Lewis Hicks, 63, veteran labor leader, dies in Paducah

November 2006

Benny Adair is presenting Lewis Hicks the W.C. Young Award. Benny is the council vice president.

By BERRY CRAIG

KEA-NEA/AFT-Kentucky

PADUCAH , Ky. -- When Lewis Hicks received the 2005 W.C. Young Award, the Western Kentucky Area Council's highest honor, he spent less time at the microphone than anybody who came to praise him.

"I accept this award with pride and a promise that I will continue to work for working people as long as there is breath in this old body," Hicks said.

The veteran union activist died Nov. 27 at Western Baptist Hospital in Paducah . He was 63. Survivors include his wife, Mary Hicks, two daughters, Regina Renfrow and Katrina Hendrickson, and two grandchildren, Dustin and Alisha Renfrow.

“Lewis kept his promise,” said Jeff Wiggins, council president. “He fought for working people right up to the end. He loved this council, his union and his family. We loved Lewis.”

Hicks was a charter member of Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers Local 5-680, now part of the Steelworkers, at the NewPage paper mill in Wickliffe.

He was president, vice president, recording secretary, trustee and chief steward of Local 5-680. In addition, Hicks was the Paducah-based Area Council's COPE director and a trustee. He also served on the state AFL-CIO Executive Board.

Hicks was reelected mayor of La Center, his Ballard County hometown, on Nov. 7. He was a member of Newton Creek Baptist Church and a 1961 graduate of Ballard Memorial High School .

"If they hadn't called my name, I wouldn't have known who they were talking about," Hicks joshed when he earned the Young Award, named for the late W.C. Young, a national labor and civil rights leader from Paducah . "But no doubt I am among friends."

State AFL-CIO President Bill Londrigan and Vice President Larry Jaggers praised Hicks at the award dinner. Londrigan called Hicks "a great union member and a great union leader. Great union members and great union leaders go to work and do their jobs; they become leaders in their communities; they run for public office; they participate in their churches and their AFL-CIO central labor councils."

Jaggers said when he met Hicks, he "decided right away that Lewis was a man I wanted on my side and a man I wanted to call my friend. There is no better ambassador for labor than Lewis Hicks."

Hicks worked in the Lubrication Department at NewPage. He was hired at the mill in 1969, when it was owned by Westvaco, later Meade-Westvaco.

“We didn't have a union for the first six months I worked there,” Hicks said. “I was for the union for personal reasons. I had to work for a man who didn't treat his employees right. I knew that with a union, you didn't have to take this mess.”

Hicks campaigned for the union, which the workers voted for in 1970. “We haven't regretted it since,” he said.

At the award dinner, Wiggins also saluted Hicks as a union leader “who stands strong and steady.” He asked the crowd “to stand with me and show your love for Lewis Hicks because he has stood strong and steady for us.”

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