Plunging into Vassar life, Roche debated with Qui Vive, visited slum settlements in Poughkeepsie, joined the basketball and track clubs and was a double major in Economics and Classics. Abigail Leach (Greek) and Herbert Mills (Economics) were among her teachers, and her yearbook quotation sums up her time at Vassar: she was “cheerful and happy in the prospect of having almost more to do that day than she could possibly accomplish.”
Despite a conservative, violently anti-union father, she embraced the liberal social and economic thought of the day – learning at Vassar about the benefits of trade unionism, minimum working and living standards and active involvement in the political process. Following commencement, Roche moved to New York City and entered Columbia University to pursue a Masters in Social Work (received in 1910). Between 1910-12, Roche investigated the conditions of working children and immigrants for the Russell Sage Foundation and Columbia and directed evening classes at the pioneering social service agency, Greenwich House.
Roche’s family moved to Denver in 1908, and in October 1912 Roche left New York to become Denver’s first policewoman. As Inspector of Amusements, she supervised public dance halls and cafes and cleaned up the Red Light district – taking girls home to their families. In a battle with entrenched business interests, Roche and her boss, Commissioner Creel, were fired in early 1913. Community pressure obtained her reinstatement but official non-cooperation led to her resignation in August 1913.
In 1915, President Hoover appointed Roche Special Agent of England and the United States for the Commission for Relief in Belgium. It was the first of many governmental appointments... On the death of her father, in January 1927, Roche inherited his 40% interest in the Rocky Mountain Fuel Company. At the time, the company and the United Mine Workers were engaged in a bitter strike over higher pay and better working conditions. By November, 90% of the mines in Colorado were on strike and 6 miners had died in the Columbine Massacre at a Rocky Mountain Fuel Company mine.
In 1934 Roche ran for governor of Colorado on the motto: “Roosevelt + Roche = Recovery.” She lost the Democratic primary to the incumbent governor by 10,000 votes. In Nov. 1934, she joined FDR in Washington as Assistant Secretary of the Treasury. “The baby member of the Brain Trust," Roche was in charge of the Public Health Service, Chair of the advisory board of the National Youth Administration and a participant in the committees formulating Social Security.
In 1937, Roche returned to the Rocky Mountain Fuel Company, commuting regularly, however, to Washington to chair the National Health Conference and the Interdepartmental Committee to Coordinate Health and Welfare Activities, groups that worked tirelessly for federal health subsidies and a broad government health plan for all US citizens.
The RMFC closed in 1944 and Roche, who had become President of the National Consumers League in 1940, joined John L. Lewis and the United Mine Workers in 1948 as Executive Director and neutral trustee of the United Mine Workers’ Welfare and Retirement Fund. Funded by the mining companies, the fund provided health care, disability pensions and pensions to miners’ widows. During the 24 years of her administration, the Fund collected $2.5 billion and paid out $1.2 billion in pensions and $900 million in medical care for miners and their families, via an extensive network of hospitals and clinics.
Muncy is one of those historians who can just command an audience, more of a storyteller than a stodgy academic. She came to my American Century class today, so we had the chance to meet her before the evening's lecture. Miriam Cohen, our professor, has been taking us through the politics of the Progressive Party, which was formed by Teddy Roosevelt in 1912. Muncy talked about her research on the Progressive Era, and the unique role that Vassar College played in producing social reformers in the late-19th and early 20th centuries.
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