On behalf of the delegates and officers of the Western Wisconsin AFL-CIO I offer all delegates to the Wisconsin State AFL-CIO Convention held in La Crosse on September 16 & 17th a heartfelt welcome.

La Crosse has much to offer including ancient bluffs, unique bridges, breathtaking landscapes, historic monuments, and legendary parks, and we invite you to take in what our beautiful city has to offer.

This Coulee Region of Wisconsin boasts a plethora of outstanding sights to explore during your free time.

The Coulee region is defined as the entirety of La Crosse, Vernon and Monroe Counties and sometimes portions of Northwest Wisconsin including Trempealeau and Jackson Counties. Other geographic definitions toss in Northeastern Iowa and Southeastern Minnesota as well.

Why is it called the Coulee Region? The word “coulee” is an old French idiom for the steep narrow valleys which abound in this area and various the rivers and streams flowing through this area.

The glaciers that came with the ice age stopped north of the Coulee Region. With no glaciers to level the landscape, frost, water, and gravity have gradually worn down the sandstone and limestone hills through the centuries. Creeks, streams, and rivers have eroded heights that may have reached 300 or more feet above the present highest elevations. The smaller of these waterways created the above-mentioned coulees, transforming the landscape into the beautifully varied hills and valleys of today.

Unionism has deep roots here in La Crosse, reaching back to 1863; at that time, the State of Wisconsin was only 15 years old, and the City of La Crosse had been chartered for just 7 years.

The shoe and boot cobblers of La Crosse at that time banded together to improve wages that were inadequate due to the inflation caused by the Civil War. (they prevailed)

Our Labor Body first formed 1902, a charter was granted to the unionized workers by President Samuel Gompers, and it was named, The La Crosse Trades and Labor Council (AFL). In 1959, this body was re-charted after the merger of the AFL and CIO in La Crosse and it became the La Crosse, Wisconsin AFL-CIO. In 2003 the body was re-charted in La Crosse and became the Western Wisconsin AFL-CIO. The WWAFLCIO has authority in six Western Wisconsin Counties, Crawford, Jackson, Juneau, La Crosse, Monroe, and Vernon.

All attendees will be given a special souvenir edition of the Union Herald newspaper, specially written and printed for the convention. We are proud that our Union Heard is one of just three Union Worker newspapers still standing in Wisconsin. The other two are the Union Labor News in Madison, and the Southeast Labor Times in Kenosha.

Our Union Herald wasn’t born yesterday either. In 1917, the La Crosse Trades and Labor Council (AFL) began an annual publication. It continued as an annual until 1959, when it ceased publication. In 1951, the CIO Industrial Council of La Crosse began a monthly newspaper, The Union Herald, Inc. It continued as a CIO publication until 1959, at which time it became the official publication of the La Crosse AFL-CIO Council. In 2003 it became the official publication of the renamed, Western Wisconsin AFL-CIO.

Back in 2006, then president of the Labor Council Terry Hicks ended his welcome message to the delegation with a quote from Sir Winston Churchill, the Prime Minister of England for most of World War II.

Churchill said, “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”

He went on to say,

“You have enemies?

Good.

That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life.”

I ask all of you to heed Churchill’s words and go do what union members do – get out there and make “enemies” of the people who oppose working family values. Be heard, be seen, let those who oppose the American worker know that we are not going anywhere. Together we cannot be stopped. And vote! Go forth and remind our “enemies” that we are here to stay – and we will prevail. They need to acquiesce or get the hell out of our way!

Thank you, my brothers and sisters!

Please, enjoy your stay here in the Coulee Region!

Mike Davis Jr.
President, Western Wisconsin AFL-CIO
IAMAW 1115