Description
Inscribed by Secretary-General Yeruham Meshel to UAW President Leonard Woodcock, the first edition of Israel: A Personal History by David Ben-Gurion.
Large octavo, xxii, 862pp. Tan cloth, title in brown on spine. Full number line printed on copyright page. Solid text block, faint foxing and dust remnants to top edge, a near fine example. In the publisher’s dust jacket, with $17.50 and $20.00 retail prices listed on front flap. A few short closed tears, light wear to edges of spine, faint shelf wear, a near fine example.
Inscribed on the front free endpaper: “To Brother Leonard Woodcock, President of U.A.W: On the occasion of your first visit with Histadrut in Israel – with best wishes and in the spirit of International Labour Solidarity and Brotherhood / Y. Meshel / Secretary-General of Histadrut 21 July, 1974.” A unique piece featuring two prolific union leaders.
Yeruham Meshel (1912-2002) was an Israeli union leader who served as the head of the Histadrut, Israel’s national trade union center, from 1973 to 1984.
Leonard Woodcock (1911-2001) was the President of the United Auto Workers and the first United States Ambassador to China. Woodcock dropped out of college in 1933 and began working as a machine assembler in Detroit. As manufacturing unions grew, he joined the United Auto Workers. After the tragic airplane accident resulting in the death of former UAW president Walter Reuther, Woodcock was selected to lead, and would remain president of the union from 1970 through 1977. Due to his progressive ideals, Woodcock was listed #9 on Nixon’s Enemies List, with the notation “No comments necessary.”
