80 day strike ends! Men return to jobs

Ending the 80 day old Inter-Island strike so far as it affects seamen and stevedores, the International Longshoremen and Warehousemen’s union, No. 1-37, voted this morning to return to work.

After balloting secretly the longshoremen, accompanied by union seamen, marched four abreast from the Kaahumanu St. union hall to Pier 13 for reinstatement.

Under the terms of the strike settlement plan approved by the unions, approximately 131 seamen and 47 stevedores are eligible for reinstatement.

Despite decision by the ILWU and IBU to end the tieup, Inter-Island drydock workers remained on strike and continued to picket company offices at Fort and Merchant Sts.

… Settlement of the seamen-longshoremen phase of the tieup is expected to enable William G. Strench, department of labor conciliator, to concentrate on the drydock tieup.

The IBU and ILWU are affiliates of the CIO. The Metal Trades council, representing striking drydock workers, is an AFL affiliate.

Col. George W. Bicknell, Inter-Island industrial relations executive, announced this afternoon that the Hualalai is tentatively scheduled to be drydocked Wednesday.

No estimate was made of the amount of time necessary to refit the steamer for service.

Although the majority of the 178 workers had been signed up at 1 p.m. Inter-Island officials had not completed a tabulation of the number of men for whom reinstatement was arranged today.

Decision by the ILWU to return to work paralleled similar action taken Saturday by the Inland Boatment’s union, which voted to accept the reinstatement offer by the Inter-Island Steam Navigation Co., Ltd.