Profiles and Interviews: Ernest Friend

(Ernest Friend, arms folded, behind bullhorn, was a leader of AFSCME Local 1834 and helped negotiate the unions’ first contract with the board of commissioners.)

Ernest Friend was one of the leaders of AFSCME Local 1834. Ray Metz, a retired AFSCME staff representative, recalled Friend and his fellow Local 1834 leaders, Hollie Atwood and Leo Rinker in negotiations with Garrett County Commission Attorney Jack Turney. “I liked and respected those guys,” said Metz. “They cared not just about themselves, but about the union. The roads workers made good choices in picking their leaders.”

“My father worked in small coal mines [before being hired on the roads]. One of the mines was in Kitzmiller He was on his knees all the time,” said Ernest Friend’s son, Gary Friend, a retired State Highway Department worker. “The strike was “about fairness. The guys felt they were being put down and their employers didn’t want them to get ahead,” said Gary Friend.

“My Dad was the kind of guy who would always help a neighbor butcher a hog or make hay. Dad walked the picket line every day during the strike. Dad would pick up work around the lake cleaning up a lot or putting a boat dock in,” said Gary Friend. “The strike was hard on my mother. Shortly after the strike, she got real sick. If it wasn’t for getting the union and having good insurance, we couldn’t have gotten good treatment for my Mom,” he said.

“Before the strike, my Dad would get sent home if it was raining. I thought he was on vacation,” said Jeff Friend, Ernest’s son, a retired Garrett County roads supervisor, who previously served as president of Local 1834 in the early ‘80s.

“People used to have to leave the county to get a union job. The union in the roads department changed things. We were lepers. I made $3.45 an hour. I used to think with 20 hours of overtime I’d make $100. Now roads workers are making $27 an hour,” said Jeff Friend.