This article is co-published by El Paso News and Fronterizo Magazine.
At one point, El Paso had large apparel manufacturing operations feeding the city’s economy. The city was once considered the jeans capital of the world. Behind the gleaming factories churning out pants across El Paso employing large quantities of El Pasoans, lay a sinister hidden secret – that El Paso’s economy was the continuing extension of the conquest and plunder that the European colonization of the Americas has become known for. This is the El Paso history rarely understood and much less recognized: the rise of “la mujer obrera” (the woman workers) who transformed themselves into a women-led organized militant group that shocked El Paso’s elite into capitulating for the rights of the working class.
In 1970, Farah Manufacturing employed a little over 6,000 people in its clothing manufacturing operations. Its employees accounted for about 29% of the city’s manufacturing labor force. Farah wasn’t only an El Paso company, it had manufacturing plants in San Antonio and Victoria in Texas, in addition to El Paso, as well as plants in Albuquerque and Las Cruces. Later it added plants in Asia and Europe.
On January 11, 1967, Farah Manufacturing, which opened in 1921, went from a family-owned business to a public company when it filed to be listed on the stock exchange with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Its initial stock offering was 750,000 shares of common stock. The shares included 400,000 shares owned by investors in the company. On February 16, 1967, the company began offering its shares for sale at $18 per share. On July 14, 1967, the New York Stock Exchange approved the listing of the Farah stock under the ticker symbol FRA.
Behind the celebrations of a successful company the workers that drove the share price for the company were not the valued and recognized employees its owner portrayed publicly. Instead, for William F. Farah, his employees were just vassals working for their master.
A former Farah employee who spoke in Spanish about her experience using only her last name of Sanchez, said that when she started in 1969, “everyone at Farah hated their job.” Sanchez said the employees were hired with zero experience because of the large turnover at the company. The lack of experience led to many accidents from cuts and burns, and that the managers were “disrespectful” and didn’t care if the employees were hurt on the job. The problem was, as Sanchez explained, that many people believed that Willie Farah was “a god.” She realized this one day on the picket line when suddenly “an elderly lady started hitting her with her bag saying that Farah was a great” person. (translated from Spanish)
As characterized by the national news media, what started as an attempt to unionize Farah workers exploded into the battle to “break the white political domination of El Paso.” The successful strike not only empowered the Farah employees but, in the end, it was William “Willie” Farah the one fighting the banks and his family for control of his company. For the Chicano diaspora in El Paso, the strike was a pivotal moment for gaining political clout in their city while for Farah, it was the start of the end of his company that had been operating for over 50 years, and who would close before it reached 100 years because of the women who chose to yell; “¡basta!,” enough.
It is the story of one of the largest major labor strikes in the history of El Paso.
The worker movement exploded into the headlines four years after Farah Manufacturing purchased five full El Paso Times pages to paint a picture of a company putting employees first while being essential to El Paso’s economy. It is the story of Mexican-American women pitted against El Paso’s business elites and political leaders.
Farah Attempts To Paint Rosy Picture Of Company Through An El Paso Times Advertorial
On March 15, 1970, Farah Manufacturing purchased three full pages in the El Paso Times to explain its history and economic impact on the city. The three-full spread newspaper page advertorials included 11 editorials explaining Farah Manufacturing’s history, impact on El Pasoan’s lives and the economic impact the company had on El Paso. Newspaper advertorials are editorials written and paid for by companies that are used to inform readers about the company and its products.
A letter attributed to William F. Farah printed in the advertorial expressed that Farah’s success lay in the “high quality of El Paso employees.” Farah’s letter added that it was his parents that started the manufacturing business. The newspaper advertorial included editorials on how the company’s subsidized cafeteria serves meals to the company’s employees at 70 cents each. Another advertorial included an explanation of how the two-and-a-half doctors and other medical professionals provide health care to its employees, while another talked about how the company encouraged education with scholarships.
One advertising editorial was credited to the then-dean of the School of Business at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), John M. Richards. Richard’s advertorial clearly explains the purpose of the editorials purchased by the company, explaining why employees don’t need a labor union, without outright expressing it.
As the dean of the university’s business college, one would expect his editorial to explain the numbers behind the company’s impact on El Paso’s economy. Instead, Richards dispenses with that at the beginning when he wrote that “Farah Manufacturing is an important part of El Paso’s economy; the sheer size of its plants and operations, as well as the frequency with which the name is mentioned, leave no doubt of that.” Richards then gets to the crux of what is behind the advertorials when he follows with “a firm’s real economic role is not expressed solely in plant size or dollar volume, but in its impact on people’s lives.” Richards concludes his analysis of Farah’s impact on El Paso’s economy by writing that Farah accounted for around 12% of El Paso jobs from its direct employees and jobs at the company multiplies through its business dealings in the city. It should be noted that Richards is the only byline in the 11 editorials published that day.
Behind the glitzy advertorials was the hidden truth that Farah wasn’t the employee-friendly company it was attempting to pretend to be in its advertorials. The advertorials hid the reality that employees of Farah, mostly Mexican-American women, were being abused at Farah. A strike and the subsequent national boycott of Farah would expose everything.
The Labor Union Fight
In early 1970, Farah employees in the shipping department signed cards seeking to join a union. The employees invited Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America to help them form at union at Farah. This was the beginning of the battle between the banks and Willie Farah, as he was generally known, for control of El Paso’s largest manufacturing company, and a successful fight for workers’ rights in El Paso. The firing of Adan Gonzalez was the spark that lid the fuse for unionizing Farah. Farah was one of ten major garment plants in El Paso at the time and Amalgamated had already unionized four of them. However, Farah would be the “major breakthrough” the union needed in El Paso.
But the union faced a “fortress” in Farah as the company closed its doors to the union impeding their ability to begin talking to workers about forming a union. Barbed wire and locked fences would soon be erected at Farah plants to keep the union outside. Lawsuits and recriminations soon followed.
The union sought a hearing before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to get access to Farah’s workers in January 1970. On January 7, 1971, the National Labor Relations Board ruled that Farah had “discriminatorily” fired Gonzalez in 1969 for attempting to form a union. The NLRN ordered Farah to “cease and desist” from discouraging the formation of a union at the plant. It also ordered that Gonzalez be reinstated. Farah, all but ignored the ruling, and instead hunkered down believing that the controversy would end soon.
As Amalgamated and Farah employees were fighting for the right to unionize, Farah was rapidly growing its business footprint in New Mexico and in Texas. Hidden behind the growth and the overwhelming Mexican-American workforce hid the anti-immigrant stance that Farah, an immigrant himself, had been hiding. On September 22, 1971, Farah’s disdain for immigrants peeked out through a ruling from U.S. District Judge D.W. Suttle. Suttle ruled that Farah’s “policy of hiring only citizens of the United States is discriminatory.” Legal resident, Cecilia Espinoza, who was married to a U.S. citizen had applied for work at Farah’s San Antonio plant. Espinoza sued after she was denied a job in 1969 because she was not a citizen, although she was a legal resident with work authorization.
Willie Farah was pro-American to the point that he purchased “only materials, machines and supplies made in the U.S.,” and that the company only sold to American companies in the country. He also refused to hire legal workers who were not American citizens. Farah told The New York Times that it was “the worst form of treason for the American Businessman to use labor to the detriment of American labor.”
The seemingly innocuous court ruling requiring Farah to hire legal immigrants, even if they were not U.S. citizens would begin to expose that for all the glitz behind the 1970 advertorials of putting workers first, was the reality that William Farah viewed his workers behind the system of Patron-Peon, where he was the patrón and his workers should be grateful for the work and amenities he provided them without the social dignity that the strikers wanted from him.
UTEP’s professor of political sciences, Melvin P. Straus, explained in 1974 the labor relationship at Farah to The New York Times when he told the newspaper that Farah’s workers were “in economic bondage.”
The Strike
On May 2, 1972, a walkout began at the two San Antonio plants over the firing of one, or three employees depending on who was talking about the strike. Disinformation was the response from the company from the beginning, and it would be its modus-operandi until it was forced to capitulate two years later. By the next day, 200 to 400 employees were on strike.
Part of Farah’s disinformation would lead to erroneous news media reports saying that the strike started in El Paso, it did not, and the number of strikers would vary between the two local newspapers, likely influenced by El Paso’s leadership who tried to portray a picture of a few disgruntled employees as the nation started to look closer at El Paso.
Farah Vice President, Joe Chemali, told the San Express that business at the Farah plants continued “as usual.” According to Chemali, the labor dispute was over the firing of one employee, while the spokeswoman for the strikers, Joan Suarez, said it was over the firing of three employees that led to the strike. Chemali said that about 250 employees were striking while Suarez said the number was 400.
Workers at Farah’s Gateway plant joined the strike nine days later, when 400 El Paso Farah employees walked off the job on May 9, 1972. According to Farah’s attorney, Kenn Carr, Farah had begun hiring replacement workers to replace the striking workers. Willie Farah, a staunch anti-unionist said that “he would let his machinery rust before he surrendered to unionization.”
By the next day, Farah workers began to strike at the two other El Paso plants.
On May 12, 1972, El Paso Judge George Rodriguez, Jr. signed an order prohibiting “further walkouts.” Farah employees in El Paso had started to stage work stoppages, “wildcat strikes,” and Farah responded by locking the plant doors to limit the workers’ ability to walkout during the day. The order was served on Amalgamated’s business manager, Antonio Sanchez. Rodriguez issued an injunction prohibiting the union from “engaging in any violence, threats, property damage,” and restricted pickets “to 50 feet” away from Farah properties.
One of the state representatives at the time, Paul Moreno, announced that he would be backing the Farah strikers. He was the first public official to support the strikers, and one of the few who did. El Paso’s elite and political leaders remained silent or publicly opposed the strikers.
Although over 400 workers had gone on strike, Farah told the El Paso Herald Post that only 70 people were on strike on May 15, 1972. Gordon Foster, Farah vice president added that only two people were on strike in San Antonio and 12 had walked out of the Las Cruces plant. Foster characterized the walkouts over the last ten days as “the last desperate attempt on the part of the union to disrupt operations at Farah.”
Warrants Issued Against Strikers
Publicly, Farah was telling the public that it was operating at full capacity and that the strike was fizzling out. But behind the scenes, El Paso business owners and political elites were becoming concerned. On May 17, 1972, El Paso Justice of the Peace, Bob Lewis issued 189 warrants for the arrest of the strikers for violating the law against mass picketing. Violation of the state’s mass picketing law required picketers not to interfere or intimidate workers attempting to enter or leave. Farah officials had been photographing the strikers so that they could be arrested when the warrants were issued, suggesting that the arrests were part of the intimidation tactics against the strikers.
Amalgamated paid the $400 bond for each worker as they voluntarily surrendered to the sheriff’s office to be processed. The union argued that new arrests days later of 125 strikers, along with the previous arrests were “discriminatory and excessive.”
In June 1972, Antonio Sanchez, the Amalgamated representative, was fined $250 and ordered jailed for six months for contempt of court by Rodriguez for violating the mass picketing state law. Rodriguez suspended the jail term if Sanchez did not violate the mass picketing state law again. By June, over 500 Farah strikers had been charged with violating the state statue against mass picketing.
The arrests would later reveal that there was more in play than the state law against mass-picketing. Lewis would be redistricted out of office and his attempts to make money from the arrests failed. The law itself was deemed unconstitutional.
About a month after the first charges were filed against the picketers, the county attorney had yet to prosecute any of them. Also, a three-judge appeal court in Brownsville had struck down several labor laws, including the one used in El Paso against the strikers on June 27, 1972, as unconstitutional. The case that the appeals court ruled on was a 1967 case involving the arrests of striking farm workers by Texas Rangers.
The sheriff’s department’s role was to serve the arrest warrants and process the defendants, who all voluntarily turned themselves in and paid the bond to get out of jail. The El Paso police said they were not involved in the cases, and the county attorney was not prosecuting the cases. While the strikers were alleging that the arrest warrants were part of Farah’s intimidation tactics, the only one benefiting from the arrest warrants was Justice of the Peace Bob Lewis who was issuing the arrest warrants against the protestors. Lewis was to make $5 for each warrant he issued.
There is a discrepancy between the El Paso Times and the El Paso Herald Post as to how many picketers were charged with misdemeanors by Lewis. According to the Post, it was 500 and the Times said it was between 800 and 1,000. The New York Times, without attribution, supported the Times’ count of 1,000 arrest warrants issued by Lewis.
Before the arrests in January 1972, then-County Judge Udell Moore started looking on how to coordinate how the county paid its justices of the peace. Two downtown JPs were paid salaries while the nine other JPs were on a fee basis. For the JPs working on the fee basis system, criminal cases allowed them to keep more if the money from the court fees than the civil cases. Lewis generated $30,242 in fees for the county but was keeping $28,671 for himself, the highest amount of the JPs. In 1974, the county commissioners abolished three justices of the peace offices, including Lewis’ precinct. The three former JPs unsuccessfully sued the county, and Lewis ran for county judge against Moore. After losing, Lewis opened a burrito restaurant and unsuccessfully ran for JP again in 1982. In 1981, Lewis was arrested for kicking a woman at a bar.
In response to Moore’s move to disband his office, Lewis announced that he would begin holding trials for the strikers in his court room, even though the county attorney had yet to start any prosecutions. Lewis set the trial date for July 24, 1972 for everyone he had issued arrest warrants for. After the county attorney’s office refused to send prosecutors to the hearings, Lewis was forced to dismiss the charges in each case. Nonetheless, Lewis submitted an invoice to the county for $2,000 in fees he said was owed to him for the warrants he had issued in the Farah case. The county refused to pay Lewis.
Farah’s attempts to force the strikers to end their strike created deep animosity between the Farah family and the strikers to the point that Hana Abihider, the Lebanese mother of Willie Farah was charged with running down a picket while driving through the plant gates. Meanwhile, the union was escalating the fight against Farah by organizing a national boycott of its products.
The Farah National Boycott
Amalgamated began organizing pickets in support of the Farah strikers in Chicago, New York and San Fracisco where Farah also had manufacturing plants operating, and stores selling his products. The union launched its successful campaign asking consumers not to buy Farah products.
By 1974, the boycott organized with the help of AFL-CIO had turned $6 million in profits before the strike into $8 million in losses by 1974. It was this campaign that led to the eventual closure of Farah Manufacturing years later and not NAFTA as often characterized in contemporary history.
Boycott leaders said that the drop in Farah’s revenues and the suspension of the 11.4 cent dividend the stock was paying proved how successful the boycott was while Willie Farah said it little effect on his company.
On May 20, 1972 Farah paid for half-page advertisement in the El Paso Herald Post listing 14 reasons how Farah values its employees. The advertisement, which was signed by “Happy Employees at Farah,” included that they did not want a union because they were “satisfied FARAH employees.” From the advertisement, the strikers took to calling the non-striking Farah employees, “the happies,” although for the most part there was little animosity between both groups. Later many of “the happies” would go on to vote to form a union. although some strikers were not happy that “the happies” had a seat at the table during the negotiations to settle the strike. Other similar half page advertisements from Farah appeared in the Albuquerque Journal, The Albuquerque Tribune and the San Antonio Express/News newspapers in May 1972.
While Farah continued to insist that production continued at the plants, the arrest warrants were just the first step in trying to intimidate the strikers. Farah brought in dogs that “growled and barked ferociously” as part of their security. Leashed, but unmuzzled dogs were moved closer to the picket lines at times to intimidate the strikers.
Although it was William Farah’s policy not to hire legal non-citizens at his plants until a court ordered him to stop discriminating against workers legally authorized to work, the U.S. Department of Labor ordered immigration officials to deny entry into the U.S. Green Card holders seeking jobs at Farah. Why the labor department felt the need to intervene in the strike in this form is not known, but limiting workers from Juárez only helped the strikers.
The union escalated the controversy by contracting people to hold pickets in front of New York department stores asking shoppers not to buy Farah clothing as part of its national boycott. Other pickets appeared asking shoppers not buy Farah clothing in front of department stores in Chicago, Detroit and San Antonio.
On September 12, 1972, William Farah told shareholders that “there has been little indication to date,” that consumers “were paying attention to the boycott effort,” and that the demand for Farah’s goods remained strong.
This was not true.
Behind-the-scenes William Farah was feeling the pressure of the ongoing strike against his company, especially since it was making national headlines. In early June 1972, after then-U.S. Senator Edward “Ted” Kennedy delivered a speech to the 28th Biennial Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America Convention, Farah sent him a telegram complaining that Kennedy did not have all the facts. Writing that Americans “expect more of public figures than indiscriminate allegations on unsubstantiated information…it is indeed unfortunate” that Kennedy made statements “without having the facts.” Farah added that “wages and working conditions are not the real issue,” the issue Farah wrote was that the union wanted the $500,000 a year in union dues, “from the majority of Farah employees” who did not want a union.
Farah also closed its Albuquerque manufacturing plant on July 1, 1972, while telling anyone that was paying attention that Farah was operating normally. Before the strike ended, the governors of Maine and Kentucky publicly endorsed the boycott against Farah, and the Catholic Church would become instrumental in helping the strikers.
The Catholic Church Gets Involved
In early June 1972, El Paso Catholic Bishop Sidney M. Metzger issued a letter to the strikers. Metzger was responding to a letter that Antonio Sanchez, the union representative, had sent him. In it, Metzer wrote that the strikers were justified in demanding a living wage. Metzger agreed that the strikers were not Communist, as they had been accused, and that striking is “sometimes the only way to get a living wage.” Metzger added that the Church “has to defend demands of social justice.”
Both the Texas Conference of Churches and the National Catholic Conference publicly endorsed the strikers. The Catholic Church would go on to be important to the strike as it provided the strikers with credibility against Farah’s propaganda campaigns and the lack of support by El Paso’s leadership. Farah complained that the Church’s involvement was “hard to accept,” because “everyone here is Catholic but me.” Although the Church was supporting the strikers and national attention began to focus on El Paso, the city’s leadership kept trying to pretend all was well with only a few strikers walking picket lines.
The Strikers Surprise Everyone, Including The Union
By the second year of the strike, an Amalgamated official told The New York Times that they were “astonished” that the San Antonio plant went on strike. They added that the union was not “ready for a strike at Farah for another two to three years.” They “figured it would last two or three days and then they would quietly go back,” because “historically, the Mexican-American community hasn’t been cohesive enough to sustain this type of strike.”
On the surface, Farah looked like it was weathering the controversy over the strike. Going into its second year, around 20% of Farah’s original workforce was striking. From the outside it looked like Farah was able to bring in more Mexican-American workers to replace the strikers and operations looked normal to the news media. But William Farah, who regularly accepted media interviews, had retreated behind the high razor-wired fences at the Gateway plant and Farah’s public relations firm, Carl Byoir & Associates had returned to New York.
As The New York Times described it, by the second year, the strike had “settled into a kind of holy war of attrition.” For striker Benjamin Robles, the strike was “now a personal thing between me and Willie Farah.”
Farah, though, had the support of El Paso’s business and political elite.
During the annual El Paso Chamber of Commerce dinner on September 26, 1972, then Chamber president, George Janzen told the attendees that “the truth has been obscured and concealed and individuals far from the source of the problem are making flat statement for public gain without full investigation of both sides of the issue.” Janzen was alluding to the “bad publicity” El Paso was receiving from the boycott by saying that those outside of the city supported the strikers while El Pasoan’s supported Willie Farah and his company.
Janzen went on to complain that “some of the nation’s most prominent politicians who deal themselves in against the company without sufficient knowledge of the facts,” were creating the national attention against El Paso. Janzen was referring to national politicians like Kennedy supporting the strikers openly.
As for the boycott, Janzen said that El Paso supports “Farah and all their employes [sic] in their desire for a constructive and just decision in the dispute.” He concluded with “when Farah products are being boycotted in a nationwide action, fair treatment and an equal hearing are not possible.”
Willie Farah continued to argue in 1973 that his company was weathering the boycott, but the financial filings betrayed the reality that the company was losing money.
Ted Houghton Tells Consumers About Exciting New Fashion From Farah
Meanwhile, the company’s marketing department was busy pretending everything was fine telling consumers and department store buyers that the 1973 fashion forecast for men’s and boys’ pants were “brighter colors, bolder patterns and cuffs up to 1-1/2 inches wide.” E. C. “Ted” Houghton was hired by Farah Manufacturing in November 1971 and promoted to vice-president of senior marketing officer on September 6, 1972. He told the newspapers covering fashion in January 1973 that “people feel more affluent and are spending more on clothes because dressing up is the best way to show how they feel.” Houghton added that Farah had introduced another trending style, plaids in an “unconstructed design.”
Unconstructed design in apparel is marketed as relaxed fitting wear because they lack underneath structured elements that require precise tailoring to make them look good. The lack of having to match seams means that it requires less time to make and can be made by less qualified seamstresses. In essence, the unconstructed design allowed Farah to make clothing cheaper and with less qualified workers. Houghton said that the unconstructed design eliminated some components from its slacks, like inside waist lining and rear pockets. But, Houghton said, the new design had “absolutely no reduction in quality of fabric or workmanship.” The new design further betrayed the economic impact on Farah the strikers were having on it.
With no end to the controversy in sight as 1974 started, the fight between Farah and the strikers had turned into a complicated controversy that had captivated a national audience.
A Clash of Two Cultures
While the local news media was focused on the strike’s local impact on the El Paso economy, the national media saw it for what it was – a clash between the White elite establishment of El Paso against the Mexican-American majority of the city. On February 4, 1974, The New York Times said that the fight to allow a union at Farah was “a struggle to try to break the domination by Anglo-Saxon Protestants of predominantly Mexican-American and Catholic El Paso.”
The newspaper added that Willie Farah had “at least the tacit approval of many of El Paso’s top businessmen and bankers as well as the city administration and the Chamber of Commerce.” El Paso’s local news media generally followed the same playbook of tacit support for the White establishment over the Hispanics strikers, while the national news media saw it for what it was, a class struggle between the White elite being challenged by the majority minority of El Paso. El Paso residents generally didn’t view the controversy as a culture war, but rather as an issue of the “cheap labor,” that El Paso was known for.
The strike had also become a clash between the Roman Catholic Church and Willie Farah. Both Farah and Rev. Sydney Metzger both said they would never capitulate. Both would refer to the Farah workers and strikers as “my people.” “My people” is patriarchal on its face. For both, notwithstanding their rhetoric, the strikers were the peons in this battle for control.
Farah argued that “if trying to do the right thing” for his workers, means “being paternalistic,” then he would accept that.
During the first week of January 1974, one article appeared in numerous newspapers across the country. The article by Eloy Aguilar of the Associated Press focused on the clash between the “business tycoon and the El Paso bishop.” The article laid out the battle lines between the Farah strikers and the owner who refused to accept that Farah could be unionized. On January 9, 1974, the article appeared in 30 or so newspapers like The Progress in Pennsylvania to The Lima News in Ohio. By January 3rd, the article had been published across the country.
Buoyed by the national boycott, the goliath versus the Mexican-American women manning picket lines in El Paso had caught the attention of the American people. A propaganda video produced by the union would further expose the underling class struggle driving the controversy.
The People vs. Willie Farah
The Citizens Committee for Justice for Farah Workers produced a video titled The People vs. Willie Farah in 1973. The video starts with an interview with Roberto Reyes who had worked at Farah since 1965. According to Reyes, supervisors at Farah were “pushing workers like slaves.” Reyes explained that supervisors would approach workers from behind and make smacking sounds, like one would make for a mule to start moving. Reyes said that the only thing missing was the whip. One Farah women worker described how she witnessed “papa Willie,” like Willie Farah, was often addressed on the factory floor yelling at another women worker because she forgot to add material to a belt she was working on. According to the woman, she heard William Farah yell at the worker, “why you dirty Mexican!”
When the strike started, the video says that Willie Farah said that “with that filth gone, the plant is more cohesive,” crediting The Los Angeles Times.
In 1979, a fight broke out at the Education Building at UTEP after sociologist professor Julio Rivera showed the film. Rivera told investigators that the fight did not involve UTEP students, “but two rival factions from off the campus.” Members of the Revolutionary Communist Party had asked the professor if he would allow them to speak to the class. Rivera denied the request, but the group stayed to watch the movie. After the movie, members of the communist group told The Prospector that they were attacked by “activists.” No arrests were made in the fracas.
Willie Farah tried his best to show that the strikers were losing their struggle against the company, regularly saying that Farah’s finances were doing fine, but behind the curtain, things were not good for the company.
Willie Farah Starts To Feel The Pressure
As 1974 got underway, the two-culture clash was starting to sway El Paso’s leaders towards finding a solution for the strike before it was too late for the Farah company to recover. With El Paso’s economy in danger, it was now time for the city’s elite to circle the wagons to protect themselves. Willie Farah was now saying that he would allow an election to see if his employees wanted a union, arguing that the union didn’t want one because they feared losing. This would be another lie.
Three elections had been held by this point. The first one overwhelmingly supported a union. Farah appealed leading to a second and third election. The second election was stopped by the union citing unfair tactics by Farah. In the third election, the union lost and they appealed the results.
But the economic impact forced the El Paso City Council to call for another union vote at Farah. Mayor Fred Harvey said that the union vote was essential “to halt the nationwide boycott of Farah products.” The January 3, 1974 city council resolution, prepared by Harvey, stated that Farah was “of prime importance…to the economic wellbeing of El Paso,” and that the city council “recognized that the closing of the Farah plant would severely cripple the economic life” of El Paso. The city council approved the resolution calling for the National Relations Board to supervise a union election at Farah.
The lead figures in the controversy by 1974 were Willie Farah versus Amalgamated’s Emilio Molleda as well as the Farah employees on the two sides of the picket lines. For Suelma Barraza, a 26-year-old divorced mother of a six-year-old, Farah offered “so many benefits” that other jobs had not offered her. Her “happiness was shattered” when the two Farah plants were closed. Willie Farah told the San Antonio employees “that they were out of jobs because of the successful nationwide boycott,” The battle between the two and the involvement of the Church was being characterized as Texas industrialists versus the Church in newspapers across the country, from Montana to Florida.
Mayor Hervey and then-alderman Ruben Schaeffer organized a meeting between Farah and Amalgamated representatives on January 16 to discuss a solution to the strike. After meeting for two hours, the two parties emerged only to say that a follow up meeting was to be scheduled, after their “amicable” meeting that day. It would be revealed later that several secret meetings were being held.
As much as Willie Farah tried to portray the union as the abusive one in the controversy, a court ruling on January 28, 1974, further added pressure to Farah. In a scathing ruling, Walter H. Maloney Jr. ordered Farah to rehire six employees the company had “illegally” fired in San Antonio. The judge’s order was characterized as “one of the harshest decisions ever handed down by labor authorities.” In his order, Maloney wrote that Farah “has been repeatedly directed to mend its lawless ways and yet it continues on as if nothing happened, pursuing its policy of flouting the act and trampling on the rights of its employees as if there were no (Labor Relations) act, no board and no ten commandments.”
In addition, the judge ordered other several requirements like posting for three weeks bilingual notices at its plants that the company “would desist from unfair labor practices,” and provide the union with a list of current and past employees. One other requirement was “highly unusual” for a case like this. It was the requirement that Farah pay the expenses of the union and the NLRB for having to litigate the reinstatement of the fired employees. The judge wrote that the unusual order was because of the company’s “repetition of the same kind of pervasive and serious unfair labor practices.”
True to form, the following day Farah announced it would appeal the judgement. Farah accused the judge of using “inflammatory and vitriolic language” in his decision.
But the pressure from the boycott was starting to force Willie Farah into conceding to the strikers. On February 8, 1974, the company announced it had entered discussions with the union to discuss “a possible solution to its labor controversy.”
In what appears to be a last-ditch effort to stop the union, Willie Farah addressed the Texas Conference of Churches on February 18, 1974. He told the members that the group had “committed an error and gave injustice in 1973 by supporting” the nationwide boycott against Farah. Farah added that “no one can fail to see that a boycott of this type is cruel and destructive.” Adding, Farah said that the boycott had “forced the closing of four plants,” and “deprived 5,000 people of their jobs.” While Farah was imploring the church group to drop its support of the boycott in Fort Worth, rumors were starting to leak out in El Paso that an agreement had been reached between the union and the company. Al Herman, spokesperson for Farah, said that there was no agreement yet.
Days after addressing the church group, Willie Farah complained that his appearance before the group “was ‘rigged’ against him.” It was clear the boycott had forced Farah to capitulate, but Willie Farah was still trying hard to find a way to win the controversy. The church group voted on February 20, 1974 to continue supporting the boycott against Farah and asked Farah to hold a secret election as soon as possible asking employees if they wanted a union.
El Paso’s business leaders also continued to support Farah, as a February 22, 1974 editorial in the El Paso Times explains. The Times editor, William Ignatius Latham, wrote in his editorial that the “El Paso Times has repeatedly, in editorials, taken a position backing the Farah company” and “attacking” the union “for their position and tactics” in the strike. Latham added that the newspaper “most times” referred to the strike as “a walkout,” and not “a strike.” Latham titled his editorial, “Setting It Straight,” and explained that he was responding to an editorial in the St. Cloud Visitor, a Catholic newspaper that stated that “in El Paso Farah is losing support even from the local business people, and local papers have made no move to support Farah.” Latham’s editorial title and the inclusion of “losing support even from local business people,” suggests that Latham was speaking both for his newspaper and El Paso’s business community.
That same day, the El Paso Herald-Post’s frontpage headline said it all, “Farah Strike Settlement Reached.” In an “exclusive,” the newspaper announced that an agreement had been reached to settle the dispute. According to the newspaper, “secret” meetings had been held over five weeks. It was later revealed that the “secret” meetings were being held at the Airport Hilton.
Farah and the union had agreed that Farah would allow Amalgamated to bargain for all employees and that the union would end the boycott. The official announcement would be made two days later.
Farah Strike Ends 21 Months After It Started
On February 24, 1974, the labor strike in Texas and New Mexico ended almost 22 months after it started when Farah capitulated and agreed to rehire the 3,000 strikers and accept their right to organize a labor union. What started as a labor dispute quickly evolved into a “long controversy [that] was marked by nationwide boycotts against the company and by ethnic, religious and political factors,” as The New York Times characterized it. Against the strikers, 85% of which were Mexican-Americans, were the business and political leaders of El Paso.
Although an agreement had been reached that the union would be allowed into Farah and the union would call off the boycott, the mechanics of the settlement still needed to be worked out. Talks to finalize the settlement began in March 1974. Two weeks before the announcement, 67% of Farah employees had signed union cards asking to recognize Amalgamated as their union representative. The union pledge cards count was conducted under the supervision of Fred Hervey as both sides agreed he was to be the impartial observer.
For his part, Willie Farah said that he was “pleased” that the controversy had been settled and that he would reopen the two closed San Antonio plants and one each in Victoria, Texas and Las Cruces, New Mexico. But Farah’s attorney, Kenn Carr, contradicted Farah saying that the reopening of plants depended on sales and that there were no plans to open the Las Cruces or Victoria plants.
Carr added that the first order of business was for the company restore its name across the country as it had become “synonymous” with “exploitation and intolerable working conditions.”
Willie Farah had lost both the union fight and control of his company, but he didn’t know it yet.
As the strikers celebrated the end of the fight, some in El Paso were not overly happy. According to an El Paso Times article on February 25, 1974, without a byline, unnamed city leaders called the settlement “one of the most profound changes in the personality of El Paso since the advent of the railroad.” It was felt that “for better or worse, the Farah settlement marked a turning point in the social development of the El Paso Southwest.” To some in El Paso, the settlement either “means El Paso is coming of age or that it is being robbed of its individuality,” but what everyone seemed to agree on is that El Paso “will never be the same again.”
According to Mayor Hervey, the strike had cost the city “millions” and “almost wrecked our business in El Paso.” Farah had lost between $4 to $5 million from the national boycott. The boycott had driven the Farah stock down from $30 a share in 1972 to a low of $3.25. It had closed at $8 a share the Friday before the settlement was announced. The one thing everyone seemed to agree on was that the boycott was successfully used to force Willie Farah to capitulate in the end.
Behind the smiling faces and cordial handshakes hid almost two years of animosity that briefly resurfaced at the meeting announcing the settlement when a group of strikers broke into the meet hall in New York and chanted that “Farah workers broke the ass of Willie Farah and his class.”
The strike had ended, but Willie Farah was facing further fights to save his company, one from family members and another from the bankers loaning him money to help his company survive. But before the fights came the contract.
Contract Signed
During the May 6, 1974 annual stockholders meeting, Willie Farah said that the ratification of the labor contract the next day would return the company to profitability, and at some point, the dividend the company paid investors in the past. On March 7, 1974, employees in El Paso and former employees in San Antonio were presented the details of the agreement between Farah and the union for ratification. The company had announced it would reopen the San Antonio plants.
El Paso and former San Antonio Farah employees “overwhelmingly” ratified the 3-year labor contract on March 7, officially ending the strike. Not all employees were happy with the contract. Striker Martin Dilhierro said that the strikers got “peanuts back.” However, another striker, Adan Gonzalez said that “for a first contract, I think it’s pretty good.”
Among the contract’s labor benefits were time-and-a-half pay for overtime and Saturday work and double-time for Sunday, and holiday work. Farah employees also received job security and seniority rights under the new three-year contract. Additionally, the contract included a provision for union engineers to check production standards.
The settlement contract left many workers confused about what it is they achieved by striking. Although pay had increased slightly, the quota system that led many to strike remained. As striker Nellie Reyes told the El Paso Times, “we still have a quota so they’re paying us just a little bit more for the same work.” The new starting pay was $1.90 per hour. Adan Gonzalez, however, argued that “to have a union we had to sacrifice for the betterment of everybody,” adding that “we can’t get back everything we lost while we were out, and I didn’t expect to…but, it’s a beginning.”
Although there was optimism among the workers and the company’s leadership that Farah would recover from the boycott, it remained an illusion. When Farah settled its labor dispute, there were around 73 clothing manufacturers in El Paso employing around 16,000 workers. Farah accounted for around 6,000 of the El Paso employees. The largest garment manufacturers at the time included Mann Manufacturing, Billy the Kid, Inc. and Levi-Straus and Co. Except for Mann, the top garment manufacturers were now unionized.
Economically, Farah was doing all it could to recover economically. In April 1974, it reopened the two San Antonio plants. Although Farah was reporting increased sales, its profits were trending lower.
Another threat loomed for Farah and El Paso’s garment manufacturers, the maquilas and a free trade agreement with México. Although maquilas, or twin-plants had been operating in México since the mid-1960’s, it wasn’t until the late-1980’s when they started to affect US manufacturing. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) did not go into effect until ten years after Farah settled its strike. It would be blamed for Farah’s closing by contemporary historians who ignore the company’s profit margins hidden behind rising sales reports. Understanding how loans, reduced costs and money from a lawsuit shows that Farah’s failure years down the road can be traced directly to the successful union boycott of Farah products. The fact is that Farah never fully recovered from the boycott.
The strike empowered El Paso’s labor movement and was the blueprint for other labor movements across the country, but for the Farah workers, the success of the boycott was also the reason their victory was short-lived.
The End of Farah
On October 31, 1974, Amalgamated’s president, Murray H. Finley, announced that the union’s former target, Farah Manufacturing and the union would join to fight El Paso’s “twin plant concept.” “This twin plant concept enables American companies in El Paso to exploit cheap Mexican labor by establishing assembly plants in Juarez,” said Finley. According to him, five percent of El Paso’s manufacturing was being done in El Paso, while the rest was being completed in Juárez.
The former opponents were now united against a common foe – Mexican labor.
It took 24 years for Farah to close, but by 1974, the writing was on the wall, Farah could not survive the damage from the boycott. Free trade, a bank proxy and intra-family fight would only make things worse.
Contemporary history teaches that Farah Manufacturing’s end came about because of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) because manufacturing had moved to México. But the reality is Farah’s sales dropped by 40% because of the strike and they never recovered from there. By 1975, only the five plants in El Paso remained operational. On February 20, 1975, Farah had shuttered its two San Antonio plants and laid off 1,200 employees.
About three years after the strike had ended, the economic impact of it on Farah could be seen in its financial reports. In the third quarter of 1976, the company reported losses of $3.5 million. Before the strike, in 1971, Farah had reported a net income of $1.6 million, up from $1.5 million the year before. Now it was reporting regular losses.
In 1976, Farah delayed releasing its annual financial report after the company’s auditors; Peat, Marwick and Mitchell refused to certify that the company’s finances were healthy. Farah was forced to use its plant and equipment as collateral to borrow $22 million, in addition to the $11 million in loans it already had. Under pressure from the lending banks, Willie Farah removed himself as president and chief executive officer of the company in 1976, leaving William C. Leone in charge of the company’s operations. Farah remained the largest stockholder.
The banks had become impatient with Willie Farah. As for Farah, himself, in response to questions about changes in the leadership of the company and declining sales, he told The New York Times on August 15, 1976 that “we love everything that is happening,” and that he was “happy as the devil.”
Three lender banks had demanded a provision in the loan documents that effectively kept Willie Farah from regaining control of Farah. One of the lending banks was State National Bank. Nonetheless, Willie Farah wanted back control of the company, often criticizing the current leadership and threatening to boycott an annual meeting to force it to end for lack of a quorum. In between Willie Farah had gone from chairman of the board, to board member to returning as the chairman without the title of president. During the April 18, 1978 board meeting, the company’s bylaws had been changed to allow the chairman of the board to actively manage the company while the company had no president. Willie Farah had regained control of the company without the title of president.
Since his resignation in 1977, Willie Farah had mounted a proxy fight to elect his own board of directors and fought off a family lawsuit for control of the family’s stock in the company. Now back in control of the company, Willie Farah removed 20 top-level employees. For the first time in the company’s history, Farah defaulted on a loan payment due in June 1978. The following month, Farah accused the banks of conspiring against him.
The Bank Fight
On July 31, 1978, Farah Manufacturing filed a lawsuit against State National Bank accusing it of “wrongfully” acquiring control of Farah “for its own benefit.” Willie Farah also sued Prudential Insurance Co. in federal court for similar charges. Farah sued State National Bank for $68 million in losses, the money Farah lost over three years, and $136 million in exemplary damages. Former Farah employee, Ted Houghton had become vice-president of State National Bank after leaving Farah in 1975.
According to the lawsuit, a “last-minute covenant” in the loan agreements had forced Willie Farah out of the company. Farah was referring to the 1976 loan provision that required Willie Farah to step-aside before the banks would loan the company money it needed to be certified by its auditors “as a going concern.” Without the loans, Farah was essentially bankrupt.
State National Bank president, Hal Daugherty, responded to the lawsuit by saying that because Farah Manufacturing was “critical to the economy” of El Paso, his bank, along with three other banks did its best to help “resolve the company’s financial problems.”
Meanwhile, to help shore up its bottom line, Farah sold its manufacturing plant on Gateway for $18 million to six investors led by Sam Attaguile. Attaguile had partnered up with five unnamed Mexican investors to buy the building. Most of the purchase price, $14.8 million, would go towards the company’s loans. Farah Manufacturing would continue to operate at the location under a 30-year lease.
During this time, Farah opened a new plant on Paisano and had two other smaller plants operating, along with the Gateway plant. Economically, the financial reports suggested increased sales but financially, the company was still struggling. Loans were what kept the company operating. Through 1981, Farah reported increased sales publicly, but it was, at best, a house-of-cards supported by selling buildings and leasing them back, borrowing money and leasing parts of the plants to companies like Atari to manufacture game cartridges.
In addition to his battle with the banks, Farah was also being sued by Billy the Kid for infringing on its labels. Billy the Kid sued in 1979, and in 1981, the court ordered Farah to stop using labels that resembled the ones been used by Billy the Kid. Farah had started using a label with “Pat Garret” as part of its denim apparel. The ruling would cost Farah “enormous” amounts of time and money to make changes to its labels. It was Willie Farah who had the idea to use “Pat Garret” as a brand for a boy’s line in 1978.
The bank trial started on November 2, 1981.
Paid ‘Jurors’ And A Courtroom Mockup
During three days of testimony, Willie Farah told the jury that the banks were selling off Farah plants, and equipment at losses to pay off loans. Farah alleged that the loans were being settled before they were due. Farah told the jury that he had turned the company towards profitably after he regained control. In cross examination, Robert Blumenfeld, representing the bank, asked Farah if it was true that a mockup of the courtroom had been built at the Farah plant to allow Willie Farah to practice his testimony. Farah agreed that he used the mockup to prepare for his testimony.
Farah, in addition to building the courtroom mockup, paid people $60 a day to sit as practice jurors as he practiced how he would testify in the court hearing. The practice sessions included “questioning by friendly and hostile lawyers,” Farah told the jury. Farah was then coached by a psychologist about his body language.
Farah was again attracting national attention. In the case of the boycott, the national attention on Farah was the battle between the company leadership and the workers and how the boycott was playing out in the saga. The latest attention was whether banks had the right to influence the management decisions of companies. Farah was opening banks up to liability with his lawsuit.
During final arguments, another lawyer stepped in to make the case for State National Bank, Ray Caballero. On December 30, 1981, Caballero told the jury that “if anyone damaged the company,” it was Willie Farah. Caballero added that Farah “was in deep trouble even before State National Bank and other lenders became involved.” The turnaround of Farah Manufacturing that Willie Farah was taking credit for was the result of the leadership that Farah accused of auctioning off company assets, Caballero said. The selloff of assets helped to reduce costs for the company that helped Farah show profits. Caballero told the jury that he wished Farah “had spent half as much time doing research and marketing its product as it did in the research and marketing of this lawsuit.” Caballero was referring to Willie Farah’s testimony practice at his courtroom mockup and paid practice jury.
Jury Finds For Willie Farah
After several days of deliberations, the seven-women and five-man jury awarded Willie Farah $18.9 million on January 14, 1982. Immediately the banks said they would appeal. The jury voted 10 to two for Farah, after deliberating for eight days. State National Banks’ liability was five percent of the verdict, after the banks reached an agreement when the lawsuit was filed on how they would split the liability if needed.
The banks agreed to pay Farah $14.5 million to settle the 1982 verdict in February 1985.
In December 1982, Farah Manufacturing announced “the highest sales and highest net income of any quarter or any fiscal year in its history.” It reported net sales of $194.3 million in fiscal year 1982 with a net income of $15.5 million. Farah, however, acknowledged that the financial figures included the sale of company property and the reduction of interest on $30 million the company did not have to pay. Behind the figures being reported in the news media lay the truth that the company wasn’t recovering as the figures seemed to show. Layoffs and plant closures betrayed the dire reality of the company.
As the company was reporting record-breaking earnings, it was also laying off employees. It also shut down its Las Cruces plant on April 11, 1985. The 1985 quarterly reports did not show strong financial numbers for Farah. For the first quarter of 1985, the company was set to report lower earnings for the company. Instead, the company reported $9.1 million in earnings helped by the $7.4 million that the company received from the lawsuit settlement. Of the $14.5 million the company was to receive, it only received $7.4 million after court costs, taxes and attorney fees. Farah applied the $7.4 million towards outstanding loans.
Then on January 13, 1986, Farah announced that it was considering making the company private. The Farah family owned 34% of the company’s shares and was considering purchasing the remaining shares to take control of the company. Willie Farah told the El Paso Herald Post that there was “a million and one beautiful reasons” to become a private company, including “when you’re public, everybody knows what you’re doing.” In February, the union and Farah agreed to freeze wages for three years, betraying the financial problems the company was facing behind glowing sales reports. Union manager Antonio Sanchez said that the workers understood the threat from foreign competitors.
Twin plan manufacturing was increasing across the border and although it had an effect on Farah, the danger of foreign competition was masking that behind the sales figures Farah was announcing after settling the strike and Willie Farah took back the company was that the sales figures hid loans, ongoing expense reductions, assets selloffs and lawsuit settlements that were used to prop of Farah’s finances. Layoffs continued to be a regular occurrence with 300 sewing machine operators laid off the year before. But, as union officials were asking the Farah employees to accept wage freezes because of foreign competition, Willie Farah was moving production to Juárez. According to union, the Farah Juárez operation was a loss of 4,000 jobs.
On April 11, 1986, more bad news signaled the economic problems Farah was trying to hide behind sales reports when the company announced it would close its Paisano plant and lay off the 1,000 employees there. The work that was being done at the Paisano plant was now being done in Asia, the Caribbean and México. Willie Farah – who had refused to hire legal Mexican workers at his US plants – had embraced the twin plants while blaming job losses to them.
Farah’s 1986 fiscal income report also demonstrated that behind the sales figures and dividend payments remained the problem from the 1970’s that although sales were up, income continued to be endemic for the company that needed money to survive. Reporting a 14% increase in sales, Farah also reported that income had dropped by 60%. Loan and lawsuit bailouts were running out for the company.
By 1987, things were getting worse for Farah. On February 9, 1987, Farah announced that the US government was seeking to fine it $25.5 million for not paying $464,000 in import duties. U.S. Customs charged Farah for fraud for not reporting goods that were subject to duties.
Under the twin-plant scheme, certain products paid import duties on the “value-added” to the product in México. Generally, manufacturers would take American raw materials or partially finished products into México to finish them into consumer products. The Mexican labor used to assemble the products were taxed while the American raw materials or partially assembled products were exempt. From 1982 to 1985, Farah had spent $1.5 million building a plant in Torreón, México. U.S. Customs was alleging that Farah should have paid duties on its investment in Torreón as value-added taxes.
As 1988 drew to a close, the end of Farah loomed. On August 15, 1988, Farah was down to 2,500 employees in El Paso and was looking to sell itself to an investor. This would get worse for Farah in 1989. As 1989 closed, Farah announced a “supersecret anti-wrinkle treatment” that it hoped would save it in 1990.
In 1977, Farah lost $17 million and although revenues increased, by 1989 it was losing almost $12 million. In 1990, Farah closed its sewing production in El Paso, leaving only 700 employees in the city. Another court battle had been brewing since May 1 when Farah filed a lawsuit alleging that the company wanted to “illegally” remove him again and bar him entering the company’s building.
Things would only get worse. On May 4, 1990 Willie Farah was sued by his own company alleging that he was disrupting the company’s manufacturing processes. Company losses continued and 1/3 of its 700 employees were laid off in December 1995. The layoffs were blamed on NAFTA.
The next year a court case of “a major drug smuggling case” that used tractor-trailers from June 1992 to May 1995 revealed that two of the drug ring’s drivers, Joel Kline and Manuel Castro, were employed by Farah. Prosecutors agreed that Farah was not aware that two drivers were transporting marihuana across the border.
By 1998, there was no possible return for the company. Willie Farah died on March 9, 1998 at the age of 78.
The end for Farah Manufacturing came quietly a few months later when in June 1998, without much fanfare, Tropical Sportswear International Corporation purchased what little was left of Farah Manufacturing and the company became Savane International Corp.
As much as the propaganda machine was trying to hide behind foreign competition, the fact is that Farah never recovered from the 1970’s national boycott. But Farah would continued to make headlines.
Woody Hunt Crticizes Joe Wardy
Controversy over Farah would not end with the sale of the company or the death of Willie Farah. In 2003, Woody Hunt criticized then-mayor Joe Wardy over a tax incentive project the city was offering an out-of-town developer who wanted to build a mall at the empty Farah building. Hunt wanted the incentive package to be used for downtown redevelopment. Another local developer, Artemio de la Vega, also opposed the development as it would compete against his Las Palmas Marketplace.
Wardy was proposing to create a tax increment financing district (TIF) to help DeBarteolo Property Group build Towne Centre at Cielo Vista with $12 million in TIF incentives and $13 million in tax rebates. On August 27, 2004, DeBartolo dropped its plans for the shopping center.
Three years later, Paul Foster would be asking the city council for $12 million in incentives to build a shopping center where the empty Farah building sat. The Fountains shopping center would be built after several economic delays. Foster was asking for $8 million in sales tax subsidies from the city over 10 years and another $4 million from the county. The Fountains is now known as The Fountains at Farah.
This time, local government officials had no problem giving Foster the incentives they were apposed to with an out-of-town investor, DeBarteolo only three years before.
Although construction was to begin shortly after 2007 when Foster was awarded the incentives to build the mall, by 2010, the old Farah building had yet to be razed. Asking for an extension to begin construction, county commissioners agreed to the extension if demolition of the Farah building was completed by July 31, 2010. Foster was asking for a delay to deliver on his project because he was unable to get enough retailers to lease space at his mall. In return for the compromise, the county commissioners reduced the county’s incentives by $100,000.
The city council also agreed to give Foster the extension the following week. As a penalty, the city council reduced the incentives from $8 million to $7.8 million. Then city representative Eddie Holguin was the sole vote against giving Foster the extension, while Rachel Quintana did not attend the meeting. For the county commissioners, Veronica Escobar, Willie Gandara, Jr., and Anna Perez voted for the extension, while Anthony Cobos and Dan Haggerty voted against it.
Fountains at Farah opened in November 2013.
On January 2, 2018, the Texas Department of Transportation (TXDOT) was forced to spend $16 million to fix a highway hazard created by the Fountains at Farah on the interstate. The ten-month project required reversing some ramp changes TXDOT spent $8 million on in 2010 because the Fountain’s project wasn’t there, according to TXDOT. However, the project had been announced in 2007 when it sought incentives from the local government.
NAFTA was not the proverbial nail in Farah’s coffin, but the decline of the company came about because the company was never able to recover from the loss in sales from the strike. It was the Mexican American women empowering El Paso’s Chicanos that ended Farah.
There is no doubt that twin plants and NAFTA changed El Paso’s economy, moving manufacturing out of the city. According to figures from the Texas Employment Commission, in 1976, manufacturing accounted for around 23% of El Paso’s jobs. Ten years later, manufacturing jobs in El Paso were less than 20% of the city’s job market. For Farah, its end came because it never recovered from the national boycott. A changing economy was just a symptom of a problem that had existed since the strike was called in 1972.
When Congress tried to rollback Ronald Reagan’s veto of legislation protecting American jobs in the apparel industry in 1986, Jim Farah, Willie’s son, then company president said that “protectionist legislation would lift the cost of apparel, hurting sales.” Farah had fully embraced foreign labor to help save Farah Manufacturing.
For Willie Farah, his unwillingness to allow the union meant the end of his company. For the union, the victory was short lived as it had to represent workers that were losing their jobs even as sales were going up. As for the Mexican-American strikers, they proved they had the political clout to force changes in El Paso, even if in the end they lost the jobs that helped their families.
The dilapidated and vacant Farah Manufacturing building on Gateway was demolished in 2010, after sitting vacant for several years. Fountains at Farah now occupies the land where the plant once stood.
Throughout its history Farah Manufacturing employed mostly Mexican American women, and it was they that led the strike against Farah. The Farah women would go on to leave another legacy in El Paso on September 31, 1980 when Ronald Reagan dropped his planned visit to the Tony Lama Boot company and instead visited the Farah plant because the garment company “employs more voters.” At least that was the public explanation, like all political intrigue, Reagan’s visit to Farah had the back story that Willie Farah was Republican enough when compared to the Democratic credentials of the Tony Lama company.
Lesson Learned For Future Advocacy Through Boycotts
Consistently, strikers represented around a third of the Farah employees who worked at the company. Although religious and governmental figures across the country openly supported boycotting Farah products, it wasn’t the boycotts alone nor the strikers that led to victory in the end. Although Cesar Chavez was first to use national boycotts as a tool for social change in the 1960’s and 1970’s, it was the Farah boycott that was instrumental in directly forcing change through the capitulation of Willie Farah.
According to Kenn Carr, Farah’s labor lawyer, “had it just been the boycott, our sales would have dropped from two to five percent,” but because the boycotters successfully used targeted pickets by identifying the names of the stores they were picketing is what made it so effective in killing Farah’s business.
As Carr explained, “there’s a lot of difference between saying ‘don’t buy Farah pants sold in this store’ and ‘don’t buy Farah pants at The Popular’,” It was the shaming of the stores by their names that made consumers feel that the picket was against the individual store instead of the Farah apparel. It was this technique that forced store owners to remove Farah products from their shelves to keep their stores insulated from the pickets.
This strategy resulted in around 1,000 stores, from the 9,000 stores that carried Farah products to stop offering them to their customers. The ten percent loss of stores translated to reduced sales that drove Farah profits from $6 million in 1971 to $43,000 in 1973.
How effective they are for labor movements remains debatable as some point to Farah’s closure as the result for using them for labor reforms. Farah never recovered from the boycotts even after settling with the union.
For Willie Farah, two things worked against him, one was believing the patron-peon relationship still worked in the 1970’s, the second was believing that the El Paso business and political leadership would back him until the end, not understanding that self-preservation would be what would force them to turn their backs on him as soon as the economy was threatened.
Willie Farah had one victory. His lawsuit win over the banks gave borrowers the leverage they needed to sue their banks. By 1986, more borrowers were suing banks claiming the banks were acting in bad faith. Bankers were now facing lender liability when issuing loans.
This article is based on public records, court testimony and documents, and interviews.
Note: Willie was sometimes spelled Willy in newspaper articles. We have chosen to use Willie because that is the spelling used in the 1973 union video: The People vs. Willie Farah.
