Abstract:

The Chamber of Commerce of the United States has matured into the largest lobbying group in Washington. Formed in April of 1912 at the request of President William Howard Taft (1857-1930), the Chamber's commitment to be the voice of business is well documented. The records contain articles of incorporation, bylaws, resolutions and minutes of annual meetings. Presentations to Congress, speeches by members, and conferences hosted by the Chamber. Numerous publications give insight into the concerns facing American businesses in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

Scope and Content:

Series VI consists of documents produced internally by various PP&L departments, as well as other miscellaneous material from the company. Of note are fact sheets of PP&L’s subsidiary companies in the 1980s, notes and correspondence related to the production of the company’s annual reports and its Statistical Review. Other material of note includes material produced by PP&L’s Public Affairs and Human Resources Departments, such as customer relations training programs from the late 1950s, and perspectives on PP&L’s future energy plans and marketing strategies in the 1980s. There is also some material on the Employee-Management Cooperation Plan formed between management and workers in the mid-1930s.

Scope and Contents: PLEASE NOTE: employees who were retained from company to company maintained their files and did not start new file arrangements. To aid researchers, the change in company name from Ransome Airlines to PAE to TWE appears before the original file title. The Joseph "Joe" C. McGhee, Director of Personnel, papers series contains materials related to labor relations, labor union contracts and agreements, personnel benefits, and labor law. McGhee served in this position from 1986 to 1992, working for Pan Am Express and Trans World Express. Ethel Boyd was McGhee's predecessor in this position at Ransome Airlines, and McGhee inherited some of Boyd's files. The series is arranged into five subseries: Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) files; Independent Union of Flight Attendaents (IUFA) files; International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) files; General files; and Grievance and arbitration files [RESTRICTED].The Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) files subseries documents the process of collective bargaining or labor contract negotiation. During this process, the union submits a series of proposals on the employees' behalf. An agreement draft is submitted. The labor union and employer correspond concerning the draft, making revisions. Eventually, both sides will sign off on the draft, and a final agreement letter will be composed, signed, and officially published. The agreement letter, or contract, includes sections that cover pay, sick leave, vacation, overtime, benefits, and all policies and procedures. The materials in the subseries include contract drafts, final agreements, correspondence, wage rates, and pay scale analysis. A major issue between ALPA and PAE was compensation and seniority. As the regional carrier, the PAE pilots were paid at a lower rate than their Pan American World Airways counterparts, known as "B-scale." ALPA and PAE negotiated a promotion system that allowed pilots to go from PAE to the parent company, where PAE wouldn't lose too many pilots. Of significant interest among the TWE and ALPA materials are the Union Leave of Absence (ULOA) materials. The subseries is arranged chronologically and dates from 1983 to 1994. The Independent Union of Flight Attendants (IUFA) files subseries contains primarily PAE agreements. There are some materials related to a Ransome Airlines agreement negotiation on April 1, 1985, and some correspondence between IUFA and TWE during the transition from PAE in...

Abstract:

The Phoenix Steel Company began in the late 18th century as a manufacturer of cut nails. It later became a major producer of railroad rails and iron and steel structural members. Claymont Division of the Phoenix Steel Corporation was established in 1960 when the company purchased the Claymont, Delaware steel plant from the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company. This small collection of materials originating from the Claymont steel plant includes miscellaneous plant announcements, catalogs, labor agreements, photographs, company-issued newsletters, and brief historical essays on the Phoenix Steel Corporation and its predecessors.