Brotherhood welcomes Leta Miller, PhD, Professor of Music Emerita at UC Santa Cruz (and a longtime member of TBE), for a presentation based on her new book, Union Divided: Black Musicians' Fight for Labor Equality, an in-depth account of the segregation within the American Federation of Musicians. For most of the twentieth century the AFM maintained separate locals for Blacks and whites, which operated in overlapping territories. The Black locals arose not from any policy of the AFM, but rather at the express request of Black musicians themselves, who thought they could reap significant benefits from monoethnic locals of their own. When the AFM tried to merge the dual locals in the 1960s and 70s, the Black musicians strongly resisted. The AFM was thus placed in a no-win situation: either support its Black members and continue segregation or go against their wishes and force mergers. Prof. Miller will explore this complex labor situation (which even included a Black v. white lawsuit in San Francisco in 1934) in a talk illustrated by numerous informative slides.

Beginning at 10 am, we'll host our always delicious lox and bagel brunch, take care of a little Brotherhood business, followed by Dr. Miller’s presentation starting at 11:00, with a Q&A session concluding around noon.  Charge is $5 for Brotherhood members and $10 for non-members.  All TBE welcome!