Deauville Hotel in Miami Beach, Florida, was the site of an International Brotherhood of Teamsters convention around July 1961, where officers were elected and other union matters considered. In Frank Sheeran’s account, the hotel is more than a meeting place: it is where Jimmy Hoffa gave him his first convention assignment, placing him at the threshold between the union gathering and the outsiders trying to observe it.

The 1961 convention

The convention was held every five years. Sheeran recalled that Hoffa appointed him sergeant-at-arms for the gathering, which was the first Teamsters convention Sheeran had attended. Raymond Cohen did not want him to go, but Hoffa’s decision prevailed; Cohen, Sheeran said, had no say in the matter.

Among the matters taken up on the convention floor was a substantial increase in the expense account. Sheeran, who described himself as having grown up without much, remembered welcoming the proposal. His recollection places the hotel’s formal business alongside the practical benefits delegates discussed and approved there.

The entrance and its watchers

As sergeant-at-arms, Sheeran checked the credentials of people seeking entry. He recalled that representatives of the AFL-CIO and the Federal Bureau of Investigation tried to get into the convention, but were turned away without giving him difficulty. They remained outside the perimeter, attempting to listen and peer in from a distance.

Looking back, Sheeran speculated that both organizations might already have planted listening devices in the convention room. He interpreted their attempts at the entrance as a possible way of making the union believe it had kept them out. The account presents this as his retrospective suspicion, not as a confirmed discovery at the hotel.

Newspaper photographers proved a more immediate nuisance. Sheeran said he pushed them back from the opening, only for them to edge forward again as their flashbulbs went off. To the police officer assigned to the door, he remarked, “I think I’m going to need a surgeon. Can you radio in for a surgeon?” The anecdote captures the tension between controlling access to a private labor gathering and the photographers’ efforts to get close enough to record it.

Significance in Sheeran’s account

The hotel’s importance rests on this tightly bounded episode: it hosted a union convention where elections and internal business took place, while Sheeran’s new role made him responsible for guarding its entrance. The contrast between the proceedings inside and the persistent watchers and photographers outside gives the location its narrative significance. The account does not establish further details about the hotel itself or make it the setting for later conventions.