Monterey Fish Processors Association Records
Finding aid created by Monterey Public Library staff using RecordEXPRESS
Monterey Public Library
2023
625 Pacific Street
Monterey, California 93940
(831) 646-3741
https://monterey.org/library/services/research/history_room/index.php
Title: Monterey Fish Processors Association Records
Dates: 1942-1952
Collection Number: ARC 544
Creator/Collector:
Extent: 1 document case : 26 files; 27 cm.
Repository:
Monterey Public Library
Monterey, California 93940
Abstract: Documents pertaining to the Monterey Fish Processors Association.
Language of Material: English
By appointment only; Contact Local History Librarian or designated staff.
Reproduction by Local History Librarian or designated staff; may be restricted due to condition of material.
[Identification of item]. Monterey Fish Processors Association Records. Collection Number: ARC 544. Monterey Public Library
Donated by Margarete Worthington
Biography/Administrative History
The Monterey Fish Processors Association was established in August 1940 during labor disputes with local fishermen, represented
by the Seine and Line Union, and cannery workers, represented by the Cannery Workers Union of the Pacific. All the cannery
operators joined the Association. After a protracted strike that extended two and half months into the fishing season, an
agreement was reached with the cannery workers. The Association remained the representative organization for the cannery owners
through the last boom years and the decline in the sardine fishing industry. It cooperated with national and regional organizations
on matters such as water standards, lease agreements, and oceanographic research during the mid- to late 1940s. George Clemens,
later a mayor of Monterey, served as the Associationʼs executive secretary from its inception until 1950.
Scope and Content of Collection
Collection includes legal correspondence to and from the Associationʼs attorneys, Littler & Coakley in San Francisco; letters
from the National Fisheries Institute, the National Canners Association, and the California Sardine Products Institute; a
members list; a few check payments; minutes of Association meetings; agreements; production figures; a poll of Monterey Bay
sardine canners (1948); a letter and exhibits from the Attorney General of California to the U.S. Court of appeals, Washington,
D.C., on lease and ownership of coastal waters (1948); research bulletins; mimeographs of High Seas Fishery Policy of the
United States; magazine articles (including two issues of Pacific Fisherman (August 1945 and April 1949); and union booklets
on wages, hours, and working conditions for cannery workers.
Fisheries
Sardine fisheries
Cannery workers
Howser, Fred N.
Clemens, George M.
Fish Cannery Worker's Union of the Pacific
Seine and Line Union
Littler & Coakley, Attorneys at Law
Monterey, California
Minutes
Legal correspondence
Documents