United Paperworkers' International Union
Open-knowledge reference entry
The United Paperworkers' International Union (UPIU) was a labor union representing workers involved in making paper, and later various industrial workers, in the United States and Canada.
The union was founded on August 9, 1972, when the International Brotherhood of Pulp, Sulphite and Paper Mill Workers merged with the United Papermakers and Paperworkers. Like both its predecessors, it was chartered by the AFL–CIO. On formation, the union had 389,000 members. In 1974, the large majority of its Canadian section split away, to form the Canadian Paperworkers' Union.
In 1978, Joseph Tonelli, the union's president, was indicted on a charge of embezzling $360,000 of union money.
In 1987 and 1988, UPIU members struck against International Paper in Jay, Maine. The strike generated international attention but ultimately ended in defeat for the strikers and the permanent replacement of union members with non-union replacements.
The Independent Workers of North America union merged into the UPIU in 1991, followed in 1994 by the Allied Industrial Workers of America. On January 4, 1999, the union merged with the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union, to form the Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers International Union.
“United Paperworkers' International Union” enters the record as open-knowledge reference entry. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what United, Paperworkers' and International can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“United Paperworkers' International Union” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, United, Paperworkers' and International provides the most credible route into that argument.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 10, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q111914976. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1972, 1974, 1978 and 1987.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “United Paperworkers' International Union”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow United Paperworkers' International Union primary sources, United Paperworkers' International Union archive and United research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “United Paperworkers' International Union”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “United Paperworkers' International Union” 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.