Tom Buffenbarger on ‘Wimpy’ Winpisinger and the Origins of Labor Day

IAM retired International President Tom Buffenbarger discusses William ‘Wimpy’ Winpisinger’s rise from boomer mechanic in postwar Cleveland to IAM general president, his confrontational presence on the AFL-CIO executive board, his walkout of the 1980 Democratic National Convention and his decade-long auto racing program featuring drivers including Roger Mears and Josele Garza that put union craftsmen on national television — and revisits the Labor Day founding story: Matthew Maguire, a machinist, proposed the holiday in 1882, but President Cleveland gave the 1894 signing pen to a carpenter with a similar name and sent Maguire’s wife a letter of apology.