About the PCPA Oral History Project

A Collaboration between the Labor Archives of Washington University of Washington Libraries and the ILWU Pacific Coast Pensioners Association

The Pacific Coast Pensioners Association Oral History Committee (PCPA) has been collecting oral history interviews with PCPA members, officers, and convention visitors since 2013. Oral historian Harvey Schwartz, historian Ron Magden, and labor archivist and oral history project manager Conor Casey conducted interviews at the PCPA annual conventions.

Thanks to generous funding from the PCPA and the Friends of the Labor Archives of Washington, all 46 interviews were fully processed, transcribed, captioned, and are made available online via this web portal highlighting these treasures of labor history. These interviews provide a unique perspective on the history of the PCPA and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) and document the lives and experiences of working people on the Pacific Coast.

What you can learn from these oral history interviews:

• How the PCPA has impacted pensioners
• The role of the ILWU and PCPA in labor struggles on the West Coast and internationally
• The experiences of working as a longshore worker, warehouse worker, or other ILWU member
• The lives of retirees and their families