THB Sidebar: The Longest Strike... FIGHT!

I ran into this on Wikipedia and thought I pulled this clipping… but do feel free to read it all.

The Conference of Studio Unions was then an international union, led by the United Painters organizer Herbert Sorrell. It represented the Carpenters, United Painters 644, Screen Cartoonists Guild, Electricians [IBEW 40], Laborers, Set Decorators Guild, and several other crafts working for the studios in Hollywood.

An estimated 10,500 CSU workers went on strike in March 1945 and began picketing all the studios resulting in delays of several films. Unfortunately for CSU, the studios had some 130 films on the shelves and so comfortably sat out a strike for the time being. Regardless, Disney, Monogram, and several independents bargained with CSU, but Columbia, Fox, MGM, Paramount, RKO, Universal, and Warner did not.

Despite orders from their leadership and threats of fines and revocation of their cards, many members of IATSE refused to cross the picket lines or to do work that was normally fill…