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Eddie Frow

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Eddie Frow was described in the celebrated book, “Love on the Dole”, by a little character sketch whereby a demonstrator against the Means Test is arrested and jailed for five months. But Frow was actually a real hero of the Communist Party’s struggle against 1930s unemployment in Salford and remained true to his beliefs in a very long life. A skilled engineer, he was later elected as shop steward in factory after factory, being successively and comprehensively victimised. He had 21 jobs in 20 years and only walked out of one of them voluntarily. Frow was a long term delegate to the AEU National Committee and secretary to the Manchester District Committee of his union.

In later life, he married Ruth and they became famous as collectors of books and memorabilia on working class history. So large did the collection become that their semi-detached home in Old Trafford became completely dominated by it. To save it for posterity, Salford City Council agreed to take over their library, the Working Class Movement Library, and re-housed it in a former nurses’ home opposite the university. See: http://www.wcml.org.uk

 
Source: Ruth Frow “Edmund Frow 1906-1997: the Making of An Activist”; Morning Star February 9th 2000