Shannon J. Wall

Shannon J. Wall (March 4, 1919, Portland, Oregon – February 2, 2007) was a merchant seaman and an American labor leader. He was president of the National Maritime Union (or NMU, now part of the Seafarers International Union of North America) from 1973 to 1990. His father and mother ran a small dry cleaning company.

He joined the United States Merchant Marine and became a merchant seaman. He joined the NMU shortly thereafter. When the Merchant Marine was incorporated into the U.S. armed forces during World War II, he became a boatswain and served in the Pacific on both freight and troop carriers.

Presidency of NMU Wall was elected interim president of the NMU on March 5, 1973. He was only the second president in the union's history.

Wall was re-elected for a fourth term as president in 1983 after a bitterly contested campaign. Wall received 9,958 votes and his opponent, Kirby-Smith McDowell, had 4,140 votes. Although no investigation by the United States Department of Labor was undertaken, Senator William V. Roth Jr. (R-Delaware) argued that significant violations of federal labor law had taken place in the election.

Mergers In 1988, Wall helped craft a merger between the NMU and the Marine Engineers Beneficial Association (MEBA). After the merger, Wall became chair of the unlicensed seamen's division of District 1, and an MEBA executive vice president. At the time of the merger, NMU had 30,000 members—which included about 14,000 members working in commissaries, dining facilities and other units in U.S. naval military bases overseas.

NMU disaffiliated from the Marine Engineers in 1993. Louis Parise was elected the newly independent union's president. In 1999, NMU became an autonomous affiliate of the Seafarers International Union of North America, and 2001 fully merged with that union.

Legal and legislative achievement Roughly 250,000 merchant seamen served (many under combat conditions) during World War II. The Merchant Marine service suffered the highest casualty rate of any service during the war. However, they were not recognized as military veterans and were not able to obtain veteran's benefits or health care.

In 1987, Wall and others sued the federal government to win designation as veterans for merchant seamen who served from December 7, 1941, to December 15, 1945. A federal district court, ruling in Schumacher v. Aldridge, 665 F. Supp. 41 (1987), agreed. The collapse of the unionization effort led Wall to retire from union life.

Wall died of natural causes at his home in Sequim, Washington, on February 2, 2007. Wall and his wife, Lucy, had two sons and a daughter.

Wall was also a member of the board of directors of the American Merchant Marine Library Association and a member of the advisory board of the National Maritime Historical Society.

Honors In 1987, Wall received the Admiral of the Ocean Sea Award from the United Seamen's Service, a prestigious nonprofit association which provides assistance to American seamen in foreign ports.

The same year, the New York State AFL-CIO awarded Wall its Labor Recognition Award for his service in building the labor movement.