page_title: Harry Bridges
section_title: Legacy
hierarchical_section_title: Harry Bridges / Legacy
caption_attribution_description: The entrance to the Harry R. Bridges Memorial Building, headquarters of the ILWU in San Francisco. Photo by Jim Heaphy.
context_page_description: Harry Bridges was an Australian-born American union leader, first with the International Longshoremen's Association. In 1937, he led several chapters in forming a new union, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, expanding members to workers in warehouses, and led it for the next 40 years. He was prosecuted for his labor organizing and believed subversive status by the U.S. government during the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s, with the goal of deportation. This was never achieved.
  Bridges became a naturalized citizen in 1945. His conviction by a federal jury for having lied about his Communist Party membership when seeking naturalization was overturned by the Supreme Court in 1953 as having been prosecuted untimely, outside the statute of limitations. His official power was reduced when the ILWU was expelled by the CIO in 1950, but he continued to be re-elected by the California membership and was highly influential until his retirement in 1977.
context_section_description: On the West Coast, Bridges still excites passions both for and against the labor movement.
  The Almanac Singers, including Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, recorded "Song for Bridges" in 1941 while working on their album Talking Union that defends Bridges' work.
  Rancid, a band from Oakland, California, released a song titled "Harry Bridges" on their 1994 album Let's Go.
  California Governor Gray Davis declared July 28, 2001, Bridges' 100th birthday, as "Harry Bridges Day". On the same day, the City of San Francisco dedicated a plaza in Bridges' honor.
  The ILWU headquarters in San Francisco is called the Harry R. Bridges Memorial Building.
  The Harry Bridges Institute in San Pedro, California, is a research institute that focuses on topics of international economics and how changes in political geography affect unions. The archives of the Harry Bridges Institute are held at the Oviatt Library at California State University, Northridge.
  The Harry Bridges Center for Labor Studies at the University of Washington (UW) in Seattle, Washington, was established in Bridges' honor in 1992 by ILWU past and current ILWU members. The center supports research, teaching, and community outreach by UW faculty and students and labor organizations.
  The nonprofit Harry Bridges Project produced From Wharf Rats to Lords of the Docks: The Life and Times of Harry Bridges, a one-man play that was directed and filmed by Haskell Wexler. It promotes Bridges' legacy and the influence of his work. The film was broadcast on some PBS stations on Labor Day Weekend in 2009.
  Harry Bridges Span School, in the harbor town of Wilmington, California, is named after him, as is Harry Bridges Blvd (also in Wilmington), which runs along the north side of the Port of Los Angeles.
  In 2010 the Long Beach City Council renamed the Queen Mary Events Park to the Harry Bridges Memorial Park.
caption: ILWU Headquarters
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