Paul F. (Paul Frederick) Brissenden

Born in 1885, Paul Frederick Brissenden was an American labor historian whose writing focused on unions, labor conflict, and working-class movements in the United States. He is most often associated with his influential study The I. W. W.: A Study of American Syndicalism, a detailed account of the Industrial Workers of the World.

The front matter of early editions of that book identifies him as holding a Ph.D., having worked as an assistant in economics at the University of California, and having served as a university fellow at Columbia, as well as a special agent for the U.S. Department of Labor. Those roles fit the character of his writing: scholarly, deeply researched, and closely tied to the real conditions of labor in his time.

Brissenden died in 1974. Archival records for his papers show that his work and correspondence were preserved well beyond his most famous publication, suggesting a long intellectual life devoted to documenting labor history and industrial relations.