This 1964 black and white film “The Inheritance” celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America by outlining the improvements the union has won for clothing workers over its five decades. It visits early America and the immigrants who arrived to Ellis Island in NYC and who toiled in the garment and steel factories of the United States. It is a story of the birth of organized labor and the Amalgamated Union. At the time the film was released, the Amalgamated had 385,000 members working in the apparel and related industries, and in laundries, cleaning and dyeing plants and retail stores. The union operated in 42 states, four Canadian provinces and Puerto Rico.

The film opens with a ship sailing in front of the Statue of Liberty in a deep fog. The Inheritance – Part 1. Ellis Island 1:40. Narrated by Robert Ryan. Written by Millard Lampell. Directed by Harold Mayer. An abandoned room at Ellis Island with an empty crib 2:20. Photos of immigrants arriving in the US in the early 1900’s 2:30. Immigrants meet immigration officers at Ellis Island 4:30. Children are checked for tuberculosis 4:35. Families seeing New York for the first time 5:32. People mill about downtown Manhattan 5:35. Very old film of people dancing in a ballroom 6:00. The wealthy flaunt their wares 6:30. The tenements of New York City 6:45. A fire hydrant is opened to cool off the children 7:00. Photos from the year 1905. People living in horrid conditions in the tenements on Mulberry Street 7:30. Fancy ladies with umbrellas 7:55. Parents and children work side-by-side in the clothing factories of New York 8:25. Coal miners and railroad workers work on the train lines 8:40. Factory workers and lumberjacks toil together 9:00. Women work in the clothing factories 9:13. Sprinklers opened on a New York St. 9:25. Immigrant children and adults learn English in school 9:35. People frolic in the sea 10:05. Children pledge allegiance to the flag 10:40. Child stands in a factory 11:00. Women and children work in the clothing factories 11:20. Children work in the mills in the minds 11:40. Old photos of immigrant workers 12:15. Union workers protest 12:40. Men in bowler hats assemble 12:55. Protesters march in New York City for workers’ rights 13:15. Mounted police officers 13:35. Police try and control the protests 14:00. Women work at sewing machines 14:25. Rapid footage of men working on garments in factories 15:05. Protesters start to walk out of the factories and march in the streets 16:43. Trouble in the streets. A factory worker, Charles Lazinskas is murdered, protesting the cause of his fellow workers 17:56. He was shot in the head by a clothing factory foreman. The foreman is arrested 18:03. Jane Adams, social worker speaks 18:12. Factory owners start to see the conditions in which his workers are living 18:40. Jewish men working on fabric in the factories 19:10. Pictures from the clothing market in New York city in the year 1912 19:32. Protesters are arrested and Fiorello LaGuardia bails them out. Photo of Fiorello LaGuardia 19:46. Baltimore protesters 20:20. Ida Brayman Memorial: she was shot and killed by her employer on February 5, 1913 20:40. Protesters in Nashville 20:55. Scenes from deliberations in the courtrooms of the United States 21:32. The Amalgamated founders gather at Webster Hall in New York City in 1914 22:36. Photos of men behind desks in offices piled with papers 23:03. The protests go national and walkouts in factories are rampant 23:40. Factory steam billows from smokestacks and men work in steel mills 24:38. Children play in the streets 24:45. Scenes from silent films are shown 25:00. Uncle Sam 25:08. Newspaper headlines from the sinking of the Lusitania 25:23. People waved from ships deck 25:40. The war is upon the world 25:50. Scenes from the battlefield 25:59. Photos of the wounded in foxholes and men in battle 26:15. News footage and headlines from 1918-1919 and Germany’s surrender 26:25. Arlington National Cemetery 26:40. The KKK gather with burning torches 26:50. Panic in the United States over the “red scare” and the Palmer raids were conducted under Woodrow Wilson 27:07. Men in concentration camps from the Palmer raids 27:23. Riots in the streets 28:05.

This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com