Remembering the Portland News Guild Strike of 1953

On September 13, 1953, 100 workers in in the editorial, maintenance, proof reading, and mailing departments at the Portland Press Herald, Maine Sunday Telegram and Portland Evening Express went on strike to demand a better contract offer from the newspapers' parent company Guy Gannett Communications. Placard carrying Guild picketers marched before the newspaper building and unloading points at the railroad station and the carriers’ terminal.

The members of the American Newspaper Guild Local 128 of the CIO voted 96-24 to reject the company’s offer, which included a demand to eliminate the closed union shop — a contract provision that required all employees to pay for the cost of collective bargaining. Instead, Gannett proposed a a maintenance of membership clause, which would make union membership optional but require those joining the union to remain members. Union members said the plan “threatened the destruction of the Guild.”

In addition, the newspaper workers demanded a wage increase of $3 to $10 a week, while management offered just $1 to $3. Guild members argued that the three papers paid $15 to $40 a week below the national wage average for the newspaper industry, while the company countered that they were earning the highest wages among newspaper employees in Maine.

According to the Lewiston Sun Journal, the Gannett management claimed the strike came “unexpectedly and without warning,” but Local 128 President Waldo E. Pray, who later became president of the Maine State Employees Association, said it “came only after all possible means of achieving a just and honorable settlement … were taken by the Guild.” Meanwhile, newspaper executives and scabs from the Gannett-owned and non-union Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel were brought in to continue putting out the three Portland papers during the strike.

“Some readers did not get papers this morning and readers should expect delays. “We ask for your indulgence,” said the publisher in a statement. “We ask you to bear with us and forgive our mistakes. Many of us are doing unfamiliar jobs, and there are bound to be errors. But we believe that uninterrupted publication of your newspapers is a public trust, and we will continue to give you the best possible newspapers.”

On day five of the strike, union members picketed outside the Kennebec Journal to protest the firing of Elwood G. Keller, a mail clerk of 42 years who objected to distributing Portland newspapers involved in the strike. The Guild filed an unfair labor practice complaint with the National Labor Relations Board over the firing.

A few weeks into the strike, Pray blasted leaders of the Young Democrats and Young Republicans of Maine for providing columns to substitute for Kennebec Journal State House reporter Peter M. Damborg while he scabbed at the Portland papers.

“Your copy can only be interpreted by the Guild as support for union-busting publisher,” wrote Pray.

Finally, on October 11, Local 128 announced that it had voted 98-34 to accept an agreement with Gannett and would return to work. In the new contract, the company granted pay increases of $1 to $6.25 a week, a raise from the previously offered $3 a week. However, the Guild gave up its closed union shop provision for a maintenance of membership clause.

Local 128 was founded as an affiliate of the Congress of Industrial Organizations on July 6, 1937 and originally only included the Press Herald, Evening Express and Sunday Telegram. Since then, staff at the Kennebec Journal, Morning Sentinel and the Bangor Daily News as well as Dale Rand Printing in Portland and Laura Marr Printing in Westbrook have joined the Guild.