The last survivor of a historic Portland strike fought scabs, beat a murder rap and made history. - BY JAMES PITKIN, Willamette Week, OR
Marvin Ricks was a 22-year-old Portland dock worker when local longshoremen joined the West Coast Waterfront Strike of 1934.
For three months starting that May, thousands of workers shut down every U.S. port on the Pacific Coast, demanding an independent union. They won, but only after battling police and hired goons in every major West Coast city, including Portland, where one strike-breaking worker is the only known casualty.
(By comparison, the Pacific Northwest Region of Carpenters, representing 1,300 drywallers in Oregon and Southwest Washington, went on strike starting June 1, with peaceful pickets going up in the Pearl District and South Waterfront.)