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Session:         Page of 592

'33. 1933, the communities were agog with the threat of fascism. This was before Hitler's rise to power. Hitler comes in in '36, right?

Q:

No. Hitler is elected vice president under Hindenberg, if I'm not mistaken, in 1933.

Foner:

Then it's around that period then that people are becoming very --

Q:

And already the brown shirts and the black shirts, whatever --

Foner:

And Austria, the Dolfuss thing, Austria in 1934 where they wipe out the socialists' houses. And the threat of fascism becomes an issue, and the American League Against War and Fascism was formed, I recall. And I was a member of the American League Against War and Fascism in the community. I remember going to rallies in the streets of Boro Park where people like Norman Tallentine, one name, fantastic outdoor speakers, would bellow voices without microphones, could be heard for weeks, for years, and for miles and could really carry and impress an audience. They would do it very night and you would follow them. We had chapters of it. I'm in college, and because of my brothers' influence, and I'm reading the Nation and the New Republic, etc., I'm beginning to meet communists in college, in the class. The student movement is developing in college. My activities are largely in the community in Boro Park, with YCL, and then you get to '35,'36, you're coming into Spain. I get to know my brothers' friends from college, teachers, too. Phil is teaching uptown, Jack is teaching at 23rd Street, and they're already involved in the Anti-Fascist Association at the college, and the College Teachers' Union, and I'm already dragging around in those things, too, and I know people who are in the student organizations.

Q:

I don't want to collapse all this history into a short time. I'd like to take it piece by piece. Was there more that you wanted to say based on your conversation with Jack?

Foner:

Yes, there's one other thing that's important because it has an effect later on. I mentioned earlier, and I checked it out, the family had no difficulty during the Depression. None of us can recall any economic problems during the Depression. I think it was 1934, Phil is already teaching at the college and he's invited to go to Yellow Springs, Ohio, to teach a training school for the CIO. Now, when is the CIO?

Q:

The CIO was formed in '35, when Lewis punches out the guy from the carpenters' union, but there's a huge strike movement in '34.





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