Oral history with Mr. Claude Ramsay, president, Mississippi AFL-CIO - Page 1 |
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Oral history with Mr. Claude Ramsay, president: Mississippi AFL- CIO
This oral history is provided through a cooperative project of University of Southern Mississippi Libraries and USM's Center for Oral History and Cultural Heritage.
Funding provided by a National Leadership Grant for Libraries from the Institute for Museum and Library Services
The transcript is presented here for reference purposes only. Interviews in this collection are protected by copyright. PERMISSION TO PUBLISH MUST BE REQUESTED from the Center for Oral History and Cultural Heritage. Please call ( 601) 266- 4574 for more information.
Biography
Claude Ramsay was born in Ocean Springs, Mississippi, in 1916, but within a year or two moved with his family to the small community of Fort Bayou. An impression of the rural environment in which he grew up can be gained from Mr. Ramsay's recollection that at about the age of two or three " because he ( Claude's father) was going to start farming, he drove in a team of mules and a wagon this day and I was the happiest kid you had ever seen." He helped his father build the family home, and then on one occasion he lived with a relative who needed some help and " I milked the cows for him and stayed with him for about a year."
Mr. Ramsay recalls that " I wanted to go to college but my folks had lost all of their money during the crash," so he got a job milking the cows and doing other chores at Perkinston Junior College to pay his tuition and costs. After one year he had a disagreement with the head of the department of agriculture and left the job as well as school.
Mr. Ramsay served briefly in the Civilian Conservation Corps camps during the late 1930' s and then persisted until he got a job with the big International Paper Company plant in Pascagoula. He progressed rapidly because of the fact that many fellow workers were being called away to military service in the mobilization for World War Two. Mr. Ramsay was married and a father and thus was not in the earlier military call- ups. However, he was inducted in mid- 1942 and served until 1946. He was trained as a military policeman and eventually assigned to duty in Europe during the great Battle of the Bulge.
Mr. Ramsay returned to his job with the International Paper Company after demobilization, but he also was interested in the union movement and the collective bargaining process. He also had been sensitive to his mother's teachings of a humanitarian nature, and had been impressed by racist activities of some of the men in uniform, so that upon return to Mississippi he felt strongly that "[ black people] are entitled to the same rights as everyone else." Thus, in his mind and influencing his actions in future years, was a realization of the need to develop a strong labor union movement in Mississippi which itself would be impossible until the minorities, especially black people, had gained their civil rights.
Mr. Ramsay became active in the union movement, at first carrying on his job with International Paper and doing the local union work. Eventually, after being elected president of the Mississippi AFL- CIO and
mus- coh. ramsayc. doc Page 1 of 195
Object Description
| Title | Oral history with Mr. Claude Ramsay, president, Mississippi AFL-CIO |
| Description | Oral history.; Three interviews conducted on April 28, 30 and May 7, 1981 with Mr. Claude Ramsay at his office in Jackson, Mississippi. Ramsay was born in 1916 in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. He served briefly in the Civilian Conservation Corps camps during the late 1930s until he got a job with the big International Paper Company plant in Pascagoula. Ramsay was called to service in World War II from 1942 to 1946. After the war, Ramsay returned to his job at the paper plant and began his work in the union movement and the collective bargaining process. He felt that the racial discrimination experienced by African Americans in Mississippi was unfair and believed that a strong labor union movement would be impossible until minorities had gained their civil rights. Ramsay was elected president of the Mississippi AFL-CIO in 1959. |
| Date of interview | 28 April 1981 (first interview); 30 April 1981 (2nd interview); 7 May 1981 (3rd interview) |
| Interviewer | Caudill, Orley B. |
| Coverage (time period) | 1916-1981 (primarily 1960s) |
| Resource type | Text |
| Format | Digital reproduction of a 195-page document. |
| Language | English |
| Publisher |
University of Southern Mississippi. Center for Oral History and Cultural Heritage. University of Southern Mississippi Libraries. (electronic version) |
| Contributors | Electronic version made available through a National Leadership Grant for Libraries from the Institute for Museum and Library Services. |
| Notes | This item is part of the Civil Rights in Mississippi Digital Archive. |
| Rights | Copyright protected. Use of materials from this collection beyond the exceptions provided for in the Fair Use and Educational Use clauses of the U.S. Copyright Law may violate federal law. Permission to publish or reproduce is required. |
| Contributing institution | Mississippi Oral History Program of the University of Southern Mississippi. |
| Digital repository | University of Southern Mississippi Digital Collections. |
| Digital collection | Oral History. |
| File size | 1199.366 KB |
| File extension | |
| Identifier | mus-coh.ramsayc |
| File name | mus-coh.ramsayc.pdf |
