The Tom Mooney Labor School opened in August 1942 in a few rooms over an auto salesroom at 678 Turk Street in San Francisco. Under the heading of "Education for Victory," the announcement stated "Side by side with the Army training camps, with the industrial training programs, with the civilian defense classes, it will undertake ... the systematic training and education of the men and women of San Francisco in the principles for which our country and the United Nations are fighting..." The School's program promised to analyze social, economic and political questions in light of the present world struggle against fascism. Dave Jenkins was the founding director and continued until 1949 when he was succeeded by Dr. Holland Roberts, the School's educational director.

This collection provides materials which describe the historical period of the California Labor School's early years. It was a period when unions and industry worked together to achieve maximum production for the war effort. There was interest in and a strong spirit of friendship for the USSR, a wartime ally of the U.S. Support for the School was received from unions whose membership had grown due to war industry. The ILWU sent 4,000 members to classes for new union members. Prominent citizens from industry and government were also listed as sponsors including Cyril Magnin, Richard Gump, Charles Crocker, U. S. Senator Sheridan Downey and U. S. Representative Franck Havenner. By the time the School was five years old, it boasted of conducting 135 classes for 1800 students, it had moved to larger quarters in a five-story building at 216 Market Street and had extension classes in Oakland and other Northern California sites.

In 1945, the U. S. State Department asked the California Labor School to serve as the official host in San Francisco for labor delegations to the founding conference of the United Nations.

From 1945 to 1947, The California Labor School was accredited by the California State Department of Education for veterans' education under the G.I. Bill of Rights and by 1947 there were 220 full-time students.

In 1947, the School bought its own building at 240 Golden Gate Avenue. Holland Roberts, in a draft manuscript of his memoirs, described 1948 as "the School at its peak." That same year, however, the U.S. Attorney-General placed the California Labor School on the Subversive List and thus began a ten-year attack led by the Subversive Activities Control Board in the Department of Justice and other government agencies. After the School was on the Subversive List, a student could not be employed by the federal government or any institution which had a "loyalty oath." If a student worked for the government, s/he could be discharged.

Support and attendance at the California Labor School declined. Union support was reduced to a few CIO locals which in 1949 were expelled from their Federation for being "Communist-dominated." The School was no longer a vital center for labor education and by 1951, the catalogs did not list one labor studies class. The School survived as a center of resistance to the political repression of the cold war-McCarthy years. Until it was padlocked by the IRS for alleged non-payment of taxes, the remaining students continued to support a reduced number of classes on the cold war, McCarthyism, U.S. history, USSR and socialism, writing, literature and the arts.