Crystal Lee Sutton

Crystal Lee Sutton whose fight to unionize Southern textile plants with low pay and poor conditions was dramatized in the film Norma Rae, has died.
Sutton, 68, died Friday after a long battle with brain cancer.
In 1973, Sutton was a mother of three earning $2.68 an hour folding towels at J. P. Stevens when a manager fired her for pro-union activity. In a final act of defiance before police hauled her out, Sutton, who had worked there for 16 years, wrote "UNION" on a piece of cardboard and climbed on a table on the plant floor. Employees responded by shutting down their machines.
In 1974, a union won the right to represent workers at seven plants in northeastern North Carolina.
"Crystal was an amazing symbol of workers standing up in the South against overwhelming odds," said Bruce Raynor, president of Workers United, who worked with Sutton to organize the Stevens plants.
Despite what many people think, Lee got little profit from the movie or an earlier book written about her, said her son, Jay Jordan.
"When they find out she lived very, very modestly, even poorly, in Burlington, (N.C.), they're suprised," Jordan said.
Hopefully, we can all learn from Sutton and help right some of the wrongs that we see around us.