Events of the last two weeks likely have left a bitter taste in the mouth of Harvard's mealtime messiah, Michael P. Berry.

On April 2, Berry, the University's director of dining services, fired Darryl Hicks, a cook and labor union shop steward in the Harvard Union dining hall. In the letter informing Hicks of his termination, Berry--affectionately dubbed the mealtime messiah by many students--cited Hicks' "unacceptable performance and conduct as an employee" and "numerous prior warnings."

Indeed, Hicks had a long disciplinary history at Harvard Dining Services (HDS). During his more than five year tenure at the College's largest dining hall, the 32-year-old Army veteran had amassed a paper trail of warnings and suspensions.

Berry has refused to comment on the case, but Harvard officials have said the decision to fire Hicks was more than justified based on his record.

"If you've seen Darryl Hicks' record, why are you standing here?" Union Assistant Manager John P. Shaffer asked a Crimson reporter earlier this week. "He did it. We didn't do it."

That record, however, is precisely what Darryl Hicks had been fighting over with Harvard management for his entire career here--and it is that same record that Hicks has strongly contested in the past two weeks.

Hicks, who began working at Harvard in late 1987 and was elected shop steward in 1990, has been contesting disciplinary action taken against him by dining hall administrators dating back to early 1988, just a few short months after he was hired.

It started with one Harvard Union cook who charged racial discrimination and lost his job three months later. Now, others are coming forward with a catalog of complaints. Harvard Dining Services officials have denied allegations of harassment and intimidation. The battle lines are being drawn for a...

Those protests came to a head in December, 1992, when Hicks--who is Black--filed a set of state and federal complaint: charging that he had been racially harassed and discriminated against on the job. In March, he told The Crimson that dining hall managers were also trying to silence his vocal labor union activism.

In April, he was fired.

Now, Hicks is escalating the battle over his employment at the University.

During the last two weeks, he has charged top HDS administrators--from Shaffer, to Harvard Union dining hall Manager Katherine E. D'Andria, to Berry himself--with having less-than-spotless records of their own.

Theirs are records that, according to Hicks, indicate a pattern of discrimination, harassment, and the intimidation of employees at the Freshman Union.

And this week, Hicks received a pledge of support from fellow HDS shop stewards at the University, who are circulating a petition demanding his reinstatement. In addition, most workers interviewed in the last two weeks have backed the fired cook, and organized student support is growing.

"Management has a history of racial prejudice, intimidation and threats," said Co-chief Shop Steward Edward B. Childs, who is white. "We have a history of complaints against [D'Andria] from workers. The Freshman Union has been known for this for sometime since she started there and it's one of the factors that workers transfer out and don't transfer back in."

D'Andria and Shaffer strongly denied the allegations.