International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers
North American trade union
The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) is a labor union that represents approximately 887,000 workers and retirees in the electrical industry in the United States, Canada, Guam, Panama, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands; in particular electricians, or inside wiremen, in the construction industry and lineworkers and other employees of public utilities. The union also represents some workers in the computer, telecommunications, and broadcasting industries, and other fields related to electrical work.
IBEW conducts apprenticeship programs for electricians, linemen, and VDV (voice, data, and video) installers (who install low-voltage wiring such as computer networks), in conjunction with the National Electrical Contractors Association, under the auspices of the National Joint Apprenticeship and Training Committee, which allows apprentices to "earn while you learn." In Canadian jurisdictions, the IBEW does not deliver apprenticeship training, but does conduct supplemental training for government trained apprentices and journeypersons, often at little or no cost to its members.
History
The organization now known as the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers was founded in 1891, two years before George Westinghouse won the electric current wars by lighting the Chicago World's Columbian Exposition with alternating current, and before homes and businesses in the United States had begun receiving electricity. It is an international organization, based on the principle of collective bargaining. Its international president is Kenneth W. Cooper and is affiliated with the AFL–CIO.
The IBEW began with the Electrical Wiremen and Linemen's Union No. 5221, founded in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1890. By 1891, after sufficient interest was shown in a national union, a convention was held on November 21, 1891, in St. Louis.
“International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers” enters the record as north American trade union. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what International, Brotherhood and Electrical can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6048868. VIAF identifies the subject as 132064655. The Library of Congress control number is n82059102. 3 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1891 and 1890.
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This entry incorporates text from “International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.