Alma McIntosh

Member/Leader, SEIU Local 880 (ACORN affiliate organization), Chicago; Board Member, SEIU Local 880, 2006-2008; Member/Leader, Chicago ACORN, 1990-2000; Board Member, SEIU Local HCIIMK*, 2008 on *HCIIMK was a new Local organized in 2008 and composed of SEIU Local 880’s 70,000 homecare and childcare members, SEIU Local 4’s 10,000 nursing home members, and SEIU Local 20’s 7,000 hospital and clinic workers.

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Alma McIntosh joined ACORN as a member of Local 880 in 1980 or 1981. She ran a home childcare center and credits union mentors Helen Miller, Lula Bronson, Keith Kelleher, Armean Allen, and others for encouraging her to “move from the back to the front” and become a speaker/leader in union actions and negotiations. In this interview, she talks about her life-long interest and actions working for justice and bringing people together. She marched with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. when he came to Chicago to fight housing segregation on the city’s west side. She also was a member of Operation Push and the NAACP. Beloved by many, she tells a story of her 80th birthday party in which 200 people came to celebrate her, including many now adult children she cared for. This interview will be of interest to those researching the work of Black women to organize their communities and workplaces.