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Inspiration for movie 'Norma Rae' dies at 68 (AP)
Yahoo News ^ | Mon Sep 14th, 2009 2:14 PM EDT | AP

Posted on 09/14/2009 1:19:43 PM PDT by FourtySeven

RALEIGH, N.C. - Crystal Lee Sutton, whose fight to unionize Southern textile plants with low pay and poor conditions was dramatized in the film "Norma Rae," has died. She was 68.

Sutton died Friday in a hospice after a long battle with brain cancer, her son, Jay Jordan, said Monday.

"She fought it as long as she could and she crossed on over to her new life," he said.

Union organizers had targeted J.P. Stevens, then the country's second-largest textile manufacturer , because the industry was deeply entwined in Southern culture and spread across the region's small towns. However, North Carolina continues to have one of the lowest percentages of unionized workers in the country.

Bruce Raynor, president of Workers United and executive vice president of the Service Employees International Union , worked with Sutton to organize the Stevens plants. In 1974, the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union won the right to represent 3,000 employees at seven Roanoke Rapids plants in northeastern North Carolina .

"Crystal was an amazing symbol of workers standing up in the South against overwhelming odds — and standing up and winning," Raynor said Monday. "The fact that Crystal was a woman in the '70s, leading a struggle of thousands of other textile workers against very powerful, virulently anti-union mill companies, inspired a whole generation of people — of women workers, workers of color and white workers."

...

"She never would have been rich. She would have given it to anyone she called the working class poor, people that were deprived," Jordan said.

Sutton donated her letters and papers to Alamance Community College in 2007. She said: "I didn't want them to go to some fancy university; I wanted them to go to a college that served the ordinary folks."

(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events; US: North Carolina
KEYWORDS: classist; divisivepolitics; dnctalkingpoints; normarae; obituary; textiles; unions; usandthemmentality; workplace
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1 posted on 09/14/2009 1:19:44 PM PDT by FourtySeven
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To: FourtySeven

So her union became part of SEIU. I guess all those manufacturing jobs are gone now. Some victory.


2 posted on 09/14/2009 1:21:28 PM PDT by Frantzie (Lou Dobbs & Glenn Beck- American Heroes! Bill O'Reilly = Liar)
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To: FourtySeven

I bet that really worked out. How many jobs at these plants are left today?


3 posted on 09/14/2009 1:21:30 PM PDT by C19fan
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To: FourtySeven
at seven Roanoke Rapids plants in northeastern North Carolina .

Are the plants still in operation?

4 posted on 09/14/2009 1:22:20 PM PDT by Tribune7 (I am Jim Thompson!)
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To: C19fan

Probably zero but the area is being flooded with illegal aliens. I think the carpet mills in Dalton, GA are filled with illegal aliens now.


5 posted on 09/14/2009 1:22:47 PM PDT by Frantzie (Lou Dobbs & Glenn Beck- American Heroes! Bill O'Reilly = Liar)
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To: FourtySeven
Crystal Lee Sutton, whose fight to unionize Southern textile plants with low pay and poor conditions was dramatized in the film "Norma Rae," has died.

Foreign textile workers are surely grateful that this character hastened the demise of the American textile industry.

6 posted on 09/14/2009 1:23:50 PM PDT by Zhang Fei (Let us pray that peace be now restored to the world and that God will preserve it always)
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To: FourtySeven
Hard to believe that in 1974 we were still making textiles in the US. I wonder what percentage of the textile business is in the US now compared to what it was in 1974. That would be a fun statistic for someone who has access to the data.
7 posted on 09/14/2009 1:23:53 PM PDT by GonzoGOP (There are millions of paranoid people in the world, and they are all out to get me.)
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To: C19fan

“I bet that really worked out. How many jobs at these plants are left today?”

Over the years I worked for three different textile companies that are no more...almost all are gone now.

And the entire time the dems promised, and the unions promised, to save those jobs.


8 posted on 09/14/2009 1:24:25 PM PDT by Moby Grape (Formerly Impeach the Boy...name change necessary after the Marxist won)
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To: FourtySeven

Unions had a place at one time, but the mobility of the public, technology, the modern business climate, overseas outsourcing, and most significantly the politicization of union management have long since eliminated the conditions that allowed businesses to misuse their employees.


9 posted on 09/14/2009 1:24:55 PM PDT by Little Pig (Vi Veri Veniversum Vivus Vici.)
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To: FourtySeven

and the Textile industry in the US died 25 years ago.


10 posted on 09/14/2009 1:25:34 PM PDT by babble-on
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To: Frantzie

The jobs that they can’t outsource are filled with illegals. Welcome to post-America. Viva la Raza.


11 posted on 09/14/2009 1:27:12 PM PDT by Pelham (Obammunism, for that smooth-talking happy -face communist blend.)
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To: FourtySeven

John Edwards said his daddy worked in a meel.


12 posted on 09/14/2009 1:27:56 PM PDT by a fool in paradise (I'm no racist, I oppose the political agenda of Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and Bill Ayers as well.)
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To: Frantzie

Correction: Filled and gone.

Textile industry in North and Central Georgia is a bust. Now they are all in Mexico or Brazil.


13 posted on 09/14/2009 1:28:41 PM PDT by autumnraine (You can't fix stupid, but you can vote it out!)
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To: GonzoGOP

My husband worked in the textile industry until 2004. Started in mid 1970’s.


14 posted on 09/14/2009 1:29:22 PM PDT by autumnraine (You can't fix stupid, but you can vote it out!)
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To: FourtySeven

Some victory. Look at the tags in your clothes and linens. There are virtually no textiles manufactured in the USA now, and the little southern towns have died along with the mills.


15 posted on 09/14/2009 1:30:39 PM PDT by kittymyrib
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To: autumnraine
That's why I wondered how hard it got hit. I know it took a big hit in the 80’s, but all from anecdotal evidence. I've never seen any numbers. IOW did China shut us down, or did we just hold steady and they picked up the growth in the market.
16 posted on 09/14/2009 1:31:50 PM PDT by GonzoGOP (There are millions of paranoid people in the world, and they are all out to get me.)
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To: FourtySeven

She made $2.65/hr in 1973, the equivalent of $12.85/hr today (if you believe the govt numbers) — for folding towels.

http://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm


17 posted on 09/14/2009 1:32:01 PM PDT by PghBaldy (Obama Hijacks 9/11: http://www.serve.gov/assets/documents/09_0828_potus.pdf)
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To: Tribune7

Stevens sold out to Westpoint-Pepperill in 1988. Not sure how many of the Stevens plants are still open.


18 posted on 09/14/2009 1:33:35 PM PDT by texmexis best
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To: C19fan

Those plants were killed off by globalization. It’s labor intensive work and low wage countries have an advantage. The Multi Fiber Agreement, GATT, and the WTO all played a part.


19 posted on 09/14/2009 1:34:03 PM PDT by Pelham (Obammunism, for that smooth-talking happy -face communist blend.)
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To: FourtySeven

Yep great victory!! The industry is gone and American textiles were once upon a time the standard of the earth.


20 posted on 09/14/2009 1:34:24 PM PDT by Cheetahcat (Zero the Wright kind of Racist! We are in a state of War with Democrats)
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