the staff voted to keep him in spite of numerous cancellations by irate readers. [6] [7] Wagner left the paper after ten months and was later replaced by Mike Konopacki, who specialized in labor-related cartoons.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">National Labor Relations Act of 1935</span> 1935 U.S. federal labor law regulating the rights of workers and unions

The National Labor Relations Act of 1935, also known as the Wagner Act, is a foundational statute of United States labor law that guarantees the right of private sector employees to organize into trade unions, engage in collective bargaining, and take collective action such as strikes. Central to the act was a ban on company unions. The act was written by Senator Robert F. Wagner, passed by the 74th United States Congress, and signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Taft–Hartley Act</span> 1947 U.S. federal law regulating labor unions

The Labor Management Relations Act of 1947, better known as the Taft–Hartley Act, is a United States federal law that restricts the activities and power of labor unions. It was enacted by the 80th United States Congress over the veto of President Harry S. Truman, becoming law on June 23, 1947.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Coors Brewing Company</span> American brewery and beer company

The Coors Brewing Company is an American brewery and beer company based in Golden, Colorado that was founded in 1873. In 2005, Adolph Coors Company, the holding company that owned Coors Brewing, merged with Molson, Inc. to become Molson Coors. The first Coors brewery location in Golden, Colorado is the largest single brewing facility operating in the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Communications Workers of America</span> U.S./Canadian labor union

The Communications Workers of America (CWA) is the largest communications and media labor union in the United States, representing about 700,000 members in both the private and public sectors. The union has 27 locals in Canada via CWA-SCA Canada representing about 8,000 members. CWA has several affiliated subsidiary labor unions bringing total membership to over 700,000. CWA is headquartered in Washington, D.C., and affiliated with the AFL–CIO, the Strategic Organizing Center the Canadian Labour Congress, and UNI Global Union. The current president is Chris Shelton.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (1968)</span> American labor union 1968–1981

The Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization or PATCO was a United States trade union that operated from 1968 until its decertification in 1981 following an illegal strike that was broken by the Reagan Administration.

The Badger Herald is a newspaper serving the University of Wisconsin–Madison community, founded in 1969. The paper is published Monday through Friday during the academic year and once during the summer. Available at newsstands across campus and downtown Madison, Wisconsin and published on the web, it has a print circulation of 6,000.

<i>Wisconsin State Journal</i> Daily newspaper in Madison, Wisconsin

The Wisconsin State Journal is a daily newspaper published in Madison, Wisconsin by Lee Enterprises. The newspaper, the second largest in Wisconsin, is primarily distributed in a 19 county region in south-central Wisconsin. As of September 2018, the Wisconsin State Journal had an average weekday circulation of 51,303 and an average Sunday circulation of 64,820. The State Journal is the state's official newspaper of record, and statutes and laws passed are regarded as official seven days after the publication of a state legal notice.

The Tamiment Library is a research library at New York University that documents radical and left history, with strengths in the histories of communism, socialism, anarchism, the New Left, the Civil Rights Movement, and utopian experiments. The Robert F. Wagner Archives, which is also housed in Bobst Library at NYU, documents American labor history. Together the two units form an important center for scholarly research on labor and the left.

<i>Green Bay Press-Gazette</i> Daily newspaper in Green Bay, Wisconsin

The Green Bay Press-Gazette is a newspaper whose primary coverage is of northeastern Wisconsin, including Green Bay. It was founded as the Green Bay Gazette in 1866 as a weekly paper, becoming a daily newspaper in 1871. The Green Bay Gazette merged with its major competitor, the Green Bay Free Press in 1915, assuming its current title. The newspaper was purchased by Gannett in March 1980.

Robert Dennis McFadden is an American journalist who has worked for The New York Times since 1961. He won a Pulitzer Prize in 1996.

Capital Newspapers is a partnership between Lee Enterprises and The Capital Times Company that operates 27 publications and several web sites in Wisconsin. The corporate name of the company is Madison Newspapers Inc. Capital Newspapers has nearly 400 employees.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pete Wagner</span> Political cartoonist

Pete Wagner is an American political cartoonist, activist, author, scholar and caricature artist whose work has been published in over 300 newspapers and other periodicals. His cartoons and activist theatrics have been the subject of controversy and frequent media attention.

A wildcat strike action, often referred to as a wildcat strike, is a strike action undertaken by unionised workers without union leadership's authorisation, support, or approval; this is sometimes termed an unofficial industrial action. The legality of wildcat strikes varies between countries and over time, although they are not typically criminal offenses.

The Detroit Sunday Journal was a weekly tabloid newspaper published from November 19, 1995, through November 21, 1999, in Detroit, Michigan, in the United States by striking workers from The Detroit News and The Detroit Free Press. It was pro-union, and focused on labor issues as well as local news. There were just over 200 editions published and circulation for most editions was 40,000-60,000, being made available through the mail and in stores and corner boxes throughout Southeast Michigan. Originally intended to merely shed light on the Detroit Newspaper Strike and other labor issues, it became one of the longest-running temporary newspapers ever.

The 1933 Wisconsin milk strike was a series of strikes conducted by a cooperative group of Wisconsin dairy farmers in an attempt to raise the price of milk paid to producers during the Great Depression. Three main strike periods occurred in 1933, with length of time and level of violence increased during each one.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mike Konopacki</span> American cartoonist

Mike Konopacki is an American political cartoonist from Wisconsin, specializing in labor issues.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Teaching Assistants Association</span> Wisconsin graduate student employee union

The Teaching Assistants Association (TAA) is a graduate student employee union formed at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1966. It is credited as the first graduate student labor union. Following voluntary recognition by the university as the teaching assistants' bargaining agent in 1969, negotiations resulted in a 1970 strike, which secured "bread-and-butter" gains such as job security alongside grievance procedures. Their major unmet demand from their strike—the inclusion of teaching assistants and students in the course planning process—went unfulfilled. The TAA struck again in 1980 and lost its union recognition until 1986. The union's protest at the Wisconsin State Capitol building began the 2011 Wisconsin protests.

<i>Työmies</i> Finnish language communist newspaper in the USA

Työmies was a politically radical Finnish-language newspaper published primarily out of Hancock, Michigan, and Superior, Wisconsin. Launched as a weekly in July 1903, the paper later went to daily frequency and was issued under its own name until its merger with the communist newspaper Eteenpäin (Forward) in 1950 to form Työmies-Eteenpäin.

The Atlanta sanitation strike of 1977 was a labor strike involving sanitation workers in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Precipitated by wildcat action in January, on March 28 the local chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) agreed to strike. The main goal of the strike was a $0.50 hourly wage increase. With support from many community groups, Atlanta mayor Maynard Jackson resisted the strike, firing over 900 striking workers on April 1. By April 16, many of the striking workers had returned to their previous jobs, and by April 29 the strike was officially ended.

A strike paper, strike bulletin or strike newspaper is a news publication started by participants in a strike action.

References

  1. ↑ "Press: The Madison Connection" . Time. 1978-01-09. ISSN   0040-781X . Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  2. ↑ "About Madison press connection. (Madison, Wis.) 1977–1980". Chronicling America – Library of Congress. 2008-08-04. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  3. ↑ "Madison Press Connection records, 1977-1980". UW Madison Libraries. Retrieved April 9, 2023.
  4. ↑ Buhle, Paul (1997). "Lost Struggles of the 1970s: Dave Wagner and the Madison Press Connection". From the Knights of Labor to the New World Order: Essays on Labor and Culture. Taylor & Francis. pp. 222 ff. ISBN   978-0-8153-2225-2.
  5. ↑ Eisen, Marc (2008-02-12). "Ron McCrea backs changes at 'The Capital Times'". Isthmus. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  6. ↑ Wagner, Pete (1980). Buy this Book. Me Publications. p. 212. ISBN   978-0-937706-00-8.
  7. ↑ Interview, WORT-FM Radio, March 1978.[ full citation needed ]
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.