Abraham Feinglass ^People

He was employed as a fur worker in Chicago while also completing the course of study at Marshall High School and attending Crane College in the evening. He be- came an activemember of the ChicagoFur Workers Union, which had been chartered in 1913 as Local 45 of the newly established International Fur Workers Union. In the late 1920s there was an intense factional struggle in the union from which Feinglass emerged asthe leader of a rank and file group advocating clean unionism, democracy and militancy. At a convention of the I.F.W.U. in 1932 the leaders of the rank and file faction were expelled, and this led to the formation of the Fur Division of the Needle Trades Union with Feinglass as Manager. In 1935 this group was reunited with theI.F.W.U. and Feinglass was elected Business Agent and later, Manager.After merger of the National Leather Workers Union with the I.F.W.U. in 1937, Feinglass became vice president and Midwest district Director of the I.E.LW.U. and ledvigorous drives to organize the fur industry and improve wages and working condi- tions. Feinglass participated actively in numerous international and national organi- zations and conferences concerned with disarmament and world peace. He addressed these issues frequently and was outspoken in his opposition to the Viet Nam War. He was a member of the National Committee of Labor for Peace, and in the late 1970s he served as vice president of the World Peace Council.