John L. Lewis has been described as a "legendary hero to three generations of mine workers and the thunderer who roared the sounds of protest of another era of social change." He is credited with making coal miners the highest-paid industrial force in the world. He broke away from the American Federation of Labor (AFL) to found the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). Then, he left that organization "to go it alone with his miners."
Lewis was born in Lucas, Iowa, and began working in the mines at an early age. According to his official biography, over the years he worked in most of the mines of the West and Midwest. He was interested in the union movement and served in various local and district offices. In 1910, he was elected to the Illinois Miners' Legislative Committee, but resigned later that year to work as an organizer for the American Federation of Labor. In 1917, Lewis began his career with the United Mine Workers, going to work as a statistician.
Lewis has been described as "the most colorful labor leader in American history, a man who also favored three-piece suits, quoted broad swatches of Shakespeare and once called the vice-president of the United States a "labor-baiting, poker-playing, whiskey-drinking, evil old man."
In 1960, when he was almost 80 years old, John L. Lewis retired. He was replaced by the union's vice-president, Thomas Kennedy, who was 72 years old. A one-time Socialist, Kennedy had served as lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania from 1935 to 1939. He became active in the UMWA in 1906, when he was 18 years old, and he attended his first international convention as a delegate. Four years later, he was elected president of UMWA District 7, an eastern Pennsylvania anthracite district, a post he held for many years. Kennedy participated in negotiations that led to the first joint hard-coal contract in 1912, and according to contemporary sources, remained a key figure in anthracite negotiations, becoming known as "the UMWA's 'little giant of the anthracite.'"
He was elected secretary-treasurer of the UMWA in 1925 and served in that office for 22 years. In 1947 he was elected vice-president, an office he held until 1960, when he was elected to succeed John L. Lewis as president. According to Lewis, Kennedy was recognized as "one of the outstanding leaders in the ranks of organized labor in America."
