Screen Cartoonist's Guild
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The Screen Cartoonist's Guild was formed in 1938 in Los Angeles, California. Following the events of strikes at Van Beuren Studios, Fleischer Studios, and Disney, a band of Los Angeles cartoonists gathered and elected Bill Littlejohn as president. The group of cartoonists went on to form contracts and resolve issues with numerous studios including MGM, Screen Gems, and Disney. The Screen Cartoonist’s Guild was later renamed to The Animation Guild, I.A.T.S.E. Local 839 and is currently still in existence.
For many years animators had been treated as secondary workers that were not important enough to be taken seriously. However, in the late 1920s animation had become a huge business in Hollywood studios. It is in part due to men like Walt Disney, Paul Terry, and Walter Lantz for providing many jobs to several hundred artists in the West and East Coasts. The beginning of the unionization of animators can be seen to start on October 29, 1929, when the Stock Market Crash occurred and many needed to find a more stable income source. As the nation attempted to recover, President Roosevelt issued a bank holiday on March 8, 1933 in order to stabilize the crashing of the banks. The Hollywood studios were heavily reliant on Wall Street investors, however, the bank holidays made it impossible for investors to give them the money flow required. This forced studio executives to come up with a solution that would cut the salary of employees, with previous contracts, by thirty-fifty percent. In addition to the salary cuts, studio executives took no pay cuts for themselves. The unfortunate timing of the Great Depression of 1929 and the unfair treatment of studio employees led to the creation of the Screen Cartoonists’ Guild.
Initially cartoonists did not have a union of their own rather they began with the union, International Alliance of Theatrical and Stage Employees (IATSE) in 1914. This union was the only one not to have been hit by the massive salary cuts which in turn caused a mass spree of unionization to take place in Hollywood. As the union numbers grew in Hollywood, many studio executives began their own stand against them, one of which was Darryl F. Zanuck who was quoted saying, “You put a picket line in front of my studio and I’ll mount a machine gun on the roof and mow you all down.” Many picketers and union members were being fired at a steady rate, adding onto the growing anger. The battle between the two continued and all the while union groups only began to grow even more popular. However, an animators only union had still not been created. In 1925 Bill Nolan, attempted and failed at creating the first union for animators. Later in 1932, animators from numerous studios, including Myron Natwick, Shamus Culhane, and Al Eugster hosted a meeting in a Hollywood saloon. They invited additional animators in order to discuss the similar mistreatment that all animators were receiving. Eventually Natwick became the first president of the group of animators. Popularity amongst the group grew until even the studio executives took notice and began threatening the employees. The group began to disband after many of the union members had lost their jobs.
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