On June 13th, 1963, with Kennedy in the White House (just having dealt with the Cuban Missile Crisis) Black and Latino construction workers picketed and protested at Harlem Hospital. Why? The new building (now 60 years old) was being built with labor that did not hire Black or Latino workers.
New York CORE’s campaigned against construction at Harlem Hospital in June 1963, ‘…fighting against racial discrimination in the building trades’, as this ‘had become ‘the most important civil rights issue in the city’.
| 1963 Vintage Wire Press Photo by ASSOCIATED PRESS. The arm of a shouting picket is grabbed by a New York City policeman, out of picture at left, as other pickets at construction site do a New York hospital push forward today. The group was part of 150 pickets who tried to rush through opening in barrier around Harlem hospital site, but were repelled by waiting police. Pickets were protesting against alleged discrimination against Negroes and Puerto Ricans in the construction trades. |
The bronze sculpture above the entrance and the marble and blue facade, all point to architecture and design in 1963.
