Julia Ruuttila

Julia Ruuttila (1907–1991) was a journalist, writer, and political activist, who wrote stories, articles, and poems under many names, including her maiden name, Julia Godman.

Her parents were socialists and her mother was a feminist who distributed birth control literature when such actions were illegal. Growing up in Oregon, she witnessed terrible working conditions in the logging camps and helped to organize the International Woodworkers of America’s union in 1935, as well as their Ladies Auxiliary group to support striking timber workers. Ruuttila was involved in many radical and labor-activist activities, including writing for leftist and labor-related publications like the International Woodworkers of America’s Timber Worker and the Communist Party’s People’s World. Though she held a position with the Oregon Public Welfare Commission, Ruuttila lost the job when she advocated for African Americans who had lost their homes to a flood. Despite never having joined the Communist Party herself, she was investigated by the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1956, during their inquiries into the Committee for Protection of Foreign Born. Ruuttila continued working with area unions and in 1965 served as the chair of the legislative committee of the International Longshoremen and Warehouseman’s Union Ladies’ Auxiliary and as a Democratic party precinct committee representative. Ruuttila also demonstrated against the war in Vietnam, agitated for a unilateral freeze on nuclear proliferation, opposed the storage of nerve gas in Oregon, and lobbied against state sales tax initiatives.[1]