Honoring Frank Emspak, emeritus faculty (June 21, 1943 — June 14, 2024)

Frank Emspak | New York Times Obituary

EMSPAK–Frank, died June 14, 2024 from acute myeloid leukemia. In 65 years as an activist, organizer, labor leader and media executive, he lived by the principle that working-class people must be central in organizing society. Born in 1943, Emspak grew up in Yonkers, NY. His father, Julius, was co-founder and first secretary-treasurer of the United Electrical and Machine Workers (UE). His first political activity was while at Roosevelt High School, when he joined a march by the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy, and picketed Woolworth’s in New York City for its discriminatory policies. While a student at University of Wisconsin Madison, in August of 1965 he became chairman of the National Coordinating Committee to End the War in Vietnam; the organization led the first nationwide protests. He was a precinct coordinator for a referendum in Madison that called for immediate troop withdrawal; the referendum won 45 percent of the vote. In 1963 he went to Hazard County, Kentucky, to interview striking miners and bring them food supplies. He also became involved with organizing student employees at UW who won higher pay. After graduating with a degree in Zoology, Emspak continued to work with anti-war organizations. He earned a PhD in American History from UW Madison. He also attended Madison Area Technical College and learned the machinist trade. He married Dolores Fox in 1964. Awarded a Ford Fellowship in history, Emspak accompanied Dolores to Paris with their first child, Jesse. Dolores continued her studies in French literature. After returning to the U.S., the family, now including a daughter, Freya, moved to the Boston area and settled in Lynn, Massachusetts. In 1972, Emspak became a machinist at United Shoe Machine Corp. in Beverly, MA. He developed his machinist’s skills, which he saw as key to being an effective organizer and union member. Rising from shop steward to executive board member for local 271 of the UE, he learned important lessons about the cultures of working people in the mill town factories in Massachusetts. After his stint at USM, he went at General Electric, Local 201 in Wilmington. With a PhD, Emspak was one of the most highly educated workers there. At first that would set him apart. But when he was appointed to the Health and Safety Committee, he used his education to benefit the people he worked with, earning the respect of his work mates. He became a shop steward and later a member of the union’s Wilmington plant executive board. In 1979, the plant went on strike over sexist hiring and promotion practices at GE. That strike was the result of a lawsuit originally filed in 1944, demanding equal pay for women workers in the wartime plant. GE had ignored the verdict; the strike changed that. Women received back pay, some dating back decades. Jobs were reclassified to ensure that both men and women were paid equally. That sense of justice — and pragmatism — also meant he supported his wife Dolores in her efforts to become a doctor. The local continued to clash with the company over the introduction of new manufacturing technologies. The problem, as Emspak saw it, was that there was no left- wing vision for protecting employment even though the same Left activists had made what would now be considered unheard-of gains in union membership and outreach in the Wilmington plant. In 1987, he went to work for the Massachusetts Center for Applied Technology. He attempted to offer a vision of technological change that would enhance rather than reduce worker’s skills and protect jobs rather than eliminate them. It was, for Emspak, a way to use his intellectual skills and give workers a say in the way technology is built and used. In 1991 he joined the School for Workers in Madison. During this period Emspak was a member of the International Federation for Automatic Control, a multinational engineering organization that studies automation and the social effects of technology; he became vice chair of their social effects committee. He also was a fellow at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Washington, D.C. Emspak recognized it was important that unions have a voice in the mass media. The result was the birth of Workers Independent News. It was to be a source of content for radio stations, and would be financed by the labor movement. For a decade, Emspak was tireless in his efforts to raise funds and build a viable news organization. Eventually the unions cut their support and WIN was forced to close. Even after the demise of WIN, Emspak made time once a week to speak to younger people, offering strategic advice and support. He also completed a memoir. Emspak was always intellectually curious; that defined much of his life. To be a skilled worker, he said, one has to want to know how things work. He was an avid gardener and amateur bird watcher. Besides his wife, son and daughter, Emspak is survived by his grandchildren Dexter Frank Gordon and Simon Gordon, brother Steve (Meryl), brother-in-law John Reed Fox (Donna) and nieces Gabriella, Maya, Stacy and Danielle. The family extends its gratitude to Dr. Gahvari, nurse Katie, the nurses at the Infusion Center at the University of Wisconsin Hospital as well as the hospice staff at Oakwood Village. Memorial services will be held July 1 at Olbrich Gardens at 3330 Atwood Ave., Madison, Wisconsin.

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