INS Presents | A Book Talk by Dr. Vernon Pedersen

Part of INS Presents: The 2020-2021 Faculty Research Series

In the early years of the Great Depression, the Marine Workers Industrial Union (MWIU) was a colorful presence on the American Waterfront. In 1935, the MWIU seemed to vanish, closing its halls and stopping its publications. Dr. Vernon L. Pedersen convincingly demonstrates that the MWIU did not vanish—instead it was ordered by the Moscow-based Communist International to send its members into mainstream "ALF" unions and take over from the inside. Initiated by accident on the west coast and deliberately duplicated in the east, the Communists seized control of the west coast longshoremen’s union, destroyed the International Seamen’s Union, and created the Communist-dominated National Maritime Union.

About the Speaker

Dr. Pedersen is a Professor of History and Head of the Department of International Studies (INS) at AUS. He is a specialist in the history of American and International Communism with emphasis on the maritime unions and the Spanish Civil War.  His teaching areas include American and Soviet history, European history, history of the Cold War and espionage, as well as maritime history and international security.  He taught at Shepherd College in West Virginia, the American University in Bulgaria and at the University of Great Falls in Montana. He is the vice-president of the Historians of American Communism and the author of The Communist Party of Maryland, 1919-1957.

You can access the session through the following link.

For more information, please contact [email protected].