Back in December, Melville House inaugurated its “Live Book” project, a series of reports by Washington Post staff writer Kari Lydersen about workers at Chicago’s shuttered Republic Windows and Doors factory. The workers occupied the factory and refused to leave until paid for accrued vacation time and two months of federally-mandated severance. The series culminated with the publication of Revolt on Goose Island: The Chicago Factory Takeover, And What it Says About the Economic Crisis, just out and available here.

As it turns out, workers in Rhode Island were listening to the Republic story, as Lydersen makes clear in the following excerpt from Revolt on Goose Island. After the Colibri Group—which manufactures high-end lighters, pens and cigar-cutters—unexpectedly shuttered a factory outside of Providence in mid-January, some of the 250 workers laid-off there decided to fight for exactly what Republic workers had fought for. This excerpt also appears in the magazine In These Times.

A special note to Chicagoans: Please join us for a panel discussion and launch party for Revolt on Goose Island on Thursday, June 23rd, at the STOP SMILING storefront in Chicago. For more info, click here.

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The Colibri Group was formed in 1928 to make mechanical cigarette lighters—a novel invention at the time. The company became a leading manufacturer of high-end lighters, pens, cigar-cutters, cuff links, and other accessories engraved and encrusted with gems. Until recently, its headquarters and two factories in Rhode Island employed a diverse, largely immigrant workforce who spoke at least six languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, Hmong, Chinese, and Haitian Creole.

But gem-encrusted pens and $100 lighters are the kinds of luxuries most people cut down on during rough times, so it is no surprise that the economic crisis hit Colibri hard. The company suffered several waves of layoffs over the past year. On December 22, 2008, 52-year-old Alda Bonin and a number of other workers were laid off. “Merry Christmas,” she told her manager. She didn’t mean it sarcastically, but the ill-timed move couldn’t be ignored.

Bonin is a skilled jewelry mold-maker and kept her own tools at the factory, so she told the manager she needed to collect them. “Don’t worry about it,” she was told. “The layoff is only temporary, you’ll get your job back in early February.” Just two years earlier, Bonin had been laid off from another flailing jewelry company, so she was skeptical. She lives about a mile from the factory, and on January 15, when she happened to see her former co-workers walking by in tears, she feared the worst.

She quickly got on the phone and learned that her former colleagues had arrived at work to see a sign saying the plant was permanently closed. CEO Jim Fleet had sent an e-mail the previous night, but since many workers didn’t have internet connections at home, they had showed up in the morning none the wiser. About 280 workers had lost their jobs, in addition to the previous layoffs. Continue Reading »

In her final report for her ongoing Melville House “Live Book” project — now she’s off to finalize the book, which should appear in June — Kari Lydersen reports the story may have a shocking ending ….

Chicago, February 19, 2009 — The saga of the Republic Windows workers may be coming to a close next week; or perhaps a better description would be the close of one chapter and the beginning of another. Next week a bankruptcy judge is likely to rule on whether to approve the sale of the company to Serious Materials, a Bay Area, California-based green building components company, hence keeping the factory open and giving the workers their union jobs back. Continue Reading »

Kari Lydersen reports the end of the story may be near, while the Resistance & Recovery tour finds growing support, in today’s installment of her ongoing Melville House “Live Book” project ….

Chicago, February 17, 2009 — UE Local 1110 has reportedly reached a tentative labor agreement with Serious Materials, the California green building component company which wants to buy the factory and transition it to a major Midwestern supplier of their popular energy efficient windows. The CEO found out about the Republic Windows struggle through media coverage and has vowed that if he is allowed to buy the plant he will try to rehire all workers who want their jobs back and will work with the union. The sale still must be approved by a bankruptcy court and Bank of America, the primary secured creditor. Continue Reading »

In the latest installment of her ongoing Melville House “Live Book” project, Kari Lydersen takes another look at the WARN Act — the Federal law that supposed to protect workers like those at the Republic Windows & Doors factory, and that was so central to their case ….

Chicago, January 13, 2009 — Chicago attorney Jorge Sanchez has represented workers in a number of WARN Act cases, so he knows what he’s talking about when he says the Republic Windows workers are lucky they did not have to go into litigation to get the money due them under the federal law, which mandates companies above a certain size give 60 days notice or 60 days severance pay when closing or making mass lay-offs. Continue Reading »

in the latest installment of her ongoing Melville House “Live Book” project, Kari Lydersen talks to a journalist activist about how the local community organnized in support of the striekrs at the Republic Windows & Doors factory workers, and what the overall implications of the strike might be …

Jerry Mead-Lucero

Chicago, February 12, 2009 — After 15 years as an activist and journalist in the labor movement, Chicagoan Jerry Mead-Lucero is fairly jaded. He is dedicated to and passionate about the power of organized labor, but he feels unions have become mired in bureaucracy, unwisely committed to cooperating with management and too timid or comfortable to pick a fight.

He has long admired UE for bucking these trends, and for continuing to see the value of organizing manufacturing workers which made up the traditional heart of American unionism even while other major unions have shifted their focus to service industries and other sectors.

“A lot of unions think manufacturing is dead in the U.S., but the reality is there are still a lot of small workplaces doing light manufacturing, and the UE takes those places seriously,” said Mead-Lucero, who does a weekly radio show called Labor Express. Continue Reading »

Kari Lydersen checks in on the situation in Cleveland, where anoter UE local finds inspiration in the direct action of the Republic Windows & Doors factory workers, in today’s installment of her ongoing Melville House “Live Book” project …

Chicago, february 10, 2009 — On Wednesday the Republic Windows workers will visit one of UE’s flagship worksites: Local 506 at the General Electric locomotive factory in Erie, Pa., which won UE recognition in 1940.

A campaign at the plant had started in 1937, just after the UE’s founding in 1936. (Two other area GE factories were also organized by the UE in the 1930s). The ensuing years of gaining members and support at the Erie factory were surrounded in the anti-Communist rhetoric that was sweeping the country and especially aimed at the UE. Continue Reading »

In today’s installment of her ongoing Melville House “Live Book” project, Kari Lydersen checks in on the situation in Cleveland, where a group of workers from the Republic Windows & Doors factory is visiting tonight …

Cleveland, January 10, 2009 — When the Republic Windows workers roll into the Teamsters hall in Cleveland Tuesday evening, they will be greeted by a crowd of local workers with much in common. Cleveland has been hurt by factory closings and overall job losses in the past year, and more are expected. But it is a city with a proud blue collar history and about double the national current level of unionization (14 percent compared to seven percent), so there will be much enthusiasm for the UE’s strategy and victory. Cleveland is also home to the headquarters of KeyCorp (parent of KeyBank), which is in financial distress and got $2.5 billion in TARP bailout money. (As Bank of America did with Merrill Lynch, KeyCorp is using the money to help acquire other institutions). Continue Reading »

In today’s installment of her ongoing Melville House “Live Book” project, Kari Lydersen looks at the situation in other cities being visited by a group of workers from the Republic Windows & Doors factory …

Chicago, February 9, 2009 — A group of Republic Windows workers are halfway through a two-week “Resistance and Recovery” tour of New England, the Rust Belt and parts of the south, where they are sharing their story, gaining support for their bid to keep the factory open and meeting other workers impacted by the many ripples of the economic implosion Continue Reading »

In this backgrounder, Kari Lydersen reports on the original union at the Republic Windows & Doors factory, and how they set the scene for events to come, in today’s installment of her ongoing Melville House “Live Book” project ….

Chicago, 5 January 2009 — As previously reported, the UE came to represent workers at Republic Windows and Doors after a contentious battle to oust the existing union, the Central States Joint Board (CSJB), which they successfully decertified in 2004. Workers had complained how the CSJB had failed to take their side in disputes with the owner and failed to defend them when workers were fired in relation to Social Security “No Match” letters. At a public event at Hull House Museum in Chicago Tuesday night, workers described how they had gone on strike during their tenure with the Central States Joint Board, and how, rather than advocating for them, union officials had tried to persuade them to end the strike and go back to work. One worker described how half the workforce was on strike and the other half was inside working, a poisonous labor situation. Continue Reading »

Suspicious behavior by management  at the Republic Windows & Doors factory tipped off workers long before they were fired, says Kari Lydersen in today’s installment of her ongoing Melville House “Live Book” project ….

In the weeks leading up to the announcement of the plant closure Dec. 2, many workers knew something fishy was up. Tuesday night before a packed room at the museum of Hull House –- the institution that served immigrant workers in hardscrabble Chicago communities a century ago -– Republic Windows workers recounted how they watched their workplace disappearing out from under them, even as management assured them everything was fine and some equipment was just being sold to “increase the credit line.”

UE Local 1110 president Armando Robles and another worker were so suspicious they started staking out the factory parking lot at night, watching computers and other equipment being loaded onto trucks and even following those trucks to the city’s south side, they said. One Monday morning just before the closing announcement, they showed up at work to find a whole production line’s worth of equipment had disappeared over the weekend. Continue Reading »