Jerome Wurf (May 18, 1919 – December 10, 1981) was a U.S. labor leader and president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) from 1964 to 1981.
Wurf was a friend of Martin Luther King Jr., and was arrested multiple times for his activism, notably during the Memphis sanitation strike.
The son of Jewish immigrants (his father was a tailor and textile worker) from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, he developed polio at the age of four.
[3][4] ) District Council 37 won many of the ensuing elections, making it into one of the large public employee local unions in the world.
The organization gained popularity, and received a number of votes in 1962 even though hundreds of "international" delegates were directly controlled by Zander.
Zander, surprised by the result, subsequently lost face at the convention during unsuccessful efforts to increase union taxes on the Locals.
Zander and his supporters also published negative stories about Wurf in the union's newspaper, denying COUR access to the mailing list for its distribution.
According to the Milwaukee Sentinel: "Zander's supporters attempted to prevent Wurf's backers from reading results of the election into the convention records.
After the announcement of his narrow victory, Wurf surrounded himself with bodyguards and sent three people to the union office in Washington to change the locks.
[7] This program funneled around a million dollars to British Guiana between 1957 and 1964 for the purpose of supporting Forbes Burnham over Cheddi Jagan.
The convention did increase the powers of the union president, authorizing him or her to "employ, terminate, fix the compensation and expenses, and direct the activities of such office staff, administrative assistants, technical and professional assistants, field staff, organizers, and representatives as are required to carry out effectively the functions of his office.
He was a close associate of Martin Luther King Jr., who was working in support of the Memphis sanitation strike when he was assassinated in April 1968.