Tamiment Library Research & Tools

The Tamiment Library holds rich collections relating to:

• labor and social history,
• the history of the Left,
• the place of workers in American society, and
• the evolution of labor law

It also holds significant collections relating to women's history, immigrant history, and other topics.   

Tamiment preserves the history of working-class New York City:

• its neighborhood associations,
• fraternal and ethnic societies,
• political organizations, and
• the unions that shaped the social and economic structure of the city

The Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives is the designated repository for the records of the New York City Central Labor Council, its member unions and affiliated organizations. 

To help you get started with your research, we have listed below some of the archival collections in the Tamiment Library that are related to labor unions.

The list is arranged by broad subject area -- Building Trades, Communications, Entertainment, Labor Coalitions & Organizations, Public Employees, Retail & Service, and Transportation -- and will help you identify some of the organizations represented in the library's collections. Clicking on the link associated with each collection title will open the finding aid in a new tab. Please note that this list is not exhaustive; it is meant to get you started thinking about the collections we have in the library. 

See Searching and Browsing tips in the box on the left to find collections in the Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives.

Carefully researched interviews with labor leaders, rank-and-file workers, and political activists are an important part of the Tamiment collections.

Core Oral History Collections:

• Paul Buhle's Oral History of the American Left 
• Debra Bernhardt's New Yorkers at Work 

The collections also include:

• audiotapes of speeches,
• concerts,
• conferences,
• memorial meetings,
• union meetings and
• other public and private events,
• as well as commercial recordings

Transcripts or summaries are available for many oral history interviews. Donor restrictions govern the use of some interviews. Please reach out out to NYU Special Collections at special.collections@nyu.edu for more information about requesting access to oral histories.

Some oral history interviews are available online:

Through our Digital Tamiment site.  Listen to interviews on your own time and check back often for new audio and video files.

The Tamiment Library holds approximately 10,000 reels of microfilm and includes a significant number of labor union-related collections. 

Highlights include:

• American Labor Unions' Constitutions and Proceedings (Film R-7020)
• American Federation of Labor Records: The Samuel Gompers Era (Film R-7075)
• Jewish Labor Committee Records (Film R-7015, for full list of contents see Jewish Labor Committee Records, Part I (WAG.025.001) and Jewish Labor Committee Records, Part II (WAG.025.002), as well as Jewish Labor Committee Records, Part III (WAG.025.003) which is not microfilmed)
• Labor Union Minutes on Microfilm (contact NYU Special Collections at special.collections@nyu.edu for list)
• Max Schactman Papers (Film R-7203, for full list of contents see Max Shachtman Papers (TAM.103))
• Women's Bureau of the U.S. Dept. of Labor Records, 1918-1965 (Film R-7103)
• Women's Trade Union League and its Principal Leaders (Film R-7099)

The sources listed below provide a great deal of information on trade union periodicals. In many you can look up the name of a union and see what journals it published. 

• The American Labor Press: An Annotated Directory. Washington, D.C.: American Council on Public Affairs, 1940. Compiled at the University of Wisconsin as a WPA project, this directory lists 676 periodicals, including 30 from Canada. 
• American Labor Union Periodicals: A Guide to Their Location / Naas, Bernard G. and Carmelita J. Sakr. Ithaca: Cornell University, 1956. Begun under the sponsorship of the Committee of University Industrial Relations Librarians, this acts as a union serial list with entries for over 1,700 periodicals. 
• Annotations: A Guide to the Independent Critical Press. 3rd ed.  updated ed. / Marie F. Jones. Baltimore: Alternative Press Center; San Francisco: Independent Press Association, c2004. Documents and describes titles that were either indexed in the Alternative Press Index and/or members of the Independent Press Association as of Fall 1998. 
• The Immigrant Labor Press in North America, 1840s-1970s: An Annotated Bibliography / Dirk Hoerder. New York: Greenwood Press, c1987-. The Labor and Newspaper Preservation Project, based at the University of Bremen in Germany, has compiled an impressive guide to an important historical source. Covers Canada and the United States but excludes the publications of French-Canadian, Chicano, and Puerto Rican residents. It also omits those from South America, Asia, and Africa due to the "refusal" of any North American foundation to participate in the project. 
• Labor Papers on Microfilm; A Combined List. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1965. A list of labor papers published in the United States available on microfilm and is meant to complement Naas' American Labor Union Periodicals, a Guide to their Location (see above). 
• Trade Union Publications: The Official Journals, Convention Proceedings, and Constitutions of International Unions and Federations, 1850-1941 / Reynolds, Lloyd George and Charles C. Killingsworth. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1944-45. 3 volumes subject index to journals and convention proceedings of fifty international union and federations.