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Megan Cornish papers, 1955-2019

Overview of the Collection

Creator
Cornish, Megan
Title
Megan Cornish papers
Dates
1955-2019 (inclusive)
Quantity
12.44 cubic feet (13 boxes)
Collection Number
6259
Summary
Papers of one of the first female electricians for Seattle City Light and labor activist
Repository
University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections
Special Collections
University of Washington Libraries
Box 352900
Seattle, WA
98195-2900
Telephone: 2065431929
Fax: 2065431931
speccoll@uw.edu
Access Restrictions

Access to portions of the collection is restricted. Contact University of Washington Libraries Special Collections for details.

Request at UW

Languages
English
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Biographical Note

Megan Cornish was born in 1947 into a military family and grew up in various locations around the United States. After graduating from Cornell University in 1969 with a BA in literature, Cornish moved to the Puget Sound region and worked at The Shelter Half, an anti-war GI coffeehouse in Tacoma. In her early years in the Pacific Northwest, Cornish was not a member of a formal group or organization. However, Cornish joined Radical Women after being drawn to the group's intersectional approach and became more interested in labor organizing. She took a job at a nursing home and also briefly worked in an industrial laundry facility.

In 1974, Cornish was recruited by Clara Fraser, a cofounder of Radical Women and education coordinator at Seattle City Light, to apply for a position as an Electrical Trades Trainee (ETT), an all-female affirmative action program designed by Fraser to integrate women into the electrical trades. Cornish was selected to be one of ten women ETT's out of an application pool of over 300. In the first weeks on the job, the sense of solidarity between workers as the result of a walkout that occurred just weeks before caused Cornish and the other female ETT's to be received well. The shared resentment towards City Light Superintendent Gordon Vickery and management created a sense of unity amongst the electrical workers and reduced their hostility towards their new female coworkers. The severed relationship between Fraser and management, however, left the ETT's in a highly vulnerable position as management sought to retaliate against Fraser through damaging the ETT program.

Only a week after starting, the ETT training program was canceled and Fraser was removed from her position as the training coordinator. Trainees were told on a Friday afternoon to report to field work the next week, where they made $1 less per hour than the other electrical helpers. In response, the ETT's filed a complaint with the City of Seattle Office of Women's Rights (OWR) stating that they were being denied the typical amount of training and pay reserved for male employees. After a year of training, Cornish and seven of the other ETT's were laid off, along with Fraser. The ETT's and Fraser saw their terminations as politically motivated and retaliatory, and they added the lay-offs to their OWR complaint.

As their case was being reviewed, the former ETT's engaged in a massive public relations campaign to win the support of the public. Numerous articles about the case were published in the local press, and the case became a central focus of the local women's movement. In July 1976, in a major victory, City Light was ordered to reinstate six of the terminated trainees, including Cornish, as well as to pay a settlement, give them back pay, and make them eligible for apprenticeship programs.

After the victorious court ruling, Cornish applied for a City Light apprenticeship as a lineworker, along with two other Radical Women members Teri Bach and Hildreth (Heidi) Durham. Cornish described this period as the "roughest" time during her career at City Light. Vickery and management, angered by the ruling, placed Cornish and her female colleagues into positions that were designed to be the most difficult to succeed in. Each of the women were placed into divisions that were known to be hostile to them, which ultimately led to Durham falling from a pole and breaking her back in a near fatal accident.

In addition to being antagonized by management, Cornish and the other women apprentices were also met with animosity from the male electrical workers that they worked alongside. In 1975, Local 77 of the IBEW staged a failed strike that led to harsher working conditions. Many male electricians, frustrated and demoralized by their strike's defeat, held resentment towards the former ETT's for winning their discrimination case, and these feelings were exploited by management to increase the sexist hostility of the work environments.

Despite having an affirmative action plan to diversify its workforce, Cornish, Bach, and Durham remained some of the only female electrical workers at City Light for nearly ten years. The three regularly gave public comment at Seattle City Council meetings to demand the hiring of more women and people of color at City Light. In the early 1980's, City Light hired its first new female electrical worker in nearly a decade.

In 1983, Cornish helped establish the Employee Committee for Equal Rights at City Light (CERCL) to fight workplace harassment and discrimination in response to inaction from management, union leaders, and the City of Seattle Human Rights Department (HRD). CERCL membership grew rapidly in the mid-1980's and pressured the HRD to investigate discrimination cases. In 1991, Cornish and Durham were jointly named Advocate of the Year by the Washington Women in the Trades.

Cornish retired from Seattle City Light in 2004 after 30 years. At the time of her retirement, she held the position of outage dispatcher, the highest position in the utility trades. She credits her adherence to feminism and political radicalism as essential to her successful accomplishments in her organizing at City Light. She remains an active member of Radical Women and the Freedom Socialist Party and continues to write for the Freedom Socialist newspaper.

Adapted from the Megan Cornish article on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megan_Cornish

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Content Description

This collection contains records collected by Megan Cornish as one of the first female electricians at Seattle City Light between 1970 and 2003. The materials span from her apprenticeship in the Electrical Trades Trainee (ETT) affirmative action program until her retirement from Seattle City Light as a senior power dispatcher. Cornish helped found the Employee Committee for Equal Rights at City Light (CERCL) to fight race and sex discrimination within the agency. Much of the material is related to a series of discrimination lawsuits filed by Cornish and other members of the Freedom Socialist Party (FSP) and Radical Women, including Clara Fraser, Teri Bach, and Hildreth (Heidi) Durham.

There is also material related to Cornish’s involvement and organizing efforts in her union, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), Local 77, and other unions including the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers (IFPTE), Local 17. These records contain meeting minutes, legal briefings and reports, worker testimonies; materials from other discrimination lawsuits; City of Seattle employee memorandums; correspondence; employee evaluations and documentations; City Light job postings; negotiated union contracts; Cornish’s union cards and dues statements; leaflets; newsletters; and news articles related to Cornish’s activities at City Light. This collection would be of particular interest to those interested in women in the labor movement, labor unions, feminism, socialism, affirmative action, discrimination, sexism, labor law, and organizing in the public sector.

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Use of the Collection

Restrictions on Use

Creator's copyrights transferred to the University of Washington Libraries Special Collections.

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Administrative Information

Arrangement

Organized into 2 accessions.

  • Accession No. 6259-001, Megan Cornish papers, 1955-2003
  • Accession No. 6259-002, Megan Cornish papers, 1966-2019

Acquisition Information

Donated by: Megan Cornish, 2019 and August 2022.

Related Materials

Special Collections holds similar materials in these collections:

Clara Fraser papers (Collection No. 3187)

Tyree Scott papers (Collection No. 5245)

George Hammer papers (Collection No. 6276)

Heidi Durham papers (Collection No. 6264)

Wikidata is available for this collection

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Detailed Description of the Collection

 

Names and SubjectsReturn to Top

Subject Terms

  • Affirmative action programs--Washington (State)--Seattle--History--Sources
  • Apprenticeship programs--Washington (State)--Seattle--History--Sources
  • Electric industry workers--Training of--Washington (State)--Seattle--Sources
  • Labor--Washington (State)--Seattle
  • Personal Papers/Corporate Records (University of Washington)
  • Sex discrimination in employment--Washington (State)--Seattle--History--Sources
  • Women electric industry workers--Washington (State)--Seattle--Archives

Personal Names

  • Cornish, Megan--Archives

Corporate Names

  • Seattle City Light--Employees--Archives
  • Seattle City Light--History--Sources


2019 (Last modified: 9/14/2023)

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