This collection contains transcripts and audio-tapes of the ALCOA Oral History Project. The project, which was conducted between 1998 and summer 1999 by oral history consultant Alex Bennett, was a collaborative effort between the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania and ALCOA. The interviews record recollections and personal perspectives from 26 former and current employees on a number of aspects on the company's history: research and development; market research and advertising; manufacturing, labor, work, the community, and government and environmental issues. A particular emphasis is on the transitional period in the company's history during the late 1980s and 1990s.
Language
The material in this collection is in English.
Author
The guide to this collection was written by Katharina Hering
In 1996, ALCOA (The Aluminum Company of America) donated an extensive collection of materials to the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania (MSS 282). Complementing this collection, the company suggested an oral history project with former and current ALCOA employees to record their work experiences, and their perspectives on the development of the company. The project evolved as a collaborative effort between the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania and ALCOA. Twenty six interviewees, identified by the ALCOA Foundation and through company and community contacts, agreed to participate. Between 1998 and summer 1999, oral history consultant Alex Bennett conducted the interviews, which were recorded on audio cassette tapes, transcribed, edited, and indexed. All interviewees were male, many had spent most of their careers at ALCOA, and many worked in management or supervisory positions during the final stages of their careers at the company. The interviews, while broadly conceptualized, were not life-history interviews. Rather, they covered specific topics related to the company's history: research and development, market research and advertising, manufacturing, labor, work, the community, and government and environmental issues. The questions sets were individually crafted for each interviewee. The collection includes, for example, an interview with George Anderson, an industrial engineer who reflected on his experiences working for the company in Suriname in the 1950s; an interview Dick Downey, a long time employee of ALCOA who worked on advertisement and promotion of ALCOA's Wear Ever subsidiary and who highlighted, among other topics, the evolution of the aluminum can; and Frank Kramer, an employment and personnel manager at the company, who addressed labor management relations and conflicts at the company, and also race relations at the Tennessee plant. The collection also includes interviews with two of the company's CEOs: with Alain Belda, who became president of ALCOA in 1999, and with Paul O'Neill, who was ALCOA's chairman and CEO from 1987-1999 and who oversaw the restructuring of the company in the 1980s and 1990s.
Scope and Content Notes
There have been designated three series for this collection: one series for project files, one series for transcripts, and one series for audio-cassette tapes. The project files, which are arranged alphabetically, contain correspondence with individual interviewees, notes, manuscripts of the transcriptions with handwritten edits, and a few copies of newspaper articles with background information on the two CEO's that were interviewed. The second series includes transcripts of the 22 released interviews that have been prepared on the basis of the original typewritten transcripts of the released interviews, which only exist in printed form, and the original interviews. Hard copies of these new transcripts are organized in one box as part of the second series of the collection. The third series of the collection consists of audio-cassette tapes with recordings of the interviews. The cassette tapes, which are arranged alphabetically, include master copies and user copies of the interviews. There are three boxes with 71 audio-cassettes of a total of 26 interviews.
Conditions Governing Access
22 out of 26 interviews have been released for research.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
The oral history collection was co-produced and acquired by the HSWP on 1998-1999.
Preferred Citation
ALCOA Oral History Project, 1998-1999, MSS 539, Library and Archives Division, Senator John Heinz History Center
Processing Information
This collection was arranged by Katie Laux in 2009 and processed by Katharina Hering in 2010.
Conditions Governing Use
The Heinz History Center/HSWP owns the copyrights to 22 of the interviews. The creators (Marvin Gantz, Gussie Gentile, Jerome Pottmeyer, and Charlie Walton resp.) own the copyrights to the remaining 4 interviews.
Related Materials
Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania; Alex Bennett, ALCOA: Reflections on a Company and a Region: Oral History Interviews. Pittsburgh, Pa.: Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania, 2000
Related Materials
MSS 282, Records of the Aluminum Company of America (Pittsburgh, PA)
Separated Materials
To the Annual Report Collection: Alcoa Update Annual Report 1995; Report to Shareholders Alcoa 1994; 1996 Alcoa Environmental Health and Safety Annual Report
