James Riddle Hoffa
(born February 14, 1913 – disappeared July 30, 1975)
(declared dead July 30, 1982)

On December 27, 1944, as World War II dragged on, President
Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered his secretary of war to seize
properties belonging to the Montgomery Ward company
because they refused to comply with a labor agreement.

In an effort to avert strikes in critical war-support industries,
Roosevelt (below) created the National War Labor Board in
1942.

The board negotiated settlements between management and
workers to avoid shut-downs in production that might cripple
the war effort. During the war, the well-known retailer and
manufacturer Montgomery Ward had supplied the Allies with
everything from tractors to auto parts to workmen’s clothing–
items deemed as important to the war effort as bullets and
ships. However, Ward’s Chairman Sewell Avery (below) 
refused to comply with the terms of three different collective
bargaining agreements which the United Retail, Wholesale
and Department Store Union hammered United Retail,
Wholesale and Department Store Union hammered out
between 1943 and 1944.

President Roosevelt creating the National War Labor Board
in 1942.

On the morning of July 31, 1975, James Riddle Hoffa, one of
the most influential American labor leaders of the 20th century,
was officially reported missing after he failed to return home
the previous night. Though he is popularly believed to have
been the victim of a Mafia hit, conclusive evidence was never
found and Hoffa’s fate remains a mystery to this day.