This oral history interview with Alice L. Dale was conducted by Carolyn K. Matthews at Dale’s home in Portland, Oregon, in five sessions from March 5 to May 21, 2018. The interview was conducted for the Oregon Labor Oral History Program, which collects oral histories of individuals who have advocated for working people of Oregon, including public figures, union members, and workers.

In this interview, Dale discusses her family background and early life in Ashland. She talks about her college experiences at the University of Oregon and at Loyola University in Los Angeles, California. She describes how, in 1978, she became an attorney for the Oregon Public Employees Union (OPEU), which later became SEIU Local 503. She speaks about her work with the union, about how the union developed as it affiliated with the Service Employees International Union, and about her achievements as the union’s executive after 1985. She also discusses a rolling strike in 1987, and organizing home care workers into the union. She shares her reasons for leaving Local 503 to become a trustee for Local 49, which represented janitors and hospital workers, and discusses a failed campaign to organize health-care workers at Providence Hospital into the union. She discusses a 1995 SEIU Local 503 strike over proposed changes to the Public Employees Retirement System, and changes Oregon made to the worker compensation system in the 1990s. Dale then talks about her work as director of the Property Services Sector at UNI Global Union in Geneva, Switzerland, from 2009 to 2016. She talks about returning to the U.S., and focusing her energy on helping immigrants incarcerated by President Donald Trump’s administration at the southern U.S. border. She speaks extensively about her experience with spasmodic dysphonia, a disorder affecting the vocal cords. She closes the interview by talking about mentoring future union leaders, and by reflecting on her achievements.