Western Regional Summit, 2004

The papers and audiovisual materials comprising the Ronnie Sandler collection (1942-2016; undated, bulk 1990-1998) document her career as an active member of the tradeswomen’s movement.

Much of the correspondence and organizational materials in this collection are related to Ronnie Sandler’s efforts to organize with other tradeswomen’s organizations to access funds from the Intermodal Surface Transportation and Efficiency Act (ISTEA) of 1991, to train women for non-traditional jobs. These efforts include lobbying members of congress, the U.S. Department of Transportation, the U.S. Department of Labor, and state transportation agencies. ISTEA, which was signed into law in 1991 and expired in 1997, contained a provision in which ¼ of 1% of funding received by states could be used to train women and minorities for transportation jobs. As the executive director of Northern New England Tradeswomen Inc. Sandler also participated in coalition of organizations called Northeast Women in Transportation (NEWIT) that was dedicated to making ISTEA funds available for job training for women. NEWIT organized conferences called IT’S ISTEA TIME and ISTEA II to strategize how to secure these funds from transportation agencies throughout the United States. Also included are reports, contracts, proposals and other material from Compliance, U.S.A.- a company founded by Sandler.

The bulk of this collection consists of reports and manuals; as well as Compliance U.S.A. and NEWIT project contracts and proposals; and other consulting projects such as: Better Jobs for New Hampshire Women, CareerInRoads, On-The-Job-Training Program, and projects through the New Hampshire and Maine Departments of Transportation. The most frequent topics addressed in the reports and manuals are: ISTEA, women in non-traditional jobs, and sexual harassment in the workplace. Some of the documents are official statistics or reports from government agencies but the bulk of the manuals are from tradeswomen’s organizations like NEWIT.

Formats include organizational records, calendars, promotional materials, scholarly articles, business cards, newsletters and other publications, newspaper clippings, books, correspondence, receipts and financial documents, handwritten notes, photographs, VHS tapes, and tote bags.