This collection of negatives contains images of people, programs, and events related to the California Labor School from 1944 to 1957. The purpose of the progresive California Labor School was to train the influx of new workers into a wartime economy in trades, the humanities, and in various aspects of labor relations. Includes images of lectures, performances, workshops, symposia, festivals, and portraits of administrators, faculty, and students.

The California Labor School (CLS) was originally founded as the Tom Mooney School in San Francisco in 1942. In 1944, the school changed its name to the California Labor School. The California Labor School was a cultural hub for the Bay Area's progressive and labor communities during the 1940s and 1950s. The school's curriculum included training in various trades, along with history, philosophy, and other humanities courses taught from a working class perspective. The art programs were among the most popular and many leading artists, musicians, and actors taught at the school. The school also hosted an annual artists' ball, as well as exhibitions and cultural symposia. Because the school was ethnically diverse during the Jim Crow era and many of the students and faculty were politically progressive, it was targeted as subversive during the anti-Communist 1950s, which led to its closure in 1957.

1 Cubic Feet (2 boxes)

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Collection is open for research.