United Furniture Workers of America

The United Furniture Workers of America (UFWA) was an American labor union, originally founded as a breakaway from the Upholsterers International Union of North America by a group of labor activists which included Emil Costello (a Wisconsin state legislator and president of the UIU local at Simmons Bedding Company's original factory in Kenosha, Wisconsin) in 1937. It advocated industrial unionism, and affiliated with the Congress of Industrial Organizations.

Facing declining membership, even after President Carl Scarbrough moved the union's headquarters from New York City pursuing a policy of aggressively organizing in the Southern United States (where most furniture jobs had gone), in cooperation with other unions such as their former rivals the Upholsterers and the International Woodworkers of America.,^[1] the UFWA eventually merged with the International Union of Electronic, Electrical, Technical, Salaried and Machine Workers (IUE) in 1987 to form the International Union of Electronic, Electrical, Technical, Salaried, Machine and Furniture Workers.^[2]

References

1. "Unions Map Big Drive in South" Milwaukee Journal December 20, 1977; Accent section, p. 9, col. 6
2. Scheinman, Sarah, ed. by Peter T. Alter and Rachel Juris, 2011 "Historical note" in United Furniture Workers of America records of Midwest districts and Chicago Local 18-B, 1936-1981 (bulk 1950-1970):Descriptive Inventory for the Collection at Chicago History Museum, Research Center Chicago History Museum, Research Center, 2011