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Daniel Nilva Photograph Collection

 Collection
Identifier: 5969 P

Dates

  • 1936-1962

Language of Materials

Collection material in English

Conditions Governing Access

Access to the collections in the Kheel Center is restricted. Please contact a reference archivist for access to these materials.

Conditions Governing Use

This collection must be used in keeping with the Kheel Center Information Sheet and Procedures for Document Use.

Biographical / Historical

Daniel Nilva was born to Russian Jewish immigrant parents, in New York City on March 7, 1914.

Nilva attended Cooper Union in the 1930's, though he never graduated he met some lifelong friends, Bernard Seaman, a labor cartoonist, Morris Stone, later an official with the American Arbitration Association, and Dr. Valentine Gregory Burtan, a heart specialist who had been imprisoned on a conterfeiting charge.

In 1933 he started working as a photographer for the Education Department of Local 22, Dressmakers, of the International Ladies' Garment Workers Union. He also was a photographer for the ILGWU newspaper 'Justice'. He did some freelance work for the Bookkeepers Stenographers and Accountants Union's newspaper, 'The Ledger'.

His job with Local 22 only lasted 4 years. By the 1950's, after having trouble finding the right position, he was working as a freelance photographer in New York City, many of his clients were labor unions and progressive organizations.

Nilva's health took a turn in the 1960's when he suffered a heart attack, so he had to cut back on the amount of work he could do.

Daniel Nilva passed away September 15, 1984 as a result of another heart attack.

Extent

1.25 cubic feet

Related Materials

Related Collections: Guide to the Daniel Nilva Photographs at the Tamiment Library and Robert F Wagner Labor Archive

Quantity:

1.2 linear ft.

Forms of Material:

Black-and-white negatives.

General

Contact Information:
Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation and Archives Martin P. Catherwood Library 227 Ives Hall Cornell University Ithaca, NY 14853 (607) 255-3183> kheel_center@cornell.edu http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/library/kheel-center
Compiled by:
Kheel Staff, January 24, 2013
EAD encoding:
Randall Miles, February 10, 2016
Title
Nilva, Daniel Photograph Collection
Status
Completed
Author
Compiled by Kheel Staff
Date
February 10, 2016
Language of description
Undetermined
Script of description
Code for undetermined script

Revision Statements

  • 02/23/2024: This resource was modified by the ArchivesSpace Preprocessor developed by the Harvard Library (https://github.com/harvard-library/archivesspace-preprocessor)

Repository Details

Part of the Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation & Archives Repository

Contact:
227 Ives Hall
Ithaca NY 14853