CHAPTER 7: ROAD WARRIORS AND SOLIDARITY COMMITTEES (excerpt)

Each time they spoke, the Road Warriors explained that for decades their working conditions at the Staley plant had been essentially good but that their lives were turned upside down in 1988 when the multinational Tate & Lyle arrived in Decatur. They spoke about Jim Beals’ death and the deteriorating safety conditions in the plant. They described how the company attempted to strip them of fifty years of collective bargaining gains by implementing twelve-hour rotating shifts, gutting safety and seniority, and moving from a 116-page contract to a 17-page one. They explained that Tate & Lyle was trying to eradicate their union, where a worker, on average, had twenty-one years in the plant and made $12.40 an hour.

Many audiences felt as if the Road Warriors were telling their own stories. The Road Warriors argued that it was time for workers to stand up, to return to the assertive strategies of the labor movement’s roots, and to fight back against corporate greed. “The corporations have a common strategy to decimate the labor movement,” said the Road Warriors. “They’re coming after us now, but you’re next. This fight is your fight, too. This fight is about all workers, everywhere.” They told their audiences about the slogan they carried on placards at demonstrations: “It’s Their Solidarity versus Ours.” “We have to break down the walls that divide us, “said Royal Plankenhorn, “because his battle is my battle, my battle is his battle, and your battle is my battle. We can’t succeed any other way.” …

The enthusiastic response astounded the Road Warriors. Many people in the audiences were searching for a renewal within their own unions and saw the Staley workers’ struggle as a model for labor’s revitalization. Workers registered for Local 837's mailings, made plans to come to the next Decatur demonstration, and vowed to boycott corporate campaign targets. Unionists repeatedly asked Road Warriors questions about bringing a work-to-rule campaign to their own workplaces.

The audiences’ applause and admiration were backed up by substantial donations. Gary Lamb recalled his amazement while driving back to Decatur after a road trip: “I couldn’t believe it! Why did all those people give us all that money? Maybe there’s a chance!” Added Lamb, “We were counting as we went down the road, and I said to the others, ‘My God, if the law stops us, they’ll think we’ve been selling drugs!’ Some small locals donated hundreds of dollars. One small union in Illinois paid its stewards twelve dollars for attending stewards meetings; the attendees voted to turn the money over to the Staley workers for the duration of the lock-out. Some large unions gave sizeable donations. The Canadian Auto Workers, who were contacted through Tucker, invited Road Warriors to speak and then contributed ten thousand dollars.

The Road Warriors were invigorated by the profound solidarity they experienced. “These are people who never met you, who invite you into their home, put you up, feed you, and take you where you need to go,” recalled Lorell Patterson. “Once you got out there, you found people willing to help. You just had to go out there and find them.” Bill Winter recalled one trip to West Hartford, Connecticut, where a Machinists local raised $1,700 and the union sent another $2,000 two months later. That level of generosity was not unusual. But that night, as the event was winding down, remembers Winter, “one of the gals who had been doing the bartending came to me with an envelope and told me that all the volunteer bartenders had agreed to donate their tips for the night. The envelope contained over $200, which those girls had been on their feet all evening to earn. That donation touched me as much as any we received on that trip.”…

The Road Warriors were notorious for watching every penny. Before leaving Decatur, one worker would be assigned the trip’s treasurer and given cash for gas and food. “We’d go to the grocery store the night before,” recalled Mary Brummett. “We’d buy a loaf of bread and a bag of potato chips and bologna, and you’d bring the mustard from home and maybe some cookies and pop, and fix up a cooler and they would head out.” Royal Plankenhorn, who rounded out the frequent Road Warrior trio with Brummett and Bob Sheibley, always brought along the paper plates.

Barrie Williams related an exchange that took place on a trip to Michigan: “Royal Plankenhorn was treasurer. The air conditioner was out on the van and it was over 100 degrees. We were hot! We pulled over at a rest stop, and there was a little ice cream stand. I went over and got some, the others did, but Dick Schable was broke. He said to Royal, ‘The union ought to buy us ice cream cones.’ Royal said ‘No. You don’t need that ice cream cone. You can do without it... We don’t waste union money on stupid shit.’... We almost had to get between them to stop the blows.”

Plankenhorn recalled another story about frugality during a seven-hour trip to Minnesota:

Dave Watts, [Staley spouse] Janie McKinney, and I were headed up to Austin, Minnesota, and we stopped for gas. Dave says, ‘When are we stopping to eat?’ Janie says, ‘You must not be in on the program. We don’t stop. We’ll eat this evening when we get there. We’re on the union funds.’ And Dave says, ‘When you’re hungry, you eat.’ Janie says, ‘No.’ Dave looked my way. I said, ‘That’s right. We don’t waste union money if we don’t have to. We eat as little as possible, we spend as little as possible.’ And we didn’t stop until we got to Austin. Not even for Dave Watts, the president! Dave couldn’t believe it!

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