The Lock-Out in the Cloak and Suit Industry, 1916

The Research Department records reflect the department's varied functions, documenting its role in gathering and analyzing information for international and local union leadership, representing the union before government and labor organizations, and gathering materials of research, and oftentimes historical, value. Some segments of the records focus on one aspect of the department's work, and others include documentation across the department's functions.



Research Department director Lazare Teper's papers, for example, include files relating to the Wage Stabilization Board (5780/105). The department also maintained records focused on the National Coat and Suit Industry Board (statements of receipts and disbursements, label division reports, meetings minutes, bulletins to members, and other reports and resolutions), as well as some related legal files (5780/123). Also among the documents collected by the Research Department are the New York Coat and Suit Industry Reports between 1934 and 1960. (5780/168)



Parts of the Research Department records consist primarily of collected documents from ILGWU affiliates. In this way, they resemble and, in some instances, complement the parts of the Archives Department Records (5780/121, 5780/121 PUBS), records generated by local unions (Series III), and the general collection of ILGWU publications (5780 PUBS). Research Department records of this kind contain records of predecessor unions to the ILGWU and ILGWU local union records (5780/045), or the annual report, "Conditions in the Women's Clothing Industry" (5780/078).



Other parts of the Research Department records document all of the department's functions. These records include financial and administrative reports, meeting minutes, and correspondence (5780/056, 5780/209), collected printed material (5780/168), and ILGWU statements on issues related to the garment industry (5780/209).



The files of this collection contain books, journals, reports, pamphlets, advertisements, and correspondence of the Research Department of the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union. Also included are correspondence of Lazare Teper, organizational material from local unions all over the United States, reports and writings by Research Department staff (including analyses of strikes between 1940 and 1945), files on the Cone Mills and S. Lichtenberg campaigns, as well as documents collected by the department. Among the documents collected by the Research Department are the New York Coat and Suit Industry Reports between 1934 and 1960.