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Poet identified with progressive New York City literary circles of the 1930s and 1940s, teacher and translator of Yiddish poems and songs; lived most of life in New York City and Long Island. Includes correspondence files, manuscripts and notes, audio and video recordings of lectures and readings.

Aaron Kramer Papers includes biographical materials, correspondence, publications and translations, drafts, and audiovisual recordings of Kramer's works, ranging from 1930 to 1997. The papers are divided into six series: Biographical File, Correspondence, Collaborations, Works of Aaron Kramer, Works of Other Artists, and a 2017 Accretion.

Abe and Selma Bluestein were active in the anarchist movement in the U.S. in the 20th century. Abe worked as a reporter for the Freie Arveiter Stimme, a Yiddish anarchist publication in New York, and Selma was an artist and worked with the WPA. Both reported on the Spanish Civil War in 1937, which was foundational in the evolution of their anarchist philosophies. While in Spain, Abe also served as an information officer giving radio broadcasts for the anarchist fighters in Barcelona. Back in the U.S., Abe worked for several housing co-operatives while Selma raised their children. The collection documents the couples' personal and professional lives, including correspondence, writings, and art.

The Bluestein papers comprise a variety of materials, including correspondence, writings, translations, histories, family documents, artwork, and photographs. The bulk of these materials range from 1930 until 1990, although some of the photographs and family documents are dated earlier.

The Bluestein Family papers are separated into eight series: Correspondence, Family Documents, Biographies, Writings, Corporate Files, Subject Files, Modern School, and Photographs.

Correspondence contains 1 linear foot of letters to and from the Bluestein family. The files are arranged alphabetically, first generally A-Z, with unknown correspondents following, then by principle correspondent. There are two folders of correspondence between Abe and Selma Bluestein, labeled "Bluestein, Abe to Selma" and "Bluestein Selma (Cohen) to Abe." These letters are mostly dated early in their relationship (1930), then again in 1933 when Abe was living and working at Unity House in Phildelphia, again in 1937, when Selma returned from Spain a few months before Abe. There are a few letters from Abe to Selma in 1946, when he made several short trips away from home for business purposes.* Their letters are significant for the historical information as well as the intimacy they reveal.

In the folder labeled "Bluestein, Minnie", there is one letter to Abe from Minnie, and one letter from Lou (her husband?) while they lived at the Sunrise Cooperative Farm Community in Michigan in the mid-1930s. The letter from Lou discusses life at the Cooperative as well as some gossip and infighting.

There are also letters from Mollie Steimer and Senya Fleshin, Erika and René Fülöp-Miller, Sam Dolgoff, Federico Arcos, Paul Avrich, Augustín Souchy, Harry Kelly, Milly Rocker, Rudolf Rocker, and one three-page letter to Abe from Emma Goldman. Although most of the letters are in English, there are a few in Spanish without translations. Some of the letters are not written to the Bluesteins but are copies of correspondence sent to others.

Selma designed many of the family's greeting cards which were sent out every year, and several examples are included in her biographical file, along with press clippings regarding her art exhibits. Selma often sent Abe drawings in her letters to him, and these were not separated from the letters, so although there is a folder containing her artwork, several examples of her work can be found in the "Bluestein, Selma to Abe" correspondence files.

Several of Daniel Bluestein's published and unpublished works are included the series Writings (Daniel Bluestein). Daniel had a strong interest in his family's history, and in its anarchist past, and much of that interest shows in his writings. Daniel's humorous side shows through in a letter to Abe from "Ronald Reagan." In Writings (Abe Bluestein) can be found Abe's essays, histories, and translations, as well as transcriptions of his lectures. Other people's writings can also be found in this series, including those of Sam Dolgoff and Frank Miller.

There are many newspaper clippings on the subject of Spain during the 1970s, both from Spanish and American newspapers. It was during this time that Abe, frustrated by the lack of accurate information in the American press on the CNT and labor uprisings in Spain, decided to start News From Libertarian Spain, with Sam Dolgoff and Murray Bookchin. The title was later changed to Anarchist News, and after Dolgoff died in 1990, Gabriel Javsicas joined the group.

The Modern School series is of great significance to anyone interested in the perceptions of those who attended. As mentioned earlier, Abe's experience growing up at Stelton had a profound affect on him throughout the rest of his life. In a 1975 letter to Rina Garst he asks the question, "Why does the Stelton experience create such a warm, strong bond among us, regardless of our later living experiences?" His answer was "... living and growing in freedom fosters the development of the strongest possible roots in human beings." Abe started the Modern School Reunions in 1974, and as chair of the Reunion Committee, he held the files of each of the annual events. They are arranged chronologically (with no files for 1985, 1987, 1988), ending in 1991, when Abe handed the responsibility over to Jon Scott. The files contain minutes from the Modern School Reunion Committee meetings, as well as flyers announcing each reunion, clippings, and correspondence from each of the reunion attendees. The correspondence is particularly interesting; it contains not just the usual reunion business, but also reminiscences of childhoods spent at Stelton, thoughts and comparisons of living in a modern world, sad news of illness and death, good news of finding more old Stelton-ites, and some truly heartfelt stories. Some of the correspondents are also represented in the Correspondence series (Paul Avrich, Ahrne Thorne, Thomas Yane, Clara and Sidney Solomon, Nelly Dick, Audrey Goodfriend, Pearl and Victor Morris, Dora Keyser, Federico Arcos), however, the Modern School series correpondence relates only to the Modern School reunions and was kept with the Modern School materials by Abe. Abe saw the historic value in these documents, for in 1975, and again in 1983 he sent out questionaires about remembrances to all the reunion participants, and these responses are included. There are also several histories written by various people, as well as three original record books from the Stelton Modern School (1918, 1924-28, 1936).

There are many photographs in the collection, including a family album, several loose photos, and a large portrait of Abe as a small child with his mother, Esther and his sister, Mae(?). Most of the photographs are unidentified and undated, although David Bluestein helped to identify some of them at the time of the donation. As well as the Bluestein and Cohen families, there are photographs of Rudolf Rocker, Boris Yane, Clara and Sidney Solomon, and Federico Arcos.

Sometime during the 1980s Abe dictated a biography of his life onto cassette tapes. The cassettes were not found with the collection, and no one seems to know what happened to them, however, they were transcribed by Eileen Coto of Richmond Hill, New York in 1991 or 1992. The partially-edited transcription is included in Histories (Oral) - Abe Bluestein.

There are two cassette tapes in the collection. One is a microcassette of an interview with Abe about the Spanish Civil War (Biographies, Box 2). The other is a recording of the Ahrne Thorne Memorial Meeting which took place in New York City on March 27, 1986 (Box 3).

* According to American Labor and United States Foreign Policy by Ronald Radosh (Random House 1969), it appears that Bluestein was in Germany working for the AFL (pp 328-329).

Group founded in 1933 on the initiative or Roger Baldwin of the ACLU to defend constitutional rights of foreign-born persons in the United States. It assisted individuals facing deportation, aided persons seeking to become naturalized citizens, attempted to combat harasmment and official persecution of the foreign-born, and opposed discriminatory legislation. Records include correspondence, administrative files, clippings and publicity files, subject files and case files.

The records of the American Committee for Protection of Foreign Born date from 1926 to 1980 and measure 51 linear feet and 2 oversized volumes. The papers are arranged in eight series: Administration (1935-1980s), Correspondence (1934-1980s), Publicity/Activities (1934-1977), Legal Proceedings (1950-1974), Legislation (1930-1972), Area/Ethnic Committees (1936-1969), Subject File (1933-ca. 1970s), and Cases (1926-1980s).

The main work of the Committee, in addition to its providing information and legal assistance to individuals, lay in publicizing legislation, events, and national policies affecting the foreign-born. The Committee also sponsored conferences, rallies, and other events to educate the public to the problems of discrimination and harassment that faced many of the foreign-born, and to then mobilize that public opinion to pressure public officials to deal with these problems. The files of publications and news releases within the collection help to document the publicity work of the Committee, while its activities as a lobby for the foreign-born is most evident in the correspondence files, conference proceedings and reports, legislative lobbying material, and subject files.

Unfortunately, the structure and administrative workings of the Committee are poorly documented. Board of directors minutes are spotty and the administrative files generally thin as evidence of policy-making within the organization. Area Committee materials in the main reflect the varied problems faced by the foreign-born in different parts of the country, while the subject file contains information on a wide variety of organizations established to assist the foreign-born in the mid-twentieth century.

The case files, which make up the bulk of the records, relate largely to individual cases; each file usually only contains a few routine items, such as requests for information or assistance in securing naturalization papers or obtaining entry to the United States for a friend or relative. There are a few larger case files, however, and the multiple cases pertaining to groups of individuals being prosecuted reflect the vulnerability of the foreign-born in periods of concern about the nation's internal security. Many of these persons had lived in the United States for many years, and seemed to have been charged with deportation only after becoming active in labor unions or other allegedly radical activities. The case files have little value except as evidence for the specific cases. They do not provide systematic documentation of the cases handled, and thus do not lend themselves to quantitative study.

The Ammon Hennacy Papers were acquired from the family of Hendrik Anderson, who had stored them for many years after Hennacy's Southwest sojourn. In the course of the years the papers were re-arranged, and in some cases mixed with Anderson's own papers. The bulk of the collection ranges from 1936-1944, although many items are undated.

These papers are particularly significant in their documentation of Hennacy's early years of study, his prison experiences, and his relationships with his family and various close friends, including Dorothy Day. Hennacy's notes and manuscripts document his attentive reading and study habits, while his handwritten "Gospel in Brief" includes his own cross-references (including to Tolstoy) and interpretations of the New Testament (a second volume of this project may be found in the University of Wyoming's American Heritage Center). Hennacy's letters are filled with political and social arguments; they document his constant effort to convince other people of his views.

In his personal papers, the notes on travels with Selma Melms in 1921-1925 are rich in detailed descriptions of places visited, people met, and miles traveled. Some of these latter notes appear to be written by Melms.

The Hennacy Papers are divided into seven series: Correspondence, Manuscripts, Printed Materials, Notes and Book Reviews, Personal files, Subject files and Hendrik Anderson papers.

Correspondence comprises roughly 1/3 of a linear foot. Of particular note are letters from Ralph Borsodi, Holley Cantine, Dorothy Day, Theodore Debs, Mohandas K. Gandhi, E. Haldeman-Julius, Hippolyte Havel, Thomas Keall, Lucy Parsons, Maximillian Olay, Boris Yelensky, and the Sunrise Farm Cooperative Community. The correspondence from Day, most of which is undated, is intimate in tone, touching on daily events as well as spiritual matters. Day coaches Hennacy through his conversion, complains lightly about people who hang around her but are "not really concerned in our point of view" (in a letter dated only "Saturday"), and frequently expresses worry about his health and safety. In one letter, Day indirectly addresses the physical attraction between them, and asserts her celibacy.

The letter from Gandhi is apparently not written in his hand, but appears to be signed by him. The signature, in different ink than the letter itself, matches Gandhi's as reproduced in published letters. The letter is marked "Yerawa Central Prison 3rd April," and includes a blue symbol, perhaps a censor's mark, at the top margin. Since Gandhi was in the Yeravda (or Yerawa or Yeravada) Central Prison (in Poona or Pune, Maharashtra, India) from March 1922 until February 1924, it is most likely that this letter dates from 1923. In response to a letter from Hennacy, Gandhi gently rejects Christian Science, and asserts his belief in God "...not in the hope that He will heal me, but in order to submit entirely to His will, and to share the fate of millions who, even though they wished to, can have no Scientific medical help." Gandhi adds that he often fails to carry this belief into practice.

Hennacy's outgoing correspondence is arranged chronologically. It includes his letters to Dorothy Day, to his family, the Fuller Brush Company (1923 to "Dad Fuller" and 1929 to Mr. Eckman), Upton Sinclair (1924, 1932, 1935), Gandhi (1933), President Roosevelt (1934), Emma Goldman (1936) and many others. While nearly all are dated, many are addressed only with the correspondent's first name. The letters are preserved as typed carbon copies in most cases, usually not signed by hand. They cover a wide range of topics, from personal relations to political and religious concerns, to the pragmatics of publication, travel and meetings.

The Manuscripts series contains both typed and handwritten manuscripts by Hennacy, including chapter drafts from his book on Christian Anarchism. The "Prison Writings" folder contains letters and statements produced by Hennacy during his imprisonment in 1919. These include detailed descriptions of prison conditions and Hennacy's own classification of prisoners according to their crime, background, ethnicity and honesty ("rat," "professional rat" and "potential rat").

Printed Materials contains Hennacy's clipping files, as well as articles published by Hennacy. It is not clear whether Hendrik Anderson might have added clippings to some of these files in later years.

The fourth series,Notes and Book Reviews, consists of three original Hennacy folders ("Anarchism Book Reviews," "Anarchism Notes and Articles," and "Extra Copies of Notes"), and a varied sample of Hennacy's research notes that have been re-foldered. Most of these are undated, although the dates may be extrapolated from the publication dates and sometimes from the home address Hennacy included. Hennacy's own inventory for his notes in 1938 are in the folder "Index to Notes."

Personal files and Subject files are both very small series, comprising a miscellany of materials. Of particular interest are the photographs, many of which are inscribed and a few of which are dated, and the "Honeymoon Hiking Adventure," a set of notes concerning Hennacy's travels around the country with his bride Selma Melms in 1921-1925.

The Anderson Papers, roughly 1⁄2 linear foot, date primarily from 1942-1944. They comprise leaflets, publications, and a negligible amount of correspondence. Most of the material concerns Anderson's efforts in pacifism and the Socialist Party in California and other western states.

This collection consists of one folder. With the exception of one manuscript dated 1948, and some undated materials, the contents date from 1979 to 1983. All the items in the collection are letters sent to Goodfriend, or written materials collected by her. None of her own writing is included. There are two postcards and a letter from Molly Steimer to Audrey Goodfriend, and a letter from Proudhon Carbo reporting Steimer's death, all sent from Mexico; the letter from Steimer discusses Goodfriend's separation with David Koven. The 1948 manuscript is a carbon copy of a memorial message for "Comrade Pece" written by Jules Scarceriaux. A photocopy of an unsigned memorial for Dora Stoller Keyser, and some miscellaneous flyers and writings round out the collection.

This collection was created by Margaret Kahn, a political science graduate student from the University of California, Berkeley. Kahn traveled to Great Britain to conduct research into coal miners' unions for her doctorate thesis on labor relations. While there, she witnessed and documented the coal miners' Great Strike of 1984/1985. The collection consists of Kahn's research notes and writings, along with books, papers, reports, pamphlets, and ephemera produced by unions, interest groups, companies, and government bodies. Subjects covered include the 1984/85 strike as well as broader contemporary conflicts over labor, energy, and governance in the UK.

The collection is sorted into eight series based largely on format.

The correspondence series consists of a handful of letters sent to Kahn directly, as well as a small collection of letters sent between other correspondents that Kahn collected as part of her research.

In the manuscripts series is the typescript for Kahn's unpublished biography of Arthur Scargill, the president of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) during the Great Strike.

The research notes series represents Kahn's original research. Kahn tended to create ordered compilations of annotated primary and secondary source documents interwoven with pages of her own handwritten notes. The interviews subseries features notes focused primarily on Kahn's interviews; however, additional interview notes are scattered throughout the other subseries. The alphabetical research notes are a portion of Kahn's research that she labeled by subject and alphabetized herself. At the end of the series are eight folders of unlabeled notes covering a variety of subjects.

The research documents series consists of mostly unpublished, unannotated papers that Kahn collected.

The subject files series are folders sorted alphabetically by Kahn's original titles and then grouped into broader subject categories. This series was left untouched during reprocessing due to uncertainty about the extent to which it represented Kahn's original order. Thus, there is some overlap between papers in this series and others, particularly the research documents series.

Publications are books, booklets, and other softbound publications Kahn accumulated. They have been grouped by their primary publisher, then sorted into subseries according to the sectors or interests they represent. While a good deal of materials concern the 1984 strike, they also cover related contemporary events in the UK, including the closure of collieries, the privatization of the energy sector, and the rise of Thatcherism.

Newspapers and clippings are newspapers, journals, and news clippings compilations (created by Kahn) that document the progress of the Strike, various strike topics, and issues regarding the British Press and the Strike.

Finally, the ephemera series consists of six folders of leaflets, brochures, flyers, order forms, and stickers related to coal mining, trade unionism, and political organizing.

Formerly the Tom Mooney Labor School, the records consist of correspondence, minutes of faculty meetings, faculty committee reports, financial records and fundraising materials, promotional flyers and press releases, student publications, course outlines and course announcement flyers, school term schedules from 1950 to 1955, and a transcript of the proceedings of a forum, "Industry and Labor in the Postwar World," held on July 26, 1944. Included are letters to Yehudi Menuhin and Isaac Stern concerning support of a music department at CLS. The school was investigated in 1946 by the Tenney Committee, the California legislature's Joint Fact-Finding Committee on Un-American Activities, on the charge that an institute jointly held by CLS and the University of California was Communist-sponsored. However, the only indication of this fact in the records is brief mention in the faculty meeting minutes.

The records of the California Labor School(CLS) are comprised of materials documenting the educational programs, activities, and events of the school. The records are organized into four series: Academic Files, Office Files, School Promotion, and School Publications. Records of particular interest are pamphlets found in the School Publications series, which include essays, speeches, stories, plays, and even a book of early songs by Malvina Reynolds. Researchers will also find notable historical facts on the CLS in the Press Releases and Ephemera folder of the School Promotion series.

This collection is the result of notes and materials assembled by Ann Fagan Ginger in preparation for the biography Carol Weiss King, human rights lawyer, 1895-1952. Research for the book began shortly after King's death in 1952 and continued into the 1980s. The biography was published by the University Press of Colorado in 1993. Ginger donated the Carol Weiss King collection in 1999.

The collection is in six series:

Obituaries, containing newspaper reports of the death of King in 1952, her brother William in 1946, and her son Jonathan in 1997.

Correspondence, containing photocopies of letters from King concerning the deportation case of Harry Bridges, President of the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union. The series also contains the correspondence of Ann Fagan Ginger in her efforts to interview those who had connections with Carol Weiss King during her lifetime.

FBI Dossier, a photocopy of most of the 1600 pages generated in the investigation of Carol Weiss King and her associates. The researcher will find many pages with redacted (censored) portions. These passages will have a handwritten notation listing the exception to release of this information under the Freedom of Information Act. In the King file, most are noted "b1" which is the exception due to national security. "7d" is another common exception in the file, meaning the information was supplied by a confidential source. There are also pages noted "previously upheld", meaning that the redacted sections had been challenged and that the Department of Justice appeals process affirmed that the redaction was valid. This series contains 12 folders with consecutively numbered pages, and seven folders with unnumbered pages. Folder 17 contains correspondence related to the FOIA request and the Court of Appeals case filed by Cynthia King.

Source Notes, containing lists of sources used by Ann Fagan Ginger in writing the biography, photocopies of pages from standard reference sources summarizing the lives of many persons featured in the book, and handwritten note cards with references to historical sources.

Printed Materials, booklets, pamphlets and photocopies of early publications of the International Labor Defense, with which Carol Weiss King was associated early in her career, as well as copies of articles used for background and color in the biography.

Book Drafts, early and late typewritten drafts of chapters of the King biography.