Jerome Wurf

Jerome "Jerry" Wurf
Born	18 May 1919(1919-05-18) New York City, New York, U.S.
Died	10 December 1981(1981-12-10) (aged 62) Washington, District of Columbia, U.S.
Occupation	Union leader
Spouse	Sylvia (Spinrad) Wurf (divorced) Mildred (Kiefer) Wurf
Children	Two daughters, one son
Parents	Sigmund and Lena (Tannenbaum) Wurf

Jerome (Jerry) Wurf (May 18, 1919 – December 10, 1981) was a U.S. labor leader and president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) from 1964 to 1981.

Wurf was born in New York City in 1919. The son of immigrants (his father was a tailor and textile worker) from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, he developed polio at the age of four.

Wurf began a career in the American labor movement as a hotel worker organizer in New York City. He went to work for AFSCME in 1947, then rose through the ranks of New York City's District Council 37 to become its president. In 1958, Wurf wrung from mayor Robert F. Wagner, Jr. an executive order giving the city's workers the right to form unions, and providing for elections which could establish these unions as exclusive bargaining agents for the workers in various city agencies. District Council 37 won many of the ensuing elections, making it into one of the large public employee local unions in the world.^[1]

Wurf was extremely active in the American civil rights movement. He helped establish the first New York state chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) in the late 1940s. He was a close associate of Martin Luther King, Jr., and King was attending an AFSCME sanitation strike when he was assassinated in 1968. "Let us never forget that Martin Luther King, on a mission for us, was killed in this city. He helped bring us this victory," Wurf later said.^[2]

Wurf became president of AFSCME in 1964 as the head of a group of "Young Turks" committed to changing the organization into an effective union.^[1] He unseated incumbent president Arnold Zander by just 21 votes, becoming the first challenger to defeat a president of a major AFL-CIO international union since Walter Reuther had done so in 1946.^[1] Through energetic organizing and aggressive bargaining, AFSCME grew rapidly under his leadership from about 220,000 members to just over one million in 1981.^[3]

Wurf died of a heart attack at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, D.C. on December 10, 1981.^[3]

Gerald McEntee succeeded him as president of AFSCME.

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} Billings, Richard N. and Greenya, John. Power to the Public Worker. Washington, D.C.: Robert B. Luce, Inc., 1974. ISBN 0883310678
2. ^ Joseph C. Goulden, Jerry Wurf: Labor's Last Angry Man. New York: Atheneum, 1982, p. 56.
3. ^ ^{a b} Robert D. McFadden, "Jerry Wurf, Leader of Federation of Municipal Workers, Dies at 62," New York Times, December 11, 1981.

External links

• Jerry Wurf, 1919-1981: A Short Biography
• Jerry & Mildred Keifer Wurf Collection, 1936-1982. Walter P. Reuther Library of Labor and Urban Affairs. Wayne State University.

Preceded by Arnold Zander

President of American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees 1964-1981

Succeeded by Gerald McEntee

Persondata
Name	Wurf, Jerome
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	May 18, 1919
Place of birth	New York City, New York, U.S.
Date of death	December 10, 1981
Place of death	Washington, District of Columbia, U.S.