The Chicago Boy

Evan R. Dale, 38, is a chunky labor leader who has shouldered his way to the top of the A.F.L.'s Southern Illinois Hod Carriers, Building and Common Laborers Union. He likes to wear wide-brimmed hats, collect expensive shotguns, throw parties at his hunting lodge. He also likes to mix in politics; in 1952 he was a labor consultant to the Republican National Committee.

Labor Boss Dale's biggest chance to show his muscle came in 1951 after Joseph V. Moreschi, president of the hod carriers union, made Dale the union spokesman for a pool of 38,000 construction laborers building power plants at Joppa, Ill. and Shawnee, Ky. for AEC's A-bomb plant near Paducah, Ky. Teaming up with James Bateman, 63, who ruled the Joppa plant's pipe fitters, Dale lost no time in calling on the Joppa plant's major contractor, Ebasco Services Inc., a subsidiary of Electric Bond and Share Co. Pointing out that he was a "Chicago boy," Dale emphasized how tough he was; he bragged that he had been indicted for murder on another construction job. (Actually indicted for conspiracy to assault, Dale was freed for lack of evidence.) Then he laid down his terms. Ebasco could have labor peace on the projects if it would "do business the customary way," i.e., kick back 1% on the $197,000,000 contract. When Ebasco refused, Dale went to work.

One time he pulled out 350 carloads of laborers at Joppa, kept the motorcade touring for two days around the plant. Then Bateman pulled out his pipefitters over squabbles about who should unload pipe from trucks. In 29 months, work on the Joppa plant was stopped more than 40 times. Ebasco fell so far behind that the Bechtel Corporation took over its contract (TIME, Oct. 4). The delays added $58 million to the cost of the plant.

In April 1953 a Federal grand jury, spurred on by a St. Louis Post-Dispatch expose of labor racketeering, indicted Dale and Bateman and 13 other A.F.L.

labor leaders. Three weeks ago a St. Louis jury found both men guilty of attempting to extort $1,030,000 from the Joppa plant contractors, the 13th and 14th to be convicted in the largest shakedown attempt since the Browne-Bioff syndicate operated in Hollywood.

Last week, Labor Bosses Dale and Bateman, red-faced and perspiring, stood up before U.S. Federal Court Judge Fred L. Wham for sentencing. Said Judge Wham: "Dale has been disloyal to the men he represented . . . He has a faculty for instilling fear of physical violence in people. He has never failed to profit in full from use of his abilities in this line." Then Judge Wham handed down the sentences: for Dale, 15 years in prison and a $10,000 fine; for Bateman a $2,000 fine and probation for five years.

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