NY Harvard Club Pickets Mix With Police in Strike

NEW YORK, April 4--Pickets and police clashed at the strike-bound Harvard Club here Wednesday, resulting in the arrest of 12 members of the AFL union which has paraded in front of the building 24 hours a day since a "lockout" of employees Thursday, March 18.

Police tried to force a mass picket line of 150 members of Local 6, Hotel and Club Employees Union to observe a ruling limiting demonstrators to three at each Club entrance. A short fracas and arrests followed, but no injuries were reported.

Pickets were held on charges of disorderly conduct. They will go before a hearing Tuesday.

Meanwhile, a Harvard Club spokesman reported last night that State Board of Mediation attempts to settle the dispute have failed so far, but "a full crew" of non-union employees has kept Club affairs running "pretty smoothly."

Union Asks 5 Day Week

The "lockout" took place when Management-Union negotiations for a new contract broke down. Employees had pressed for a 10 percent wage increase for kitchen workers, a 40 hour, five day week for all others, and a group insurance plan.

Colorful picket line activities have included circulation of a pamphlet stating that the Club had "betrayed" former Harvard President Eliot's affirmation of union rights on collective bargaining.

Demonstrators also rushed a lingerie truck delivering too cream to the Club's kitchen, and made up a new College cheer, "H-A-R-V-A-R-D phooey!"

The Union's newspaper stated that the prelude to the "lockout" was a strategy meeting of over 100 employees held in the basement of the Club. Workers' refusals to obey management demands that they halt the conclave led to an order to "go home."