Research Catalog

Details

Description

1. 2.3 lin. ft.

Summary

1. The collection consists primarily of printed material gathered by Stephanie Black in researching the sugar industry in the United States and its treatment of workers who harvest the crop. Included are FBI files related to investigations of the United States Sugar Corporation, 1940s peonage petitions filed by the Workers Defense League on behalf of the African-American workers and copies of the contractual agreements and documentation of the violations and abuses of the individuals contracted to work in the program. African-American male agricultural workers provided inexpensive and sometimes, free labor to the sugar industry until the peonage scandal broke in the 1930s. There is also documentation of the AFL-CIO's legal actions against the sugar corporations, opposing their usage of immigrants for the available jobs and the treatment of those hired to harvest the sugar cane. The newspaper clippings from the 1940s through the 1990s present a view of the media's coverage of the U.S. sugar industry, along with national, regional, and Caribbean public and political positions on the "H-2" guest-worker visa program. Also included are some of Stephanie Black's notes, transcripts of radio and television interviews, and copies of legal briefs (1942-1946) prepared by the Farmworkers Justice Fund.

Subject

1. Black, Stephanie
2. H-2 Worker (Motion picture)
3. Farmworker Justice Fund (Washington, D.C.)
4. Sugar beet industry -- Florida
5. Sugar workers -- Florida
6. Migrant labor -- United States
7. Migrant agricultural laborers -- United States -- Economic conditions
8. Peonage -- United States
9. Migrant agricultural laborers -- United States
10. Agricultural laborers, Foreign -- United States
11. Motion pictures -- United States
12. Experimental films -- United States

Call number

1. Sc MG 681

Source (note)

1. Stephanie Black

Biography (note)

1. "H-2 Worker" (1990/16mm/70 min) is a documentary film about the plight of Caribbean men, mostly Jamaican, who are brought to Florida each year under the temporary guest-worker (H-2) visa program to harvest sugar cane for American sugar corporations.

Indexes/finding aids (note)

1. Preliminary finding aid available.

Processing action (note)

1. Accessioned
2. Cataloged