Representation and Rebellion : The Rockefeller Plan at the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, 1914-1942

In response to the tragedy of the Ludlow Massacre, John D. Rockefeller Jr. introduced one of the nation s first employee representation plans (ERPs) to the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company in 1915. With the advice of William Mackenzie King, who would go on to become prime minister of Canada, the plan which came to be known as the Rockefeller Plan was in use until 1942 and became the model for ERPs all over the world.In Representation and Rebellion Jonathan Rees uses a variety of primary sources including records recently discovered at the company s former headquarters in Pueblo, Colorado to tell the story of the Rockefeller Plan and those who lived under it, as well as to detail its various successes and failures. Taken as a whole, the history of the Rockefeller Plan is not the story of ceaseless oppression and stifled militancy that its critics might imagine, but it is also not the story of the creation of a paternalist panacea for labor unrest that Rockefeller hoped it would be.Addressing key issues of how this early twentieth-century experiment fared from 1915 to 1942, Rees argues that the Rockefeller Plan was a limited but temporarily effective alternative to independent unionism in the wake of the Ludlow Massacre. The book will appeal to business and labor historians, political scientists, and sociologists, as well as those studying labor and industrial relations. "In response to the tragedy of the Ludlow Massacre, John D. Rockefeller Jr. introduced one of the nation's first employee representation plans (ERPs) to the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company in 1915. With the advice of William Mackenzie King, who would go on to become prime minister of Canada, the plan which came to be known as the Rockefeller Plan was in use until 1942 and became the model for ERPs all over the world. In Representation and Rebellion Jonathan Rees uses a variety of primary sources including records recently discovered at the company's former headquarters in Pueblo, Colorado to tell the story of the Rockefeller Plan and those who lived under it, as well as to detail its various successes and failures. Taken as a whole, the history of the Rockefeller Plan is not the story of ceaseless oppression and stifled militancy that its critics might imagine, but it is also not the story of the creation of a paternalist panacea for labor unrest that Rockefeller hoped it would be. Addressing key issues of how this early twentieth-century experiment fared from 1915 to 1942, Rees argues that the Rockefeller Plan was a limited but temporarily effective alternative to independent unionism in the wake of the Ludlow Massacre. The book will appeal to business and labor historians, political scientists, and sociologists, as well as those studying labor and industrial relations."--Jacket Contents......Page 8 Illustrations......Page 10 Preface......Page 12 Acknowledgments......Page 20 Introduction......Page 24 1: Memories of a Massacre......Page 36 2: Student and Teacher......Page 60 3: Between Two Extremes......Page 84 4: Divisions in the Ranks......Page 108 5: The Rockefeller Plan in Action: The Mines......Page 134 6: The Rockefeller Plan in Action: The Mill......Page 158 7: New Union, Same Struggle......Page 182 8: Depression, Frustration, and Real Competition......Page 204 Conclusion......Page 230 Appendix 1......Page 244 Appendix 2......Page 262 Notes......Page 290 Bibliographic Essay......Page 336 Index......Page 340