Description
Collector's Note – Why This Issue Matters
Harry Bridges on the cover of Time Magazine on July 19, 1937 places this issue at one of the most turbulent and consequential moments in the history of American labor. Bridges was the Australian-born leader of the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union on the West Coast, and by the summer of 1937 he had become the most controversial labor figure in the United States. The 1934 West Coast waterfront strike — which he had led — had been one of the most significant labor actions in American history, resulting in a general strike in San Francisco that paralyzed the city for four days and ended in a landmark arbitration victory for the longshoremen. By 1937 he was directing the ILWU's affiliation with the Congress of Industrial Organizations and was simultaneously the subject of sustained government investigation into his alleged Communist Party membership — charges that would follow him for decades and generate some of the most protracted immigration and deportation proceedings in American legal history. Time's decision to put him on the cover in July 1937 reflects his position as the most visible and most contested figure in the American labor movement at a moment when that movement was achieving its greatest legislative and organizational gains. For collectors exploring the Time magazine archive from the Depression era, this cover is among the most historically loaded labor-related issues the magazine produced in the 1930s.
The broader context of July 1937 is essential to understanding this cover's full weight. The National Labor Relations Act — the Wagner Act — had been upheld by the Supreme Court just three months earlier, in April 1937, fundamentally legitimizing the right of workers to organize and bargain collectively and transforming the legal landscape for American unions. The Congress of Industrial Organizations, founded in 1935, was in the middle of its most aggressive organizing campaign, having just secured contracts from U.S. Steel and General Motors in the landmark sit-down strikes of early 1937. At the same time, the "Little Steel" strikes were underway, and the Memorial Day Massacre — in which Chicago police killed ten striking Republic Steel workers — had occurred just weeks before this issue's cover date. American labor in the summer of 1937 was simultaneously at its most powerful and its most violently contested, and Bridges represented the most radical edge of that power. The magazine record from 1937 documents this extraordinary year of American labor history with unusual immediacy, and this Time cover is its most direct human document.
Harry Bridges's subsequent history — the decades of government attempts to deport him as a Communist alien, the multiple Supreme Court cases bearing his name, his survival of all prosecution and his continued union leadership until the 1970s — gives this 1937 Time cover additional retrospective significance. It is a portrait of a man at the beginning of a decades-long legal and political battle, captured at the moment of his maximum public visibility and influence. For researchers of American labor history, immigration law, civil liberties, and the political history of the American left, this issue is a primary document of the first order.
About the Publication
Time was founded in 1923 by Henry Luce and Briton Hadden as the first American weekly news magazine. By 1937 it was one of the most widely read publications in the United States, covering the full sweep of national and international affairs with its signature departmental format and opinionated editorial voice. Its labor coverage in the 1930s engaged seriously with the dramatic transformation of American industrial relations taking place under the New Deal, and its cover selections in this period reflect a genuine editorial effort to identify and profile the figures most directly shaping that transformation. Putting a labor leader on the cover was an editorial statement about the movement's centrality to American public life in 1937 — one that Time made with considerable analytical seriousness.
Key Highlights Inside
- Harry Bridges cover feature — The cover story examines Bridges as the most prominent and controversial figure in American West Coast labor, engaging with his leadership of the ILWU, his role in the 1934 San Francisco general strike, and the ongoing government investigation into his alleged Communist Party ties.
- American labor at its transformative peak — Published weeks after the Memorial Day Massacre and during the active Little Steel strikes, the issue documents the American labor movement at the moment of its greatest legislative success and its most violent industrial conflict simultaneously.
- Post-Wagner Act labor landscape — The issue appears three months after the Supreme Court upheld the National Labor Relations Act, fundamentally reshaping the legal context for American union organizing and giving the cover story its particular policy significance.
- Depression-era Time editorial content — Beyond the Bridges feature, the issue reflects Time's coverage of the New Deal political economy, the CIO's organizing campaigns, and the broader social and political landscape of mid-1930s America across its standard departments.
Condition & Rarity
Time issues from July 1937 are now nearly ninety years old, and the condition of any surviving copy must be evaluated with the full weight of that age in mind. The listing presents this issue without a detailed written condition grade, directing collectors to available photographs for assessment. The paper stock of late 1930s Time was acidic and not designed for archival longevity, meaning significant tanning, brittleness, and fragility are expected findings in any unrestored example approaching ninety years of age. Protective plastic covering indicates deliberate preservation storage, which typically correlates with better structural integrity than completely unprotected storage would produce over the same period. For any surviving copy of this issue, the primary condition concerns are page brittleness — which substantially increases handling risk at this age — spine integrity, and cover surface condition, since the Bridges portrait is the primary display element. Collectors should handle any late 1930s Time issue with exceptional care and assess cover surface quality and interior page stability carefully in available photographs before drawing conclusions about display or research suitability.
Looking for More Issues Like This?
Time covers from the Depression era featuring major figures in American labor and political history are among the rarer entries in the magazine's archive, and an issue this specifically focused on the most controversial labor leader of the 1930s is a genuinely distinctive find for collectors of American labor history documentation. The full Time magazine archive at OriginalMagazines.com is the best place to explore other historically significant covers from the magazine's Depression and New Deal era coverage. For collectors building a broader picture of the extraordinary year this issue inhabits, the 1937 magazine collection gathers contemporaneous coverage from multiple publications across one of the most consequential years in American labor and political history.