A Presentation on Herb Mills by Clarence Thomas and Professor Peter Cole
CITY COLLEGE OF SAN FRANCISCO
Presented October 22, 2024
Solidarity greetings to all who are in attendance at this gathering this evening. My college education started here at City College in 1965 through 1966, before transferring to San Francisco State College in 1967. Before I get started, I just wanted to mention for the record, that I’m dealing with the lingering effects of shingles which have impacted my left eye. I would urge all who are 50 years and older to get a shingles vaccine if they have not already. It is the most debilitating health issue I’ve ever faced.
I am most pleased to be here this evening with Professor Peter Cole who has done such great scholarly work about radical labor history, and the ILWU specifically.
I am here this evening because as a retired member of ILWU Local 10, who has served as an officer and have been a part of many historic rank and file actions at the point of production such as Herb Mills illustriously describes in his novel “Presente A Dockworkers Story.”
For those who may ask, what does supporting international workers' struggle have to do with Longshore duties? Let me answer that question. “ The history of the ILWU, the record of its origins and traditions, is about workers who built a union that is democratic, militant, and dedicated to the idea that solidarity with other workers and other unions is the key to achieving economic security and a peaceful world”
I will never forget my introduction to brother Herb Mills, because it took place on July 28, 2001, at the Centennial Birthday Celebration for Harry Bridges founder of the ILWU, at the William “Bill” Chester Hiring Hall in San Francisco. This was during my first term as secretary-treasurer of ILWU Local 10. I was assigned the responsibility of chairing the committee to organize the festivities for the centennial birthday celebration in San Francisco. My duties included being the moderator during the program and controlling the Speaker List.
As one can imagine, l was being approached by individuals desiring to speak, and l thought l was doing a good job of controlling the list, keeping the speakers on their time schedules, and keeping the program moving. Brother Henry Graham, president of Local 10 at the time approached me about adding a person to the speakers list. I believe the stress of the day and my becoming somewhat dictatorial led to my initial declining his request. Henry whose nickname was “Hammering Hank” was unrelenting. He insisted that l add a speaker which turned out to be brother Herb Mills. The irony besides the embarrassment for me, is that Herb Mills should have been on the official speakers list. Herb gave an appropriate and relevant speech compared to others, who lacked Herb’s experience, knowledge, and intellect.
I have subsequently met Herb at historical community and rank-and-file actions such as the first protest of the Israeli ZIM shipping line in 2010, following Israeli commando murders of Gaza humanitarian activists on the Mavi Marmara flotilla in international waters. Herb was in a wheelchair. I chronicled our meeting in my anthology “Mobilizing in Our Own Name.”
As was referenced earlier, the ILWU specifically Local 10, has a long history of championing the struggles of the working class and the oppressed at home and abroad.
One of the ways it has been successful in carrying out these solidarity actions is through building labor community coalitions. In his novel Presente, Mills takes the public inside of the esoteric world of waterfront, and behind the curtain of inner workings of the officials of the union and the employers of the Longshore workers. The novel also explores the significant amount of respect and goodwill the union has had in the community and internationally for over 80 years.
Labor historian Peter Cole has recently returned to the Bay Area, to do a series of talks on the book “Presente A Dockworkers Story”, a novel written by retired past ILWU Local 10 Secretary Treasurer Herb Mills. It is a story of his accounts of the union's efforts to refuse to load arms bound for the brutal junta in El Salvador in 1980, ‘but knew their stand risked heavy fines, a federal takeover of the union, and jail time to the officers.’ Cole was asked to edit Brother Mill’s manuscript, by the author himself.
On October 22nd, Peter Cole and l were invited by James Tracy, Chair of the Department of Labor Studies at City College of San Francisco to do a presentation on “Presente.” During his presentation, Professor Peter Cole discussed Herb growing up in “Dearborn Michigan, where he worked in Ford’s legendary River Rouge Plant, where he learned about labor unions and decided to go to college. He was a Phi Beta Kappa graduate at the University of Michigan, became an army veteran honorably discharged in California, and he went to graduate school, studying political science at the University of California, Berkeley.” While at UC Berkeley, Herb taught and became active in the student movement organization called SLATE. He demonstrated against the House Un-American Activities Committee at San Francisco’s City Hall.
In 1963, Herb dropped out of graduate school and became a San Francisco Bay Area longshoreman. On countless occasions, he declared it was “the best decision I ever made.“ In 1968, his friend Cleophas Williams, the first Black man to be elected president of Local 10, granted Herb a year’s leave of absence to complete his PhD at the University of California, Irvine.
Herb went right back to the waterfront and became active in the ILWU, being elected shop steward, chairman of the stewards’ council, business agent and finally secretary-treasurer of Local 10. He took an injury-related retirement in 1991.
Herb was a leader in major conflicts between the longshore workers and our employers the Pacific Maritime Association. He helped lead the 1971-72 Strike, the longest in US Longshore history.
As an officer, he was the key leader in the ILWU’s 1978 refusal to ship military cargo to post-coup d’etat Chile. A similar effort in 1980 stopped military cargo from going to the El Salvador military junta. In January 2018, Local 10 presented him with a Lifetime Achievement Award.
As a veteran of many successful and historical rank-and- file actions that required both strategic planning and skillful execution in dealing with our employers and at times our own union’s bureaucracy, I and generations of others, have learned the invaluable lessons Brother Mills describes in his novel.
Never before has there been a writer with the knowledge and the background of an officer and rank-and-file leader to convey our history and its many lessons through a novel.
By making me part of his presentation, Professor Cole wants to call attention to the fact that these radical traditions continued through many decades up to the present. As a member of many historical Local 10 actions at the point of production which include:
On May Day 2008, shutting down all 29 Ports on the West Coast to oppose the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
In 2010, shutting down 5 Bay Atea Ports for ‘Justice for Oscar Grant’ and ‘Jail for Killer Cops.’
In 2010, the first demonstration against an Israeli ZIM Line vessel at the Port of Oakland.
In 2011, Port Shutdown in solidarity with Occupy Oakland (Wall Street on the Waterfront).
On Juneteenth 2020, shutting down all twenty-nine ports to protest the murder of George Floyd and all other victims of police terror.
Two of the most important and recent struggles and actions are Block the Boat campaign against the ZIM Shipping Line starting in August 2014, and SLAP (Schools Labor Against Privatization.) Both struggles were great examples of community labor collaboration that resulted in significant outcomes. In the case of Block the Boat, the Israeli ZIM lines have not worked at the Port of Oakland in a decade: that is because Local 10 members have not crossed AROC’s (Arab Resources Organizing Center) picket lines. There have also been disruptions of ZIM vessels at other West Coast ports as well. The groundbreaking coalition involving Oakland teachers and dockworkers in ILWU Local 10, creating SLAP, can serve as a model for other struggles of true working-class solidarity.
John Fisher, a right-wing billionaire owner of the Oakland A’s baseball team, and a major player in the Charter school industry which he owns and funds, was attempting to privatize the Port of Oakland. SLAP and several other community sectors were able to stop Fisher from privatizing the Port when he wanted to build a ballpark, condos, and retail space, at the 3RD busiest port on the West Coast. These have been basic examples of workers organizing and mobilizing in their own name.
Thank you for your attention. I may be retired from the waterfront, but not the struggle.
Clarence Thomas
ILWU Local 10 Retired
Co-founder DeClare Publishing
(“Mobilizing in Our Own Name Million Worker March”, “Cleophas Williams, My Life Story in the International Longshore & Warehouse Union Loc 10” and “1934: A year of good trouble”)