Guide to the Vern Smith, Collector. Industrial Workers of the World Files,
1916-1935 [bulk 1924-1925].

Vern Smith was an editor of The Industrial Pioneer, a publication of the Industrial Workers of the World (I.W.W.).

Established in Chicago in 1905 by sponsors of socialism and the remnants of 19th century labor unions, including the Knights of Labor, the radical Western Federation of Miners and the American Labor Union, the Industrial Workers of the World (I.W.W.), or "Wobblies", evolved into a radical industrial union which waged campaigns for improved working conditions, wages and hours of work, as well as workers' control in mines, mills, lumber camps and factories.

Includes report (originals and carbons) of Vern Smith to the general convention of the I.W.W. (1924) on the status of newspapers, questions on the revolutionary nature of the I.W.W., the question of pacifism, an appeal for workers to go to California, the question of boycotts, and injuring the California capitalists by withdrawing buying power in limited localities; report on change of editors of Industrial Solidarity (the weekly official organ of the I.W.W.); list of Council members appointed by people's commissars, and officials of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR (1935); charges brought against Vern Smith for deliberately violating the policy of the I.W.W. by printing "undesirable articles" in The Industrial Pioneer; copy of the organization program for the I.W.W.; report (1924) to the general convention of the I.W.W. by the business manager of Industrial Solidarity and The Industrial Pioneer; report of the Ballot Committee (1925); and Gordon Cascaden's communication to the I.W.W. General Convention (1925).

Also includes a statement of I.W.W. principles; affidavit of two miners (members of the United Mine Workers and the National Miners Union) (1931) before the State of New York; typed mss. by Smith, "The Worker's Prospects in the USSR (1934), and "Beginnings of Revolutionary Political Action in USA"; typed ms. "The I.W.W. Since the World War" (n.d.); La Vie Ouvrière (23 July 1926); and "The Situation of the I.W.W." (extracted from a report of Earl Browder to the executives of R.I.L.U.; copy of facts and statistics extracted from various sources regarding farm products prices to farmers and on the market (1929); and a copy of the introduction to the minutes of the 1899 International Workingmen's Congress, by Wilhelm Liebknecht.

Also loose sheets (copies) from typed mss. of outline on years 1928-1931, the "third period", with reference to unification of the Communist Party and its growing influence, the Agricultural Workers Industrial League, criminal syndicalism prosecution in California, the Illinois General Strike (1929), the National Textile Workers' Union, the New Bedford Strike (1928), the Gastonia Strike (1929), imperialism, war danger, terrorism and suppression of the militant press. Also scrapbook regarding the I.W.W. and clippings from The Daily Worker (1924-1925).