Sol Gorelick Papers
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Abstract
Sol Gorelick (1916-2004) was a social worker and union activist. He began his career with the City of New York in 1940 as a caseworker at the Brownsville Welfare Center. He would work with the city's welfare departments in Brooklyn until his retirement in 1980, also working at the Boro Hall Center and Fulton Center. The range of city documents maintained by Gorelick include memorandums, correspondence, procedural manuals, and educational materials. They document the city's bureaucratic culture, labor relations, unemployment, social conditions, health and healthcare, and housing in mid-20th century Brooklyn. Gorelick was a union member throughout his career with the city. His longest membership was with the Welfare Local 371 of AFSCME, District Council 37. He was a member during the union's tempestuous 1960s, which saw tense contract standoffs with the city, strikes, competition with the rival Social Service Employees Union, and the eventual merger of the two as the SSEU Local 371. Union materials include those documenting committee and chapter activities, negotiations, and recruitment. Gorelick was also active in professional organizations and advocacy groups, including the National Association of Social Workers and the Brooklyn Tuberculosis and Lung Association. Documents from these organizations and others illustrate how a social worker's activism could span work, union, volunteer, and professional activities.
Historical/Biographical Note
Sol Gorelick (1916-2004) was a social worker and union activist. He began his career with the City of New York in 1940 as a caseworker at the Brownsville Welfare Center. After an absence to serve in World War II, Gorelick returned to the Department of Welfare. He would work with the department and its successor, the Human Resources Administration, until his retirement in 1980. Gorelick worked at several welfare (also termed income maintenance) centers in Brooklyn including the Boro Hall Center and the Fulton Center, for which he was director.
Gorelick joined the United Public Workers union when he started with the city. Following the UPW's dissolution amid the CIO's anti-Communist purges, Gorelick would join the Welfare Local 371 (later the Social Service Employees Union Local 371) of AFSCME, District Council 37. During the 1960s Gorelick served as a vice president of DC 37.
Gorelick was also active in many other profession organizations and advocacy groups, including the National Association of Social Workers and the Brooklyn Tuberculosis and Lung Association.
Arrangement
The collection is arranged in four series: City, State, Federal Social Welfare Programs; Labor and Unions; National Association of Social Workers; and Organizations and Subjects.
Files within each series are arranged alphabetically.
Scope and Contents
These papers document the career, labor activities, and activism of Sol Gorelick.
The largest series is comprised of documents from government entities concerned with social welfare. Most come from Gorelick's employer, the New York City Department of Human Resources, and its predecessors. These materials document the procedures and results of the city's welfare programs. The city's bureaucratic culture profoundly impacted its relationship with its employees and welfare clients. The resulting body of directives, memorandums, and correspondence show all facets of this experience. Because of welfare's relationship with other areas, the collection also illustrates unemployment, crime, and housing conditions in mid-20th century Brooklyn, with Brownsville being particularly well-represented.
Gorelick was a member of Social Service Employees Union, Local 371, which represented employees in the City of New York's welfare departments. A significant portion of the collection documents this local, its predecessor unions, and its parent union, AFSCME, District Council 37.
The collection also gives insight into trends in the profession of social work, and shows how an individual's activism could span work, union activities, and professional organization participation.
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Conditions Governing Access
The majority of the collection is open for research without restrictions. Restricted folders are noted in the finding aid. These materials include files with personal information on individuals' welfare cases and employee files. Please contact tamiment.wagner@nyu.edu for more information.
Conditions Governing Use
The Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Archives has no information about copyright ownership for this collection and is not authorized to grant permission to publish or reproduce materials from it. Materials in this collection, which were created in 1940-1980, are expected to enter the public domain in 2101.
Preferred Citation
Identification of item, date; Sol Gorelick Papers; WAG 019; box number; folder number; Tamiment Library/Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives, New York University.
Location of Materials
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Materials found in repository; provenance is unknown but were likely donated by Sol Gorelick in the late 1980s. The accession number associated with these materials is 1950.268.
About this Guide
Processing Information
The collection was partially processed sometime between acquisition and 2013. By all appearances, multiple individuals worked on the collection. Their level of coordination is unclear, and their interventions may have taken place years apart. Materials were foldered and arranged alphabetically in one series, and a folder-level inventory was published. Processing had not been completed, however. Several boxes were foldered but not included in the inventory, and three boxes were entirely unprocessed. Based on these unprocessed boxes, it appears that the materials likely arrived at the repository roughly sorted by organization, and that the arrangement seen in the inventory and most or all folder titles were archivist-devised.
The most recent processing actions were undertaken in 2013. At this point all finding aid notes were written and files were arranged in four series. Some folder titles were edited or consolidated for clarity or consistency, but existing folder groupings of materials were largely maintained. Three boxes of entirely unprocessed material were foldered and inserted into the appropriate series. Two of these boxes were mostly material for the City, State, and Federal Social Welfare Programs series and one was for the National Association of Social Workers series. Folders containing personnel files and clients' welfare records were restricted and physically separated from other materials.
