**Date:** 3-9-67
**Source:** Unknown
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A potentially explosive situation between management and members of striking unions against UniRoyal was averted this morning as picets allowed male management and office workers to pass through the lines into the Maple St. entrance to the Footwear Division.
The situation was not relieved however, before 21 more picets, mostly all members of Local 45, URW, were arrested on charges of breach of the peace. They were cited at about 7 a.m. when a group of management personnel attempted to cross the lines.
A large group of office and management workers were later booed by strikers as they filed quietly into the gate on the south side of Maple St. Raymond Mengacci, vice-president of Local 45, explained the situation to the strikers over a police department bull-horn.
He said the local police would be augmented by state Police if any violence ensued on the picket lines. He said State Police would have in their possession “riot guns and tear gas.”
Mengacci said he would leave the decision of what the strikers would do when management personnel came down Maple St. from The Green up to them. He explained, however, that any violence would lead to the participation of State Police.
Mengacci told the large crowd that he was in the court in Waterbury at 2 p.m. today to appear at proceedings in which UniRoyal is seeking an injunction regarding the amount of picketing.
Mengacci said the company wants to limit picketing to five persons per gate, “if the company wins that match,” he told the crowd surrounding him on Maple St., “there’s nothing we can do.”