They’re seen here marching to Madison Square Park in 1934’s May Day anti-Fascist demonstration and parade, said to have been the largest gathering of workers, unions and labor organizations the city had yet seen, with over 100,000 listed in the Forward as having participated.

Frank Crosswaith (פרענק קראָסוועיט in Yiddish) was a Black, socialist politician and powerful labor organizer who was targeted by the Ku Klux Klan for his work but remained allied with the Forward newspaper's Yiddish speaking readership in the struggle for a more just labor market. He began his vocational life as an elevator operator and rose to become the founder and chairman of the Negro Labor Committee, with offices at the Harlem Labor Center at 312 West 125th Street. This served as a home base for workers and labor organizing in Harlem. Crosswaith was called “the Negro Eugene V. Debs” for his stirring oration. Born in 1892 in La Croix, Virgin Islands, he immigrated to the United States at the age of 13. He served in the U.S. Navy and eventually settled in New York City. Throughout his career, Crosswaith, a brilliant organizer, ran for numerous elected positions on the Socialist party and American Labor party tickets.

For many of his campaigns, he ran alongside other famous socialists including Eugene V. Debs, who ran for governor when Crosswaith ran for secretary of state in 1924. Crosswaith also ran with prominent Jewish socialist leaders on a slate endorsed by the Forward such as Charles Solomon (pictured above giving a speech) and Harry W. Laidler who ran for mayor and comptroller when Crosswaith ran for alderman in 1933.

In 1938, the New York City board of aldermen was replaced by the city council, where Crosswaith also ran for a seat in 1939. The council continues to meet at City Hall today. Crosswaith also ran for Congress (1930 and 1936), Lieutenant Governor (1932).

He won a scholarship from the Forward to attend the Rand School of Social Science, seen here at 7 E. 15th St. New York City school associated with the Socialist Party and considered historically, one of the most important sources of education for workers.

It was as a labor organizer that Crosswaith perhaps had his greatest successes. In 1925, he became the secretary of the Trade Union Committee for Organizing Negro Workers, which resided in Times Square. Through his work there, he was able to convince many unions to include Black members. Crosswaith was also an organizer for the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the first labor organization led by African Americans to receive a charter in the American Federation of Labor. He also organized Black and white women into laundry workers union. In 1934, Crosswaith founded the Harlem Labor Committee, a multiracial group of workers who sought better wages, working conditions and benefits. Crosswaith founded the Negro Labor Committee in 1935, an amalgamation of unions, to advance the rights of Black workers.

Known as “the Negro Eugene V. Debs” for his orating skills, Crosswaith gave memorable speeches throughout his career. In 1929, he spoke at the New York Coliseum -- which is near the Starlight Amusement Park (above) -- celebrating the British Labour Party's victory.

In 1932 he addressed the crowd at Ulmer Park in Brooklyn when Eugene Debs inaugurated his campaign. He was among those who eulogized socialist leader, Morris Hillquit, at Cooper Union, seen here, in 1933. In his later years, Crosswaith was an unsalaried member of the New York Housing Authority.

Remembered for his “unswerving devotion to black people and working peoples everywhere,” and his forcefullness, he was instrumental in securing major gains for those he represented and for helping the Socialist Party rise in prominence. Crosswaith was no stranger to the problem of virulent racism present in the labor movement, writing in 1935, “It is eminently true that race prejudice in varying forms and degrees is entrenched within the ranks of labor -- even as it is interwoven in the fiber and sinews of American live." Frank Crosswaith lived at 55 La Salle St., near this block of apartments, when he died at the age of 72.