On the Irish Waterfront: The Crusader, the Movie, and the Soul of the Port of New York (review)

Summary Review

Fisher has written a brilliant book which examines the real, historical backdrop of the classic movie, On the Waterfront. Fisher carefully charts the growth of Irish control over the New York waterfront, and the development of a distinct Irish ethos upon which that control was built. The Irish ethos included an inviolable code of silence, deference to authority, an intimacy with violence, alcoholism, and hostility toward outsiders. Irish control of the waterfront and the code of silence would break in the 1950s.

Part I, “The Boys of the Irish Waterfront,” presents three powerful Irishmen who dominated labor, politics, and business: Joseph “King Joe” Ryan, the president of the International Longshoreman’s Association (ILA), Frank Hague, Mayor of Jersey City, and William J. McCormack, “Mr. Big” on the waterfront. These three oversaw a corrupt, violent waterfront empire that depended on the Irish ethos for sustenance and support. We are also introduced to Monsignor John J. “Taxi Jack” O’Donnell, the house chaplain for Joe Ryan, and John “Cockeye” Dunn, the brutal enforcer of waterfront discipline. Also introduced is Austin Tobin of the Port Authority of New York, whose efforts helped dismantle the system.

Part II, “The Soul of the Port,” charts the rise of opposition to the corruption on the waterfront. Two Jesuits, Philip Carey and John M. “Pete” Corridan challenge the status quo. Carey established the Xavier Labor School in Chelsea to help educate workers as to Catholic social teaching and Corridan became the activist who put theory into practice becoming known as the “waterfront priest.” Carey and Corridan turned Catholic labor action away from the anti-communism with which it was initially obsessed, to address the issue of corruption on the Irish waterfront. Corridan led the charge to rid the waterfront of the shape-up hiring system, stressing again and again the “human dignity” of each worker. Despite his crusade on behalf of the worker, Corridan never enjoyed widespread support among the rank and file. Confronted by the seemingly unbreakable Irish ethos and code of silence, Corridan turned to what Fisher dubs a “spiritual front,” in which Corridan enlisted powers outside the Irish community to smash the corruption. Included in the front were Malcolm Johnson, investigative reporter who wrote a Pulitzer Prize winning series on “Crime on the Waterfront,” assisted by Corridan; Budd Schulberg, former Communist, who came to admire Corridan, wrote the screenplay and was the driving force behind the movie, On the Waterfront. (Fisher goes to great lengths to disprove the accusation that OTW was a justification for Schulberg’s testifying before HUAC); and Tobin, who brought government power to crack the waterfront.

Part III, “Waterfront Apotheosis,” charts the breakdown of the Irish waterfront as a series of sensational hearings exploded the code of silence, exposing “Mr. Big,” Ryan, and other corrupt figures. Great insight is given into the production of the movie that would eventually sweep the Academy Awards, and further contribute to the breaking of the code. But even as the code was breaking, Corridan endured a stinging defeat as the reform union he advocated was defeated by the rank and file who preferred the familiar ILA. The real undermining of the Irish waterfront came from the changing ethnic make-up of the port workforce, and the modernization of the port.

The epilogue highlights Corridan’s fade; he remained at the Xavier Labor School for several years following the movie, but a new provincial, less inclined to endure controversy, banished Corridan to Syracuse.

Fisher has written an amazingly complex and layered study of life on the Irish waterfront and its depiction in On the Waterfront. What is of particular interest to me is the role of the Catholic Church in the sustenance of and confrontation with the Irish waterfront. Fisher contends there were two Catholic world views—that of waterfront realists submerged in the...