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DESCRIPTION:ILWU Local 10 Pays Tribute to Howard Keylor, Longshore Veteran of Bay Area 
 Labor StrugglesLocal 10 of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union 
 in San Francisco is holding a public event to honor Howard Keylor. A 
 veteran of the Battle of Okinawa, Howard opposed the atomic bombing of 
 Japan, an experience that led him to become anti-militarist, anti-racist 
 and anti-imperialist. He quit college to support Filipino farm workers in 
 the 1948 asparagus strike and became a labor activist during the McCarthy 
 period, joining the longshore union in Stockton in 1953.During his decades 
 on the waterfront, he initiated, organized and participated in many picket 
 lines and demonstrations, including the longshore strike of 1971-1972, the 
 ILWU’s 1974 KNC Warehouse strike of Mexican American workers in Union 
 City, the historic 11-day 1984 boycott of South African cargo to protest 
 Apartheid in 1984, the 1999 coastwide shutdown and march of 25,000 in San 
 Francisco to demand freedom for Mumia Abu-Jamal, the United States’ most 
 prominent political prisoner, the May Day 2008 anti-imperialist war 
 shutdown of all West Coast ports, the blockades of Israeli ships to protest 
 the war on Gaza, the 2011 ILWU struggle against the grain monopolies in 
 Longview, Occupy Oakland’s march of 40,000 to the port, Local 10’s 
 actions against racist police murders and fascist terror last year, and 
 countless other militant job actions and protests.Howard Keylor is a 
 veteran of the militant labor history of the Bay Area. Like the core 
 founders of the ILWU, he seeks to replace capitalism with socialism, a 
 commitment which he has maintained all his life. He continues to approach 
 every issue from this perspective.PLEASE JOIN ILWU LOCAL 10 IN HONORING 
 HOWARD ON HIS 93RD BIRTHDAY:Sunday, December 9th 2018, 2 - 4pmILWU Local 
 10, Henry Schmidt Room400 North Point St, San Francisco (near Fisherman’s 
 Wharf)A Brief Biography of Brother Howard KeylorAn army veteran of the 
 Pacific Theater in World War Two, Brother Keylor became a longshore worker 
 in Stockton in 1953 and later transferred to the San Francisco local. In 
 1971 he, along with Brothers Herb Mills and Leo Robinson, and a majority of 
 the Local 10 membership opposed the proposed 1971 contract which codified 
 the 9.43 steadyman system. This led to the longshore strike of 1971-1972, 
 which shut down 56 West Coast ports and lasted 130 days. It was the longest 
 strike in the ILWU’s history.Like the founders of the ILWU, Brother 
 Keylor seeks to replace capitalism with socialism, a commitment he has 
 maintained all his life. He continues to approach every issue from this 
 perspective. He served on the Local 10 Executive Board and was frequently 
 an elected Caucus and Convention delegate. Brother Keylor was a member of 
 the Militant Caucus, a class struggle rank-and-file ILWU group which 
 published a regular newsletter, the “Longshore Militant”. He later 
 split from the Militant Caucus and published a separate newsletter on his 
 own, the “Militant Longshoreman”. Both called for breaking with the 
 Democratic and Republican Parties, and building a Worker’s Party to Fight 
 for a Worker’s Government. Brother Keylor has always worked to extend 
 Local 10’s solidarity to other unions and locals. In 1974, he supported 
 the ILWU Local 6 strike at KNC Glass in Union City in which a mass picket 
 line defeated the police and scabs, resulting in a contract for a workforce 
 composed primarily of Mexican-American immigrants. Keylor advocates 
 deliberate defiance of the “slave-labor” Taft-Hartley law through 
 illegal secondary boycotts and pickets by workers.He worked tirelessly to 
 uphold the ILWU’s proud tradition of militant unionism by participating 
 in protests and boycotts of military cargo bound for the military 
 dictatorship in Chile in 1975 and 1978 and again in 1980 to the military 
 dictatorship in El Salvador.In 1984, Brother Keylor made the motion, 
 amended by Brother Leo Robinson, which led to the eleven-day longshore 
 boycott of South African cargo on the Nedlloyd Kimberley; and in 1986 he 
 supported the Campaign Against Apartheid’s community picket line against 
 the Nedlloyd Kemba. When Nelson Mandela spoke at the Oakland Coliseum in 
 1990 after his release from prison, he credited Local 10’s actions with 
 re-igniting the anti-Apartheid movement here.He also supported the 1974 and 
 2010 ILWU Boron miners’ strikes and the 1987 Inlandboatmen’s Union 
 strike shutting down the Bay Area ports and mobilizing boatmen and 
 longshoremen to march onto the Redwood City docks to drive out the scabs 
 from other unions.Even after he retired from active longshore work in 1988, 
 Brother Keylor continued his activism on behalf of the working class and 
 the oppressed. In 1999, he helped organize the coastwide shutdown in 
 defense of Mumia Abu-Jamal, the United States’ foremost political 
 prisoner. ILWU Local 10 workers and the drill team led 25,000 people on a 
 march through the streets of San Francisco. Later in the year he marched 
 with the Local 10 contingent in the Battle of Seattle, the mass protests 
 against the World Trade Organization (WTO).Throughout his life, Brother 
 Keylor extended solidarity where it was needed, including taking action 
 against racist police murders and fascist terror, defending abortion 
 clinics, and supporting survivors of psychiatric abuse. He witnessed 
 psychiatric torture while working at the notorious Stockton State Hospital 
 in 1949-51. He also witnessed members of his family become victims of 
 electroshock and forced drugging. Having grown up in Appalachia, he has 
 always been an environmentalist, and in recent years helped shut down a 
 Monsanto facility in Davis in 2012, as well as fighting pesticide use and 
 deforestation in the East Bay.Brother Keylor used his experience and 
 insights to help organize picketing and marches during the PMA lockout in 
 2002; and in 2010 and 2014, to protest Israel’s massacre of Palestinians 
 in Gaza, he used his experience to help organize successful pickets against 
 Israeli ZIM Lines container ships.In 2015, as he was approaching 90, he 
 took part in Local 10’s protest at the APL terminal and later in downtown 
 Oakland to protest racist police killings; and in August 2017 he supported 
 Local 10’s anti-fascist action in San Francisco. The following day he 
 participated in the anti-fascist demonstration in Berkeley. Brother Keylor 
 had done this before: in 1980, the Militant Caucus called for a mass 
 mobilization to stop the American Nazi Party from holding a rally at San 
 Francisco Civic Center. Like Local 10’s call in 2017, the mobilization in 
 1980 succeeded in stopping the fascists.In light of his contributions to 
 the international labor movement, Local 10 voted the following resolution 
 to honor Brother Keylor for his years of service to the working class and 
 the oppressed:"Therefore it is fitting for Local 10 to honor our oldest 
 living veteran of these ILWU struggles, Howard Keylor (#20447), with a 
 plaque and an event on his 93rd birthday in December in the Henry Schmidt 
 room honoring his contributions to the workers movement in the best 
 tradition of the ILWU."  \n 
 https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2018/11/30/18819491.php
SUMMARY:ILWU Local 10 Tribute to Howard Keylor, Longshore Veteran of Bay Area Labor Struggles
LOCATION:ILWU Local 10, Henry Schmidt Room, 400 North Point St, San Francisco (near 
 Fisherman’s Wharf)
URL:https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2018/11/30/18819491.php
DTSTART:20181209T220000Z
DTEND:20181210T000000Z
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