HARVARD COLLEGE
LIBRARY
GIFT OF THE
GOVERNMENT
OF THE UNITED STATES
L- . .-- 7?
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES,
NEW YORK AREA— PART III
HEARINGS
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON UN-AMEEICAN ACTIVITIES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
EIGHTY-FOURTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
MAY 3 AND 4, 1955
Printed for the use of the Committee on Un-American Activities
(Index in Part IV of these hearings)
HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY
DEPOSITED BY THE
.UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT
UNITED STATES
G.OVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
WASHINGTON : 1955
COMMITTEE ON UN-AMERICAN ACTIA^ITIES
United States House of Representatives
FRANCIS E. WALTER, Pennsylvania, Chairman
HAROLD H. VELDE, Illinois MORGAN M. MOULDER, Missouri
BERNARD W. KEARNEY, New York CLYDE DOYLE, California
DONALD L. JACKSON, California JAMES B. FRAZIER, Jr., Tennessee
GORDON H. SCHBRER, Ohio EDWIN E. WILLIS, Louisiana
Thomas W. Beale, Sr., Chief Clerk
CONTENTS
May 3^, 1955 : Page
Testimony of Mildred Blauvelt 820
Index See part IV
(Testimony of Mildred Blauvelt heard on May 5-6, 1955, is printed in pt. IV
of this series.)
in
Public Law 601, 79th Congress
The legislation under which the House Committee on Un-American
Activities operates is Public Law 601, 79th Congress [1946], chapter
753, 2d session, which provides:
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States
of America in Congress assembled, • • *
PART 2— RULES OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
RlTLE X
SEX). 121. STANDING COMMITTEES
17. Committee on Un-American Activities, to consist of nine members.
Rule XI
POWEBS AND DUTIES OF COMMITTEE
• ♦•••*•
(q) (1) Committee on Un-American Activities.
(A) Un-American activities.
(2) The Committee on Un-American Activities, as a whole or by subcommittee,
is authorized to make from time to time investigations of (i) the extent charac-
ter, and objects of un-American propaganda activities in the United States, (ii)
if the diffusion within the United States of subversive and un-American propa-
ganda that is instigated from foreign countries or of a domestic origin and
attacks the principle of the form of government as guaranteed by our Constitu-
tion, and (iii) all other questions in relation thereto that would aid Congress in
any necessary remedial legislation.
The Committee on Un-American Activities shall report to the House (or to the
Clerk of the House if the House is not in session) the results of any such investi-
gation, together with such recommendations as it deems advisable.
For the purpose of any such investigation, the Committee on Un-American
Activities, or any subcommittee thereof, is authorized to sit and act at such
times and places within the United States, whether or not the House is sitting,
has recessed, or has adjourned, to hold such hearings, to require the attendance
of such witnesses and the production of such books, papers, and documents, and
to take such testimony, as It deems necessary. Subpenas may be issued under
the signature of the chairman of the committee or any subcommittee, or by any
member designated by any such chairman, and may be served by any person
designated by any such chairman or member.
RULES ADOPTED BY THE 84th CONGRESS
House Resolution 5, January 5, 1955
RtJLE X
STAKDINQ COMMITTEES
1. There shall be elected by the House, at the commencement of each Con-
gress, the following standing committees :
(q) Committee on Un-American Activities, to consist of nine members.
Rule XI
POWERS AND DUTIES OF COMMITTEES
17. Committee on Un-American Activities.
(a) Un-American Activities.
(b) The Committee on Un-American Activities as a whole or by subcommittee,
is authorized to make from time to time, investigations of (i) the extent, char-
acter, and objects of un-American propaganda activities in the United States,
(ii) the diffusion within the United States of subversive and un-American prop-
aganda that is instigated from foreign countries or of a domestic origin and
attacks the principle of the form of government as guaranteed by our Constitu-
tion, and (iii) all other questions in relation thereto that would aid Congress
in any necessary remedial legislation.
The Committee on Un-American Activities shall report to the House (or to the
Clerk of the House if the House is not in session) the results of any such inves-
tigation, together with such recommendations as it deems advisable.
For the purpose of any such investigation, the Committee on Un-American
Activities, or any subcommittee thereof, is authorized to sit and act at such times
and places within the United States, whether or not the House is sitting, has
recessed, or has adjourned, to hold such hearings, to require the attendance
of such witnesses and the production of such books, papers, and documents, and
to take such testimony as it deems necessary. Sulipenas may be issued under
the signature of the chainnan of the committee or any subcommittee, or by any
member designated by such chairman, and may be served by any person desig-
nated by any such chairman or member.
YI
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES,
NEW YORK AREA— PART III
TUESDAY, MAY 3, 1955
United States House of Representatives,
Subcommittee of the
Committee on Un-American Activities,
Washington, D. C.
PUBLIC HEARING
A subcommittee of the Committee on Un-American Activities met,
pursuant to notice, at 10 : 30 a. m. in the caucus room, Old House
Office Building, Hon. Edwin E. AVillis, presiding.
Committee members present: Representatives Edwin E. Willis
(presiding) , and Gordon H. Scherer.
Staff members present: Frank S. Tavenner, counsel, and George C.
Williams, investigator.
Mr. Willis. The subcommittee will come to order.
Let the record show that Hon. Francis E. Walter, chairman of
the Committee on Un-American Activities of the House of Repre-
sentatives, pursuant to the provisions of law establishing the com-
mittee, has duly appointed a subcommittee, consisting of Mr. Morgan
M. Moulder, of Missouri as chairman, Mr. Gordon H. Scherer, of
Ohio, together with myself, Edwin E. Willis of Louisiana, for the
purposes of this hearing.
Mr. Moulder is temporarily delayed but will soon be presiding.
Under the rules of the committee, two being present, a quorum is
established.
The committee will hear today Mrs. Mildred Blauvelt, detective of
the New York City Police Department, who was an undercover op-
erative for the New York Police Department from April 1943 until
November 1951, during which time she was assigned to several differ-
ent Communist Party groups within the New York area.
The purpose of the hearing is to ascertain what knowledge she has
of the extent, character, and observation of Communist Party activi-
ties within the areas to which she was assigned.
Are you ready to proceed, Mr. Tavenner ?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes, sir.
Are you Mrs. Mildred Blauvelt?
Mrs. Blau\t:lt. I am, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you rise and be sworn, please.
Mr. Willis. Do you solemnly swear the evidence you are about to
give before the committee will be the truth, the whole truth and
nothing but the truth, so help you God ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I do.
819
820 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
TESTIMONY OF MRS. MILDRED BLAUVELT
Mr. Tavenner. Where were you born ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. In New York City.
Mr. Tavenner. It is noted that you are not accompanied by counsel.
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is correct.
Mr. Tavenner. It is the practice of the committee to advise a
witness that they are entitled to counsel and may consult counsel
at any time they desire.
Wliat is your occupation, Mrs. Blauvelt?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I am a detective with the New York City Police
Department.
Mr. Tavenner. How long have you been engaged as a detective
with the Police Department of the city of New York ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I was appointed to the New York City Police
Department December 7, 1942.
Mr. Tavenner. Are you still so employed?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, I am.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee, please, what your
formal educational training was prior to acceptance of your position
with the police department ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I was a graduate of one of the New York City
high schools and I attended Pace Institute, now called Pace College.
Mr. Tavenner. Have you held any positions of employment other
than that of detective for the Police Department of the City of New
York?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Prior to my appointment to the New York City
Police Department I was employed by several companies in the capac-
ity of stenographer or secretary.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee, please, the general
nature of your preparation for the assignment about which I am going
to ask you ; the special assignment within the Communist Party ?
Mrs. Blauatslt. Wlien I was appointed to the New York City Police
Department I first had to attend the police academy for training for
a period of 2 or 3 months.
Following that period of training, I was then assigned by the New
York City Police Department to become an undercover operative in
the Communist Party. I did gain entry into the party in April of
1943 and I remained in the Communist Party until November of 1951,
when I was expelled. That period in between of course covers ap-
proximately 9 years.
Mr. Tavenner. Over this period of approximately 9 years were you
required to serve in different clubs of the Communist Party or was
this entire period of time spent in one group or club of the Commu-
nist Party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, when I first gained entrance into the Commu-
nist Party in April 1943, I was in the 9th A. D. Club in the upper
West Side of Manhattan, and I was in that club about 5 or 6 months.
I was expelled from it formally in September 1943.
Mr. Tavenner. I will ask you about the circumstances of that ex-
pulsion a little later.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 821
Mrs, Blauvelt. Then I was under orders from the New York City
Police Department to regain entry into the Communist Party. There-
fore, I attempted to do so and in April of 1944 I joined the Flatbush
Club in the Flatbush section of the Brooklyn Communist Party. And
when the Flatbush Club underwent a reorganization in January of
1946 I was placed in a club called the Parkside Club, also in the
Flatbush section, and when that club underwent a reorganization
Mr. Willis. Were you placed in the third club by the police depart-
ment ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I was in the Communist Party at that time and this
was just a matter of routine on the part of the Communist Party to
place me in these clubs. It was a matter of transfer.
Mr. Willis. Did the Communist Party place you in the third club?
Mrs. BLAu^^ELT. That is correct.
The Parkside Club underwent reorganization in June 1946 and I
was placed in the Lincoln Koad Club and then from the Lincoln Koad
Club I was transferred in June of 1947 to the Jay-Smith Club in the
Boro Hall section of the Brooklyn Communist Party, and remained
in that particular club until my formal expulsion from the Com-
munist Party in November 1951.
Mr. Tavenner. During this period of time how much of your day
was usually spent in connection with your Communist Party work?
Mrs. Blauvelt. A very great deal of it. Meetings were held in the
evenings and I attended over the course of a period of time; execu-
tive meetings which probably would be held on Monday evenings;
membership meetings on Tuesday evenings; section meetings on
Wednesday evenings; contact with party members or attendance at
other county meetings or other rallies during the rest of the week;
and mobilizations for canvassing for the Worker on Saturdays and
Sundays; and my time also had to be spent in reporting all of these
for the files of the New York City Police Department. So a great deal
of my time was spent in this activity during the period of the 9 years.
Mr. Tavenner. How did you prepare your reports to the New York
City Police Department ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, immediately upon arriving home from a
meeting I would have to write the reports and have them ready for
the police department. It was a matter of compiling the information
as soon as possible after the meeting was held.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you preserve copies of the reports you made to
the police department ?
Mrs, Blauvelt. Yes ; copies are in the files of the New York City
Police Department.
Mr. Tavenner. Are you under subpena to appear here and testify ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is correct.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you asked by the staff of this committee in
preparation for your testimony here, to make a study of the reports
or copies of the reports which you had made to the New York City
Police Department?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes ; I was.
Mr. Tavenner. Have you made a thorough and complete study of
your files ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I have made as thorough and complete a study as
I possibly could, due to the pressure of time. I have spent a good
822 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
deal of time in the preparation of material to be presented to you.
It has taken about 2 months to compile the material.
Mr. Tavenner. Therefore, your testimony before the committee
today is based upon your own reports which you made at the time of
the incidents ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, that is correct; reports that are now official
reports in the files of the New York City Police Department.
Mr. Tavenner. I believe, Mrs. Blauvelt, that you received a signal
honor as a result of the services you rendered in this undercover
capacity. Our information is that you received a police department
citation for exceptional merit which is an award given for an act of
bravery, intelligently performed involving risk of life. Did you
receive such an award ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, sir ; I did.
Mr. Tavenner. Are you the only woman who has received such an
award from the police department of the city of New York ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I was the first one to receive it.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee what official positions
you held in the various groups to which you were assigned by the
Communist Party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Wlien I was in the Ninth A. D. Club I was made
a group captain, which meant that several of the members of the
Ninth A. D. Club were placed in my supervision.
I was to visit them, inform them of meetings, tell them about party
activities, attempt to activize them in party activities, collect their
When I was in the Parkside Club I was made chairman of the fund
drive committee being conducted for the party in 1946.
In the Lincoln Koad Club I was its financial secretary for a period
of about 2 months, then I became its press director, and in the Jay-
Smith Club I was its financial secretary for the entire duration of
my membership in the club, plus acting as organizer at certain times,
and as membership director at other times.
Mr. Tavenner. Did your duties require your attendance at the
section or county meetings of the Communist Party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. At section levels; yes, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. On section levels?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. During the period of time you held these positions
in the party, were you required by the Communist Party to engage
in any special course of training for your work?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you mean required by the Communist Party to
engage in such training?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. When I first became a member of the party,
as a member of the Ninth A. D. Club they sent me to the Workei^
School of New York City. They told me they were sending me there
on a scholarship. I did not have to pay m^^ own way. They were
paying it for me. I went there for a period of a couple of months.
Then in the Flatbush Club a class was conducted in the fundamentals
of Marxism given by Abe Feingold, the educational director of the
club, and I was requested to attend that class as a new member of
the party.
INrVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 823
I did receive some very formal education by being selected to attend
a county training class in 1948 and a regional training class in 1950
and if you would like any of the details regarding those classes, I
could give them to you. They were selected groups of the members of
the party.
These classes were considered to be cadres. The intent was to train
the people selected for these classes for party leadership.
Mr. Tavenner. This would be a good place to explain that.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, for instance in the 1948 class which was a
county training class, Bernie Frank was the instructor. The regional
training class which was held in 1950 was held in the home of Gert
Levine, at 1343 45th Street. And the instructors in that class were
Joseph Bell, Ben Davis, Bea Sacks, and Harry Oacher. It may also
be spelled 0-n-c-h-e-r.
Mr. Tavenner. You mentioned the name of Ben Davis. Is that the
Benjamin J. Davis, Jr., who was elected councilman for the city of
New York'^
Mrs. Blauvelt. No. Ben Davis was one of the important func-
tionaries in the Brooklyn Communist Party, a member of the regional
group of which my Boro Hall section was a part, regional director for
a while and also one of the functionaries on the county committee of
the Brooklyn Communist Party.
These courses ran for 5 or 6 weeks and each ran 3 nights a week.
At the beginning of the 1948 class, the county training class, we were
addressed by Margaret Krumbein, who was also known as Margaret
Cowl, who was a member of the county committee assigned to this
particular work of organizing classes or cadres for training. She
explained that this class or school, in her own words, was a cadre and
was being conducted by the county committee for the purpose of train-
ing certain members in Marxist theory in the light of present-day
issues.
Beraie Frank, the instructor, stated that the goal of this cadre was
to develop forces for party leadership in the important struggles
facing the party through the study of Marxist theory, and its applica-
tion to party activity, and it was necessary to develop leadership in
the party so that the party through its activity could mold the opinion
of the people and give impetus to mass movements.
This was the general explanation that was given to us in this
class before it started.
The course of study was on the nature of capitalism, capitalist
crises, imperialism and monopoly capital, imperialism and war,
fascism and struggle for democracy, the Negro question, strategy
and tactics, policies and program of the party, organization of the
party.
The material to be studied was: Political Economy, by Leontiev;
Imperialism, by Lenin; State and Revolution, by Lenin; Founda-
tions of Leninism, by Stalin ; Report to the Seventh World Congress,
by Dimitrov ; Wieden's Notes on the National Question ; Bob Thomp-
son's Questions and Answers on the Negro Question; Ben Davis'
Path to Negro Liberation; and a Marxist study guide which was
entitled, "Theory and Practice of Communism."
The Daily Worker was included in the material ; Political Affairs
was included in the material; and Foster's Report to the National
Committee Meeting of February 3 to 5, 1948, was included.
S24 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
In addition to which an educational pamphlet called Clarity,
issued by the educational department of the New York State Com-
munist Party, was included in that material.
The regional training class followed practically the same course
of study, and I don't know whether you want me to go into that or
not. If you do, I will do so.
Mr. Tavenner. Yes; first, in a general way, please. It may be
we will want to hear it in detail.
Mrs. Blauvelt. The regional training class was conducted by the
particular region of which my section was a member.
Mr. Tavenner. I believe we should have it in detail.
Mrs. Blauvelt. The topics covered were Basic Principles of Polit-
ical Economy; the Features and Contradictions of Capitalism; Fea-
tures of Socialism ; Imperialism as a Stage of Capitalism ; Imperial-
ism and Its Contradictions; White Chauvinism; Vanguard Role of
the Party; Concentration as a Leninist; Method of Work; Oppor-
tunism! United Front; Communist Vigilance; and the material used
was practically the same.
It was Lenin's Imperialism; Stalin's Foundations of Leninism;
Foster's Twilight of World Capitalism ; Anna Rochester's Nature of
Capitalism; History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union;
and some issues of Political Affairs.
Joseph Starobin's pamphlet Should the Americans Back the Mar-
shall Plan; Harry Haywood's book on Negro Liberation; Stalin's
Marxism and the National Question ; and Pettis Perry's report. Press
Forward the Struggle Against Wliite Chauvinism. "
Ben Davis' report on the Negro People in the Fight for Peace and
Freedom ; and Thirty Years of the Communist Party in the U. S. A.
Gilbert Green's Need for Strengthening Communist Vigilance,
which appeared in the May 1950 issue of Political Affairs.
I think probably there might be one session which would be of
interest to you in this particular class, which was held on May 2,
1950. Bea Sacks, who was the organizer of the Boro Hall sec-
tion, and also a member of the county committee of the Brooklyn
Communist Party, made the point that according to Lenin concen-
tration work meant that the party must conduct its activities among
the workers in basic industries because it was there that the most
exploited and oppressed workers in the capitalist system could be
found, and it was easier to reach them and influence them in the
shops.
She told the comrades that the main concentration work of the
party in Brooklyn was among the longshoremen, that transit was
also one of the chief concentrations, and that the party had recently
started concentration activity among domestic workers. Metals was
another concentration in which the party was interested.
It was at the last session of the class held May 4, 1950, that Mar-
garet Krumbein, who had the job of organizing these cadre groups,
told the comrades that the purpose was to train the comrades to do
better work in their clubs, that they expected them to return to their
parly clubs and really assume the role of leadership after these par-
ticular classes were held.
Mr. Tavenner. I believe you stated that your membership began
in 1943?
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 825
Mrs. Blauvi<:lt. Yes, that is right.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you continue, please, with the circumstances
under which you became a member of the Communist Party?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I had to gain entrance into the party and I dis-
covered that tlie Ninth A. D. had advertised some forums in the Daily
Worker, so I attended one of these forums and, of course, as soon as
I appeared at it, I was recognized as a newcomer and was approached
with the invitation to come back to further forums. Frank Asher,
the executive secretary of the Ninth A. D. Club at that time, invited
me to attend a meeting, which I did. And following that meeting
he asked me to come to a meeting which was being held on April 4,
1943, in the home of Fan Fundler, which I did, and at which time I
formally joined the Communist Party.
Mr. ScHERER. What year was that?
]Mrs. Blauvelt. 1943.
JMr. TA^^)NNER. You stated you were recruited as a result of your
having attended certain forums. Did you preserve an advertise-
ment of the forums that you attended ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, I did.
Mr. Tavenner. I hand you a photostatic copy of an advertisement
of a forum. Did you attend the forums appearing in this advertise-
ment ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, I did. There are 2 forums, 1 on March 11
and another on March 25, 1943, which I attended before my entrance
into the Communist Party.
The other two forums, one on April 8 and another on April 22,
1943, I attended after I had become a member of the Communist
Party.
Mr. Tavenner. I desire to offer the document in evidence and ask
that it be marked "Blauvelt Exhibit No. 1," and that it be incor-
porated in the transcript of the record.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
(The exhibit referred to is as follows :)
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 1
FotTR FOEUMS FOR VICTORY
THURSDAYS AT 8:30 P. M.
March 11 : America Answers Nazi Slauj^hters in Europe
Symposium— Speakers : Rev. Ethelred Brown, Max Felshin, and Abraham
Chapman. Morning Freiheit.
March 25 : Discrimination Cripples Manpower.
Speaker : Cyril Philip, Negro Communist Leader.
April 8 : Zionism and Palestine. A New Approach.
Speaker : David Goldway, State educational director, Communist Party.
April 22 : Anti-Semitism Is Treason — Make It a Crime.
Speakers: Rev. James Robinson, and Isidore Begun.
At the Hotel Newton, 2528 Broadway, at 93d Street, New York-. Auspices:
9th A. D. Club of the Communist Party.
Subscription : Series of 4 lectures, 75 cents, single, 25 cents.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you issued a Communist Party card on join-
ing the Communist Party?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, I was.
Mr. Tavenner. I hand you a number of cards and ask yon to iden-
tify them, please. Will you state what they are?
826 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mrs. Blauvelt. These are the membership cards which were issued
to me noting my membership in the Communist Party for the years
1943 to 1948 inchisive. The card that I was given for 1944 is in the
name of the Conmiunist Political Association. The last card which
I received was the membership card for 1948. That was the last year
that the party issued membership cards. They discontinued after
that year, as a matter of security.
Mr. Tavenner. Wliat name did you use when you became a member
of the Ninth A. D. Club of the Communist Party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. In the Ninth A. D. Club 1 used the name of Mildred
Brandt, and after I was expelled from the Ninth A. D. Club I had to
assume another alias and I assumed the name of Sylvia Vogel, which
was the name I was known by in the party from 1944 through 1951.
Mr. Ta\^nner. I would like to offer in evidence the first Communist
Party card issued to you under the name of Mildred Brandt in 1943,
and the last Communist Party card which was issued in 1948 to you
under the name of Sylvia Vogel, and ask that they be marked "Blau-
velt Exhibits Nos. 2 and 3" respectively, and that they be incorporated
in the transcript of the record.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
(The exhibits referred to are as follows :)
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 2
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 827
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 2
Blatjvelt Exhibit No. 2
828 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
■■■^■■■ipl
^^f-'^im^^^^^$^siMi^^mS§ttMSM
|ilil¥*5pp^»^*i^i5iSsS^
BiJ-TTVELT Exhibit No.
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 3
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 829
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 3
Mr. Tavenner. I should like to have the privilege of making photo-
static copies and returning the originals to the witness.
Mr. Willis. That procedure will be followed.
In the course of your work in the Communist Party, did you find
it common or uncommon for members to use their own names or aliases
for party reasons or for any other reasons ?
Mrs. BLAu^^LT. I found both to be the case. There were many who
used their own names, had no objection to using their own names, but
there also were many who did use party names, as they were called.
There were known in the party by those party names. And they
would use them in many instances to conceal their identity, their
true identity for reasons of their own, probably for positions that
they held or to the degree they might have been known by other
people.
Mr. Willis. I suppose the Communist Party knew that that practice
prevailed ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That would be known, I would say to most of the
executive membere of the club.
Mr. Tavenner. You spoke of the Ninth A. D. Club. What do the
initials "A. D." represent?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Assembly district. The clubs usually were divided
into geographical designations according to assembly districts, es-
pecially at that particular time. The Upper West Side section, had the
7th A. D. Club, 9th A. D. Club and 11th A. D. Club and I was a mem-
ber of the Ninth A. D. Club.
Mr. Tavenner. Can you tell the committee the approximate nu-
merical strength of the Ninth A. D. Club during the period of your
membership ?
63968 — 55— pt. 3 2
830 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mrs. Blauvelt. I can't give you any exact figure on that because I
was in the club too short a time and the membership in the light of
numbers was not discussed. I would assume that there might have
been at least 100 from the composition of the clubs at that time.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you please give us the names of the members
of the Ninth A. D. Club, whom you can of your own knowledge
identify as members of the Communist Party ?
I would like to make this preliminary statement in regard to it.
If, in the course of identifying members of that group you should
name any person known to you to be a member of the Communist
Party who, at any subsequent period of time was issued a license to
teach that you so state if that is a fact ; and if the license to teach was
revoked or surrendered, that fact should also be stated.
Mrs. Blauvelt. In the Xinth A. D. Club I knew the following
Communist Party members through having met them at party
meetings. [Reading :]
Archie Abrams, 308 West 92d Street, New York City. I met him at the time
that I joined the party in the home of Fan Fundler. At that time he told me he
had joined the Communist Party in the days of the depression and he was
waiting for his orders to go to Fort Monmouth, which came through the fol-
lowing day.
Ruth Abrams of 308 West 92d Street, New York City, was the financial secre-
tary of the Ninth A. D. Club and also a member of the county committee. She
later became executive secretary of the Ninth A. I). Club, one of the active
members of the club.
Dorothy Ames, 467 Central Park West, New York City; I understood she
changed her name from Abrams. She was one of the members placed in my
group. In other words, I was her group captain. She did attend party meetings.
Mr. Tavenner. If any of the persons whom you are identifying as
members with you in any group of the Communist Party are now
being investigated by any investigative agency of the State or Federal
Government, I suggest that your identification of those individuals
be reserved for executive session.
Mrs. Bluv'elt. All right. [Reading :]
Michael Ames, 467 Central Park West, New York City. He attended meet-
ings prior to his induction into the service.
Frank Asber, 425 Central Park West, New York City, who was the executive
secretary of the club and took great interest in me when I first came into the
Ninth A. D. Club insofar as his recruiting me into the party. He was also a mem-
ber of the county committee and he became chairman of the club while I was
there.
Steve Ballin was the industrial director of the club and a delegate to the
county convention which was held at that time.
Ann Boylan attended some meetings. I remember one time she said her
husband was in San Francisco doing organizing work. The implication was
doing organizational work for the Communist Party; organizing in some con-
nection or other. She didn't specify just what.
I think I would like to point out here there were two members in
the Ninth A. D. Club who had been placed in my group as group
captain, and when their names were given to me by Ruth Abrams,
financial secretary of the club, she told me they never attended meet-
ings, and I was to collect their dues from Frank Asher, the executive
secretary. Frank Asher told me they had been members of the party
6 years prior to this time and had rejoined in February 1943.
Mr. TA^^:NNER. Did you collect the dues from them personally?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Not personally, no; I collected their dues from
Frank Asher.
INVESTIGATION OF COMJVIUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 831
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I suggest the identification of those
two individuals be reserved for executive session.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
Mrs. Blauvelt. I come across a name here that would fall into the
category you just mentioned, of being investigated by one of the
city departments.
Mr. Tavenner. Please withhold the name for executive session.
Mrs. Blauvelt (reading) :
Fan Fundler, 143 West 96th Street, New York City. It was at her home I
joined the Communist Party, April 4, 1943.
Bert Greene, whom I met at meetings.
Minna Horowitz, who was director of the party's press drive taking place
fit that time.
Rose Lurie, who told me she was a physiotherapist in some hospital. She is
one of the comrades who took great interest in me when I first came into the
Ninth A. D. Club and was actually credited with having recruited me into the
party.
Pete Mendell was chairman of the club and a picture of Pete Mendell appears
in the Daily Worker of June 11, 1943, under the name of Amen Dell.
Al Prago, who directed the Daily Worker fund drive. Al Prago had been
designated as a member of the Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and
subsequently I did see his name in catalogs of the Jefferson School of Social
Science listed as an instructor with the notation that he was national com-
mander of the Veterans of the Abraham Ijincoln Brigade at one time.
Bea G. Schutz, 130 West 97th Street, New York City, who was membership
director of the Ninth A. D. Club. She did have a substitute license in the New
York City school system, but it was surrendered.
Fanny Sheftman, 425 Central Park West, New York City. She was a member
of my particular group. She told me she had a defense job, that she was a
block captain in the air raid warden service and also served on the local draft
board. I did succeed in collecting dues from her.
Joe Silver was legislative director of the club and he was a delegate to the
county convention held at that time.
Rose Wallach of 315 West 98th Street, New York City. She was active in
CDVO work and also was a delegate to the county convention held at that time.
Dorothy Weber, 9 West 97th Stdeet, New York City, also known as Ryder,
R-y-d-e-r which I believe was her maiden name. She wished to use the name
of "White" in the party. She said she was a Civil Service worker. She was also
in my group. She paid me dues and did attend meetings.
William Weinstone, who was connected with the Workers School of New York
City. He was elected a delegate to the county convention that was held at that
time.
Abraham Ziff, who became a new member of the club at about the time that I
did.
I also knew Abraham Chapman as chairman of the Upper West Side section.
He did attend a meeting at the Ninth A. D. Club.
David Goldway, of 467 Central Park West, New York City, spoke at one of the
forums of the club.
Goldie Young, who was introduced to me as organizer of the section.
Mr. T.vvenner. 1 hand you four issues of the bulletin or periodical
entitled "News of the Ninth." Will you examine them and state what
they are, please?
Mrs. BLAU^^LT. These are bulletins which were issued by the Ninth
A. D. Club, which reported on the activities of the club and on meetings
and also included announcements of future meetings, also little bits of
information about the party members and forums that were being
held.
Mr. Tavenner. In referring to the names of the Communist Party
members, is that a reference to the full names of the individuals, or
merely the first name and last initial ?
832 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mrs. Blauvelt. In most cases I would say that just the first names
or the first names with a last initial was used.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you know who edited the News of the Ninth ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, I don't.
Mr. Tavenner. I desire to offer the four bulletins in evidence and
ask that they be marked "Blauvelt Exhibits Nos. 4, 5, 6, and 7," for
identification purposes only, and to be made a part of the committee
files for further analysis and study.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you state that there were possibly as many as
100 members of this first club of which you became a member?
Mrs. Blauvei/f. I believe from any computation I could make on
membership at that time, that that would be so. I cannot be absolutely
sure.
Mr. Tavenner. Except for a few whose names you will give us in
executive session, have you given us the names of all the members you
can positively identify as members of that group ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. You stated that you were expelled from that group
in the Ninth A. D. Club.
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. What was the reason for the expulsion ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Frank Asher, the executive secretary of the club,
or chairman at the time of my expulsion, suddenly confronted me with
the statement that I was being charged with being a member of the
Christian Front and therefore I would have to be expelled from the
party. However, I didn't even know what the Christian Front was.
Of course I denied any affiliation and it was supposed to be taken under
consideration, and I had to keep in contact with him for a period of
several weeks. I did so and of course I was told that things looked
very bad for me and finally in September the expulsion really did be-
come official.
Mr. Willis. Did you have a hearing ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, I had absolutely no hearing whatsoever. I
was just confronted with the charge by the chairman of the club and
that was the end of it.
Mr. Willis. Did he tell you you could have counsel such as we accord
witnesses here?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir; that was absolutely all there was to it. I
was given no opportunity to refute any charges.
Mr. Tavenner. Did he explain to you that you could refuse to an-
swer on the grounds of the fifth amendment ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir; I was just accused and thrown out. I
wasn't given an opportunity to say anything.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you advised of the character of the evidence
which the chairman apparently relied upon as a basis for the charge?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No.
Mr. Scherer. Do you think that was the real reason you were ex-
pelled, namely, your alleged membership in this Christian Front
organization ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I was not a member of the Christian Front so actu-
ally there could have been no basis for such an accusation. It is pos-
sible that they might have discovered that I was a member of the
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 833
New York City Police Department, but just were not confronting me
with that information. It might have been a ruse on their part.
There certainly was no basis for a charge of "Christian Frontism."
Mr. Willis. Did you ever find out what the Christian Front was
supposed to be?
Mrs. Blauvelt. According to the explanation I later heard through
the Communist Party, the Christian Front was considered by them
to be an extremely anti-Semitic organization and of course they were
utterly opposed to it. They usually included in the group of Christian
Frontists, Father Coughlin and Gerald L. K. Smith and people of that
type.
' Mr. Tavenner. When you were expelled in 1951, were you faced
with the specific charge of being a member of the FBI or the New
York City Police Department?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes ; that was a very definite charge but there again
I was not confronted with any evidence. In connection with that ex-
pulsion, if you are interested in hearing the process, I will go into it.
Mr. Taa^nner. Yes, now that we have spoken of it, w^ill you de-
scribe the story of your expulsion in 1951 ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. In 1951 the Communist Party was conducting what
they called verifications. It was a term that they applied to what we
would naturally call screening and they had started with the top
echelon in the party and were going down through all of the execu-
tive ranks, and as an executive member of the Jay-Smith Club I was
called in to a meeting to answer certain questions about my back-
ground.
I was given a mimeographed legal sized form several pages in
length, containing about 60 questions, and had to answer in detail
each one of the questions on that form.
Mr. Tavenner. I believe you have prepared a list of a number of
those questions ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, sir; but I do not have that list in front of me.
Mr. Tavenner. Just omit that phase of it and we will produce that
later.
Mr, Willis. I wonder if you would remember that in substance
now.
Mrs. Blau\^lt. The substance of the questions was, I would say,
the background of one's life from practically one's date of birth
through the educational process that one had undergone and also the
educational process toward becoming a Communist, what were your
party affiliations or what were your leftist leanings before you be-
came a member of the Communist Party, and how were they de-
veloped within the party.
Mr. Ta\^nner. And also whether you had been a member of a
political party and if so which one ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes; what was your political affiliation before
you became a member of the Communist Party. It went into a great
deal of detail about one's background and left nothing out, I would
say, so far as one's life history was concerned.
There were two members of the party conducting this verification.
One was David Sales and the other Allen Rosenstein. They were
members of the review commission and had been appointed to conduct
this verification. After this particular verification they called me
into a private hearing.
834 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mr. Tavenner. Were all members subjected to this verification?
Mrs. Blauvelt. At this time, no, just the executive members of the
Jay-Smith Club. There were about three of us undergoing this par-
ticular verification. But I was called back for a further oral hearing
and at this one they told me they were considering me for a confi-
dential assignment within the party, but that I would have to be
further verified, further screened. And then they later told me that
they would have to hold this assignment in abeyance.
There were charges — not charges — but suspicion that I might be
a member or agent for the FBI. Certain things were happening in
the Boro Hall section; they did not know if they could blame me
for whatever was going on ; maybe it was somebody else who wanted
to divert suspicion from themselves, trying to cast it upon me. I was
told to review the membership to find out whether or not I could
determine whether I had an enemy in the party, or whether there
might be anybody who would be an enemy of the party who was doing
this work of provocation.
However, they did finally call me in to a meeting in the latter part
of November of 1951 at which actually expulsion proceedings were
conducted. At that time they accused me of being a member of
the New York City Police Department and told me inasmuch as I was
a stool pigeon and spy and had done my dirty work, I no longer had
any place in the Communist Party and I was being expelled.
Mr. Willis. The subcommittee will take an informal recess for
5 minutes.
(Brief recess.)
Mr. Willis. The subcommittee will come to order.
Let the record show that Mr. Willis and Mr. Scherer are present,
constituting a quorum.
Proceed, Mr. Tavenner.
Mr. Tavenner. l^^iat time of the year 1943 were vou expelled from
the 9th A. D. Club of the Communist Party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I would say that my formal ending of membership
in the Ninth A. D. Club took place at the beginning of September of
1943.
Mr. Tavenner. You have told us that you were directed to try to
regain entrance into the Communist Party in another area of the city ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is correct.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you describe the circumstances under whicli
that took place ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, immediately upon my final expulsion from
the Ninth A. D. Club, T again had to renew my efforts to gain entrance
into the Communist Party and I did this over the next several months,
and it was in January of 1944 that I once again through the Daily
Worker saw an advertisement which had been inserted by the Flat-
bush Club advertising a forum, and I therefore attended ithat forum
and once again I was looked upon as a good potential recruit. They
were in the midst of a recruiting drive at that time. I was invited
to attend otlier forums by Abe Feingold in particular, the educational
director of the club, and he did also invite me to attend one of the
meetings of the club. This was prior to my becoming a member.
Then finally at one meeting that was held April 4, 1944, I did
consent to become a member of the party once again. This time in
the Flatbush Club.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 835
Mr. Tavenner. What name did you use this time ?
Mrs, Blauvelt. Sylvia Vogel.
Mr. Tavenner. How long did you remain a member of the Flat-
bush Club?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Until January 1946. The Flatbush Club under-
went a reorganization, was broken down into smaller clubs and I
was placed in the Parkside Club.
Ml". Tavenner. Were we in the war period during the time you
were a member of the Ninth A. D. Club and the Flatbush Club ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. Would it be correct to say then that the activities
of both those clubs during the war period were substantially the
same ?
Mr. Blauvelt. Yes ; I would say so.
Mr. Tavenner. Without attempting to break down activties of the
2 clubs, the Ninth A. D. and the Flatbush; what were the chief activi-
ties of the Communist Party during your membership in that war
period ?
Mrs. Bl^vuat^lt. I found that one of the big issues that was raised
was the opening of a "second front." They were continually calling
for a "second front" until it became an actuality in 1944, and they were
very concerned about the war effort. They accepted the no-strike
pledge, they participated in all war activities such as civil defense,
buying of war bonds, giving blood and all that type of war activity.
This continued while I was a member of the Ninth A. D. Club and
while I was a member of the Flatbush Club of the Communist Political
Association.
There was a very definite change in policy from this period, if
you would like me to go into that at this point. I think probably
one example of the change in policy can be shown through the
Mr. Willis. At what time was the change in policy ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. This covers the period of 1943 and 1944, and I would
say — well, part of 1945 up until the conclusion of the war.
Mr. Willis. Are you still talking about the war period ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, the war period. During that period their
policy was very broad, one of cooperation with capitalism, but there
was a radical change at the end of the war. One example is in the
Flatbush Club. For instance, they had been very vigorous in war-
loan bond drives, but as soon as the war ended that discontinued. The
Treasury Department had sent a letter to the club, read by the chair-
man of the club, at one meeting, but consideration had to be given to
this request on the part of the Treasury Department to join in a vic-
tory war loan drive, and it was based on political reasoning.
The decision was that the Treasury Department was to be informed
that even though the Flatbush Club was proud of its record in the
past in the bond drives, now that they were engaged in the struggles
of labor and other issues of China and Palestine they would have no
time to participate in a victory war loan drive.
That was one of the examples I think that might be of interest.
However, when it comes to the so-called struggles of labor, there was
a very distinct line of demarcation in party policy. They had, for
instance, accepted the no-strike pledge and an example of that I think
can be shown when I was a member of the 9th A. D. Club. A meet-
836 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
ing was held specifically, on May 11, 1943, at which Sam Barron of
the Workers School of New York City spoke. He spoke about Stalin's
order of the day which had been issued on May Day and how it called
for a second front.
He discussed the coal-mining situation at that time. John L. Lewis
had called for a strike. He said it was treason on the part of Lewis
to call for a strike at that time, because it would impede the war effort.
However, I found that as soon as the war ended and labor situations
did arise there were strikes in which the party did give its support.
For instance, in the fall of 1945 the longshoremen went on strike,
and that was supported by tlie party. The Food, Tobacco and Agri-
cultural and Allied Workers Union of America struck against the
Amei'ican Tobacco Co. and they sent cards. Party members were
given printed cards to send to the American Tobacco Co. in protest.
Mr. Tavenner. I hand you a photostatic copy of such card and ask
whether that is the type card used by the Communist Party member-
ship in attempting to boycott products of the American Tobacco Co. ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is right. This is the card. We were given
this card and instructed to send it to the American Tobacco Co.
Mr. Tavenner. Please read the last paragraph of the card addressed
to that company.
Mrs. Blatjvelt. It reads :
This is to inform yoii that I am refraining from buying any of your products
until the demands of your employees are met.
Mr. Tam^.nner. I desire to offer this card in evidence and ask that
it be marked "Blauvelt Exhibit No. 8" and that it be incorporated in
the transcript of the record.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
(The exhibit referred to is as follows :)
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 8
American Tobacco Company,
111 Fifth Avenue, New York, N. Y.
To the American Tol)acco Company:
Gentlemen : I understand tliat 2,500 of your employees are on strike for a
living wage — 65 cents an hour minimum and a 25-cent increase in pay. Even
just from seeing your Company's advertisements in the press and hearing your
programs on the radio, it is evident that a corporation as large as yours can
afford to pay its employees enough to guarantee them a decent American stand-
ard of living.
This is to inform you that I am refraining from buying any of your products
until the demands of your employees are met.
Yours truly.
Mrs. Blauvelt. There was another strike where a great deal of
activity was conducted in the Flatbush Club — the General Motors
strike in December 1945 and January 1946. The comrades made mon-
etary contributions to a strikers' fund. They solicited contributions
of food from the shoppers. The members' participation in this activ-
ity was well organized in the Flatbush Club.
Mr. Tavenner. Therefore we have the distinct picture of a neigh-
borhood group or cell of the Communist Party being active in strikes.
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is correct. There was a Western Union
strike around January of 1946, and in connection with all of this
strike situation we had a meeting at the Parkside Club one evening.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEM^ YORK AREA 837
It was on January 22 of 1946, when one of the members by the name
of Leonard Tyler reported on the strike situation, and said that the
club was going to form a strike-activities committee to participate in
these strike struggles.
Ruth Wang, who was the membership director of the section, said
that the county committee was participating in the strike struggle and
that as of January 24, 1946, the county committee was inaugurating a
7-day campaign to raise $7,000 for Communist Party strike activities
and planned on sending 20 volunteers to industrial cities in upstate
New York to cover strike activities; and Nat Rosenbluth, chairman
of the Flatbush section, stated the State committee planned on raising
$20,000 for a strike-activities fund.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, this may be an explanation of testi-
mony we received at Albany, N. Y., of the importation into that area
of numerous Communist Party workers from the New York area. It
seems to me to prove that our suspicions at Albany were correct.
Mr. Willis. The New York example was a pattern.
Mr. Tavener. Yes, here we have evidence for the first time from a
cell in the Communist Party that people were being organized to
go into upstate New York for Communist Party purposes where we
have received testimony that people did come upstate from New York,
but we could not prove that it M'as a concerted plan of the Communist
Party.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Now at this time, in January of 1946, while the
Western Union strike was being conducted, the party members were
instructed to join the picket lines and some of the members of our
club did so.
There is one interesting — I believe it is interesting — strike which
took place in June of 1946, and at a meeting of the Parkside Club,
Sid Wang, one of the organizers of the Flatbush section, stated
that wholehearted support had to be given by the party to the impend-
ing maritime strike. He said the local branches and sections of the
Communist Party would not prepai-e any strike literature in their own
names, because the possibility existed that the preparation of such
literature might be undertaken by some one not sufficiently advanced
politically or by a "provocateur"' in the Communist Party for the pur-
pose of taking advantage of just such an opportunity to subtly mis-
represent the Communist Party's position, and in order to avoid the
possibility of any literature ever being used as a weapon against the
Communist Party, the State committee was handling the prepara-
tion of maritime-strike literature to be distributed by the various
clubs.
At this time also the comrades were asked to sign little coupons
pledging that they would take seamen into their homes to give them
lodging.
Mr. Tavennfji. I hand you a throwaway sheet entitled "The House
YOU Live In." In the right-hand corner there is a coupon. Will
you examine it and state whether it is the coupon to which you are
referring ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, that is it.
Mr. Tavenner. I desire to offer the document and ask that it be
marked "Blauvelt Exhibit No. 9," for identification purposes only,
and to be made a part of the committee files.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
838 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mrs. Blauvelt. On the continuation of party participation in the
so-called strike struggle, in October of 1946 the New York State Com-
munist Party issued a leaflet, the intent of which was to explain the
Communist support of the United Mine Workers of America strikers —
the strike going on at that particular time. The explanation was that
the Communists did not like Lewis but they did support the mine
strikers for the sake of the miners and the cause of labor.
In May 1947 there was a strike at the Reynolds Tobacco Co. and
Camel cigarettes were boycotted.
Mr. Tavenner. Was any boycott action taken at your club meeting
in connection with the products of that company?
Mrs. Blau\^lt. The comrades were actually instructed to boycott
products of the Reynolds Tobacco Co. Then in July of 1947 when I
was a member of the Jay-Smith Club another strike took place at the
Brooklyn Trust Co. at 177 Montague Street, Brooklyn. This was
considered a rather important strike because this was the first strike
in any bank.
Mr. Tavenner. What union was involved?
Mrs. BLAu^^LT. United Office and Professional Workers of America
conducted the strike.
At a meeting of the Jay-Smith Club on August 5, 1947, Eleanor
Schor, the club organizer, instructed the comrades to telephone the
Brooklyn Trust Co. between the hours of 10 o'clock and 11 o'clock in
the morning and 1 and 3 p. m. in the afternoon as a nuisance measure
so that the employees who were in the bank would be harrassed at
hours when they would be busiest.
Mr. TA^^NNEE. What was the nature of those telephone calls?
Mrs. Blauvelt. The nature of the telephone call was to give a ficti-
tious name just to give them trouble in locating a name, to waste their
time and annoy them. There would be no such account in the bank
but it would interrupt their functioning during busy hours.
Mr. Tavenner. Was that type of action directed by the Communist
Party leadership of your group?
Mrs. BLAu^^:LT. Yes, those were directives we received.
There was a longshoremen's strike or shipyard workers strike, I
guess you would call it, in September 1947, and we were asked to bring
food to those workers. The American Communications Association
was on strike in February 1948 and we were asked to support that
with collection cans. The miners' strike in 1950 was supported and
an American Safety Razor Co. strike in 1951 was supported by col-
lections of food and funds.
Mr. Tavenner. I hand you a throwaway sheet regarding the last
mentioned strike and I will ask whether or not it was used in your
Communist Party meetings.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, this was distributed at a party meeting in 1951
when this particular strike at the American Safety Razor Co. was being
conducted.
Mr. TA^^ENNER. I desire to introduce the document in evidence and
ask that it be marked "Blauvelt Exhibit 10," and that it be incorpo-
rated in the transcript of the record.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
(The exhibit referred to is as follows :)
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 839
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 10
51-615
We Can't Eat Razors
We Need Raises.'
*Over 1100 of us, members of Local H75, U.E.R.M.W.A. (UE), who
work for the American Safety Razor Company in Brooidyn, have been
on strike sITfie May 1st for a desperately needed wage increase.
ASR WORKERS NEED 20^ INCREASE
^Ever since the first of April, we have been trying to negotiate
an increase in wages to help us support our families and meet the
sky-rocketing cost of liviffg. The minimum rate in our shop is $1,03
per hour. We need at least 20* per hour more. This is little enough
in face of today's increased food prices and higher taxes.
ASR COMPANY CAN AFFORD TO PAY
"while our savings disappeared long ago and many of us have had
to go into debt to meet our bills, the American Safety Razor Com-
pany increased its reserves from $9,126,315 to JIO, 188,313 at the
«^d of I 950 .
While high prices forced the living standards of its workers
^2cI3' \^l American Safety Razor Company showed a profit for
ASR REFUSES TO SETTLE
^In spite of all our arguments, facts and figures, sound as they
were, the Company refused to budge from a miserly 8* per hour offer.
Hardly a drop in the bucket with food and clothing prices sky high
and even higher taxes just around the corner. The stubborn and
arrogant attitude of the ASR Company left us no choice but to strike.
^we ASK youR support^
ȣ PBODUCE THE FOLLOWING PRODUCTS AT THE
AMSRiCAN SAFSTY RAZOR COMPANY
Gem Razors and Blades Ever-Ready Brushes
Silver Star Blades ASR Lighters
Blue Star Blades Treet Blades
SUPPORT OUR STRIKE
Write, wire or telephone the American Safety Razor Company.
315 Jay Street. Brooklyn. MAiNS.6tOO ano urge them to sit oowi
AND negotiate immediately.
issued by: USB Strike Committee. Local 6 75 U . E .R . M . t .A . (UE)
160 Montague Street, Brooklyn,N.Y. '
840 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mr. Tavenner. Wliat was the participation of the Communist
Party in this strike ?
Mrs. Blauvklt. In a branch such as ours — a community branch —
support had to be given to any activity on the part of the strikers and
we were instructed to assist in whatever way we possibly could. They
would need food, for instance, because they were not employed, and
probably were not getting money, so it was one way of participation
in the strike activity.
Mr. Tavenner. The union which went on strike was local 475 of the
United Electrical Radio & Machine Workers of America. Do you
have any knowledge of participation by any Communist Party mem-
ber on the strike committee of that union ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I do not have any knowledge — not within my own
group.
Mr. Tavenner. Normally would that occur in a neighborhood
group ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir ; I would say not to any great extent.
Mr. Tavtenner. Will you continue, please.
Mrs. Blauvelt. As a further example of participation in strikes to
the degree that a Communist club would participate in them, such as
going to the picket line and participating in picketing or supplying
strikers with food and clothing, there was another method of demon-
stration used by the party to bring attention to certain issues, and not
simply a strike situation, but where picketing as a measure of activity
would be employed. When I was in the Jay-Smith Club, for in-
stance, we were instructed to join a picket line that was going to be
conducted at the Greek consulate on July 9, 1947, being sponsored by
the American Council for a Democratic Greece.
Mr. Tavenner. I hand you a throwaway sheet relating to that
demonstration. Will you examine it, please, and state whether it
identifies the occasion of which you are speaking?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. We were given these at a meeting to inform
us of the particular picketing action that was going to be taken.
Mr. Tavenner. I desire to offer the document in evidence and ask
that it be marked "Blauvelt Exhibit 11," and that it be incorporated
in the transcript of the record.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
(The exhibit referred to is as follows :)
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 841
lii^uvELT Exhibit No. 11
--STOP THE WAIVTOIV BLOODSHED--
PROTEST MURDERS OF
GREEK PATRIOTS
PATRIOTIC RESISTANCE FIGHTERS BEING EXECUTED
DAILY BY PRO-NAZI MONARCHIST GOVERNMENT
Here Are The Facts:
1 . 333, including 7 women, executed by firing squads
on false charges after sentence by pro-Nazi court
martiais.
2. 17 heroes of the anti-Nazi Resistance Army, the
ELAS, were shot on June 1 9 for having fought the
Germans.
3. 1300 more such patriotic heroes have been sen-
tenced and are awaiting death. Only our protest
can save them.
4. Thousands in prison awaiting further sentences of
death or exile.
JOIN THE MASS PICKET LINE BEFORE
THE GREEK CONSULATE
AT 30 ROCKFELLER PLAZA
(49th and BOth Streets) ^ .^
ON WEDNESDAY. JULY 9th. AT 5 P.M./^^
TO PROTEST THESE EXECUTIONS AND
THE MURDER OF GREEK DEMOCRATS
Sponsored by the
AMERICAN COUNCIL FOR A DEMOCRATIC GREECE
ond the
UNITED COMMITTEE TO PROTEST GREEK EXECUTIONS
152 West 42nd Street • New York 21, N. Y.
842 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mrs. Blauvelt. There were other instances when we were informed
about picket lines. For instance, at the Lenin memorial meeting of
January 14, 1948, leaflets advertising a picket line in front of the
Spanish consulate January 15, 1948, by the Veterans of the Abraham
Lincoln Brigade were distributed, and then in 1950 on March 8, tSie
Joint Anti-Fascist Kefugee Committee was going to hold a picket
line in front of the office of the Vultee Aviation Corp. to protest ship-
ment of goods to Franco Spain and we were instructed to participate
in that.
That was the type of activity that was conducted either in the strike
situation or in protest.
Mr. Tavenner. You began your discussion of the strike situation
by telling us that during the period of the war the party was opposed
to strikes.
Mrs, Blauvelt. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. It was after the war was over that this strike par-
ticipation took place. At the beginning of your testimony you men-
tioned a person by the name of Sam Barron who spoke at a meeting,
I hand you another edition of News of the Ninth which was published
by the Ninth District Assembly Club of the Communist Party, under
date of May 6, 1943, and will you state whether a meeting was
advertised to be held on May 11, 1943.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. In this particular News of the Ninth there
is the announcement that at the next meeting, "What is holding up
the Second Front" would be discussed by a prominent speaker, and in
parentheses : "Can't announce the name."
Mr. Tavenner. But you have described in your testimony that
meeting and what Sam Barron, the speaker, said.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes; the meeting was held on the following May
II and it was Sam Barron of the Workers School of New York City
who spoke.
Mr. Tavenner. I hand you a later issue of the News of the Ninth
and I will ask you to state whether or not you find confirmation of the
fact in the last paragraph that Mr. Barron did speak.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes ; it says here :
In retrospect Sam Barron, to quote one listener at our last meeting "Gave the
clearest and best analysis of the current world situation I have ever heard."
Sorry you were too busy to get there, if you missed it.
Mr. Taatenner. I desire to offer the 2 documents in evidence and
ask that they be marked "Blauvelt Exhibits 12 and 13," respectively,
and that they be incorporated in the transcript of the record.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
(The exhibits referred to are as follows :)
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 12
News of the Ninth
Issued bimonthly by 9 A. D. Club Communist Party, New York City, May 6, 1943
Last issue we vowed we wouldn't brag about our meetings but — that last one
was something that just can't be passed in silence. It was a wow! It ended
with the audience of 100 yelling enthusiastically. Special credit must go to
the excellent worlj of the cast and to the professional direction of Mike. And
extra praise to Pete, the author of the script! Frustration of the week was
Ernie, the stagehand, who was left standing at the light switch when the director
forgot to give him the cue !
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 843
Headed for the Array soon is IVIike, Herman, Selwyn, Leonard, Marty, Jesse,
and Bea's husband. Herb. Among those already serving are Dave, Allan, Eddie,
and Rose's two sons, one of them in the South Pacific.
RECRUITING DRIVE OVER
We've sent lots of our boys to fight, but for each one gone, two new members
have joined our ranks. The section oversubscribed its quota by fifty. Our Glub
hit 27 out of a quota of 25 — and still more are knocking on the doors. The
News of the Ninth takes this opportunity to gxeet every one of you 27 and wants
to say (for new members only — tired old timers skip to the next page) : The Club
looks to you newcomers to perk us old timers up a bit. We want your ideas,
your freshness, your knowledge, your enthusiasm and energy. Don't be timid
about discussing your problems and ideas with us. We want to hear them.
WALL STREET SECTION
We're running a modest sort of private fund drive. Don't skip buying those
bonds, but if there's anything left over, we can use it. A hundred smackers in
so far. Support the Club and stop inflation (sic).
THEATRE
Two Best Bets of the Year : Voice of the People, By 9 A. D. Club ; Mission
to Moscow, Warners.
We Editors sat hypnotized, magnetized, and electrified for 2 solid hours. See
it (but, please, not on Tuesday night).
BELLES LETTERS
For them as reads mysteries — Johnny On the Spot, by Amen Dell. A swell
mystery with a progressive slant. At your lending library.
PERSONAL INTELLIGENCE
No getting away from it — -our guys are good. None of that nine-months
stuff for us. We are accelerating to meet the new war tempo. Result — Ruth J.
has a premature incubator baby ! And is it tiny ! And cute ! Paula G. is
beginning to knit tiny little sweaters and things . . . And that puffed up look
about Anne M. ain't gas. And Dorothy, you look so beautiful these days. Which
leads us into Mother's Day. Lots of mothers are separated from their sons
this year. Quickest way to get them back is Lick Hitler Now. Second Front
tables and petitions will be scattered along Broadway this Sunday to help bring
about that Second Front.
MEDICAL
George Washington used to have himself bled regularly as a health measure.
In those days they wasted blood. Today we save lives with it. We're going to
give blood to the Red Cross — and each pint will save a life. You'll hear more
about this at the next meeting. Those who are willing to start the blood rolling
should be prepared to set the date. The entire Executive Committee is volun-
teering. Wanna come along?
LEGISLATION
The Dickstein Bill— The Lynch Bill.
Both would forbid Anti-Semitic, Anti-Negro material the use of the mails.
We should push for the passage of both. Write Sol Bloom, House Office Bldg.,
Washington, D. C.
And while you're writing to Bloom it won't hurt to tell him of your dis-
appointment at the negative results of the Bermuda Conference on Refugees, in
which he participated.
NEXT MEETING
"What's Holding Up the Second Front?" — Prominent Speaker (can't announce
the name). Good and Welfare Session. Mass Induction. Current Events
Quizz. Tuesday, 8 : 30 P. M. May 11th, Hotel Newton. Be sure to bring your
friends.
844 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
BuvtrvELT Exhibit No. 13
News of the Ninth
Issued by 9 A. D. Club Communist Party
Special — First of Two Pre-Convention Discussions
SPECIAL
Tuesday night, May 25th, Hotel Newton, 8 : 30 P. M.
This is when we hammer out a line and a program to contribute to our State
Committee. This is the place to raise your problems, express your opinions,
report your activities, criticize yourself and your leadership.
Now is the time when you contribute your share in forming a program and
policy for the coming year, and elect your delegates to take your program to
the State Convention.
Here's Democratic Centralism in Action.
Come and Do Your Democratic Share.
Delegates to the Convention will be apportioned on the basis of dues pay-
ments through May. No one can be a delegate or vote if he is in bad standing.
Therefore all dues should be paid up at once. If you can't come to the next
meeting send your dues to Frank Asher, 425 Central Park West, N. Y. C, but
be sure to put your name on it.
IN retrospect
Sam Barron, to quote one listener at our last meeting, gave "the clearest and
best analysis of the current world situation I have ever heard." Sorry you
were too busy to get there, if you missed it.
legislation
The crystal ball tells ye editors that you haven't yet written about the
Dickstein and Lynch Bills. Why not? Don't you want to curb anti-Semitism?
At present the Bill is in the Committee on PostofEces and Post Roads. Con-
gressman Burch, Chairman. Address House Office Bldg., Washington, D. O.
Tell the Honorable Sir you want the Bill brought out on the floor for an open
hearing.
Another valuable letter would be to Sol Bloom asking that he be sure to be
on the floor of the House when the Anti-Poll Tax Bill comes up. He'll vote
right if he's present. We've got to make sure he is.
BONDS AND BLOOD
Get one — Give the other — Nuff said.
political
Did you know that the outlook for the United Nations has entered a new
phase since the beginning of the month? Or have you been missing the Daily
Worker? Keep up with important trends and movements by reading the paper
and attending your Club meetings.
A WORD TO THE WISE
You've probably noticed that the "Beat Japan First" diversionists are getting
more vehement, despite Churchill's speech. Do you know all the answers to
their falacious arguments? Do you know Reuther's role on the Labor Front?
Dubinsky's? Well then f 'Heavens sake — get the latest Communist and the Daily
Worker. They'll teach ya.
POISONAL
Ran out of baby news this week. How come, reporters? Blache and Florence
who have been quite ill are now back on their feet again.
Our condolences to Judith on the untimely death of her father.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 845
Mr. TA\TE>rNER. Did yon tell the committee what Mr. Barron in
the conrse of that speech had to say regarding John L. Lewis?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes,
Mr. Tavenner. Yon presented me with a copy of Earl Browder's
speech made on May 7, 1943, which was 2 nights prior to that of
Mr. Barron's speech. Did Mr. Barron's speech follow the line of
Mr. Browder's speech on the qnestion of repndiation of INIr. Lewis?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is right.
Mr. Tavexner. I desire to offer that docnment in evidence arid ask
that it be marked "Blauvelt Exhibit No. 14," for identification pur-
poses onl}^, and to be made a part of the committee files.
Idr. Willis. It is so ordered.
Mr. Tavenner. During this war period did any dispute arise within
the Communist Party as to the change of the name of that organiza-
tion?
Mrs. Blau\t:lt. Well, there was a change of name from the Com-
munist Party to the Communist Political Association, which took
place in the early part of 1944 whereby the Communist Party was
more or less dissolved as the party and became the Communist Politi-
cal Association. The Communist Political Association was in ex-
istence under that name for a period of about a year and then in the
spring of 1945 the famous Duclos letter came into existence, and upon
that letter and the party's decision that there should be a change in
the policy of the party, discussion was conducted for a few montlis
regarding the change in policy of the party from the Communist
Political Association to the reconstitution of the Comnumist Party
once again as a militant party. I do not know just how much detail
you want on that.
Mr. Tavenxer. The committee has received considerable evidence
regarding the Duclos letter and the effect of it.
Mr. Sctierer. Let the Duclos letter incident be restated for the
record.
Mrs. Blaua-elt. The Duclos letter was a letter which had been
written by Jacques Duclos, one of the high functionaries of the Com-
munist Party in France. It was a criticism of the decision of the
Communist Party of America to have dissolved itself as the Com-
munist Party and to have conducted its activities in the name of the
Communist Political Association. He felt that they had abandoned
the true Marxist principles of the Communist Party by doing so, and
this letter created quite a bombshell within party circles at the time
it was made public.
There was a great deal of discussion regarding party policy and
in tlie review of all this discussion it was brought out that Browder
had led the party into an incorrect policy of revisionism and there-
fore the party should be reconstituted, that under Browder an incor-
rect ])olicy of collaboration with capital had been followed and it
was now found that this could not be done, that capitalism was
reactionary and therefore the Communist Party had to resume its
militant and vanguai'd role of organizing the working class and once
again assuming its revolutionary tactics.
Mr. SniERER. And if necessary to accomplish that to advocate the
merthrowing of the capitalistic system by force and violence.
0.39G8— 55 — pt. 3 3
846 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, they went back to the concept of the prin-
ciples of Marxism and Leninism, the revolutionary concept of the
principles of Marx and Lenin.
Mr. ScHERER. Which carried with it force and violence if necessary.
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is correct.
Mr. Tavenner. You have presented to the staff 3 periodicals en-
titled : "Discussion Bulletin", issued by the New York State Commit-
ter of the Communist Political Association, which describe this change
or this reorganization of the Communist Party.
Mrs. Blauv-elt. That is right.
Mr. TAVEN>rER. These bulletins contain articles written by numer-
ous persons in the Communist Party on this subject, do they not?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. I desire to offer the 3 bulletins of June 26, 1945,
July 3, 1945, and July 10, 1945 in evidence and ask that they be
marked "Blauvelt Exhibits Nos. 15, 16 and 17", respectively, for identi-
fication purposes only, and to be made a part of the committee files.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
Mr. Ta\^nner. Tell us how many persons comprised the member-
ship of the Flatbush Club of the Communist Party prior to its being
broken down into smaller groups.
Mrs. Blauvelt. It was supposed to have comprised I think, between
300 and 350 in its membership, at that particular time.
Mr. Tavenner, Will you identify for the committee, please, the
geographical territory of the Ninth A. D. group of which you were
a member, and the Flatbush group ?
Mrs. Blaitv^lt. The Ninth A. D. covered the area in the upper
West Side of Manhattan, taking in I would say, the area of the West
Nineties, West 90th street, that particular geographical area. The
entire section I believe ran from some place in the Seventies up
through part of the Hundreds.
I don't know whether that is clear to you or not. If you know
what New York City is like, you probably will understand better
what I am speaking about. That is about the best I can give you as
an explanation of geographical location of the club.
Now the Flatbush Club comprised the area of the 21st A. D. in
Brooklyn and there was also another club, a large club at that time
which covered the 11th A. D. section, and at the time of reorganiza-
tion in January 1946 the 2 clubs were merged into one section, Flat-
bush section, covering the 21st A. D. and the 11th A. D.
Mr. Tavenner. What was the membership of the 11th A. D. Club,
prior to its merger ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I understand that also was something like 300,
though I am not too sure about the actual count.
Mr. Ta\t:nner. Therefore you had those 2 sections in the same
general area of Brooklyn ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. The Flatbush containing 350 members and the 11th
A. D. possibly as many as 300.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you be able to identify many of those who
were members of the Flatbush Club with you ?
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 847
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes.
Mr. Willis. The committee will stand in recess until 2 o'clock.
(Whereupon, at 12:15 p. m., the committee was recessed, to re-
convene at 2 p. m. the same day.)
AFTEKNOON SESSION, MAY 3
Mr. Willis (presiding). The subcommittee will come to order.
Let the record show that present are myself and my colleague from
Ohio, Mr. Scherer. The two members present being a quorum under
our rules, will you proceed, Mr. Taveimer.
TESTIMONY OF MRS. MILDRED BLAUVELT— Resumed
Mr. Tavenner. Mrs. Blauvelt, at the time of the recess we were dis-
cussing the Flatbush Club of the Communist Party. Will you name
those persons whom you can, of your own knowledge, identify as mem-
bers of the Communist Party within that group ? I would like you to
spell the names, please, so that the reporter will get them correctly.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. May I ask you this : Are you able to give the cor-
rect spelling of these names, or will it b© phonetic spelling in some
instances?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Some spellings will be the correct spelling of the
person's name. In some instances it will be a strictly phonetic spell-
ing. I have either heard the individual himself state his name, or I
have heard him greeted by that name, but it still remains a phonetic
spelling as far as I am concerned. I have prepared this in alphabetical
order.
Mr. Tavenner. May I make another statement? In identifying
these individuals, will you also give any descriptive information you
have as to their occupations and any information that might serve
to identify them, as well as information regarding their activity with-
in the group ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. If I am able to do so, I certainly will.
I have prepared this list alphabetically so that in the course of it
we will come across some of the comrades who were the functionaries
of the club and those that were most active. I will not point them out
first, I will just include them in the alphabetical listing. [Reading:]
Irwin — also known as Bud — Abrams, A-b-r-a-m-s, 2113 East 47th Street. He
was on the executive committee of the Flatbush Club for a time; and when I
knew him, worked for the Everett Chair Co., 114 East 32d Street, New York City.
He was a regular attender at party meetings.
Florence Abrams, whom I also heard identified as Chris, C-h-r-i-s, 2113 East
47th Street. She was the recording secretary of the Flatbush Club for a while.
Rose Akula, A-k-u-1-a ; she was on the executive committee of the club and
also active in the committee consumers council of Flatbush.
Bill Alexander — I first saw his name on a recruiting chart which I observed
in headquarters of the Flatbush Club at 848 Flatbush Avenue. I later met him
at meetings of the club.
Leo Auerbach, A-u-e-r-b-a-c-h. He used the party name of Arnold, A-r-n-o-l-d.
Auerbach was a member of the school commission of the New York State Com-
munist Party. He was an instructor In party schools and stated that he in-
structed a class for club executives and was instructor of a class in the painters'
union; he was an instructor of Marxism in the World Today at the Flatbush
Club. He also stated that he had been a member of the Communist Party since
he was 16 years of age, when he joined the Young Communist League. He said
848 nsrV^ESTIGATION of communist ACTIVHTES, new YORK AREA
that he wrote leaflets and pamphlets for the Communist Party. He had been a
teacher in the New York City school system who was dismissed after public
trial.
Shirley Auerbach, also known as Wallach, was the literature director for the
Flatbush section. She holds a license to teach in the New York City school
system.
Harold Bakerman, B-a-k-e-r-m-a-n, stated that he was a lawyer, that he had
been in the Communist Party for 10 years ; this statement being made in 1945,
and that he had held all positions in a party branch.
Sabina Bate, B-a-t-e. This is a strictly phonetical spelling. She was present
at one of the meetings and had volunteered to do some work in one of the activ-
ities being conducted at the time.
Eileen Bernstein, B-e-r-n-s-t-e-i-n, whom I also heard addressed as Estelle.
She was active in the club and attended many of its meetings.
Leo Bernstein — Leo Bernstein himself stated that he had joined the Communist
Party about 1932, and that he was in the merchant marine or had been in the
merchant marine, and had been in the American Communications Association
in Washington.
Miriam Black, B-1-a-c-k, 41.5 East 17th Street, Brooklyn, N. Y., was the treasurer
of the Flatbush Club. She stated that she worked in the Agriculture Department
of the United States Government and that she was going to be transferred to the
Treasury Department which was located on Vesey Street, V-e-s-e-y Street, New
York City.
Ben Bloom, B-1-o-o-m, attended many meetings and stated that he was a mem-
ber of the architects union.
Norman Bloom, B-1-o-o-m. wdio at one of the meetings volunteered to help in
the press drive by gettting subscriptions to the Worker.
Betsy Blom, B-l-o-m. 510 Ocean Avenue. She was recruited into the party by
Alex Rosen in April of 1945. She became a member of the Women's Army Corps.
Sabina Bluman, B-1-u-m-a-n. She was present at one of the meetings where a
petition, nominating petition for Peter V. Caechione when he was running for re-
election to the New York City Council, was circulated. This was in 1945. She
signed one of those petitions.
Joe Burns, B-u-r-n-s. That is a phonetical spelling. He was in attendance
at one of the meetings which I attended.
Arthur Bussie, B-u-s-s-i-e. His business address was 2518 Tilden Avenue. He
was on tbe executive committee of the Flatbush Club. He was a dele-^ate to the
New York State Convention which was held on July 21 and 22 of 1945. That
was the time of the reconstitution of the Communist Political Association to the
Communi-st Party.
Mr. Tavenner. Are you identifying these persons as members of
the Communist Political Association or the Commnnist Party?
Mrs. Blai^'elt. They are beino: identifiefl as members of the Flat-
bush Club from the time that I entered it in April of 1943 until the
time that I left it, or rather at the time that I was transferred to the
Parkside Club in January of 1946. Of course, during that interim,
we do have the Flatbush Club known first as the Flatbush Club of the
Communist Party, and then the Flatbush Club of the Communist Po-
litical Association, and then back again as the Flatbush Club of the
Conmiunist Party. T have not been able to make the distinction here
]ii.<t which period of time. If I gave dates, it will indicate at which
period of time it was either the Communist Party or the Communist
Political Association. [Reading :]
Bob Bussie, whose business address also was 2518 Tilden Avenue. He had
been nominated as a delegate to the New York State convention in 1945 but
had declined the nomination. He did attend some of the party club meetings.
Susie Bussie, who was the wife of Arthur Bussie. She was nominated to
the county convention which was held in 1946.
Dorothy Cass, C-a-s-s. That would be phonetical, too, she pledged .$100 in
the bond drive that was being held in the sijring of 1944.
Frank Coghlan, C-o-g-h-l-a-n, 220 East 2.3d Street, who was a transfer from the
Kings Highway branch into the Flatbush Club. He stated that he worked for the
Pennsylvania Railroad.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 849
Mr. Tavenner. Was that in Brooklyn ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, sir, these will all be Brooklyn addresses, be-
cause it confines itself to the Brooklyn area. [Heading :]
Hy Cohen, H-y C-o-h-e-n had heen discharged from the Army in the latter part
of 1945 and attended some of the meetings at which I was present. He had held
a license to teach in the New York City school system, but surrendered that
license.
James Colton, C-o-l-t-o-n, 1191 Dorchester Road. He was on the executive
committee of a club in the Flatbush section. He had at one time held a sub-
stitute license to teach in the New York City school system, but it had been
^ acated.
Herbert Cooper, -312 East 21st Street, was a member of the Flatbush Club and
then became a member of the executive committee of the Flatbush section. I
happened to see him in the May Day Parade of 1948.
Rose Cooper, R-o-s-e C-o-o-p-e-r, 312 East 21st Street ; said that she worked
in the publicity department of the Southern Conference for Human Welfare at
112 Park Avenue, New York city. She was one of the active members of the
club.
Leon Dorsky, D-o-r-s-k-y was an active member in the Flatbush Club, and was
a member of the Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade. He was chair-
man of the Spanish Aid Committee which the Flatbush Club organized to assist
the campaign of the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Conunittee.
Hy Druckman, D-r-u-c-k-m-a-n. At a meeting in December of 1945 he made a
contribution to the collection that was being taken for the General Motors
strikers.
Sylvia Elias. E-1-i-a-s, at a meeting held in December of 1945, volunteered to
help in tiie press drive by getting subscriptions to the Worker.
Bernice Engel, E-n-g-e-1 280 East 21st Street, was on the executive committee
of the Flatbush Club, and was a delegate to the county conference. She was a
member of and chairman of the Flatbush Consumers Council. She said she
was also a member of the PTA.
Thomas Erickson, E-r-i-c-k-s-o-n ; he attended some meetings in the latter part
of 1045. and was nominated as a delegate to the county convention being held in
Januai-y of 1946.
Molly Feig. F-e-i-g. I saw her name on a recruiting chart which was in the
Flatbush Club headquarters in connection with tlie recruiting drive being held
in 1944, which is the time that I was recruited into the party.
Rebecca Fein, F-e-i-n. She joined the Communist Party at a meeting of the
Flatbush Club which was held on April 17, 1945.
Abe Feingold, P'-e-i-n-g-o-l-d 64 Sterling Street. He recruited me into the
Communist Party. He was the educational director of the Flatbush Club at
that time. He became vice president of the Flatbush Club when it was known
as the Flatbush Club of the Communist Political Association. He stated that
he had visited the Soviet Union in 1937 and that he had taken a State training
course. He was an instructor of Communist Party classes within the Flatbush
section.
Mr. Tavexxek. What do yon mean by "State training course?"
Mrs. Blauvelt. That would be a training course similar to the
courses that I had taken on county and regional levels, and this would
be one that was conducted on a State level. He was a teacher in the
New York City school system who was dismissed after trial in 1950.
[Reading:]
Ann Fierman, F-i-e-r-m-a-n ; slie was the educational director for the Flatbush
Club for a while. Slie was a teacher in the New York City school system but
she retired.
Harry Fierman. F-i-e-r-m-a-n, attended some meetings of the Flatbush Club.
He had been a teacher in the New York City school system, but surrendered his
license.
Isa Freeman. I-s-a F-r-e-e-m-a-n, was present at some meetings. He stated
he was a draftsman and was a member of the architects union.
Julia Friedlander. F-r-i-e-d-1-a-n-d-e-r ; at one of the meetings held in July of
1945 she volunteed to participate in the petition campaign that was being con-
ducted for Peter V. Cacchione.
850 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
May Friedlander ; the same information on her as on Julia Friedlander.
Lil Gellar, G-e-1-l-a-r; it might also be "e-r" ; and it is questionable. At one
of the meetings held in June of 1944 she pledged $100 to the bond drive that
was beini; conducted at that time.
Ilya Gill, I-l-y-a G-i-1-1. He attended meetings of the Flatbush Club, and at
the time of the petition campaign being conducted for Peter V. Cacchione,
volunteered to help in that campaign.
Sid Gluck; G-1-u-c-k. In November of 1944 he was credited with having
recruited 54 new members into the Communist Party. He was supposed to
have gone into the service in 1945. He was an instructor of the class on the
Soviet Union which was held in the Flatbush Club, and in the fall of 1944
he was supposed to have gone to the Jefferson School of Social Science, New York,
to do some instructing at that school.
Gloria Goldman, G-o-l-d-m-a-n, at one of the meetings in December of 1945,
volunteered to help in the press drive by getting subscriptions to the "Worker.
Rose Gollomb, G-o-l-l-o-m-b, 75 East 21st Street. Rose Gollomb once told me
that she had been a former Government worker at the time of the Hatch Act.
She was one of the people who went into the Parkside Club with me from the
Flatbush Club and worked with me on the fund drive committee in the Parkside
Club.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you Imow what type of Government position
she held?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, that was the extent of her information.
[Reading :]
Blanche Goodman, G-o-o-d-m-a-n ; she attended meetings of the Flatbush Club,
volunteered to help with the Cacchione petition campaign. I observed her in
the May Day parade of 1946 marching with the millinery contingent.
Gerald Goodman, 250 Midwood Street, Brooklyn. He was literature director
of the Flatbush Club, and acted as the executive secretary of the Flatbush Club
for awhile. He stated that he was a member of the teachers' union and had
been a member of the Young Socialist League prior to his association with the
Communist Party and that he had joined the Communist Party in 1940. He
had held a substitute license to teach in the New York City school system, but
had surrendered that, I think, around 1944.
Judy Goodman was the recording secretary of the Flatbush Club for a while,
and when the club broke up, upon its reorganization in the beginning of 1946,
was placed in the youth group, being a member of the Joe Stember Youth Club.
She worked as a secretary for the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America.
Isaac Goldenberg, G-o-l-d-e-n-b-e-r-g, attended many meetings of the Flatbush
Club.
Florence Goldstein, G-o-l-d-s-t-e-i-n ; she attended meetings of the Flatbush
Club and was active in the CDVO work that was being conducted at that time.
Nathan Goldstein ; he was the club's representative at the CDVO. He also
attended meetings of the club.
Gloria Gould, G-o-u-l-d. I saw her name on a recruiting chart which the club
had in its headquarters for the recruiting campaign — recruiting drive — held in
1944.
Shirley Gould; at one of the meetings held In July 1945, she volunteered
to help in the Cacchione i)etition campaign.
Nelson Grant, G-r-a-n-t, was in attendance at several meetings of the Flatbuah
Club.
Sidney Green, G-r-e-e-n, 105 Lincoln Road ; at one of the meetings he said to
me that he hoped he could travel with what he called the arts and sciences
caravan.
Leona Greenhill, Gr-e-e-n-h-i-l-l, 600 East 21st Street; when the Cacchione
campaign began, to place Peter V. Cacchione on the ballot through the use of
nominating petitions, she conducted that particular campaign.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the conmiittee, in a general way, what
the Cacchione campaign was \
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, in 19'
of the Brooklyn Communist Party, was running for reelection to the
New York City Council. He was running as an Independent but he
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 851
was running as a Communist, and he had to circulate petitions, nomi-
nating petitions, in which he designated his party affiliation as the
Communist Party. "VVe had to get the required number of signatures
to place him on the ballot, and this was an intensive campaign during
the summer of 1945 to place him on the ballot. [Reading :]
Marty Greenleaf, G-r-e-e-n-1-e-a-f. He attended a meeting of the Flatbush
Club, at which I was in attendance.
Cecelia Grossman, G-r-o-s-s-m-a-n. She was nominated as a delegate to the
county convention which was held in January of 1946.
Lillian Grossman. She herself said that she had been a member of the Com-
munist Party since 1919, and that she was active in the Bedford-Stuyvesant sec-
tion and was a member of the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union.
Miriam Gruber, G-r-u-b-e-r, jointed the Flatbush Club at a meeting that was
held on April 17, 1945.
Florence Haskell, H-a-s-k-e-1-1, 2323 Newkirk Avenue; she attended the class
in principles of Marxism and also some meetings.
Esther Hirschfeld, H-i-r-s-c-h-f-e-1-d. She was a director of literature of the
Flatbush Club for a time. She was a teacher in the New York City school
system who was dismissed after trial.
Susan Jackson, J-a-c-k-s-o-n, was at one of the meetings held in August of 1944.
Estelle Jaffe, J-a-f-f-e, 87 Woodruff Avenue. She attended a meeting on Sep-
tember 20, 1944, at which time we were going to have a new class starting in
just a matter of days. She signed up for the class at that time.
Hannah Jasper, J-a-s-p-e-r, 50 East 21st Street. She was on the executive
board of the Flatbush Club, and was active in the Emma Lazarus division of
the International Workers Order and financial secretary of Lodge 562, Jewish
People's Fraternal Order.
Helen Johnson, J-o-h-n-s-o-n, 236 East 69th Street, Manhattan. She joined
the Communist Party on April 4, 1^4, and was recruited by Judy Goodman.
She worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad, and stated that she was a member
of the Railroad Brotherhood Union. She was transferred to a club at 347 East
72d Street, Manhattan, because she lived in that area, although she did attend
meetings of the Flatbush Club for awhile.
Leonore Kahn, K-a-h-n, was at a meeting which I attended in June of 1944.
Phyllis Kantor, K-a-n-t-o-r : At a meeting held on April 17, 1945 she pledged
$25 to the party's fund drive.
Sigma, S-i-g-m-a, Kaufman, K-a-u-f-m-a-n : I saw her name on the recruiting
chart which was in the headquarters of the Flatbush Club in connection with
the recruiting drive being conducted in 1944.
Sally Kaye, K-a-y-e: She attended a class in principles of Marxism given
by Abe Feingold.
Michael Kenton, K-e-n-t-o-n : He had been a serviceman, and was nominated
as a delegate to the county convention to be held In January of 1946 ; his nomi-
nation being made by Nat Rosenbluth, the chairman of the Flatbush Club.
Rena Klein, R-e-n-a K-le-i-n : Attended meetings and participated in canvassing
for the American Labor Party.
Helen Koel, K-o-e-1, that is a strictly phonetic spelling: Attended meetings
of the Flatbush Club.
Eugene Kovacs, K-o-v-a-c-s : His name appeared on the recruiting chart
which the Flatbush Club had in its headquarters for the drive being conducted
in 1944.
(Mr. Doyle entered the room and Mr. Scherer left.)
Mr. Tavenner. You have mentioned the recruiting chart several
times. Did that chart show the names of persons who had been re-
cruited or the names of persons engaged in recruiting?
Mrs. Blauvelt. These were the names of the members of the club
who had been successful in recruiting members into the Communist
Party, and they were being credited with having recruited new mem-
bers into the party. [Reading :]
Jerry, J-e-r-r-y, Kroll, K-r-o-1-1, that is a strictly phonetic spelling: He had
been a serviceman, and on December 5, 1945 at a meeting of the Flatbu^jh Club,
852 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
volunteered to help in the press drive that was being conducted at that time.
He was nominated as a delegate to the county convention in 1946.
Marion Kroll, K-r-o-1-1 : Attended meetings.
Lucille Kuttner, K-u-t-t-u-e-r, 63 Fenimore Street : On May 31, 1944, at a
meeting of the Flatbush Club, she volunteered to serve on a committee to see
what could be done about providing recreational facilities for children and
for securing a housing project in the Flatbush section. She had at one time
held a license to teach in the school system, but had surrendered it.
Manny Lanser, M-a-n-n-y L-a-n-s-e-r : He became organizer of the Flatbush sec-
tion upon reorganization of the Flatbush Club in 1946. He bad been a service-
man, and he was a member of the Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln I'rigade.
Mildred, also known as Mickey, M-i-c-k-e-y, Lanser : While Manny had been in
service she contributed $25 to the fund drive and pledged his next allotment
check as a further contribution. She was active in club activities.
Florence Lepowsky L-e-p-o-w-s-k-y : Attended many meetings of the Flatbush
Club. She held a license to teach in the New York City school system but
surrendered that license.
Robert Lepowsky, or Bob as he was usually called: He was an instructor of
classes in the Flatbush Club. He held a license to teach in the New York City
school system hut surrendered that license.
Inez Lester. L-e-s-t-e-r : At a meeting of the Flatbush Club held on December
11, 1945. she was nominated as a delegate to visit Congressman HefEernan in
connection with the Government's foreign policy, and she was so nominated
because her husband was still overseas.
Mr. Tavenner. Was that an instance in which the Coniniunist
Party was expressing opposition to the administration's foreign
policy ?
Mrs. Blauvei.t. Yes, for instance at that time they were opposed
to what they called intervention in China, and it was that type of
foreign policy which they were protesting. [Reading :J
Sally Levin. L-e-v-i-n : At a meeting held on July 24, 1945, she volunteered to
assist in the Cacchione petition campaign.
Sarah Levin, S-a-r-a-h L-e-v-i-n : At this same meeting she also volunteered
to help in the Cacchione petition compaign.
Florence Levine. L-e-v-i-n-e : Attended many of the meetings of the Flatbush
Club and was a member of the Parkside Club later with me, where she w;is
membership director.
Paula Levowin. L-e-v-o-w-i-n, that is a strictly phonetical spelling : Paid
dues at a meeting on October IS, 1945.
Matty Lief, L-i-e-f, that is phonetical: Attended meetings at which I was
present.
Dorothy Liff, L-i-f-f , 50 Lefferts Avenue : She was transferred with me from
the Flatbush Club to the Parkside Club and then from there to the Lincoln Road
Club with me. and while in the Lincoln Road Club was assigned as a representa-
tive of the Lincoln Road Club to the Civil Rights Congress chapter in Flatbush.
Murray Liff, L-i-f-f 50 Lefferts Avenue: Attended meetings of the Flatbu.sh
Club.
Mr. Tavenner. When you speak of clubs, are you referring to
clubs of the Communist Party?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is right ; yes, sir.
Mr. Ta\'enner. And when j^ou are referring to persons having at-
tended meetings w^ith you, are you referring to Communist Party
meetings ?
Mrs. Bl.\uvelt. Yes, in this instance it would be meetings of
the Flatbush Club of the Communist Party. [Reading:]
Sylvia Manning, M-a-n-n-i-n-g : On January 9, 1945, at a meeting of the Flat-
bush Club, she was nominated to the elections committee. She was also sup-
po.sed to assist in manning a booth to advertise a rally of the Americans United
for World Organization and the Citizens Political Action Committee at Eras-
mus Hall High School which was held on December 6. 1945.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 853
Helen Miller, M-i-1-l-e-r ; her name miiiht be Ellen : At a meeting of the Flat-
hush Club held on July 24, 1945, volunteered to help in the Cacchione petition
compai.cn.
Lil Miller, M-i-1-l-e-r : L-i-1, on June 25, 1945, at a meeting of the Flatbush
Club, volunteered to help with American Labor Party petitions for the forth-
coming primaries.
Mike Millner, M-i-k-e M-i-1-l-n-e-r : Had been the former chairman of the Flat-
hush Club before entering the Navy, and at a meeting of the Flatbush Club
which was held on September 20, 1945, Abe Feingold introduced him as such,
and at that time he was a radioman, second class.
Bessie Mleoz, M-1-e-o-z : At a meeting of the Flatbush Club held on July 24,
1945, signed a Cacchione nominating petition.
Jack Mogolescue, M-o-g-o-l-e-s-c-u-e : Had been nominated to attend the State
convention of the Communist Party being held in July of 1945, at the time
of the reconstitution of the Communist Political Association to the Communist
Party. He also worked on the committee of the club which was helping to
organize the rally held on December 6, 1945, by Americans United for World
Organization.
Louis Mogolescue, M-o-g-o-l-e-s-c-u-e : This name was on the recruiting chart
which I observed in the headquarters of the Flatbush section during the recruit-
ing drive of 1944.
Kay Montaigne, K-a-y M-o-n-t-a-i-g-n-e, 485 Ocean Avenue: She said she
v.-orked for the Electric Bond & Share Co. at 2 Rector Street, New York City.
She attended the class in principles of Marxism which I attended in the Flatbush
Club.
Anna E. Morganstern, M-o-r-g-a-n-s-t-e-r-n, 409 Parkside Avenue : She was
transferred with me to the Parkside Club where she became its secretary for a
while and then its treasurer. She also became financial secretary of the Flatbush
section. She stated that she worked in the Federal service.
Steeia Morell, S-t-e-c-i-a M-o-r-e-1-1, 185 Erasmus Street : She was an active
member of the Flatbush Club, and recruited many members into the party.
Ted Morell, 185 Erasmus Street : He was considered the ace recruiter of
the Flatbush Club. He was a member of the executive board of the Flatbush
Club and at the time of reorganization of the large Flatbush Club, he went into
tlie Freedom Road Club where he became chairman. He was the press director
for the Flatbush section, and had an accounting office at 66 Court Street.
Charles NemerofE, N-e-m-e-r-o-f-f. He was a member of the International
Ladies' Garment Workers' Union, Needle Trades Union Local 10. He stated that
he had entered the United States in 1910, and according to his own statement,
he was a charter member of the Communist Party in 1919 and had been a
Socialist before tliat time.
Mr. Ta\t:nner. Did you leani anything about the time of his
naturalization?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir, I did not. [Beading:]
Harry Nemeroff, N-e-m-e-r-o-f-f, an active member in the Flatbush Club. He
was a delegate to the Daily Worker Advisory Council. He was very persistent
in attemiiting to sell Daily Workers at the beginning of every meeting.
Reva Nemeroff, N-e-m-e-r-o-f-f, was a member of the executive committee of
the Flatbush Club, and active in Russian war relief.
Ray Newman, R-a-y N-e-w-m-a-n, 477 East 21st Street. It was at a meeting
on November 1.3, 1945, that he volunteered to help Abe Feingold in connection
with the December 6, 1945, rally being held by the Americans United for World
Organization.
Sylvia Pakin, P-a-k-i-n. She assisted also in activity regarding this particii-
lar rally being held on December 6, 1945, in the name of the Americans United
for World Organization. She also assisted in the collection of food for the
General Motors strikers.
Leo Poisner, P-e-i-s-n-e-r. This name appeared on the recruiting chart in
the Flatbush Club at the time of its recruiting drive in 1944.
Roslyn I'erla, R-o-s-l-.y-n P-e-r-1-a. The meeting of the Flatbush Club held on
August 8, 1944, was stated as i)eing her second meeting in the Communist Party.
Oscar Price, P-r-i-c-e. He used the jiarty name of Pierce, P-i-e-r-c-e. He
lived at 310 Lenox Road. He was chairman of the war activities committee,
which the Flatbush Club had organized during the war.
854 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Rhoda Price, who also used the party name of Pierce, P-i-e-r-e-e, living at
310 Lenox Road, also active in connection with the war activities of the club.
Dorothey Piatt, P-1-a-t-t, 1701 Albemarle Road. She went to another club in
the Flatbush section after its reorganization where she became a member of
the executive committee.
Jim Popper, P-o-p-p-e-r — that is strictly a phoentical spelling — on January 9,
1945, at a meeting of the Flatbush Club he was nominated to the executive
committee.
Ann Rivlin, R-i-v-1-i-n, 130 Fenimore Street. She was also known as Gold-
berg. She was transferred from the Flatbush Club to the Parkside Club with me.
She attended many of the meetings at the Flatbush Club.
John Rogers, R-o-g-e-r-s; he was one of the members also, who was trans-
ferred with me to the Parkside Club. He attended many of the meetings and
in the fund drive which started in 1946, he pledged $25.
Alex Rosen, R-o-s-e-n, was editor of the club bulletin which was prepared by
the Flatbush Club. He was on the executive committee of the Flatbush Club
and recruited Betsy Blom into the party. Alex Rosen was a teacher but sub-
sequently retired.
Mr. Tavennee. Did that club bulletin have a name ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I believe it had just the title that appears on there;
"Community." Perhaps one of the others would show it a littlfe
better. [Eeading :]
Harold Rosenberg, R-o-s-e-n-b-e-r-g, 2604 Bedford Avenue. He assisted in the
American Labor Party petition campaign in 1945 and also assisted with the
December 6, 1945, rally being held in the name of the Americans United for
World Organization.
Nat Rosenberg, at a meeting of the club held on December 11, 1945, volunteered
to help in the press drive by securing subscriptions. He was transferred with
me to the Parkside Club.
Elsie Rosenbluth, R-o-s-e-n-b-l-u-t-h, 174 Woodruff Avenue; she was on the
executive committee of the Flatbush Club. She was also a member of the Flat-
bush consumers council.
Nat Rosenbluth, 174 Woodruff Avenue ; he was the chairman of the Flatbush
Club, and upon its reorganization, or the reorganization of the party, which
took place in January of 1946, became the section organizer which included both
the 21st and 11th A. D. Clubs and was known as the Flatbush section.
Judith Rosenfeld, R-o-s-e-n-f-e-l-d ; on January 9, 1945, at a meeting of the
Flatbiish Club, was nominated to the executive committee because of her affilia-
tion with the American Youth for Democracy.
Jean Rothman, R-o-t-h-m-a-n ; she was elected to the elections committee, and
did attend meetings of the Flatbush Club.
Isadore Rubin, R-u-b-i-n. In March of 1945 while he was in the Army in Italy,
he sent $10 to the party's fund drive. Upon his return from service, he did
attend some of the meetings of the Flatbush Club. Now, there was a club bulle-
tin issued under date of November 28, 1944, which gave his name and listed his
address as 1030 Ocean Avenue, with the notation that he was the winner of an
essay contest which had been conducted while he was in the Army. Isadore
Rubin was a teacher in the New York City school system who was dismissed in
1951, after trial.
I did read some testimony which he had presented to the Senate
Committee on Internal Security in September of 1952. At that time
he gave his address as 20 Rugby Road, and it was in connection with
the teachers union, I believe, that these hearings were being held ; and
I was particularly interested in reading the testimony because he in-
voked the privilege of the fifth amendment concerning his Communist
affiliations.
Mr. Tavenner. I have before me the April 23, 1955 issue of New
York Teacher News, and apparently published by the Teachers Un ion
of New York.
Mrs. ]3lauvelt. That is correct.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 855
Mr. Ta\^nner. I notice the name of the editor appears on the edi-
torial board and staff of this issue. Will you examine this issue and
state what you see to be the name of the editor ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. The name of the editor is Isadore Rubin.
Mr. Tavenner. Is that the same person to whom you have referred ?
Mi-s. Blau\t:lt. Yes, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. As having been known to you as a member of the
Communist Party?
Mrs. Blaitv ELT. Yes, sir, it is the same person.
Mr. Tavenner. I desire to offer in evidence that part of page 2 of
the issue of April 23, 1955, of the New York Teachers News which
indicates the editorial staff'; ask that it be marked "Blauvelt Exhibit
No. 18," and that it be incorporated in the transcript of the record.
Mr. Doyle. It is so ordered.
(The exhibit referred to is as follows :)
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 18
New York Teacher News
206 W. 15 St., New York 11— WA 4-5524
Published weekly except July and August and weeks of certain holidays by
Union Publications, Inc., at 206 W. 15 St., New York 11, N. Y. Reentered as
second class matter December 30, 1943, at the Post Office at New York, N. Y.,
under the act of March 8, 1879. Subscription $1 a year — 5c a copy.
Vol. XV, No. 29— April 23, 1955
ISADORE RUBIN, EDITOR
Editorial Board : Abraham Lederman, Rose Russell.
Staff: Edward Herbst, Stella Eliashow, David Flacks, Eugene Jackson, Esther
Rothman
Staff Photographer : Mildred Grossman
Harold Schor, Advertising Mgr. Abraham Squire, Circulation Mgr.
The Teachers Union of New York
Notify us immediately when moving. Please include mailing label for infor-
mation thereon in all your correspondence with Circulation Department. If we
know your "check letters" on your mailing label, we can serve you more promptly
and efficiently.
Mrs. Blauvelt (reading) :
Phyllis Rubin, R-u-b-i-n, was active in the Flatbush Club and attended many
of its meetings.
Rhoda Rudbarg, R-h-o-d-a R-u-d-b-a-r-g ; an active member of the Flatbush
Club, attending its meetings.
Sid Ryan, R-y-a-n— and that is a strictly phonetical spelling. At a meeting
of the Flatbush Club, on July 24, 1945, volunteered to assist in the Cacchione
petition campaign.
Elsa Schaefer, E-l-s-a S-c-h-a-e-f-e-r ; her name appeared on the recruiting
chart which the club had in its headquarters in connection with the recruiting
drive of 1944.
Vivian Schlessel, S-c-h-l-e-s-s-e-1. That Is a phonetical spelling. She was nom-
inated as a delegate to the county convention being held in January of 1946.
Doris Schlesser, S-c-h-1-e-s-s-e-r, and that is the way I heard it pronounced. I
as.sume you would call it phonetical. At a meeting of the Flatbush Club on July
24, 1945, volunteered to assist in the Cacchione petition campaign. She had
joined the party at a meeting held on April 17, 1945.
Janet Secundy, J-a-n-e-t S-e-c-u-n-d-y. She was an active member in the Flat-
bush Club, and at the time of the reorganization in January of 1946, went into
another club where she eventually became an executive member.
Louis Secundy, 530 East 22d Street. He was a member of the Veterans of the
Abraham Lincoln Brigade. He had been nominated as a delegate to the State
856 INVESTIGATIOJSr OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
conveution beinc held in 1045, resardintr the reconstitiition of the Communist
Political Association to the Communist Party. In stating his qualifications at
that time he stated that he had just been made chairman of an industrial branch
of the Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you know in what industrial branch of the
Communist Party Mr. Secundy was a member?
Mrs. Blauvelt. He said that it was a newly organized industrial
branch and that it included some of the top functionaries of the party
and that Rose Wortis was one of the members of the branch. He
did not go into any more detail. [Reading :]
Helen Seligman, S-e-1-i-g-m-a-n, was on the executive committee of the Flat-
bush Club and was also a member of the American Labor Party.
Blanche Shapiro, S-h-a-p-i-r-o, attended meetings of the Flatbush Club. Her
husband was in the service, and she contributed $20 to the fund drive which she
had received from him while he was still in the service.
Shep Sherman, S-h-e-r-m-a-n, attended meetings of the Flatbush Club at which
I also was present.
Abe Shtabe, S-h-t-a-b-e ; and that is a phonetical spelling. He had been a
serviceman, and he did attend some of the meetings of the Flatbush Club. He
made the statement that he was a member of the furriers' union.
Dorothy Shtabe. She was a member of the executive committee of tlie Flat-
bush Club.
Harry Silverstein, S-i-1-v-e-r-s-t-e-i-n, also known as Henry, attended meetings
of the Flatbush Club.
Mildred Silverstein attended meetings of the Flatbush Club.
Mike Singer, S-i-n-g-e-r, 440 East 23d Street. He was a member of the Daily
Worker staff, and did attend meetings of the Flatbush Club.
Gina Slade, G-i-n-a S-1-a-d-e : on .January 9, 1945, she was nominated for the vice
presidency and also nominated to be secretary of meml)ership and personnel of the
Flatbush Club. She had had a license to teach in the school system at one
time, but surrendei'ed that license.
Roslyn Sperling, R-o-s-l-y-n S-p-e-r-1-i-n-g. She attended meetings of the club,
and at the particular meeting held on December 11, 1045, volunteered to help in
the press drive by securing sxibscriptions to the Worker.
Abe Squire, S-q-u-i-r-e, attended meetings of the Flatbush Club, and was a
teacher in the New York City school system, who was dismissed after trial.
Mr. Taaenner. I would like to again call your attention, to exhibit
No. 18, which is the April 23, 195,5, issue of the New York Teacher
News. Will you examine it again and state whether the name of
Abraham Squire is listed on its staff ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, the name of Abraham Squire is listed here as
the circulation manager.
Mr. T.WENXER. He is the same Abraham Squire to whom you re-
ferred ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, sir, he is.
Mr. Willis. Is that New York City or New York State ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. New York City. [Reading :]
There was also a Sophie Tobin, T-o-b-i-n, who at a meeting of the club on
September 20, 1944, contributed to the fund drive.
Bella Vankin, V-a-n-k-i-n. whose name I saw on the recruiting chart which was
in the headquarters of the Flatbush Club at the time of the recruiting drive held
in 1944.
Blanche Vitrogen, V-i-t-r-o-g-e-n ; and that would be phonetical. She was
jtlaced in the Cortelyou Club, C-o-r-t-e-l-y-o-u, later on. I did see her after my
association in the Flatbush Club at one of the section meetings of the section held
on March 21, 1946.
Dave Vitrogen. V-i-t-r-o-g-e-n, stated that he had been a former Government
employee and that he had joined the Communist Party in 19.35.
Carrie Wagner, W-a-g-n-e-r, attended meetings of the Flatbush Club.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 857
Monroe Wagner was nominated as a delegate to the county convention held
in January of 1946.
Kuth Wang, of 150 Lefferts Avenue, an active member in the Flatbush Clvib.
She vi'as the executive secretary of the Flatbush Club, and was transferred into
the Parkside Club with me,where she was on its executive committee, and also to
the Lincoln Road Club, where she was on its executive committee. She did be-
come the membership director of the Flatbush section. In July of 1945 she
made the statement that she had been in the Communist Party for 8 years.
Joe Weeden, W-e-e-d-e-n ; attended meetings and he was a CIO organizer.
Esther Weinberg, W-e-i-n-b-e-r-g, at the meeting of the Flatbush Club on De-
cember 11, 1945, volunteered to assist in the press drive by securing subscriptions
to the Worker.
Eva Weinless, W-e-i-n-1-e-s-s, was at one of the meetings held in December of
1945, and in January of 1946 was nominated to the county convention which
was being held that month.
Charlotte Weiss, W-e-i-s-s : attended one of the meetings, I remember the one
held on October 18, 1945.
Jerry Weltflsh, AV-e-1-t-f-i-s-h, He was on the executive board of the Flatbush
Club. He was a chiropodist by profession. He said he had joined ihe Com-
munist Party in 1937. He was a campaign manager and cochairman of the
American Labor Party in the Flatbush section, and ran in the American Labor
Party primary, or rather he ran on the American Labor Party primary ticket for
the New York State Assembly in 1946.
Mr. Tavenner. Was he elected?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir. [Reading:]
Belle. B-e-1-l-e, Weltfish attended meetings of ihe club.
Matty Wishner, W-i-s-h-n-e-r, attended meetings of the club.
Pete Wallman, P-e-t-e W-a-1-l-m-a-n, 1555 Nostrand Avenue ; attended meetings
of the Flatbush Club. He was a veteran, and became the head of the Veterans'
Committee to Reelect Cacchione.
Natalie Wallinan, at 1555 Nostrand Avenue ; she attended meetings of the club.
Ada Zazza, Z-a-z-z-a, and that is strictly a phonetical spelling. At a meet-
ing of the Flatbush Club held on October 3 of 1944 she was instructed to report
at American Labor Party headquarters to participate in their activity being
conducted at that time.
Yetta Zidl, Z-i-d-1, and that is a strictly phonetical spelling. She was in at-
tendance at a meeting on January 23, of 1945.
Max Zimmerman, Z-i-m-m-e-r-m-a-n. On May 25 of 1944 he was present at
a class which was being held at the headquarters of the Flatbush Club, and had
come for the particular reason of paying his dues to Ruth Wang, of the section
committee.
Mr. Tavenner. Mrs. Blauvelt, you indicated to me during the
recess that you may have omitted the identification of one name this
morning. Have you given us that name in the course of this?
Mrs. Blau\^lt. No, I have not. If you wish it, I could give it to
you now.
Mr. Tavenner. Would you do so, please?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That Avas Minna Bodenheim, M-i-n-n-a B-o-d-e-n-
h-e-i-m. 158 West 99th Street, New York City. She was a member
of my group, the group of which I was the group captain. She in-
formed me that she was a clerk in the De})artment of Welfare of
New York City.
Mr. Tavenner. Was that in the Ninth A. I). (Iimip ^
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. You have made available to the stall' a number
of issues of a bulletin entitled "Flatbush Connnmiity," whi' h w^as pub-
lished by the Flatbush Club of the Commimist Political Association.
Was that paper also published by the Conmimiist Party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir.
Mr. Tavenner. Was it published only by the Coiumuuist Political
Association?
858 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mrs. Blau\^lt. Yes, sir, and at the time of the reconstitution of
the Communist Party in the summer of 1945, this bulletin was
discontinued.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I desire to offer in evidence the is-
sues of the Flatbush Community of May 16, 1944, and June 13, 1944,
June 27, 1944, July 11, 1944, July 25, 1944, August 8, 1944, September
5, 1944, September 20, 1944, October 3, 1944, October 31, 1944, Novem-
ber 28, 1944, December 12, 1944, December 26, 1944, January 9, 1945,
January 23, 1945, February 6, 1945, February 20, 1945, March 6, 1945,
March 20, 1945, April 3, 1945, and April 17, 1945, and ask that they
be marked "Blauvelt Exhibit No. 19" for identification purposes only,
and to be made a part of the committee files.
Mr. Doyle. It is so ordered.
Mr. Tavenner. Do these publications, Flatbush Community, as was
the procedure in the Ninth A. D. Club, make reference to the members
of the club by their first names and sometimes by initials?
Mrs. Blauvelt. In this particular group I would say that even
some were mentioned by their full names.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you examine these documents, and using them
as a basis for your discussion, tell the committee briefly what activities
of the Flatbush group are dealt with in those articles ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, this issue of May 16, 1944, refers to Ted and
Stecia Morell as ace recruiters, that Ted Morell had already 10 re-
cruits to his credit, and announces that classes are to be conducted at
the club, 1 in American Traditions and 1 in Marxism Today.
Most of these articles do reflect some activity being conducted at
that time, but do you want that in detail ?
Mr. Tavenner. No ; only the outstanding activities of the club.
Mrs. Blauvelt (reading) :
The June 13, 1944, issue reflects that a class on the Soviet Union is going to
start very shortly and that there is going to be a class on Marxism in the
Teheran period. It also refers to the Consumers Council, urging the members
to become active in consumers' work and Consumers Council, and part of it
says, "Why not start such a council in your immediate neighborhood? Get in
touch with Mrs. Bernice Engel, 280 East 21st Street, chairman of the Flatbush
Consumers Council." Mrs. Bernice Engel was a member of the Flatbush Club.
The June 27, 1944, issue announces that Mike Gold of the Daily Worker stafiC
is speaking at the club on June 28 and concerns itself with war bonds, for
instance.
In the July 11, 1944, issue there is the announcement that Elizabeth Gurley
Flynn will speak at the club in the near future, and also it relates some inci-
dents about working for the American Labor Party.
The July 25, 1944, issue announces that Elizabeth Gurley Flynn is to speak
at the club on August 16. It also announces that Peter V. Cacchione had spoken
at an open-air meeting on July 12, and that 1 new member had been recruited
as a result of that meeting.
The August 8, 1944, issue concerns itself with the press to some degree, and
it reads :
"Read the Daily Worker every day and get at least one new reader. Ask the
newsdealer to display it and volunteer to canvass exreaders for subscription
renewals."
The September 5, 1944, issue reports on Elizabeth Gurley Flynn's speech at
the club of August 16 on What Teheran Means to Women.
The September 20, 1944, issue reflects that courses are to be given at the Jeffer-
son School which the comrades should attend, and also announces that the party
is holding a meeting at Madison Square Garden on September 28.
The October 3, 1944, issue states that two courses are to be held at the club In
Marxism in the World Today, and the Negro in the World Today; and that
teachers are to be supplied by the school commission of the New York State
Communist Political Association.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 859
It also reports that Dave Goldway, who was State educational director of the
party, spoke at a meeting on September 20.
The October 31, 1944, issue announces that a class is being conducted at the
club entitled, "Marxism in the World Today," at which Leo Auerbach is to be
the instructor. It also announces that on November 5 a forum is to be held at
which Joseph Starobin, foreign editor of the Daily Worker, is to be a speaker.
The November 28, 1944, issue announces in its educational calendar that
a class in Marxism in the World Today is being conducted on November 30 ; and
that beginning with December 1, Margaret Cowl, also known as Margaret Krum-
bein, was giving a class on Women and the Postwar ; and there was to be a
forum of. What Is Behind the Liberal Party ? on December 1.
The December 12, 1944, issue reports on Dave Goldway having spoken on An
Analysis of the 1944 Elections. It gives an educational calendar ; for instance,
that Max Gordon is going to speak on What's Behind the Liberal Party? that
Joseph Starobin is going to speak on What To Do With Germany, and that Doxey
Wilkerson is going to speak on the New Emancipation Proclamation.
This issue also contains an article on Abe Feingold.
The December 26, 1944, issue mentions that Sadie Shatkin, who was also de-
scribed by name as Duroshkin, was to speak at the club.
This also gave an educational calendar that Starobin was to speak at the
club on January 12 and that Sam Kantor, manager of the United Electrical local
was to speak on How to Create 60 Million Jobs for Americans, and on February 9,
Doxey Wilkerson was to speak on a New Emancipation Proclamation.
The January 9, 1945, issue reports that Dave Rosenberg was guest speaker at
the meeting of December 26, 1945, in connection with the CIO and AFL conven-
tions, giving the contrast between them and their political significance.
The March 6, 1945, issue announces that Pete Cacchione is to speak at the next
meeting and that the fund drive has started, .$200,000 being the goal.
The March 20, 1945, issue announces that the Flatbush Club, in the fund
drive — out of its quota is $3,000 — the club is to keep $1,500 to use for the Cac-
chione elections, and the county gets $1,500 to use in borowide activity.
The April 3, 1945, issue concerns itself with fund raising activities. Also, it
asks for help in organizing a mass rally at Erasmus Hall High School on April
25 in support of the San Francisco U. N. Conference. It announces that the
Reverend Eliot White is to speak at the club on April 13.
The April 17, 1945, issue reports that Betsy Blom who had just joined the
club was now entering the WACS.
That about concludes the Flatbush community bulletins ; while there
was nothing very outstanding about these issues, they do reflect what
the Communist Party was doing at that time.
Mr. Tavenner. You identified a person by the name of Miriam
Black, who was a member of the Flatbush Club, and in the course of
your statement you referred to her having worked in the Agriculture
Department of the United States Government and then transferred
to the Treasury Department in Vesey Street, New York. Can you
give us any further identifying facts regarding the nature of her work
and the nature of the position she held ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No ; I do not know anything more than that. That
is a statement that she herself made to me regarding the type of work
that she was doing. She did live with her mother at the address that
I gave, and her mother's name was Tettelbaum ; now whether or not
Miriam Black was a party name and Tettelbaum was her proper name,
I do not know, but she was known only to me by the name of Miriam
Black.
Mr. Tavenner. What was the approximate date of the discussion
she held with you when she admitted the type of her former employ-
ment?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, I could not give you the specific date at this
particular moment, but it would have been approximately sometime in
the latter part of 1944 or sometime in 1945.
860 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mr. Willis. Did you lose track of her then, or did you continue to
know lier as a member of the Communist Party up to 1951 ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. After the reoro;anization of the Flatbush section in
January of 1946, I did lose contact with some of these people whom I
had known in the Flatbush Club proper. She did go into other clubs,
and I don't recall any specific instance after that except that I probably
did see her at some of the section meetings following that reorganiza-
tion. So that I might not haA^e seen her much after sometime in 1946.
Mr. Willis. As you understood it, was she working for the Federal
Government but stationed in New York ?
Mrs. Blauvf.lt. Yes, sir, and I understood her to state, it was in
New York.
Mr. Doyle. The committee will stand in recess for 5 minutes.
(Brief recess.).
Mr. Doyle. Let us resimie.
Mr. Tavenner. Mrs. Blauvelt, in addition to the various activities
of the two groups of the Communist Party of which you were a mem-
ber, were you also required to do work in selling the Daily Worker oi-
the Sunday Worker ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Oh, yes. That was one of the requirements on the
part of the membership.
Press drives were held regularly and in those press drives the com-
rades were instructed to secure subscriptions to the Worker. During
those press drives, "mobilizations'' would be held, many times on a
Aveekly basis, in order to canvass with the paper, in order to secure
new readers for it and possible subscribers to the paper, with the ulti-
mate idea of drawing them into the party through reading the paper.
Mobilizations were almost continuous so far as canvassing with the
Daily Worker was concerned.
]Mr. Tavenner. The daily life of a member of these groups was a
very busy affair, wasn't it?
Mrs, Blauvelt. It most certainly was. To be an active Com-
munist you really did give a great deal of your time to it, and your
life, actually.
Mr. Tavenner. You have told us that the size of the Fhitbush
Club numerically was approximately 350 until it was reorganized.
]\Irs. Blauvelt. That is correct,
Mr. Tavenner, What was the actual date of its reorganization,
Mrs. Blauvt:lt. Actually it was announced at a club meeting on
December 5. 1945, that the club would be reorganized. Nat Rosen-
bluth, the chairman, spoke about this particular reorganization and
he brought out the fact that the club must acquaint the members of
the community with th3 facts about China, Indonesia, Palestine, and
the roles the Truman administration and monopoly capitalism were
playing. He said the comrades must work in mass organizations
such as the American Labor Party, International Workers Order,
Political Action Committee and consumer councils, and in order to
become a better working and closely knit organization to perform
the task of mobilizing the workers, a part of the reconstitution of the
Brooklyn Communist Party woukl take the form of a new organiza-
tional setup whereby the large Communist clubs would be broken
up into several small ones.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 861
The county coniniittee had proposed that the Flatbush Club which
had a membership of about 350 be divided into 4 chibs with 75 to
100 members each. And one of these clubs was to be a youth club.
The youth club to function the same as the adult Communist Party
clubs in its procedure, policies, and activities. The comrades were to
be members of the clubs covering the areas in which they lived. Now,
there was also to be a further or<»;anizational chano;e in the county
which would mean that the reestablishment of sections would take
place so that there would be mainly several clubs in a section under
the direction of a section committee, section executive stait'.
Now in the Flatbush setup the Flatbush section was to comprise the
21st A. D. and the 11th A. D. The 11th A. D. covered the area which
had formerly been the area of the large Parkside Club of which we
spoke before. The sections and the clubs were to have four officers
each, a chairman, a secretary-treasurer, educational director and a
press director.
Also there were to be two full-time organizers in the county, one
in Greenpoint and the other in the Red Hook section because the
population in these areas was completely working class and therefore
warranting such organization.
In the Flatbush section what actualh^ resulted was that nine clubs
were formed, the Prospect Park Club, the Parkside Club, Flatbush
Clul), Farragut Club, Albemarle Club, the Theodore Dreiser Club,
Joe Stember, Freedom Road and Glenwood.
The Parkside Club of which I became a member held its first
meeting on January 22, 1946. We had a membership of 90 members
at that time and we were divided into 6 groups; the groups meeting
on alternate Tuesdays, in addition to the regular membership meet-
ing which w^as also held on a Tuesday night.
Abe Feingold, who had been transferred into the Parkside Club,
gave as the reasons and purposes for the reorganization of these two
large Flatbush and Parkside Clubs into smaller groups, the fact that
small units were needed to activize every member of the party and the
comrades would be in a better position to reach a greater number of
peo])le in their own communities on the issues of the day under such
organization.
Tie stated that the Communist Party had a membership of 6,000 at
that time and it was considered the largest in the United States, and
therefore it was up to the Connnunists in Brooklyn to set the pace.
Mr. Willis. Six thousand in the city of New York?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No; the Connnunist Party in Brooklyn was sup-
posed to have a membership of 6,000.
Mr. Doyle. You mentioned youths. What ages w^ere included in
the term "youth"' in the Communist Party?
Mrs. Blauvelt. ]Most of the youth were in their late teens. Some
of them might have been in their early twenties. Usually in a youth
group you would have an adult member to more or less give them
guidance. That vras the usual policy that was followed in the main-
tenance of these youth clubs.
Mr. Doyle. How numerous was the membership in the youth clubs
with which you were familiar?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I do not really know^ what the membership was in
this Joe Stember group but, of course, based on the figures of the
G.-^rjeS— 55— pt. 3 4
862 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
breakage into numerical numbers it must have been, I would say,
roughly maybe 50. I could be wrong on that. I really do not want to
be confined to that figure but I would say that based on what was
happening at that time in the Flatbush section it might have been
about that.
Mr. DoTLE. What sort of adult person did they put with the youth
gi'oups? What were the factors which made them choose the adult
leader ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Usually somebody who was advanced politically
to know how to transfer Marxist theory to these youth members and
how to apply it to the issues of the day in having the youth conduct
certain activities, whatever they might happen to be at the moment.
Mr. Doyle. Wliat would be the lowest age of membership in the
adult group ? Would there be any in their late teens or early twenties,
say 21 ?
Mrs. Bdatjvelt. I found that some of them were in their early
twenties in the adult group.
Mr. Tavenner. Wlien you were told that the Communist Party of
Brooklyn consisted of 6,000 members, were you given any figure as
to the membership of the entire New York area at that time ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I don't recall offhand now what that figure was
but there was some figure. I could probably locate it if you wish to
bring it up at some other time. I can probably go through figures on
the organization of the party. Offhand I do not know, just at the
moment.
JSIr, Tavenner. Was the breaking up of these two larger groups into
smaller groups for purposes of security ?
Mrs. Blau^^lt. Yes, it was. Of course many of the explanations
were that the large groups when they comprised a membership of 300
were unwieldy so far as activizing all the membership.
However, at this time they did continue to break up these groups
of 75 to 100 into even smaller groups and it was maintained that the
reorganization was not a move on the part of the Communist Party
to go underground but that it was being done to improve the organi-
zational efficiency of the party and to activate the membership.
However, a statement was made by Ruth Wang, the membership
director of the Flatbush sections, who said that the breakdown into
small clubs had to be done because no one knew just how much longer
it would be before the party might be forced underground, so there
was a security measure attached to this movement of breaking down
the clubs into smaller groups aside from the mobility that was claimed
it would provide.
Mr. Doyle. What year was that ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. This was beginning of 1946 and of course as time
went on, especially in 1947, there was a good deal of anti-Communist
feeling and the party was very anxious to combat any threatened out-
lawing. However, at that particular time, I don't know just what
specific measures were being considered, but certainly there was a
^ood deal of talk about outlawing the party and they were anticipat-
ing all of this, and probably that is why as early as 1946 they began
to reorganize in smaller groups.
Mr. Willis. Did the Communist Party become more and more se-
curity conscious later ?
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 863
Mrs. Blauvelt. They became more and more concerned as time
went on. Of course such measures as the Mundt bill were being dis-
cussed which they felt would naturally outlaw the party, and of course
when the party's 12 leaders were indicted the latter part of 1948, they
felt this was a move against the party which would force it under-
ground, and they became much more security conscious as time
went on.
It became mandatory for the clubs to break down into small groups,
and small clubs, of probably not more than 5 members each in a gTOup.
This continued up until even through 1950 when they really did
reorganize to a degree of going almost completely underground.
Mr. Willis. That is the evidence we received in Milwaukee; that
in about 1950 a large number did actually go underground there. Were
you going to develop that later on ?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes, to some extent.
Mr. Willis. I won't interfere with the chronology of the presen-
tation.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, you indicated that you would recess
at 4 o'clock, and the next subject I wanted to treat is rather extensive.
Mr. Doyle. Then perhaps we had better recess until 10 tomorrow
morning in this room.
(Whereupon, at 3 : 55 p. m., the committee was recessed, to reconvene
at 10 a. m. Wednesday, May 4, 1955.)
INVESTIGATION OF COIVLMUNIST ACTIVITIES,
NEW YORK AREA— PART III
WEDNESDAY, MAY 4, 1955
Umted States House of RErRESENTAXiVES,
Subcommittee or the
Committee on Un-American Activities,
Washington, D. 0.
PUBLIC HEARING
A subcoinniittee of the Committee on Un-American Activities met,
pursuant to recess at 10 a. m., in the caucus room, Old House Otfice
Building, Hon. Morgan M. Moulder (chairman) presiding.
Committee members present : Representatives Morgan M. Moulder
and EdAvin E. Willis.
Staff members present: Frank S. Tavenner, counsel, and George C.
Williams, investigator.
Mr. Moulder. The subconnnittee will be in order. Proceed, Mr.
Tavermer.
Mr. Tavenner. I would like to recall ^Nlrs. Blauvelt, who is now
present.
TESTIMONY OF MES. MILDRED BLAUVELT— Resumed
Mr. Tavenner. Mrs. Blauvelt, in the course of the testimony yester-
day you described for us a meeting on December 5, 1945 of the Flatbush
Club when the chairman, Nat Rosenbluth, advised that the club mem-
bers must be acquainted and the people of the comraunity must be ac-
quainted witli the facts about China, Indonesia, and Palestine.
I would like you to tell the committee what you learned in the course
of your work in the Connnunist Party regarding the activity of the
Communist Party in attempting to create a policy with respect to
China. Palestine, Iran, and what it termed in general a fight against
imperialism.
Mrs. Blat'-velt. Probably I can begin by saying that on November
16 and 18, 1945, the national committee of the Communist Party held
a meeting at which the decision was made to conduct an anti-impe-
rialist campaign directed particularly against intervention in China.
At this time the various clubs in the Communist Party throughout
New York City lield mass meetings, outdoor rallies and roving picket
lines calling for withdrawal from China. The Chiang Kai-shek gov-
ernment v\fis denounced and what was called American interference in
the intei-nal affairs of China was condemned.
In fact, the New York State committee of the Communist Party
called for a get-out-of-China rally for November 9 at Union Square.
865
866 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
In connection Avith this activity at a meeting of the Flatbush Com-
munist Chib on December 5 of 1945 Abe Shtabe, a member of the com-
mittee whicli was arranging the joint campaign of the Flatbush and
Parkside chibs in the Flatbush section against American intervention
in China and Indonesia, and against the administration policies on
international affairs in general, reported that it had been decided to
hold a roving picket line on December 13 carrying banners calling for
a free China, et cetera.
They wanted 50 veterans of the 2 clubs to lead this picket line and
he called for the organization of a veterans committee.
Now this picket line was conducted on December 13 and leaflets
had been prepared by the club which were distributed at that time.
They were throwaways, and as the picket line was being conducted,
the members participating in the picket line would distribute the
throwaways and at the conclusion of the picket line one of the mem-
bers stayed on one of the street corners to dispose of the remaining
leaflets.
Also at this time the county committee of the Brooklyn Communist
Party issued a call to the entire Kings County membership to partici-
pate in a demonstration to be held by the veterans committee of the
Brooklyn Communist Party. This demonstration was to be held on
Saturday afternoon, December 22, 1945, at 1 : 30 p. m., in the down-
town shopping area of Brooklyn. It was to last for an hour and
to be in protest against American intervention in China and was to
urge the speedy return of the GI's.
This was a continuing protest and it was coupled with the party's
position on Palestine, and leaflets were distributed at regular inter-
vals on these particular issues.
Mr. Tavenner. You spoke of the leaflets being circulated on the
general subject of China. I have before me a throwaway published
by the Parkside-Flatbush Communist Party. It is entitled "A Xmas
Gift our GI's Want."
I hand it to you and ask if that is one of the leaflets you are
mentioning ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. YevS, it is, and I would like to make this point
right here: How the Communist Party would tie up a very appeal-
ing note to the people, for instance, calling this a Christmas gift —
getting the GI's home.
Naturally, everybody wanted to see their boys home. They coupled
an appeal like that with the motive of carrying out their anti-impe-
rialistic campaign against the Government's international or foreign
policies. It was typical of how they would conduct campaigns.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, rather than introduce this docu-
ment in evidence, I believe it is worthwhile to read it into the testi-
mony because its propaganda purposes are so apparent. So with
your permission I will read it into the record.
A Xmas Gift Our GI's Want
Our GI's want more than anything else to be sent home. Their job is done.
They were sent to lick the Fascist armies of Japan and Germany. They com-
pleted this job in coalition with our allies on Y-J Day — 4 months ago :
Why today are American boys dying in China flying planes to Chiang Kai-shek?
Why are American Marines on the firing line in China, in danger of sudden
death? Why do we foster civil war by seeking to fasten the reactionary
Nationalist regime on the unwilling Chinese people?
INVESTIGATION OF COIVIMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 867
The American imperialists pushing this program are juggling with the lives
of our GI's. They are willing to let our boys stew in China and the islands
of the Pacific and in Europe as they play their dangerous game of power politics.
They are undermining our friendly relations with the freedom loving people
of China and all Asia. They are planting the seeds of a third world war.
Ambassador Patrick Hurley has resigned. He was smoked out by the speech
of Congressman Hugh DeLaey in the House of Representatives as the man
responsible for this program —
May I interrupt my reading there by stating that former Congress-
man Hugh DeLaey was called as a \Yitness before this committee
at Dayton in September of 1954 and was confronted with testimony
of Barbara Hartle from Seattle in identifying him as a member of
the Communist Party, and that former Congressman DeLaey re-
fused to answer material questions relying on the fifth amendment
for his refusal to answer.
(Continuing to read the document:)
The pressure of the American people's protest must not relax. Secretary of
State James Byrnes must go too. He is equally responsible for the policy of
intervention. American troops and equipment must leave China now.
This is America's fifth wartime Christmas. Give our GI's a real gift now.
Send a letter to President Truman. Urge him to speed our boys home immedi-
ately. Urge him to stop America's meddling in the internal affairs of China.
Don't forget the boys overseas — they haven't forgotten you.
I interrupted your narrative to show that that was one type of
propaganda leaflets used by the Communist Party in the campaign
it was making in the area of New York.
Mrs. Blaitv'elt. That is right.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you proceed, please?
Mrs. Blauvtxt. On the question of Palestine; for instance, in con-
nection with activity on this question the Flatbush Club held a meeting
January 8, 1946, at which Mary Himofl', w^io was in charge of Jewish
work for the State office of the Communist Party of New York State,
was the guest speaker. She spoke on the current question of allowing
the Jewish people to settle in Palestine and said she wanted it under-
stood that the Communist approach to the issue of Palestine was no
different than their approach to the issues of Chiang Kai-shek and
Indonesia and that just as their demand w^as for a free China and
Indonesia, so was the Communist demand that Jewish people be al-
lowed the right to make their home in Palestine.
She urged the comrades to read the Morning Freheit, which would
guide them on the issue of Palestine.
This also was a continuing discussion within the Communist Party
clubs and again on May 14, 1946, at a meeting of the Parkside Club,
Sid Wan^, one of the organizers of the Flatbush section, discussed
this question and he maintained that England's interest in Palestine
was not because of its natural resources of which it had none, but
be<?ause it was the lifeline between the oilfields of Iran and Iraq and
the Mediterranean, and he said the whole question of the fight for
Palestine revolved around the fight against this British imperialism
and that the Communists as Marxists must view the problem of get-
ting the displaced Jews of Europe into Palestine in the light of fight-
ing imperialism rather than in the light of merely giving relief and
sympathy to the Jewish people.
Mr. Tavenner. In other words, was it the Communist Party pur-
pose to carry out certain overall objectives in its world fight for com-
868 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
miinism in which it was interested rather than in the Jewish peo-
ple as such?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is right. On the rehitionship of the Soviet
Union and the displaced Jews, Sid Wang stated that the doors of the
Soviet were open to them but that the Soviet required citizenship
of those who lived and worked within its borders and that many of
the displaced Jewish people were reluctant to assume such citizen-
ship not being willing to accept socialism.
Ho also stated that the Soviet required rigid screening of those
entering the country in order to keep out undesirables and the Soviet
was justified in this screening because it was an isolated state sur-
rounded on all sides by enemies and therefore had to protect itself
against the entrance of Fascists who would sabotage it, wdiereas the
United States was not surrounded by enemies and liad nothing to fear.
He said the Communists must take action to bring the Jewish ques-
tion to the attention of the conununity and that they must work m
mass organizations and work as Communists although not necessarily
in the name of the party, and he said the Flatbush section was going
to set up a committee to work on this problem and each club was to
canvass its membership to see who would be available to work on
this particular committee.
Mr. TA\TE]srNER. When you began to discuss this subject you stated
that Mary Himoff took the lead. Have you had any opportunity to
know anvthing about Marv Himoff since the time of this meeting on
January's, 1946?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Not of my own personal knowledge.
Mr. Tavennee. Mr. Chairman, Mary Himoff is the person who was
sent by the Communist Party to the city of Baltim.ore, according to
sw^om testimony before the committee, and there became the secretary
of the Communist Party at the same time Earl Eeno was the organizer
of tlie Communist Party.
We also have testimony regarding her that she became the inter-
preter of the Russian who Avas sent from Russia to this country to
take a ])osition of leadership in the Young Communist League.
We found this person by the name of "Max'' referred to in hearings
of our committee in many i^laces in the United States hut it w^as only
during the Baltimore hearing that w^e Avere able to identify his alias
as Max Young and that his real name Avas P-a-m-a-n-o-n. We found
Mr. Damanon was then under deportation orders.
Did vou have anv knoAAdedae of Marv Himofl' prior to this meeting
of January 8, 1946?
Mrs. Blauatxt. No, sir; I don't belieA^e T did. .
Mr. Tavenner. I believe you have told us she AA-as in charge of the
JeAAHsh work for the state office of the Communist Party in NeAA' Yo}-k
in 1946.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, sir.
Mr. Taa^enner. Please proceed.
Mrs. Blaua^elt. There Avas a similar situation AAdiich existed in con-
nection Avith the question of Iran and this also AA^as discussed at party
meetings. At a meeting of the Flatbush section held on April 2i,
1946, Nat Rosenbluth, the section organizer, spoke on imperialism and
the Iranian situation and in this connection he stated that Iran AA\as a
feudal state in AA'hich English and American imperialists wished to
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 869
inaintain control of oil and that such a cartel could be prevented if
tlie Soviet Union were given concessions because the Soviet was a
Socialist state and not interested in imperialism and the Soviet would
return 49 percent of the profits to Iran and look toward the welfare
of the people : whereas the Engrlish would return oidy 20 ])ercent which
would g-o to the landowners. That was typical of their reasoning on
these particular questions at the time.
Mr. Tavp:nner. You made reference to the organization of a veter-
ans committee. You stated that special emphasis was being placed
upon recruiting veterans. Will you give the committee any additional
information you have regarding the Communist Party program
among veterans ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Here again probably I could start out by saying
tluit the Communist Party of Xew York State held a conference on
December 1-2, 1945 for the ]nir]iose of drawing up a progam in con-
nection with veterans and at this conference resolutions were presented
calling for the organization of veterans into trade unions and veterans
organizations, the organization of Xegro veterans, the recruitment of
veterans into the party, the integration of returning Communist vet-
erans into party leadership and formation of county and section
committees.
At the meeting of the Flatbush club held December 5, 1945, Abe
Shtabe, who had attended this conference, reported on it and stated
that William Z. Foster had said that the veterans would become an
integral part of the Communist Party's activities and that Robert
Thompson had compared the ditl'erence between the return of the Com-
munists from the Spanish Civil War when they knew that the world
was headed for fascism and war and comparing that with their return
from World War II when they should have been able to feel that
fascism was crushed only to find that the forces of imperialism and
reaction were still at work.
In connection with this activity the party members were constantly
reminded to recruit veterans and the clubs endeavored to reregister
those veterans who had been party members before their induction into
the services and the veterans who were in the party were urged to be-
come active in veterans organizations as well as in their own trade
unions and other mass organizations of which they might be members.
Mr. Tavenner. You have testified concerning your membership in
the Parkside club of the Communist Party. Will you refresh the
recollection of the committee, please, as to the period of time that you
were a member of the Parkside club?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I was a member of the Parkside club from January
1946 until June 1946.
Mr. Tavexner. During that period of time were you appointed to
any major committee of the Parkside club of the Communist Party?
Mrs. Blauveet. I was appointed as chairman of the fund drive
committee. The party had annual fund drives usually at the begin-
ning of the year, and in this particular fund drive that was conducted
at the time I was in the Parkside club, I was made the chairman of the
fund drive committee.
Mr. Tavexxer. A little later I will want to ask you about your ac-
tivity as chairman of the fund drive committee. I want to delay
that because I believe there were fund drive activities in later groups
in which you were a member.
870 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Will you give us at this time, please, the identification of those per-
sons in the Parkside club of the Communist Party who were per-
sonally known to you to be members of the Communist Party and in
doing' this I would want you to carry out the same instructions as
before as to identification of individuals.
Mrs. Blauvelt. When I was transferred to the Parkside club in
January of 1946 several members of the Flatbush club were trans-
ferred with me and they were Abe Feingold, Rose Gollomb, Flor-
ence Levine, Dorothy Liff, Anne E. Morganstern, Ann Rivlin, John
Rogers, Nat Rosenberg, and Ruth Wang.
In addition to those transfers from the Flatbush Club I came to
know as members of the Parkside club, Herman Abramson of 45 Haw-
thorne Street. He was on the executive committee of the Parkside
Club. He was at one time chairman of the 11th A, D. section of
the American Labor Party, a member of Americans United for World
Organization, the Zionist Organization of America and one of the
PTA groups in the neighborhood.
Mr. Tavenner. How are you able to identify these persons who
were members of the Parkside Club ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I met with them at meetings at some time or other
that were held by the Parkside club.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you also have a group of members at this club
identified to you by the chairman of the club ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, sir ; I did.
Mr. Tavenner. Tell us how that occurred.
Mrs. Blauvelt. When I was made the chairman of the fund drive
committee I had to write letters to a certain group of the membership,
letters which asked these particular members to make pledges to the
fund drive, letters which asked those members who had already
pledged to the fund drive to fulfill their pledges and an additional
letter to all these comrades, urging them to attend a party given by the
Parkside Club to raise funds for the fund drive. This list was given to
me by Betty Medinz, chairman of the club.
Mr. Tavenner. The list was give you by the chairman of the club?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is correct.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I believe we should reserve for
executive session the identification of persons whose names were given
to her on a list by the chairman of the Parkside Club which I believe to
be in a different category from persons that she actually was able to
identify from her own personal knowledge ; with the exception, how-
ever, of the persons whose names were given her as members of the
club regarding contributions to the fund drive of the Communis
Party, and who responded to that call to contribute funds.
Mrs. Tavenner. Will that procedure be satisfactory ?
Mr. Moulder. Yes. Was this list part of the records of the club!
Mrs. Blauvelt. Records as such were not actually kept under party
orders. They were not to be kept.
Mr. Moulder. Were you an official at that time ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I was chairman of the fund drive committee ; and
Betty Medinz, chairman of the Parkside Club, gave me in my capacity
as chairman of the fund drive conmiittee, this list of the members to
whom to send letters.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you understand that you are to give us in public
session only the names of members on that list who in response t-o yoar
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 871
contact with them made contributions to the fund drive of the Com-
munist Party?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yas, sir,
( Subsequent to the appearance of Mrs. Blauvelt before the commit-
tee, she located and furnished the committee 25 pledge cards from
individuals whose names appeared on the list given her by Betty
Medinz, chairman of the Parkside Club. In the particular instances
where the name of the pledgor is concealed, by either the pledgor fail-
ing to sign his full name or the use of an alias, Mrs. Blauvelt identified
each person by the name under which that person was known to her.
The pledge cards are reproduced herewith in numerical order with
each identification as furnished by Mrs. Blauvelt:)
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 20
No. 1. Betty Rosenthal.
No. 2. Belle Sitfian.
872 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
1^ ^hmt^iyg'^ riicM^-A /^
No. 3. Jean Rosenthai,.
No. 4. Harold Abkoff.
No. 5. Gebt Abroff.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 873
No. 6. Esther Buss.
No. 7. Bill Cahn.
No. 8. Abb Fkhtgou).
874 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
No. 9. Bert Feank,
No. 10. Jennie Goldman.
No. 11. Rose Gollomb.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 875
%MTMtMQ.^pi^^4^$
'*^fmwJW£^^...^^'^S^-^':
No. 12. Habold and Belle Heyman.
No. 13. Joseph Hardaet.
No. 14. Hazel Fobbes.
876 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
No. 15. Floeence Levine.
No. 16. DoKOTHY Life.
No. 17. Ben Pikbcb.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 877
....^.^^.^Mm
No. 18. Norma Pierce.
No. 19. Leonard TYLEat.
63968— 55— pt.
No. 20. Bettt MfSDiNZ.
878 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
No. 21. Barney and Sylvia Schneiderman.
No. 22. Ruth Wang.
No. 23. Ckcelia Zelman and Hi'sband Fred Zet.man.
rNTVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 879
No. 24. Anne E. Morganstekn
No. 25. Walter Nelson.
Mrs. Blatjvelt (reading) ;
There was another member, Gert Abroff, of 130 Fenimore Street. She came
to one of the meetings of the Parkside Club. She had been made a part of
the fund drive committee but never appeared at any of the meetings that I
called.
There was Harold AbrofE, 130 Fenimore Street, who pledged to the fund drive
in response to the request made in these letters.
I do have several people that I come to right now who are part of
that mailing list. I suppose you prefer that I not name them now.
There was Larry Borgia. Larry Borgia before entering the Army had been
president of the former large Parkside Club in the Flatbush section and was
called one of its most active members. He was reregistered into the party for
1946 at a meeting that was held on February 5 of 1946 and at that time he
stated that he was a member of the State, Coimty, and Municipal Workers
Union.
Also I knew Esta Buss, 57 Lincoln Road. Esta Buss was later transferred
with me to the Lincoln Road Club. She was a member of the American Labor
Party.
880 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
There was also Bill Cahn, 105 Lincoln Road. He was later transferred into
the Lincoln Road Club with me where he was acting chairman for a while.
He was a member of the United Electrical Radio and Machine Workers of
America, and of the American Newspaper Giiikl, and he said he did some of
the writing for UERMWA.
There was Rhoda Cahn, also 105 Lincoln Road, who was later transferred
to the Lincoln Road Club with me and who was very active upon party direc-
tives in attempting to form a consumers' council. She had a sublicense to teach
in the New York City school system but surrendered it.
Mr. Willis. By sublicense do you mean as a substitute teacher?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is right. [Heading :]
Elizabeth Feingold, 04 Sterlins Street. She was later transferred to the
Lincoln Road Club with me where she was educational director for a while and
membership director for a while. She stated she was active in the PTA. She
also had a license to teach in the New York City school system but also sur-
rendered her license.
There was Larry G. Garber, also know as Gold, 307 Sterling Street. He was
later transferred with me to the Lincoln Road Club and at one of the meetings
held for the purpose of reregistering the members into the party for 1947 he
appeared to reregister and at that time stated that he was a projectionist
and also stated he was trying to organize a Communist Party club in an
industrial unit.
Ted Grossman. He joined tlie party at a meeting of the Parkside Club held
March 19, 1946, at which Harold Collins of the Jefferson School spoke. Collins
had invited all of the nonmembers present at that particular meeting to join the
party and Grossman was one who responded to that invitation.
Joseph Hardart : Joseph Hardart pledged $29 for the fund drive being con-
ducted at that time.
Belle Heyman, 433 Rogers Avenue: She was transferred with me to the
Lincoln Road Club where she became its membership director. She said she
worked for Best & Co.
Harold Heyman, 433 Rogers Avenue : He was director of press at the Park-
side Club. He was transferred to the Lincoln Road Club with me where he
became its chairman. He was a serviceman.
There was a Helen Kleiner, whom I met at one of the Parkside Club meetings,
and there was Herman Lacey, whom I met at the meetings. He was supposed
to have worked for Hearns Department Store.
Abe Levine, whom I met at meetings.
Betty Medinz, 271 Parkside Avenue: She was the chairman of the Parkside
Club and stated that she worked for the Consumers' Union.
Beckie Medinz, 271 Parkside Avenue who was Betty's mother, and attended
a meeting of the club.
There was Millie Medinz, also known as Mickey, 271 Parkside Avenue. She
also attended meetings of the Parkside Club.
Mary Nelson, 150 Lefferts Avenue, who was transferred to the Lincoln Road
Club, with me. She was a member of the furriers union, she said, and was later
transferred to an industrial unit of the furriers union.
Walter Nelson, 150 Lefferts Avenue, later transferred to the Lincoln Road
Club with me.
He was literature director in the Lincoln Road Club. He stated he was a
member of the Philharmonic Choral Society.
Dorothy Nowak. 245 Hawthorne Street : She was in attendance at a meeting
of the Parkside Club.
Sylvia Ogur, 411 Parkside Avenue: She stated she was a teacher in a com-
munity school and she attended several meetings of the Parkside Club with me.
She also had a substitute license to teach in the New York City school system but
I believe that was vacated.
Gil Pelham, 100 Lefferts Avenue : He was also transferred with me to the
Lincoln Road Club where he became its press director and also its chairman for
a while. He warked for the Federal Government and I believe he mentioned
something about customs and also some work about surplus.
Mr. Willis. Was he stationed in New York ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. He was in New York. In 1946 he mentioned being
in Linden, N. J., and stated he was supposed to be going to Syracuse.
I do not know whether or not it was a transfer.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 881
Mr. Willis. When was your last association with him ?
Mi-s. Blau\'elt. That would have been sometime in 1946, early part
of 1947.
Mr. Willis. Mr. Chairman, may I make a suggestion ?
Yesterday this witness, speaking about the same period identified
someone said to have been connected with the Department of Agricul-
ture. Here we have another one connected with the customs. I sug-
gest that the clerk be instructed to write to the respective Departments
involved and ascertain if the two persons mentioned are employees
of the Government.
Mr. Moulder. A splendid suggestion.
Mrs. Blatr^elt. In connection with Gil Pelham, he was very sus-
picious of the fact that he was under investigation at that time. What
might have happened to him since then I don't know, but he was cer-
tainly aware from the opinions he was expressing that some investiga-
tion was being conducted against him. I don't know whether that
might have subsequently frightened him out of the party.
Mr. ISIouLDER. Mr. Beale understands the suggestion and he is in-
structed to proceed accordingly by seeking information as to whether
they are still employed by the Government or when they were em-
ployed and in what capacities.
Mrs. Blauvelt (reading) :
There was Harry Riehman, 317 Lefferts Avenue. He also transferred to the
Lincoln Road Club, with me. He attended meetings and at one time stated that
he had joined the Communist Party in 1932.
Sylvia Riehman, 317 Lefferts Avenue. She was also transferred to the
Lincoln Road Club with me and under party directives organized a consumers
council. She also had a license to teach in the New York City school system
but surrendered that license. •
Jeanette Rosenfeld, 85 Clarkson Avenue. She was press director for a while
and also the recording secretary of the Parkside Club. She was attending a
section training class at the time that I knew her.
Seymour Rosenfeld, 8.5 Clarkson Avenue. He was on the executive com-
mittee of the Parkside Club, and I think was organizer for awhile, and was
made part of the section review commission, as I recall. He also attended
the section training class.
Mr, Tavenner. What is a section review commission ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. A review commission is composed of those mem-
bers of the party who have the responsibility of investigating and
screening other members in the party for security reasons. If there
is any doubt about their loyalty to the Communist Party, it is this
review commission wdiich passes judgment upon them. Usually they
take action on whether party members shall be dropped from the
party or expelled from the party or retained, depending on whether
they so decide.
Mr. Willis. It seems to me that with all the care they seem to
take about security they are not as good as our FBI. There you are,
an undercover agent, and it took them 9 years to discover you were
there. They are not so smart.
Mrs. Blauvelt. I stayed a step ahead of them.
Mr. Willis. For 9 years, and at the risk of your life, according to
the citation.
Mr. Tavenner. Were there any occasions when you were fearful
that your identity had been or was about to be discovered?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, there were several times when I thought prob-
ably I might have been either recognized by the comrades whom I
63968 — 55 — pt. 3 6
882 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
met very tiiiexpectedly in places where ordinarily I should not have
been, according to my party background. I remember one instance
of one of the comrades calling upon me at my earliest address. I
wasn't there at the time. But they did a very nice job of covering for
me. Then I know one time when I had to go into headquarters.
Mr. Tavenner. Police headquarters ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Police headquarters, to submit one of my reports.
I was just about a block away from headquarters when I was cross-
ing the street and one of the comrades came driving along in a truck
and hailed me, and I was positive that probably the next day when
1 went to a meeting I was going to be criticized for being in a part of
the city at a time when I should not be there and questioned as to
my motives in being there, and probably some suspicion cast upon
me. There were other instances when I had to leave my own home,
naturally, to get to meetings and on a couple of occasions I did
happen to walk into the subway train where some other comrade
whom I knew from another section was sitting, and it meant either
a fast exit or getting into another car of the train as quickly as I
could. Incidents did happen like that with more frequency than I
cared to experience.
Mr. Willis. You related to us between sessions yesterday the occa-
sion where they finally caught up with you in 1951, and where you had
to meet someone on a street corner.
Mrs. Blauvelt. That was at the time of my expulsion from the
party. Of course they had at the time of my expulsion taken a period
of a few months before they actually got around to expelling me.
They had conducted a verification of me. In other words, a screening.
They had called me into private session and told me that they were
going to consider me for a confidential job within the party.
However, I did have to have a more complete screening than I had
already had. Then they also told me a little later that this confidential
assigTiment would have to be held in abeyance because there was some
suspicion that I might be an agent for the FBI.
Well, a certain period elapsed and I finally was contacted to meet
with my section director on one of the street comers in Brooklyn and
I did as I was directed. We stood on the corner in the cold for about
half an hour before she finally hailed a cab to take us to the apartment
where I was going to face my expulsion.
They didn't tell me it was an expulsion meeting but I anticipated it.
We went to the apartment of one of the comrades who was living in
the Gowanus housing project. I was faced with the two members of
the review commission who had conducted the verification of me and
I went through another interrogation and was called a stool pigeon, et
cetera.
Mr. Willis. All this reinvestigation of you was leading up to a
promotion in the Communist Party, whereas they were pressing you
for more information about yeur life ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, it may be interpreted both ways. They might
have been sincere in their statement that they did wish to consider me
for a confidential appointment because at that time they were placing
many of their members in the underground and they had to place those
members whom they considered reliable.
I had proved myself up until that particular time to be one of their
-»-eliable comrades. They could depend upon me to carry out direc-
INVESTIGATION OF COMIVIUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 883
tives. There might have been some truth in it. I have absohitely no
way of knowing. I would have been very interested in finding out
myself whether I ever did get a confidential assignment.
Mr. Willis. Did they ever ask you while an undercover operative
to solicit membership to the party? Was that not tough on you to
ask people to join the party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I never did ask anybody to join the party, actually.
Mr. Willis. How did you get by in making them believe you were
soliciting membership ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. There were many people whom you might ask to
join the party whom you met through canvassing with the Daily
Worker in the neighborhood, but in many cases naturally they would
refuse. So I didn't have to worrj' too much about that. I was just
not a successful recruiter.
Mr. Tavenner. You said you had to prove your so-called loyalty to
the Communist Party by carrying out its directives. Were you ever
assigned a chore or a duty which was very difficult for you to per-
form as you were not actually an ideological member of the Commu-
nist Party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, I think probably one of the most difficult
tasks that faced me in the party was distribution of leaflets on street
corners and subway stations and in front of the department stores.
When I was called upon to do those things naturally I did have to
do them and I did them, but it was with great reluctance that I did
so. Of course it always presented a security risk to myself because
I never knew whom I might meet, who might know my true identity
and would greet me by my true name.
I had not only the risk of being discovered by the party, but I had
also the risk of being confronted with personal friends of mine who
naturally did not know I was in the party. This was a well-guarded
secret during the 9 years I was in the party. There were also some
instances of carrying out directives which I was reluctant to do.
For instance, when we had to reregister the membership into the
party and I was directed to speak to certain of the members, some
of whom were a little reluctant to reregister for various reasons. I
remember the case of one of the comrades who was a deeply religious
woman. She joined the party on the urging of the party members in
my club on the basis that the party was helping the Negro people..
She happened to be a Negro. When the time came for reregister into
the party for the forthcoming year, she hesitated about reregistering,
because she couldn't quite reconcile religion and the Communist Party.
She had been told if you were a member of the Communist Party, at
least her pastor told her if she was a member of the Communist Party,
she could not be a member of the church.
I did have to see her and speak to her and project part of the
party line. However, in this instance I was not too successful and
she did succumb to her religious influences more so than to the in-
fluence of the party.
There were others. There was one who also was reluctant to re-
register because she was a type of person who had to force herself
to participate in party activities and though she had no difl'erence
with the party, she felt that inasmuch as she was inactive it would
be better for her not to remain in the party as a member.
884 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
However, I finally did persuade her to remain in the party and
she told me at the "time that I reregistered her that if the party
had sent anyone else to her but me, she probably would never have
been persuaded to reregister.
]Mr. Moulder. What do you mean by reregister?
Mrs. Blauvelt. The Communist Party conducted reregistration of
membership in the fall of evei-y year to reregister the members into
the party for the forthcoming year ; an annual procedure which was
conducted. It was not simply going from year to year with the
membership as such. They actually had to be reenroUed more or
less as party members.
Mr. Willis. Mr. Tavenner, I don't want to interrupt your chronol-
ogy of examination. Mrs. Blauvelt will develop the picture of the
party appeal to minority groups, especially the colored race; I assume
you will come to that later,
Mr. Tavenner. Yes, sir.
The reason I asked the question about this review comflaission was
to ascertain if it was the same type of commission you Iiad to go
before in the matter of your own expulsion in the year 1951..
Mrs. Blauvt^lt (reading) :
Hattie Rubin, also known as Rubinstein, 57 Lincoln Roadi She was trans-
ferred with me into the Lincoln Road Club where she attended; meetings with me<.
Barney Schneiderman, 409 Parkside Avenue. He had been a serviceman and;
did attend some meetings of the Parkside Club with me.
Sylvia Schneiderman, 409 Parkside Avenue, who stated that she had done,
some work for the state educational committee of the Communist Party and{
that she had taken one of the state education courses. Sylvia Schneidermaa
held a license to teach in the New York City School System but she was dis~
missed in 1950. ^ , , , , i, .»
Jane Shapiro, 245 Hawthorne Street. She stated she was a member or baa
been a member of the Young Communist League and was a member of the Ameri-
can Labor Party, and at the time I knew her was attending the Jefferson Scfeod
of Social Science. We held a meeting in her home.
There was Belle Sufian, 56 Winthrop Street. I had to contact her regarding
the fund drive and she pledged $15. , ^ ,, , .
There was Lucille Tow, 50 Lincoln Road. She was transferred to the Lincoln
Road Club with me at a latter periol. She and her husband contributed $50
to the fund drive. She attended a meeting with me.
Sid Tow, 50 Lincoln Road, who also went into the Lincoln Road Club with
me and together with his wife pledged $50 to the fund drive.
Bud Turchin, 49 Clarkson Avenue. He was a veteran and he did attend some
meetings of the Parkside Club with me. , , t
Leonard Tyler, 263 Parkside Avenue. I first met Leonard Tyler when I
was attending a class in the Flatbush Club which had been taught by Abe
Feingold and in the Parkside Club he was press director and member of the
executive committee. He was also a lawyer.
There were Cecelia Zelman and Fred Zelman.
Mr. Tavenner. Was there a professional group of the Communist
Party in the general Flatbush area?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I don't know of any particular professional group
at that time. Most of my experience in the Flatbush Club was as a
community club and at the time of the broad policy of the party when
the industrial units and shop units had been more or less dissolved,
many of the people in those groups came into the community branches
and the Flatbush Club did have a good number of professional people,
most of whom I learned were teachers.
There were professional clubs. I know, for instance, when I was
in the Boro Hall section there was a professional club called the
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 885
Helen Horton Club supposed to be composed of lawyers and doctors,
and I understand that this particular club was depended upon very
often to make large contributions to the fund drives and any other
monetary contributions which the party in the Boro Hall section
happened to ask for.
Mr. Tavenner. As chairman of the fund drive committee were you
required at any time to confer with members of the professional club
for the purpose of solicitation of funds ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No. As I said, there was no professional club there
at that time.
That I think would complete my presentation of the Parkside Club.
Mr. Moulder. Mr. Tavenner, do you think this would be a good
point in the proceedings to recess, for the reason that there is an im-
portant bill pending on the floor of the House and we have been re-
quested to be present at 11 o'clock.
Mr. Tavenner. May I ask just one question?
Mr. Moulder. Certainly.
Mr. Ta^^nner. Will you tell the committee at this time, please, how
many persons were on the list furnished you by the chairman of your
club to be consulted by you for the purpose of obtaining contributions
to the fund drive of the Communist Party ?
Mrs. Blaua^elt. I made no actual count of that number, but I would
judge at least a couple of dozen. I can make an accurate count for
you if you wish.
Mr. Tavenner. That is sufficient.
Mr. Moulder. The committee will stand in recess until later this
afternoon. We do not know exactly when we can return. We will
say tentatively 1 : 30.
(Whereupon, at 11 : 15 a. m. the committee was recessed, to recon-
vene at 1 : 30 p. m. the same day. )
afternoon session may 4, 195 5
Committee members present : Representatives Morgan M. Moulder
(chairman) and Edwin E. Willis.
Mr. Moulder. The subcommittee will be in order.
Proceed Mr, Tavenner.
Mr. Tavenner. Mrs. Blauvelt, will you tell us again the date you
were transferred out of the Parkside Club of the Communist Party?
Mrs. Blauvelt. It was June 1946.
Mr. Tavenner. I'o what group were you then transferred ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. To the Lincoln Road Club in the Flatbush section.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee, please, the circum-
stances which gave rise to the formation of the Lincoln Road Club?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, at this particular time it was decided that
I the clubs were still too large and that further reorganization was
' necessary to break them down into smaller groups, and therefore the
Parkside Club was divided into 2 clubs, one of which was the Lin-
coln Road Club of which I became a member.
Mr, Tavenner. What was the name of the other club ?
Mrs. Blauvt.lt. I do not recall the name of the otlier club.
Mr, Tavenner. What was the approximate membership of the
Lincoln Road Club?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I would say the Lincoln Road Club had approx-
imately 45 to 50 members.
886 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mr. Tavenner. How long were you a member of that club?
Mrs. Blauvelt. For just about a year.
Mr. Tavenner. During this period of time, did you receive an
appointment to any particular committee or any particular phase of
Communist Party work?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, for the first couple of months that I was in
the Lincoln Road Club I was financial secretary and then after that
I was made its press director.
Mv. Tavenner. As financial secretary and as press director did
you have very intimate contact with the membership of that group?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is correct.
Mr. Tavenner. I will want to ask you a number of questions re-
garding your duties as financial secretary and as press director, but
as those activities covered several different units of which you were a
m.ember, I will defer that for the moment.
I ask you at tliis time to identify the members of the Lincoln Road
Club of the Communist Party who were known to you to be members
of the Communist Party, and may I ask you to again follow the same
directions about identification as previously given ?
Mrs. Blaua^lt. Yes, sir.
AVhen I was transferred from the Parkside Club to the Lincoln
Road Club several of the other members were transferred with me
and they included Esta Buss, Bill Cahn, Rhoda Cahn, Abe Feingold,
Elizabeth Feingold, Bert Frank, Larry Garber, Rose Cellar, Belle
Heyman, Harold Heyman, Dorothy Litf, Mary Nelson, Walter Nel-
son, Gil Pelham, Harry Richman, Sylvia Richman, Hattie Rubin,
Lucille Tow, Sid Tow, and Ruth Wang.
In addition to which, Gerald Goodman who had formerly been a
member of the Flatbush Club, was placed in the Lincoln Road Club.
Mr. Tavenner. You say you came to know these individuals. Do
you mean you came to know them as members of the Communist
Party?
]\[rs. Blativelt. Yes, as members of the Lincoln Road Club. In
addition to those members I came to know Al DiMartino. [Reading :]
Al DiMartino used the name of Al Martin in the party. He was a member
of the furniture workers union and was eventually transferred to an industrial
union. He ran what he called the Flatbush Art Gallery at 849 Flatbush Avenue.
David Edelson, 145 Lincoln Road : He wished to use the name Miller in the
party. However, he was very infrequently referred to by that name. He had
been in the Army and was now working in dental supplies.
Ethel Edelson also wished to use the name of Miller in the party and I did
hear her referred to upon one occasion as Judith. She also lived at 145 Lincoln
Road.
Florence Goodman, 250 Midwood Avenue : She was registered into the party
for the year 1947 at a meeting that was held on November 19, 1946.
Thelma Ostrow, also known as Ostrowitz, 288 Midwood Avenue. She stated i
she had joined the Communist Party in 1934, that she had attended a Com-
munist Party State training school, and that she was sister-in-law to Larry
Garber. She stated she was a union organizer for district 4 of the United Elec-
trical, Radio and Machine Workers of America, and that she had done or-
ganizational work in a fur dyeing factory, also in the stockyard area in Chicago,
and also in the South.
Mr. Tavenner. You say she was an organizer in District 4, United
Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America. Did you learn
where she was located during that period of time ?
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 887
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir; I did not. That was just a statement that
she made regarding the work she had been doing in the party.
[Reading :]
Judy Straus, 1901 Bedford Avenue : She was a member of the executive board
of the Flatbush chapter of the Progressive Citizens of America, and she was
the wife of Dr. Mark Straus, chairman of the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee
Committee.
That about completes the members of the Lincoln Road Club.
Mr. Tavenner. "WTiile you served as financial secretary and as press
director of the Lincoln Road Club, did you have occasion to meet with
Communist Party members on a higher level such as the section level
of the party ?
Mrs. Blauvt;lt. Yes, sir ; I did.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell us first what is meant by the section
level of the party ?
]Mrs. Blatjv^elt. The section level of the party referred to the sec-
tion committee. Each section was divided into a number of clubs and
over these clubs there was this higher body which was called a section.
It supervised the clubs within the section ; it had an executive com-
mittee, the members of which gave certain directives to the executive
members of the branches in connection with the conduct of party ac-
tivities.
Mr. Taven-ner. Wliat was the name of this particular section?
Mr. Blauvelt. This was the Flatbush section.
Mr. Tavenner. What was the occasion for becoming acquainted
with members of the section, the Flatbush section of the Communist
Party?
Mrs. Blauvelt. As the financial secretary of the Lincoln Road Club
I was called upon to attend meetings with the section membership di-
rector and section financial secretary at a section level, and as the press
director of the Lincoln Road Club I was called upon to attend meet-
ings at the section level with the press director of the Flatbush sec-
tion, in addition to which the executive members of the clubs in the
Flatbush section would occasionally be called upon to attend what was
called sectionwide executive meetings.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee in a general way what
business was conducted at those meetings you were required to attend ?
Mrs. Blauv^elt. For instance, at these meetings where the mem-
bership directors and financial secretaries met, these executives of the
clubs would have to report to the section staff on the status of the mem-
bership, the activities which the members were participating in and
also the payment of dues, if fund drives were being conducted, what
contributions they were making to the fund drive.
In connection with the press, the press director would issue direc-
tives to be carried out by the club each week in connection with the
Daily Worker. That is, the circulation of it, canvassing in the neigh-
borhood, in apartment buildings, selling it on the streets and getting
the newsdealers to supply copies on the newsstands.
Mr. Tavenner. In the performance of your duties as chairman or
head of these two groups, did you receive your immediate directives
from the section level of the party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is correct.
888 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mr. Tavenner. And the section level coordinated the work of all
the clubs within the particular district or section ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is correct.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you know how the leadership on the section level
received its directives?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. The section level, the executives on the sec-
tion level received their directives from the county committee, from
the county executives.
Mr. Tavenner. What was the county designation in your particular
area?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That would have been the county committee of the
Brooklyn Communist Party. The county committee of the Brooklyn
Commiinist Party supervised all of the sections within the Borough
of Brooklyn.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you know how many sections there were in the
Borough of Brooklyn at that time ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. At that time there must have been at least a dozen.
They were geographical locations and in New York, especially in
Brooklyn, many of the sections of the borough were given particular
names, designating geographical locations and these names were also
applied to tiie sections of the party as a means of identifying them.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you acquire a fairly accurate idea of the num-
ber of Communist Party members within the Flatbush section to
which you belonged ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, it was considered an extremely large section;
so large in fact that they felt that it should be broken down into three
smaller sections. When I was a member of the Flatbush Club that
membership comprised anywhere from 300 to 350. There was another
large Parkside Club which was in existence at the same time. That
also had a very large membership. So I would judge from that that
there were something like 600 members in that particular section.
There might be 1 guide to computing figures because in 1947 the
organizer — in March 1947 — the organizer of the Flatbush section at
that time said they had succeeded in breaking down the Flatbush
section into 22 small clubs with a membership of about 25 each. That
might give you an idea of what the membership would be.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee, please, the names of the
persons with whom you sat in section meetings of the Communist
Party — that is, your own section, the Flatbush section ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. There was Lester Niemark, who was press director
of the Joe Stember Club. Lucy Parsons, who was an executive mem-
ber of one of the clubs in the Flatbush section, who attended meetings
of the executive members of the club on a section level.
Jack Peck, who was press director of the Prospect Park Club.
Max Kothstein, press director of the Theodore Dreiser Club.
Susan Schneiderman. She was a member of the branch which cov-
ered the Ocean Avenue area and at one of the meetings at which I met
her she stated — this was in 1946 — she stated that she worked for the
union of which the employees of Bloomingdale's Department Store
were members.
Annette Silberman, 122 Fenimore Street. She supervised the regis-
tration of the members of the Lincoln Eoad Club into the party for
1947. A class in the fundamentals of Marxism was held in her home.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 889
She stated at one time that she was j?oing to transfer from her present
chib to the chib which was still in existence then as the Parkside Club.
Sol Siegel, who was on the executive committee of the Flatbush sec-
tion. He was the educational director and I was informed that he was
transferred to the waterfront unit.
Joe Simon was a member of the Joe Stember Club and an organizer
of one of the subsections of the Flatbush section. He was also a mem-
ber of the section review commission.
Sidney Wang, 385 Ocean Avenue, was one of the suborganizers in
the Flatbush section which included the Prospect Park, Ocean Avenue,
Lincoln Koad, Woodrulf, and Parkside Club.
Abe Weissman. He was introduced as the new educational director
of the Flatbush section at one of the meetings I attended.
Mr. Tavenner. To what group or club of the Communist Party-
were you assigned at the end of your one-year service with the Lincoln
Road Club ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I was then transferred to the Jay-Smith Club which
was in the Boro Hall section of the Brooklyn Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. Were you at that time transferred entirely outside
of the Flatbush section ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is right, I went to an entirely different section.
Mr. Tavenner. What was die purpose of that transfer ?
Mrs. Blau\t:lt. My address as it was known to the Flatbush section
was outside the area of the Flatbush section and as it was the policy
of the party at that time for the members to be active in the areas in
which they lived, I was therefore transferred to the area in which
they believed me to be living.
Mr. Tavenner. Will you describe the geographical area of that sec-
tion, the Boro Hall section ?
Mrs. Blau\telt. The Boro Hall section is in what is commonly
referred to as the downtown area of Brooklyn. It included the shop-
ping area, it included an area that was considered a Puerto Rican con-
centration, a Negro concentration, it included 2 of the housing projects,
the Fort Greene housing project and the Gowanus housing project and
it also included part of the waterfront.
Mr. Tavenner. Have you any means of comparison of the member-
ship of that section, the Boro Hall section, with that of the Flatbush
section?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Do you mean in numbers ?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes.
Mrs. Blau\^elt. No. It would have been a large section because it
covered a large area and there were a number of clubs in it, at least
10 clubs, I would say, at one time. But I do not think I can give you
any numerical computation of the membership.
Mr. TAVENi^fER. Were you able to judge fairly accurately the mem-
bership of the Jay-Smith Club to which you were assigiied ?
Mrs. Blaua^lt. Yes. The Jay-Smith Club had on its rolls usually
at one time at least .50 members. Of course during the course of time
many of the members were transferred into the club and transferred
out but 50 was a fairly constant number.
Mr. Tavenner. How long did you remain a member of the Jay-
Smith Club?
Mr, Blauvelt. I remained a member of the Jay-Smith Club until
I was expelled in November of 1951.
890 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mr. Tavenner. Did you hold any positions while a member of the
Jay-Smith Club?
Mrs. Blatjvelt. Yes. I was its financial secretary. About 2
months after I had been in the club I became its financial secretary.
There were occasions when I acted as organizer and also as its mem-
bership director.
Mr. Tavenner. I would like you at this point to relate certain
overall aspects of your experience in the Communist Party which may
cover the period of your membership in all of the clubs you have
mentioned.
You have told us something of the organizational work of the Com-
munist Party beginning with the meeting of December 5, 1945. Hav-
ing joined these other clubs, will you bring that subject up to date?
Mrs. Blauvelt. When I was in the Jay-Smith Club the organiza-
tion there was similar to that in the Flatbush section. The clubs were
supposed to be operating on a group system and in November of 1947
the Jay-Smith Club was directed to institute a group system but wasn't
too successful at that time in this particular venture.
Mr. Tavenner. What do you mean by group system ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. That is, the club had to be broken up into groups
so that on alternate Tuesdays, for instance — Tuesdays being the ac-
cepted day for holding membership meetings — group meetings could
be held which would be held in the homes of the comrades. These
were small meetings. Then on other Tuesdays the general member-
shij:) meeting would be held at which the entire club membership was
to be present.
It was in June of 1948 that the directive to break up once again into
a group system was repeated and this time the explanation was given
that it was to be a precaution against the eventuality of the party being
driven underground should the Mundt bill be passed.
In the Jay-Smith Club at this particular time a group of the com-
rades was actually taken out to form another unit which was supposed
to do some Italian concentration work but not being very successful
at it they were returned to the rolls of the Jay- Smith Club just a few
months later. However, the Jay-Smith Club did finally become func-
tioning on a group system in the fall of 1948.
We were instructed that these groups were to comprise only five
members to a group. Then in 1949 — in fact it was on June 22 — at a
meeting of membership directors and financial secretaries held at sec-
tion headquarters, that Margery de Leon, membership director of the
Boro Hall section, reported that although several months ago the order
had gone out to the clubs to break down their membersliip into small
groups for reasons of security and also for mobility, this has not met
with any great success in Brooklyn and that only the clubs in Man-
hattan were operating on a fairly successful and efficient group system
basis. She instructed the clubs to review their group systems so that
the utmost activity could be obtained from each member.
She announced that it was the party's intention for security reasons
to eventually organize the membership on the basis of only 10 mem-
bers to a club, each of these clubs to be divided into groups of 5 mem-
bers. But in the meantime it was imperative for each club to get its
group system working properly with five members to a group.
Now, each group was to have a group captain assigned to it and
the responsibility of these group captains was to give leadership to
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 891
the group, see that activities — party activities — were carried out, that
dues payments were kept up to date and also that the proper j)olitical
guidance was given to the group.
In other words, a group captain's job was to be similar to that of
the organizer of a club except that the group captain's responsibility
was limited to just a few members.
Now at this particular meeting Bob Ehrlich, the organizational sec-
retary of the Boro Hall section, stressed the importance of carrying
out these directives promptly for security reasons. He stated that
in the Boro Hall section several members had recently been questioned
by FBI men and he said this questioning had been done in only iso-
lated instances and there might be no cause for alarm but he did not
want to minimize the necessity for caution on the part of the com-
rades and he instructed that they do no talking whatsoever to any in-
vestigator and that the club members be advised to be on their guard.
Also at this meeting Caryll Lasky, financial secretary of the Boro
Hall section, instructed that the financial secretarjr of the branches
keep no records but make sure that the group captains knew the dues
status of the members in their groups.
Then on August 24, 1949 at a meeting of membership directors and
financial secretaries, held in the home of Caryll Lasky, financial sec-
retary of the section, Bea Sacks, the section organizer, discussed with
me as one of the active members and executives of the Jay-Smith club
the necessity of splitting the membership in two units.
Inasmuch as the club had approximately 50 members it was con-
sidered too large a membership to handle to properly activize the mem-
bership in party activities. Under the new arrangement one group
was to be predominantly Negro; the other group was to be pre-
dominantly white. And in the Negro group, she instructed that the
Negro comrades would have to be placed on the executive committee
and trained to give leadership to the other comrades so that as Com-
munists they would all be able to go out into a neighborhood and raise
the question of struggle around particular issues that would draw the
Negro people into the party.
I was instructed to arrange the division of the Jay-Smith club
and make recommendations as to the comrades who would form the
executive committees of these clubs but just about this time Caryll
Lasky, financial secretary of the section went on vacation and I was
assigned to assume the duties of section financial secretary while she
was away.
At that time I was instructed in the method of transferring the
money that was collected from the branches to the county which
followed the same procedure which I, as the financial secretary of a
branch, used when I paid the money from the branch to the section.
I, of course, had to break down the payment of dues and contribu-
tions to the fund drives on an individual basis but at the section
level this was done on a cumulative basis— that is, a total for each
club in the amount of dues payments and the amount of contributions
to the fund drive — would be reported to the section.
Mr. Tavenner. To whom did you remit those funds ?
Mrs. Blaih^lt. While I was acting as the financial secretary of
the Boro Hall section I remitted these funds to Bea Sacks, the sec-
tion organizer.
892 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mr. Tavt:nner. Do you know to whom she remitted the funds?
Mrs. Blauvelt. They were to go into the hands of Sidney Brooks,
the county treasurer of the Brooklyn Party.
Mr. Tavenner. Can you follow the funds any further than that?
Mrs. Blair'elt. No, I can't except that from "the county they were
to be transferred to the State. It was the usual process. The chan-
nel was from the branch to the section, from the section to the county
and from the county to the State, and from the State into the national
committee.
Mr. Moulder. You have mentioned security reasons several times
for dividing into smaller clubs and organizations. When you use
that word do you mean secrecy to avoid detection so it would not be
known what was going on ?
Mrs. Blaumslt. That is security for the Communist Party so it
would not be detected.
Mr. Moulder. Do you recall any funds being solicited from your
loaders for purposes other than immediate Communist Party activ-
ities?
Mrs. BLAm^LT. Funds were solicited for the annual fund drives.
Tliere usually were some emergency fund drives that arose and there
would be instances when party members were requested to make con-
tributions. Do you wish to go into that later ?
Mr. Tavenner. Yes.
Mrs. Blauvelt. At the end of 1949 the section directives to split
the Jay-Smith club into two groups were finally accomplished and one
group was known as Jay-Smith club No. 1 and the other group was
known as Jay-Smith club No. 2 and in my particular group one of
the members by the name of Eileen Wilson was made the organizer
although she was released from this activity in the middle of March
1950 because she was moving to California.
Caryll Lasky, whom I have mentioned, stated that she was assigned
to act temporarily as the organizer of the club.
Mr. Tavenner. Which group was that ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Jay-Smith Club No. 1.
And she directed that this club was to conduct its concentration
activities in the Gowanus housing project which was considered an
important concentration.
Mr. Tavenner. What did that mean, to concentrate effort on that
housing project ?
Mrs. Blau^^elt. That meant that the club's activities in conducting
party directives were to be carried out in the Gowanus housing project.
For instance, in connection with activities on the press. We were to
canvass in the Gowanus housing project with the Daily Worker and
Sunday Worker. If any leaflet distributions were to be made, we
were to concentrate in the Gowanus housing project with that distribu-
tion.
Now, also within the Boro Hall section there was a youth group
and it was on May 24. 1950, at a meeting of membership directors and
financial secretaries that Lenore Silberman who was then section mem-
bership director informed me that six members of the youth group had
been assigned to Jay-Smith Club 1. They were : Don, whose last name
was unknown to me, captain of the group, Laura Fields, Adele Hardi-
son, Eleanor Switle, Gloria Jackson, Al Henderson.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 893
The captain of the youth group was to attend 1 club executive
committee meeting a month, and the entire youth group was to attend
1 club meeting a month so that both the adult and youth groups
would know how each group was functioning. The youth group was
to conduct its own activities and work in the name of the Labor Youth
League and was to canvass with its own paper called the Challenge.
However, this actual transfer into the Jay-Smith Club No. 1 did not
take place inasmuch as this youth group was reassigned to work with
the youth group in the Fort Greene housing project.
This was typical of the organization that was taking place at that
time and it was finally at the latter part of August in 1950, in fact it
was on August 22, 1950, at an executive committee meeting of the Jay-
Smith Club No. 1 that Al Neptune, the educational director of the
Boro Hall section, spoke of party security and the need for reorgani-
zation in order for the party to function efl'ectively in case it was niade
illegal through the passage of the Mundt- Nixon bill and the McCarran
bill, and at another meeting a couple of weeks later in the home of
Irving Feuer, who was acting as organizer of the club, the directive
was announced that the clubs were not to hold any large meetings but
only small group meetings and that the section itself was undergoing
a reorganization whereby the clubs were to be grouped by areas under
the supervision of a coordinator from the section. It was on October
9, 1950, at the home of Charles Marshall, one of the members of the
section staff, that Francis Scoville, section organizer, said that the sec-
tion had decided to have a section staff made up of section committee-
men and assigned 'i members to each committeeman to act as club co-
ordinators.
That was the organization that took place in the general area of
August through the fall of 1950 and which was the type of organiza-
tion that was in existence at the time that I was expelled from the
party.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you not believe that the necessity of breaking
up the larger groups into smaller groups for security reasons would
discourage persons from maintaining their membership in the Com-
munist Party?
Mrs. Blauvp:lt. To a certain degree it would have. They may have
been very conscious that tlie party was more or less an underground
organization and that they could be fearful of detection, and it was
during this period of time that many of the members did not wish to
reregister in the party. It seemed that they were rather afraid of the
consequences of being detected.
Mr. Tavi:nner. Wouldn't it also follow that it would be more diffi-
cult under those circumstances to recruit new members into the Com-
munist Party ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. "Well, at this particular period it was because we
had had the indictment of the party's 12 leaders and there were the
Mundt bills which were receiving publicity and the McCarran Act
which was receiving publicity and it was creating an element of fear
within many of the party members themselves and the party was at
this time losing many of its members through unsuccessful reregistra-
tion of them. That is, they were losing them from open membership
or what I should say actual membersliip within the party itself.
894 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
I don't say they lost them in sympathy. Many of them still re-
garded themselves as good Communists and there was no difference
ideologically between what they were thinking and what the party
was thinking. It was just that for their own personal fears that they
did not wish to be associated with the party.
Mr. Tavenner. Did it reflect itself in contributions to the party?
Mrs. Blaitv^elt. To a certain extent, yes, I would say so. Contri-
butions to the party of course were always made through fund drives
and as this period progressed it became more and more difficult to
get money from the comrades. Actually there were so many fund
drives being conducted that were being conducted for the sake of
helping the indicted 12 for purpose of continuing the trial, meeting
expenses, and these became so frequent that the party members really
were being l)led for money.
Mr. Taa't^nner. To what extent was the membership of the clubs of
which you were a member used in the recruiting of Communist Party
members? The committee would like to know what emphasis the
Communist Party put on recruiting.
Mrs. Blatjv^elt. There was continual emphasis on recruiting. As
a matter fact, recruiting was considered as one of the ways of build-
ing the party, and although it was constantly placed before the party
members that they were to recruit people into the party, actually re-
cruiting drives were held for the very specific ]Durpose at certain peri-
ods of time to draw people into the party. Recruiting drives were
held annually, as a matter of fact, usually at the beginning of the
Mr. Tavenner. Will you relate in detail the emphasis the Com-
munist Party put upon recruiting in the various clubs of which you
were a member ?
Mrs. BLAimsLT. Well, for instance when I was a member of the
Flatbush Club, the recruiting drive started in March of 1945 and the
Communist Political Association of New York State issued a letter
which announced that a 2-month recruiting drive for 5,000 new mem-
bers was to be conducted during April and May; and in connection
with this particular drive the members of the Flatbush Club were
instructed to give Abe Feingold the names of anyone they wanted
contacted, and readers of the Daily Worker who were not members of
the Communist Political Association were to be contacted for the pur-
pose of recruiting them.
Then in 1946 in connection with the recruiting drive that was being
conducted at that time the national committee of the Comniunist
Party designated Brooklyn as one of the pace setters in this particular
drive and the Kings County committee of the Brooklyn party held
a press conference, at the Livingston, on April 29, 1946, to report
to the membership and to the national committee.
Present were John Williamson, Steve Nelson, Bill Norman, Betty
Gannett who had been appointed by the national board to receive this
report. Carl Vedro, executive secretary of the Brooklyn party, re-
ported that the Brooklyn party had a quota of 2,740 new members
to fill but only 800 had been recruited up to this particular time.
John Williamson, national secretary of the Communist Party at
that time, called for more forceful leadership on the part of the Com-
munists in the trade unions, saying that recruiting into the party
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 895
must be done from the unions and the comrades must concentrate in
basic industries, on the waterfront, and in the shipyards, from which
labor could be recruited.
Five areas in Brooklyn had been designated as concentration points
and they were Greenpoint, Williamsburg, Eidgewood, Bay Ridge,
and Sheepshead Bay because it was in these areas where the workers
in the basic industries could be found.
He said he left out the Bedford-Stuyvesant section, considered one
of the Negro concentrations, because the Negroes were friendly to the
Communists and it was therefore not difficult to recruit them.
On the question of just who should be asked to join the party, Wil-
liamson said the comrades placed too much emphasis on selectivity,
and he said the party would never grow if only those individuals
versed in Marxism were allowed to join; and he stated there were
man}-^ who were qualified for membership because they were aware of
the issues of the day and needed only to become members of the party
to be activated in the struggles of labor and it was for the purpose of
educating such people to think and act as Marxists that the party had
schools and courses for training.
He said recruiting should be done among those who voted for Peter
V. Cacchione and that the issues such as the fight for OPA, Free
Spain, and fight for peace should be used for approaching the people.
Then in the fall of 1946 there was a meeting in the home of Bill
Cahn on September 16, 1946, and there was some discussion regarding
the press drive and party building campaign being conducted then,
and activity was to be set into motion by having each member prepare
a list of possible recruits and readers of the Daily Worker to be con-
tacted every week until they took a sub to the Sunday or Daily Worker
or were drawn into the party and it was felt that the least that could
be accomplished would be to draw the contacts into the consumers
council or the Civil Rights Congress.
These were mass organizations through which the party also hoped
to gain potential recruits.
Then at an executive committee meeting of the Lincoln Road Club in
the home of Bill Cahn November 8, 1946, both he and Gil Pelham
expressed the opinion that widespread unemployment was imminent
and in the resulting period of dissatisfaction among the people, that
would be the time when the Communist Party would be able to swell
its ranks.
Now on January 11, 1947, the Brooklyn Communist Party held a
meeting to report on the press drive and Eugene Dennis spoke at this
meeting and among his remarks was the statement that the party had
a registered membership of 62,000, but had set itself a goal of 100,000
members to be achieved in the recruiting drive which was soon to be
opening up.
This recruiting drive that Dennis spoke of officially began on March
1, 1947, and in connection therewith the Flatbush section held a sec-
tionwide executive conference on March 3, 1947, at which Alan Max
of the Daily Worker staff spoke, and among some of the remarks he
made, in addition to speaking about the drive, was on the need of a
third party, saying that it must be based on a broad coalition around
the issues of common interest to all, that the Communists must give
impetus to such a movement to fight against monopoly and reaction,
896 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
and the people must be shown that it was socialism which would make
America free.
Therefore the Communist Party must be built and the present re-
cruiting drive to raise the membership to 100,000 was being conducted.
The Flatbush section's quota in this particular drive was 200 new
members.
September 30, 1947 had been set as the date by which the goal of
100,000 members was to be achieved.
Mr. Moulder. Do you know whether that goal of 100,000 members
was achieved ?
Mrs. BLAu^^LT. No, sir ; that was not achieved.
Mr. Moulder. Do you know what the total membership was at that
time?
Mrs. Blauvelt. It was Dennis' statement that it was 62,000 at that
time. Then also in connection with this particular recruiting drive, an
educational was conducted on March 11, 1947, at a meeting
Mr. Tavenner. Are you telling us about what was required of the
membership of these groups ; what part they should play in helping to
recruit members ?
Mrs. Blauvelt, That is correct. These are discussions, directives,
and orders which were being received at these particular times on these
particular questions.
Mr. Tavenner. Was it almost a constant thing over a long period
of time ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. It was almost a constant thing, yes.
Mr. Tavenner. Proceed.
Mrs. Blauvelt. At this particular meeting of the Lincoln Road
Club on March 11, 1947, Harold Heyman conducted an educational on
Henry Winston's report, Toward a Party of 100,000.
This report pointed out that the emergency national convention of
July 1945 placed before the party as its main task that of strengthen-
ing the working-class base of the party, first of all, in the key indus-
tries. To do this, industries, and the key plants within those industries,
and key industrial towns and cities were selected for concentration,
and forces and funds were allocated for that work.
Now as a result of this concentration policy, the industrial workers
recruited into the party rose from 38 percent to 43 percent in 1946,
and the basic industrial workers rose from 19 percent to 22 percent.
Mr. Willis. You are speaking over what area ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. This is 1947 and this constitutes a report on the part
of Henry Winston on the results of what the party had been doing in
the past period.
Mr. Willis. Over what area ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. This is general. It is Henry Winston's report.
Mrs. Willis. Is this in New York ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. He is speaking on a broad general area not confined
to the New York area. This was considered an advance but changing
the industrial composition of the party so that the base of the party
would be the workers in the shops and industries was still the main
task.
And to help fulfill this task, organizers had been sent to the main
concentration sections and coordinated leadership was provided in
a number of industries. It was hoped that the party in this present
INVESTIGATION OF COMA^TUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 897
recruiting drive of 1947 would secure new members from the key shops,
industries, and working class communities.
Now in October of 1947 when I was in the Jay-Smith Club, I attended
a meeting of membership directors and financial secretaries at which
Margery de Leon, the section membership director, discussed the task
of registering membership into the party for 1948. She spoke on the
significance of building the party to stem on the onward tide of fascism,
as she called it that was sweeping the countiy.
In view of the necessity of building the party to a maximum, it had
been decided to re-register every comrade in the section but at the same
time the comrade had to be impressed with the fact that they had to
make a very determined effort to become more active in party activities.
One of the comrades from the teachers' unit said she felt one of the
teachers in her branch should be dropped because he never attended
meetings, but she heard him speak at conventions and conferences,
and one day also heard him in school presenting a study of the Soviet
Union to the pupils of his history class and she knew he was a good
Communist.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you have any further information as to the indi-
vidual referred to, or the school involved ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir. I thought that was a very interesting point,
but at this time I was very new in the section and I was not too familiar
with most of the members and therefore the identity of this particular
comrade was never revealed to me, but I thought it was an interesting
point, nevertheless.
Now, in 1948 the yearly recruiting drive began on March 1st. This
one was to last until April 15. In the Jay-Smith Club we were given a
quota of 25 new recruits and it was hoped that this number could be
recruited from the contacts made from Sunday morning convassing
with the Sunda}^ Worker and from subscribers who had been obtained
in the current press drive.
Mr. Moulder. Did you know the person who made the statement
about having heard this teacher ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir. As I explained, I was new in the section
at that time and not too familiar with some of the members. There-
fore, I did not know the person who was speaking at the time.
In 1949 at an executive committee meeting of the Jay-Smith Club
held on March 7 in the home of Charles Marshall, it was announced
that the Communist Party was launching its annual recruiting drive,
its aim this year to get as many industrial workers in the party as pos-
sible in order to carry out its plans to reorganize on an industrial basis.
Harry Shapiro, one of the members of the club, stated that although
the comrades would be asked to recruit industrial workers, it had been
pointed out at the party's industrial conference which he had attended
on March 5, that the people in the communities must also be recruited
because a great deal of excellent party work was done by the house-
wives who made up the communities.
In this recruiting drive the party had set a quota of 5,000 new indus-
trial members of which the Brooklyn party was to recruit 700. In the
Jay-Smith Club we were given a quota of 5 new Negro industrial
recruits.
I think probably the next important factor in recruiting came to
my attention in 1950 at the executive committee meeting of the Jay-
Smith Clubs Nos. 1 and 2 on February 14, 1950, in the home of Charles
63968 — 55— pt. 3 7
898 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Marshall. Bea Sacks, the section organizer of the Boro Hall section,
stressed the importance of getting every comrade registered into the
party for 1950, saying that out of 6,000 party members in Brooklyn,
1,000 were being lost through non-registration and that the year
before, 1,000 members had also been lost. I think that would cover
the salient points regarding the need for building the party through
new recruits and also re-registering the members of the party.
Mr. Tavenner. Were application forms used in the various drives
for membership ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. In most instances a printed form application
was used.
Mr. Tavenner. I hand you what appears to be such a form and on
the back of it there is noted : "Unite and Organize for Peace, Security,
Democracy and Social Progress." Can you identify that as the type
of application form used ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. This particular application was the one that
was used in 1948. This included not only an application for member-
ship in the Communist Party but also application for a subscription
to the Worker.
Mr. Tavenner. I desire to offer the document in evidence and ask
that it be marked "Blauvelt Exhibit No. 20-A" for identification pur-
poses only, and to be made a part of the committee files.
Mr. Willis. It is so ordered.
Mr. Tavenner. I present in connection with your testimony on
recruitment a sheaf of throwaways and also an article on the letter-
head of the Communist Party, U. S. A., over the signature of William
Z. Foster on the subject of recruiting. Will you examine these, please,
and state whether they were used in the course of recruiting cam-
paigns ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. Each one of these was. This particular one,
which is dated May 5, 1944, was issued by the Flatbush Club, and it
mentions the names and the addresses of some of the comrades where
meetings could be held for the purpose of probably clinching poten-
tial recruits into the party.
This one is on a letter, on the letterhead of the Communist Political
Association of New York State over the signature of Gilbert Green,
president of the CPA of New York State at that time, stating that
5,000 new members were to be recruited during the drive of April and
May 1945.
This one is entitled the "Krumbein Party Building Drive" in con-
nection with the recruiting drive, to be held from March 1 to Septem-
ber 30 in 1947.
This one is a letter to all party members over the signature of Wil-
liam Z. Foster .in connection with the 1946 campaign.
Mr. Tavenner. I ask that the documents above referred to be
marked "Blauvelt Exhibit No. 20-B" for identification purposes only,
and be made a part of the committee files.
Mr. Moulder. It is so ordered.
Mr. Tavenner. You have described numerous activities of the mem-
bership of these various groups. It is difficult to understand how the
membership could have had time for any other activities, but as you
were the chairman of the press drive and also chairman of the fund
drive, I would like to ask you about those two matters.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEVi^ YORK AREA 899
First, will you tell us what your duties were as chairman of the
press drive ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. I woud like to make a correction. I was not chair-
man of the press drive. I was press director of the Lincoln Road Club.
There is a bit of a difference.
As the press director it was my duty to attend these meetings at the
section level so that I could receive directives from the section regard-
ing the circulation of the Daily Worker and the Sunday Worker.
Now, activities with the paper usually consisted of canvassing to a
very high degree or as high a degree as could possibly be maintained
and certain areas would be designated as canvassing areas and com-
rades would be given assignments to canvass with the paper, usually
on Sunday morning. It was that type of work which the press direc-
tor was primarily concerned with.
Mr. Tavenner. Was this type of work a constant activity ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, sir ; it was. It was a constant activity. How-
ever, there were at times very concerted efforts made to increase the
circulation of the press and to secure subscriptions to either the Daily
Worker or the Sunday Worker and these concerted efforts took the
form of press drives. They were usually conducted on an annual
basis.
Mr. Tavenner. In your judgment, are there any particular features
of that activity which you should call to the attention of the com-
mittee ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. During all the time I was in the party, the press,
of course, was considered one of the major activities and in each club
it did constitute a very important part of the work of the club. If
you wish me to go into this, I can do so,
Mr. Moulder. Did you ask a question?
Mr. Tavenner. It is a question of how much detail we desire to go
into in connection with the press activities of the club.
Did the activity of the press phase of this subject lead to the use of
Communist Party periodicals for any special objectives the Communist
Party had in mind ?
Mrs. Bl^vuvelt. The Communist Party felt that the Daily Worker
was the medium through which the people could be reached.
It would present party policy to them. It was spokesman for the
party and as a matter of fact this was brought out at a meeting of the
Flatbush Club of the Communist Political Association I attended
July 25, 1944, at which Bill Lawrence, the secretary of the State
Communist Political Association spoke. He claimed that the Daily
Worker was the spokesman for the party and therefore must be read
by the party people and it was considered the medium through which
the people were to be reached, and it was at this time that he made the
statement that Earl Browder was to assume the editorship of the
paper following Labor Day of that year. We had a press drive which
was starting at that time and in this particular press drive, we were
supposed to have 22,000 subscriptions to the paper by January 7 of
1945.
900 ESrV'ESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
Mr. Tavenner. Was an effort made to sell the Daily Worker among
mass organizations irrespective of membership in the Communist
Party for the purpose of carrying some Communist Party line to
those people ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, for instance in the press drives, contact had
to be made with certain groups of people and in the press drive of
1946, this is at the time that I was press director of the Lincoln Road
Club, people were to be canvassed for subscriptions and it was to be
done on the basis of contacting American Labor Party voters and
members of the Civil Rights Congress which had a chapter in the
Flatbush section. Of course, the members of the American Labor
Party were open on record in the registered voters directory. How-
ever, it wasn't known whether or not the membership of the Flat-
bush cha])ter of the Civil Rights Congress was an open list and
therefore any of the comrades who were members of the Flatbush
chapter of the Civil Rights Congi-ess were to be contacted so that
contact would be made with the members of the Civil Rights Con-
gress in connection with the press drive.
If I may point out one thing which I always considered fairly im-
portant, it was in connection with a conference that was held in Octo-
ber of 1947. If you would like me to give you some of the details in
connection with that, I think you might find it interesting.
Mr. Tavenner. Yes, if you will, please.
Mrs. Blauvelt. In October of 1947 — and if you go into this detail
I guess I might as well say it was at a meeting of the Jay-Smith Club
held on October 6, 1947, that Harry Shapiro, one of the members of
the club, announced that the Communist Party was holding a 2-day
conference at Webster Hall on October 18 to 19, and delegates from
the eastern seaboard States were to attend and the subject to be dis-
cussed was the building of the party press to combat the wave of anti-
communism that was rising in the country. Now only three com-
rades from a section were to attend this conference and in the Boro
Hall section the delegates were to be Abe Osheroff, section organizer,
Eleanor Schor, organizer of the Jay-Smith Club, and Lola Kehoe of
the La Pasionaria Club which was the Puerto Rican Club in the Bora
Hall section.
Now there was more or less a report on the conference which was
made on October 27, 1947, at a section meeting of the executives of
the clubs in the Boro Hall section. The meeting was held to
launch the section on the party press building campaign. Bea Sacks
of the section staff' brought out the need for building the party press to
combat propaganda of such papers as the Daily News, Mirror, and
the Hearst publications.
Abe Osheroff, organizer of the section, took up the discussion to im-
press upon the comrades the necessity of overcoming the barriers in
canvassing in order to build the press.
Now he maintained that the way things were going in the country
the people were being led deeper and deeper into a jungle from which
tliey could not escape and in which they could be controlled politically,
psychologically, and finally militarily and in order to prevent a situ-
ation taking place in this country similar to that which had arisen in
Germany, it was necessary for the Communists to reach the people.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 901
Now he declared that the comrades mi^ht not think they had done
very much when they spoke to people about controlling prices, et
cetera, but that it was through this medium that the people in the
community began to think and take action.
He stated that in every case where the people took action on the
political, racial, and economic issues affecting their lives, it would be
found that such action stemmed from the influence exerted by the
Communists, and he maintained that it was this hard core or nucleus
of Communists that also gave direction to mass organizations.
For instance, he loosed the question that wliere would the CIO con-
ventions, both State and National, have been had it not been for the
Communists who kept the left and center together, and he declared
also that in the South it was the Communists who were organizing
and giving leadership to the mass organizations such as Southern Con-
ference for Human Welfare.
He further said the most recent action of protest on the part of the
actors in Hollywood against the House Un-American Activities Com-
mittee was not purely spontaneous, but was the result of Communist
influence. He said, "We know these thing;s to be a fact. We don't
have to be told."
Mr. Tavexner. This committee has gone to a great deal of effort to
prove that that statement made by this Communist Party leader repre-
sented the true situation when the fight of the Hollywood 10 occurred
before his committee. Many witnesses have been called on the subject.
Who made that statement to your club ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Abe Osheroff, the organizer of the Boro Hall sec-
tion at this particular time.
Mr. Tavenner. Proceed, please.
Mrs. Blauvelt. He concluded that the comrades should not under-
estimate the work that they did in canvassing with the paper and
urged that they be activized to participate in the campaign to build
the press. That was in October of 1947. There was one party meeting
held on December 15 of 1947, which was a closed meeting of the Brook-
lyn Communist Party; only the executive members of the branches
were present at this meeting, and John Gates spoke at it. I do not
know whether or not you would be interested in hearing his remarks
made at that meeting.
Mr. Tavenner. Yes, we would.
Mrs. Blau\t:lt. He spoke first of himself, that in 1932-33 he had
been a member of the Young Communist League in Ohio and had
won a national award for being champion sub-getter and he was now
editor of tlie Daily Worker. He spoke about the information bureau
which had been formed by 9 Communist parties of Europe because
they realized tliey were making mistakes by conducting their affairs
independently and that they would benefit by having an organization
to guide them.
He further stated that it was the decision of the American Com-
munists not to affiliate with this information bureau, but that these
Communist parties of Europe knew the position which the American
Communists were in and that it was for the understandable reason
that the Communist Party in America was trying to make the party
recognized as a legal one.
902 INVESTIGATION OF CORIMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
He then spoke about the formation of a third party and pointed
out that progress was being made by the American Labor Party in
New York State. He maintained that Truman and his administration
would never receive the support of the American Labor Party and the
Progressive forces but that it would be Wallace who would get Pro-
gressive backing. He pointed out the movement taking place in
Chicago where the Communists and the Progressives were forming
an independent party and would attempt to get it on the ballot in
Illinois for the purpose of sponsoi'ing Wallace's presidential candi-
dacy in 1948.
He pointed out work being done in California by the Progressives
in order to form a third party which he said he was sure would back
Wallace. He brought out the necessity of educating the people to the
issues involved in the present political situation and urged the com-
rades to get the Daily Worker to the people as the means of educating
them.
There was another press and party building conference held on
March 20, 1948, at which the executive members of the branches of
the Brooklyn party were also present and Max Weiss, the foreign
affairs director of the national committee of the Communist Party
was principal speaker. He pointed out that the Communists had three
big tasks to tackle, namely, bringing the issues of universal military
training before the people and securing its defeat, building a third
party movement around Wallace, and building the Communist Party
and its press.
There was a meeting held at the Brooklyn Academy of Music on
January 20, 1949. This was a I^nin memorial meeting. Joe Clark,
the city editor of the Daily Worker, spoke on the merits of this paper.
He pointed out that the capitalist press was full of untruths whereas
the Daily Worker gave only factual information, and as an example
of how the capitalist press operated, he declared that it always paid
homage to Chiang Kai-shek but it could now be seen that this was
done in the interests of the imperialists, whereas the Daily Worker
had always rooted for Mao Tse-tung, Chinese leader of China who
was leading the Chinese people to victory.
Another instance of how the capitalist press operated, he declared,
was seen in their apparent scoop that the Soviet Union was now mak-
ing overtures for peace, whereas the Daily Worker had always known
the Soviet Union worked for peace.
He, of course, at this time urged the comrades to build the circula-
tion of the Daily Worker and the press.
Mr. Moulder. We will stand in recess for 5 minutes.
(Brief recess.)
Mr. Moulder.- Proceed, Mr. Tavenner.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you recall whether or not the Daily Worker
had any problem about being able to raise sufficient funds to continue
its work on the same basis that it had been prior to 1950 ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. It was having difficulty, as I recall, and that need
was stressed in some of the fund drives held around that period when
we were told to meet quotas to the fund drive as promptly as possible
because it was not only needed for the party but for the Daily Worker.
For instance, there were many expenses that had to be met and money
was running low.
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 903
Mr. Tavenner. Do you know whether there was a period when the
size of the paper was reduced from 12 to 8 pages ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, that took place in 1951. In fact, there was
an editorial in the issue of Jun^ 25, 1951, which announced that as of
July 1 the Daily Worker would be reduced from 12 to 8 pages and the
price raised from 5 cents to 10 cents. That was because of financial
difficulties. They had to cut down. Apparently the paper situation
was a difficult one to handle, costs had gone up and they were operating
very much in the red, I understood, at that time.
Mr. Tavenner. Since we have mentioned the matter of raising
funds, we would like to know just what part of the activities of the
club was devoted to the matter of raising funds and the purpose for
which funds were raised. Will you give us your information on that,
please ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. Fund drives were held on an annual basis.
They usually started some time in the begiiming or spring of the year
and they were held for the purpose of raising money for the party,
also for the Daily Worker.
Now I have quite a bit of detail on fund drives and probably one
of interest — it was to me — in 1944 because it was actually the first fund
drive I had come in contact with, and the mechanics of it were ex-
plained at a party meeting and if you would like to have that I will
give it.
Mr. Tavenner. I think you should give us a rather detailed state-
ment of the work done by the Communist Party in fund drives.
Mrs. Blauvelt. In connection with the first fund drive in which
I actually did participate, there was a meeting held on June 13, 1944,
at the Flatbush Club of the Communist Political Association, at which
Ruth Wang, executive secretary, spoke about the fund drive which
was being launched by the party and which was to end on August 1.
For the benefit of new members who had never participated in the
fund drive, she explained that it was for the purpose of building the
Daily Worker which was in particular need of funds since its change
to a tabloid.
In this fund drive the Flatbush Club's quota had been set at $3,000
and she further explained that half of that amount would go to the
Daily Worker, the other half being divided between the county office
and the Flatbush Club, which would give the club $750.
She also explained that it was necessary for the county office to
receive part of the money raised in the drive because it took $10,000
a year to maintain it. She said there were 4 people in the county office
and mentioned the names of Joe Roberts and Tony Morton, the lat-
ter receiving $55 a week as a salary. She said it was also necessary to
contribute to Peter V. Cacchione because his salary as a councilman
was not large enough to take care of the many expenses arising out of
his activities as leader of the Brooklyn Communists.
Mr. Tavenner. Was that money to be used by Cacchione in his
political campaign ?
Mrs. Blau\-elt. That is correct. Then in 1945 in connection with
the fund drive conducted in the spring of that year which actually
started officially on March 1 and was to end on June 1, Peter V. Cac-
chione spoke at a meeting of the Flatbush Club on March 6, 1945, and
explained that this particular fund drive was being so conducted that
904 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
the clubs would receive half the quotas set for them, the other half
going to the county.
He told the comrades their first duty was to the Communist Politi-
cal Association — the name of the organization at that time — and that
their contributions to the fund drive should be larger than donations
they made to New Masses or to the Jefferson School of Social Sciences
or to Russian War Relief, and he stated that although these 3 organ-
izations received their support from the Communists, and declared
there would be no Jefferson School if it were not for the Communists,
he was quite emphatic about the Communist Political Association, it-
self, receiving first consideration where money was concerned.
Now, at this same time Ruth Wang, chairman of the fund drive, an-
nounced that the club's quota was $3,000 and she was confident that
the amount would be raised. It would be used in the campaign to
reelect Cacchione to the city council.
In 1946 the annual fund drive was held. That followed the same
procedure but there was one item which impressed me and it was a
statement that was made by Betty Medinz, chairman of the Parkside
Club, at a meeting held on April 9, 1946, when in discussing the fund
drive she pointed out the rise of the Communist Party in Alabama and
stated that the party in the South needed financial support.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you have further information about the sending
of Communist Party funds from New York to areas in the South for
Communist Party purposes ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir ; I do not. This was the one statement that
I did hear and at the time I thought that it was rather significant.
In connection with this particular fund drive there was a party
building bulletin issued to the club executives from the organizing
department of the Flatbush section.
Mr. Tavenner. I have a throwaway apparently which relates to the
fund drive you are mentioning. Can you identify it ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes. This is the one that I referred to. This lists
the clubs in the Flatbush section. The Albemarle Club, Professional
Club, Joe Stember Club, Farragut Club, Service Club, Freedom Road,
Parkside, Prospect Park, Dreiser, Glenwood.
I seem to recall I made a statement previously that I was not aware
of a professional club being in existence in the section at that time, but
I see from this there must have been one. It gives the quota of each
club and the amount that they have turned in.
Mr. Tavenner. What is the total of the quota for the clubs of the
Flatbush section ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. It looks to me here as though it were $10,000,
Mr. Tavenner. It shows that a number of those clubs had over-
subscribed their quota at the time this throwaway was issued.
Mrs, Blauvelt. That is right.
Mr. Moulder. Did you call that a throwaway ?
Mr. Tavenner. It is a leaflet. Is that the term commonly used in
the Communist Party to indicate this type of publication ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, "throwaway" usually was the term desig-
nated for leaflets which would be distributed usually in door-to-door
canvassing or street distribution. This more properly I guess would
be called just a memorandum issued to the club executives.
\
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 905
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I desire to offer the document in
evidence, and ask that it be marked "Blauvelt Exhibit No. 21" and
that it be incorporated in the transcript of the record.
Mr. Moulder. It is so ordered.
(The exhibit referred to is as follows :)
Blauvelt Exhibit No. 21
Fund drive
Club
Quota
Amount in
Percent
Amount to go
Albemarle
$1,000.00
400.00
600.00
2, 000. 00
325. 00
325.00
1,3.50.00
1,800.00
1,650.00
669. 25
$1, 336. 40
565. 50
605. 50
2,146.05
303. 75
284. 03
1,097.15
1,349.10
948. 65
669. 25
135
141
109
107
90
87
81
74
57
(■)
Joe Stember
(I)
Farraeut
(1)
$21.25
Parkside
Prospect Park
252. 85
450 90
701. 35
Total
10,000.00
9,305.38
93
1 OverfulfiUed.
Flatbush Section leads the State in the most money turned in. See the stand-
ing in June 24 Worker. This is no small achievement. We can congratulate our-
selves for a job well done. Our Section quota of 10,000 dollars however is not
yet reached. The goal is in sight. How about it ; Dreiser, Prospect Park, and
Parkside. July 4 is just around the corner and the Daily needs the Money.
RECRUITING
Farragut is well ahead of all other clubs with 22 recruits out of 25 pledged.
They guarantee the other three by July 1st. Good work Farragut.
Two more for Joe Stember making a total of 18. They pledged TWO more by
July 1st.
Can we shoot for 100 recruits by July 1st. A total of 2 per club. This is an
easy task. Lets all go out and do a job on this.
JUNE CONTROL
As of last Wednesday we have controlled 239 out of 505 members,
lowing is the standing of clubs :
The fol-
Farragut 76
Albem 25
Pros. Pk 33
Serv 10
Park No. 1 16
Park No. 2 39
Prof 1
Fi'. Rd
Dreis 29
This situation has become critical. We must act accordingly. We have only
one week to go. June control must be completed. We can do it. Lets all pitch
in and get the job over with. We have many pressing things to move forward to.
Org. Dept.,
Flathush Section,
Communist Party.
Mrs. Blauvelt. In connection with the fund drive in 1947, this par-
ticuUir drive started on March 14 and it was discussed at a meeting
of the Lincohi Eoad Chib hekl on March 25, 1947, in the home of
Elizabeth Feingold. The fund drive had been initiated by the na-
tional board of the Communist Party for the purpose of raising money
io fight the looming threat of the banning of the Communist Party.
The party had been aroused into action because of the declarations
being made by Members of Congi'ess and by the Secretary of State
906 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
that the Communist Party should be banned, and it intended launching
of a campaign using radio and press and distribution of leaflets as
a means of combating such threats.
To carry on this campaign the party needed $225,000 immediately
and the clubs had until April 1 to raise the money. I attended just
2 days later a meeting that was held by the Fort Greene section of
the Brooklyn Communist Party in the school located in the area of
the Fort Greene housing project. It was held for the purpose of pro-
testing against the threatened outlawing of the Communist Party and
at this meeting Al Neptune, one of the executive members of the Fort
Greene section, said that this section had raised $1,400 toward this
defense fund to be used by the party in fighting the Communist ban.
They were successful in raising this amount of money, at least it
was announced that they were successful in raising this amount of
money. In fact, I heard it announced that they had raised $250,000.
Mr. Tavenner. $250,000?
Mrs. Blattvelt. Yes.
Mr. Tavenner. You say that meeting was held in a school?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, it was.
Mr. Tavenner. What school was that ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Public School 67.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you know whether the school authorities knew
of the purpose of the meeting and that it was to be used for a Com-
munist Party meeting on that occasion?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, I don't, sir. I know that the school buildings
were open to meetings as long as admission was not charged. I don't
know under what name they might have applied for permission to
hold the meeting.
Mr. Tavenner. Was this a meeting open to the public generally,
or was it confined to Communist Party members?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, inasmuch as it was in the school building audi-
torium, it was an open meeting. It wasn't a closed meeting.
Then on August 5 of 1947 at a meeting of the Jay-Smith Club of
the Boro Hall section, Eleanor Schor, organizer of the club, announced
a fund drive was being undertaken to raise funds to fight the contempt
conviction imposed upon Eugene Dennis, general secretary of the
Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. That contempt proceeding arose out of his appear-
ance as a witness before this committee.
Mrs. Blauvelt. Yes, I believe it was.
Now she later announced that this fund drive had a threefold pur-
pose. It was to get funds for educational purposes, to conduct a cam-
paign for the election of Ada B. Jackson of the American Labor Party
to the city council and to establish expense funds to fight the sentence
imposed on Eugene Dennis for contempt of Congress.
Now, in connection with the drive that was conducted in 1948, 1 felt
that a very significant report was made to the members of the Jay-
Smith Club on January 6 of 1948 by George Sande, who was a mem-
ber of the Plaza Club of the Boro Hall section, also a member of the
section executive committee and also the circulation manager of the
Daily Worker.
At this meeting he stated that no statement as to the political aspects
of the fund drive had been made as yet by the party, but that such a
INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 907
statement was to appear in the paper within the next few days. There-
fore, his remarks were based entirely on his own opinion.
He announced that the party had set itself a goal of $250,000 to
$275,000 in the fund drive. He pointed out to them the need of this
amount in order to enable the party to meet the expenses that would
be incurred during the year. He asserted that not since the year of the
Second Front was the party faced with the problems and tasks that
confronted it this year.
This money was necessary to help the party carry on the fight against
anti-communism, to carry on the fight for civil liberties, to fight for
the third-party movement.
Also the fund drive would help cut the deficit of the Sunday and
Daily Worker.
He said this deficit ran into the hundreds of thousands and the
national board of the party had told them it must be reduced by at
least $50,000. He said this would be a hard job because paper had gone
up $6 a ton, resulting in an expenditure of additional thousands of
dollars.
He also stated that there were 50 members of the editorial staff, ty-
pographers, and pressmen and printers, to be paid most of whom were
party members, and paying these workers was going to be difficult
because the American Newspaper Guild which, he claimed, was now
under control of the right wing, intended to put pressure on the Daily
Worker and treat it the same as the New York Times, calling for the
same contracts.
He maintained many of the paper's expenses could be met if the
circulation could be increased and he urged the comrades to buy the
paper and create a demand for it on the newsstands and also to obtain
subscriptions.
Then in May of 1948 at a meeting of the Jay-Smith Club held on
May 11, it was announced that a special emergency fund drive was
being launched by the Communist Party to raise money with which
to fight the Mundt bill and in this particular emergency fund drive
the club would be given a quota of $600.
Mr. Tavenner. What club is that?
ISIrs. Blatjvelt. Jay-Smith Club.
Later in the year on August 30 of 1948, at an executive committee
meeting of the Jay-Smith Club, Charles Marshall, who was then the
club organizer, announced that the party was conducting another
emergency fund drive to fight the indictment of the party's 12 leaders.
This drive was to terminate on September 15. In this particular
drive the club's quota was $200.
Then in January of 1949 the Communist Party again launched its
annual fund drive and it was announced by Abe Osheroff at a meeting
of the Brooklyn Communist Party which was a Lenin memorial meet-
ing held on January 20, 1949, that the quota of the Brooklyn Party
was $185,000. Now in this fund drive, the clubs were to retain 10
per cent of the money collected, sections were to retain 10 per cent of
the money collected and 1 per cent was to be contributed to the Civil
Eights Congress.
Later at a meeting on February 7, 1949, Charles Marshall announced
that instructions had been issued that the clubs must complete their
quotas by the following week because the party's national committee
908 INVESTIGATION OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA
was pressed for money and funds were needed to meet expenses of the
trial of the party's leaders.
Mr, Tavenner. Do you know the purpose of that contribution of the
1 percent of the $185,000 to the Civil Rights Congress?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Well, at this particular time the Civil Rights Con-
gress was very active in protesting the indictment of the party's 12
leaders. They had issued petitions and they had issued leaflets and
petitions soliciting contributions, they had held a legislative confer-
ence and a pilgrimage to Washington in the middle of January, all
designed to protest the indictment of the party's 12 leaders.
In connection with this fund drive in 1949, 1 had to see some of the
comrades regarding their contributions and I went to see Murray and
Nettie Roman, at 215 Bergen Street. Murray Roman turned in $55
to the fund drive and said he would get an additional $45 from the
workers in his office, which was also his union, namely, local No. 19 of
the United Office and Professional Workers of America. He said
that it was difficult to get money for the party's fund drive this year
because the union was conducting a simultaneous fund drive. He
stated he disagreed with the two fund drives being held at the same
time, but that his union had made arrangements with the party where-
by the contributions made to the union's fund drive would be divided
equally with the party.
At this same time Nettie Roman mentioned that the Bedford-
Stuyvesant section had oversubscribed its own quota in the fund drive
and she attributed this to the fact that there was a professional group
in that section made up of doctors in the Jewish hospital.
Mr. Tavenner. Did you at any subsequent time discover whether
or not any union funds were divided with the Communist Party?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, sir, I did not. This was a statement made by
Murray Roman which came from him at this particular time, but other
than that I have no knowledge.
Mr. Tavenner. Have you facts to substantiate it other than his own
statement ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. Just his own statement and I have no knowledge
of anything else being arranged in that manner. That is, of my own
personal knowledge.
In 1949 also in the beginning of August, another fund drive was
launched, this time also for the purpose of raising money to help
defray the expenses of the trial of the party's 12 leaders, and also to
raise money for the party's activities in the coming November elections.
At the same time that this particular fund drive was still in prog-
ress, I attended a meeting of membership directors and financial secre-
taries which was held on October 5, 1949, at which Caryll Lasky dis-
cussed a new fund drive which the party had launched for the purpose
of raising money for bail in connection with the trial of the party's 12
leaders.
She stated this drive was to be conducted on a loan basis, bonds to
be issued for a minimum of $25, although $100 bonds were preferred.
She explained that if any of the comrades wanted to make a loan but
felt thev could not use their own names on a bond, they should try to
find someone who would be willing to have the bonds written in his
name or they could call upon either her or Bea Sacks for use of their
names. She declared there was no risk of loss involved in the bond
INVESTIGATIOiSr OF COMMUNIST ACTIVITIES, NEW YORK AREA 909
loan and anyone could get his money back any time and it was a matter
of urgency to have the funds available for bail by the time the trial
closed.
She said although bail for the 12 was to be furnished in the name of
the Civil Rights Congress, comrades were being instructed not to go
directly to the Civil Eights Congi-ess with contributions but to make
them to the Communist Party.
Mr. Tavenner. Do you have any way of knowing whether those
funds actually went to the Civil Rights Congress or whether the Com-
munist Party used part of them for its own purpose ?
Mrs. Blauvelt. No, I do not ; not of my own personal knowledge,
I cannot say. I know at this particular meeting one of the comrades
said he wished to make a contribution of $100 and at a subsequent
meeting held 2 weeks later money was turned in for bail bonds in the
name of other comrades, but that is the extent of my knowledge as to
the manner in which money was turned in.
On November 16, 1949, at a meeting of the membership directors
and financial secretaries of the Boro Hall section, Caryll Lasky,
financial secretary, announced that the party was conducting another
fund drive this time to defray the expenses of the trial of the party's
12 leaders and election campaigns.
There was an annual fund drive which started in February of 1950
but this was conducted in the same manner as the others. I do not
think there is any necessity of going into that one.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, I believe this is a good place to recess.
Mr. Moulder. Thank you very much, Mrs. Blauvelt.
The committee will stand in recess until in the morning at 10 o'clock.
(Whereupon, at 4:30 p. m., the committee was recessed, to recon-
vene at 10 a. m. Thursday, May 5, 1955.)
(Remainder of this hearing is printed in Part IV of this series.)
X
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