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1949

UAW pushes for expanded social security program; first pension plan for hourly workers; work standards included in contract

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1942

Hundreds of women were hired to assemble and finish parts for the Pratt & Whitney R-2800 18-cylinder air-cooled aircraft engine during World War II. Most of them had to relinquish their positions when servicemen returned to their old jobs at the plant after the war ended. Courtesy Brian McMahon

TCAP converts to war production; many women recruited; Ford gets order to make M-8 armored vehicle (more than 6,000 would be produced here by 1945)

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1941

Autoworkers in Detroit and around the country mobilized in the 1930s to achieve collective bargaining rights. Chrysler and General Motors accepted the newly-formed United Autoworkers into their plants in 1937, but Henry Ford refused to acknowledge the UAW. It would be another four years before Ford, encouraged by his wife Clara, would accept the UAW. Courtesy Walter P. Reuther Library, Archives of Labor and Urban Affairs, Wayne State University

Ford Motor Company organized by UAW; Local 879 forms new charter, July 18; federal government converts auto industry to war production; U.S. enters WWII