Sailors' Union of the Pacific

SUP
Sailors' Union of the Pacific
FoundedMarch 6, 1885
Location
Members
736 (2005)
Key people
Gunnar Lundeberg, president
AffiliationsAFL-CIO
Websitesailors.org

The Sailors' Union of the Pacific (SUP), founded on March 6, 1885 in San Francisco, California, [1] is an American labor union of mariners, fishermen and boatmen working aboard US flag vessels.

At its fourth meeting in 1885, the fledgling organization adopted the name Coast Sailor's Union and elected George Thompson its first president. Andrew Furuseth, who had joined the union on June 3, 1885 was elected to its highest office in January 1887. In 1889 he returned to sea but was reelected to the position of union secretary in 1891. It was during this term[2] on July 29, 1891 that Furuseth merged the Coast Seamen's Union with the Steamship Sailor's Union with the new organization named the Sailors' Union of the Pacific.[citation needed]

With the exception of a two-year period when he shipped out as a fisherman, he was secretary of the SUP until 1935.[3] In 1908, Furuseth also became president of the International Seamen's Union and served in that office until 1938.[2] During this period, he successfully pushed for legislative reforms that eventually became the Seamen's Act of 1915.[2]

SUP is an affiliate union of Seafarers International Union of North America. Headquarters are in San Francisco [4] and the union has branch offices in Wilmington, California, Seattle, Washington, and Honolulu, Hawaii. SUP also has an office in Norfolk, Virginia.


  1. ^ "Chapter I: The Lookout of the Labor Movement" (PDF). SUP History. Archived from the original (PDF) on May 12, 2003. Retrieved March 16, 2007.
  2. ^ a b c "Andrew Furuseth". Norwegian American Hall of Fame. Archived from the original on February 16, 2007. Retrieved March 16, 2007.
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference speced was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ "SUP, About Us". sailors.org. Archived from the original on February 20, 2007. Retrieved March 16, 2007.