 SVERDLOVE abt 1910 Phila.jpg)
Husband: Selig "Samuel" SVERDLOVE #1844 Hebrew name Shmu'el ben Moshe died at age: 42
Born: 1882 -1883 in Imperial Russian Empire 1,2 (see note 1)
Resided: 1890 in Bialystok, Grodno gubernya, Russian Empire 3 (see note 2)
Event: 1905 in active in Bund. Spent time in Siberia. Meet his wife through the Bund.
Resided: 1906 in Bialystok, Grodno gubernya, Russian Empire 3 (see note 3)
Emigrated: 1-Dec-1906 from Antwerp, Belgium on the S.S. "Samland" 4,5,3
Immigrated: 13-Dec-1906 to the Port of New York 2,6,7 (see note 4)
Description: 1906 black hair, blue eyes and 5 foot 2-1/2 inches tall 8
Resided: 1906 c/o Maurice Bacsh, 606 Franklin Street, Philadelphia, PA 3 (see note 5)
Resided: abt 1909 at 60-62 East 9th Street
Census: 15-Apr-1910 from Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA 9,2
Resided: 1910 at 859 North 6th Street 2
Occupation: 1910 presser in a shirt factory 2
Resided: in
Resided: 1911 at 466 North F Street 10
Emigrated: abt 1914 to Montreal, Quebec, Canada 4 (see note 6)
Emigrated: from Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Immigrated: abt 1921 to Manhattan, New York County, New York
Emigrated: abt 1923 to Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California, USA
Occupation: tried being a grocer in LA
Emigrated: abt 1925 to Manhattan, New York County, New York
Occupation:
Died: abt 1925 in Manhattan, New York County, New York 11
Father: Morris (Movshe) SWERDLOVE #1437
Mother: Mary (Masche) SCHAFT #2777
Notes
Wife: Eva (Yeva) YELLEN 4 #396 Census name Eva (1910) died at age: 32
Married: abt 1909 in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA 2
Born: 1886 -1887 in Imperial Russian Empire 2
Immigrated: abt 1907 to Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA 2
Census: 15-Apr-1910 from Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA 2
Resided: 1910 at 859 North 6th Street 2
Emigrated: abt 1914 to Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Medical condition: Tuberliosis
Died: abt 1919 in Laurentians, Quebec, Canada
Father: unknown YELLEN #4282
Notes
M Child 1: Leon SVERDLOVE 4 #233 Census name Leo Swerdlove (1930) Marriage Certificate name Swerdler 12 (see note 7) age: 94
Born: 14-Dec-1910 in Calahan Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 13,12,14,15,16
Resided: in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA
Emigrated: about 1912 to Montreal, Quebec, Canada 15
Resided: abt 1921 in Canada
Emigrated: from Montreal, Quebec, Canada 4
Immigrated: abt 1922 to Manhattan, New York, New York 15
Resided: about 1922 on 180th Street & Daily Avenue near Bronx Zoo with Lukin's 11
Resided: about 1923 on 110th Street & Lexington Ave with Baskt family 11 (see note 8)
Resided: about 1924 at 223 Henry Street 11 (see note 9)
Resided: abt 1925 in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA ? 15
Occupation: 1926 apprentice diamond setter 17
Emigrated: abt 1927 to New York
Census: 1-Apr-1930 in Manhattan, New York, New York 18 (see note 10)
Resided: 1930 at 41 Gouverneur Street 12
Event: 1933 joined Local 1
Resided: 1936 at 321 Ave O, Brooklyn, NY 16
Resided: 1938 at 110 Christopher Street, New York, NY 19
Event: 1938 - 1943 member of the IWO (International Workers Organization) 19
Occupation: 29-Oct-1941 Daily Worker. Article about Leon as Recording Secretary of Local 1, Jewelry Workers Union 19
Event: 1942 elected Business Representative
Resided: 1942 at 338 East 13th Street, New York, NY 19
Military: 1943 - 1945 Army Air Force, repairing the gun turrets on B-26 bombers in England and France
Military: 1943 stationed at Lowry Field in Denver, Colorado 19
Resided: 1945 - 1953 at 166 Second Ave., New York, NY 19
Event: American Labor Party (per Board of Electrion records) 19
Event: 27-Aug-1949 in Peekskill, Westchester County, New York attended the Paul Robeson concert-turned-riot 20
Event: 4-Sep-1949 Cortlandt, Westchester County, New York attended the 2nd Paul Robeson concert 11
Resided: 1955 at River Road, Scroon Lake, NY 12870; Tele: 518-532-7203 21
Occupation: 1945 - 1959 Business Representative of Local 1, International Jewelry Workers Union 19
Occupation: 1959 elected Vice-President, Local 1 IJWU
Event: 1959 expected to testify before the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee (Subversive Control). Never di 19
Description: 1959 5 foot 6 inches, brown hair, green eyes 19
Event: 1963 heard Martin Luther King in Washington, D.C. 15
Occupation: 1960 - 1980 President, Local 1 IJWU
Occupation: 10-Nov-1971 President and Secretary-Treasurer of the International Jewelry Workers Union 14
Event: 23-Oct-1979 Interview by Debra Bernhardt 22
Occupation: 1980 merger of IJWU with Service Employees International Union
Occupation: 1980 Director Jewelry Workers Division S.E.I.U.
Retirement: circa 1981 15
Resided: 1953 - 1995 at 39-49 44th Street, Sunnyside, NY 11104 23 (see note 11)
Resided: since 1996 in Yorktown Heights, Westchester County, NY
Event: 12-May-2004 feature article appeared on Newsday.com 15
Spouse: Sema POSNER #1352 Also known as Simone (Marriage Certificate & 1930 Census) 16b. 18-Mar-1918 d. ?-Jan-1982
Married: 8-Sep-1936 in Brooklyn, Kings County, New York 15,16 (see witness 1, 2)
M Child 2: Harry SVERDLOVE #657 Census name Harry Swerdlove (1930) 12 (see note 12) age: 93 Born: ? Mar-1912 in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA 12,15 Emigrated: abt 1921 to Montreal, Quebec, Canada Emigrated: from Montreal, Quebec, Canada Immigrated: abt 1922 to Emigrated: abt 1925 to Los Angeles County, California, USA Emigrated: abt 1927 to New York Census: 1-Apr-1930 in Manhattan, New York, New York 24 (see note 13) Resided: 1-Apr-1930 at 41 Gouverneur Street, New York, NY 12 Occupation: est 1934 - 1977 High School French Teacher in Brooklyn 25 Resided: 1940 at 300 Ocean Parkway, Brooklyn, NY 26 Resided: 1993 at N322 Camden P., W Palm Beach, FL 33417 Resided: est 1950 at 2825 Lakeview Rd, Lake Luzerne, NY 12846 27,28 Resided: est 1960 - 1994 at 1354 E 15th St., Brooklyn, NY 11230; Telephone: 718-336-3415 27 Event: excellent dancers, they danced (as a hobby) all over the world 29 Retirement: 1995 to West Palm Beach, FL 25 Resided: 2005 at 110 Wellington E, West Palm Beach, FL 33417-2550 Tel: 561.683.7764 30 Medical condition: diabetic since age 21 25 Spouse: Frieda UGER #1843 Other name Feida, Freda b. 1916 Married: abt 1938 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada 25
F Child 3: Lillian (Lilly) SVERDLOVE #313 Also known as Lilly age: 89 Born: 1915 - 1916 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada 31 Resided: in Emigrated: from Montreal, Quebec, Canada Immigrated: abt 1921 to New York Naturalized: 1922 in 31 Resided: abt 1925 in California Emigrated: abt 1927 to New York Census: 1-Apr-1930 from Brooklyn, Kings County, New York 31 Resided: 1930 at 1575 East 4th Street 31 (see note 14) Naturalized: 01-Jul-1943 in USDC NY, Eastern District, Brooklyn NY 32 Spouse: Hy DAVIS formerly BERKOWITZ #3098 b. est 1912 Married: in
Sources: (1) Ancestry.com, Pennsylvania 1910 Miracode Index, [database online] Provo, UT: Ancestry.com, 2000., Original data: Pennsylvania Miracode. Washington, DC: National Archives and Records Administration. (2) Ancestry.com., 1910 United States Federal Census: Philadelphia (City), Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, [database on-line]. Provo, UT: MyFamily.com, Inc., 2004. Sverdlove, Samuel Roll: T624_1390 Part: 1 Page: 283A. (3) The Statue of Liberty - Ellis Island Foundation, Inc., American Family Immigration History Center (Ellis Island On-Line) (www.EllisIsland.org), Site contains immigration records from Ellis Island between 1892 and 1924. (4) CORRESPONDENCE: Sverdlove, Freda (Freddy) Unger, Personal Correspondence, 16-Jun-1992, Dear Mr. Sverdlove: During last winter, while residing in West Palm Beach, Fla, I had the good fortune to meet and work with Mrs. Zela Reinblatt. When Zela heard my name, she immediately, thought that our family must be part of the family tree that you have developed. My husband is Harry Sverdlove and his father was Zelig Sverdlove. Leon Sverdlove is Harry's brother and my sister-in-law is Lilly Sverdlove. My husband, Harry and his family came to the United States from Montreal, but we do not know any of the Sverdloves from Montreal. We are interested in knowing more about the family tree. We would appreciate hearing from you. Sincerely, Mrs. Freddy Sverdlove, letter to Andrew I. Sverdlove in his possession. (5) IMMIGRATION: Index (Soundex) to Passenger Arrival Lists; Port of New York; 1902-1943, NARA, microfilm T621 (FHL Computer Number 0092040), National Archives, Northeast Region, 201 Varick St, 12th Flr New York, NY, microfilm T621, Roll 660. (6) IMMIGRATION: Index (Soundex) to Passenger Arrival Lists; Port of New York; 1902-1943, NARA, microfilm T621 (FHL Computer Number 0092040), National Archives, Northeast Region, 201 Varick St, 12th Flr New York, NY, microfilm T621, Roll 660, Port of Entry, New York, SS "Samland", from Antwerp, 01-Dec, 13-Dec-1906; NOTE: left Bialystock to Philadelphia, Bro in-law Maurice Bacsh ? black hair, blue eyes 5' 2-1/2" 606 Franklin St, Philadelphia PA. Selig Swerdlow. (7) IMMIGRATION: Port of Philadelphia; 1883-1921, Passenger Manifest, NARA, microfilm T840 (FHL Computer Number 0475209), IMMIGRATION: Index to Passenger & Crew Lists Arriving in Philadelphia; ; Port of Entry, New York, SS "Samland", from Antwerp, 01-Dec, 13-Dec-1906; National Archives; NOTE: left Bialystock to Philadelphia, Bro in-law Maurice Bacsh ? black hair, blue eyes 5' 2-1/2" 606 Franklin St, Philadelphia PA. NARA Archives. Index to Passenger & Crew Lists Arriving in Philadelphia for daughter and wife. Daughter? Michel is male?, RESEARCHER-UPDATE: Andrew I. Sverdlove; 07-Dec-1994; Source Documentation. (8) IMMIGRATION: Index (Soundex) to Passenger Arrival Lists; Port of New York; 1902-1943, NARA, microfilm T621 (FHL Computer Number 0092040), National Archives, Northeast Region, 201 Varick St, 12th Flr New York, NY, microfilm T621, Roll 660, Selig Swerdlow. (9) Ancestry.com, Pennsylvania 1910 Miracode Index, [database online] Provo, UT: Ancestry.com, 2000., Original data: Pennsylvania Miracode. Washington, DC: National Archives and Records Administration. Name: Samuel Sverdlove Birthplace: Russia State: PA Age: 27 Color: W Enumeration District: 0174 Visit: 0331 County: Philadelphia, Philadelphia Relation: Head of Household Other Residents: Relation:Wife Name: Eva Age: 23 Birth Place: Russia, Sverdlove, Samuel ED: 0174. (10) IMMIGRATION: Port of Philadelphia; 1883-1921, Passenger Manifest, NARA, microfilm T840 (FHL Computer Number 0475209), Baby brother Milton's Manifest stated he was going to Mr. Selig. Selig's son, Leon Sverdlove, said in March 2005 that meant Selig Sverdlove not Mr. Selig. RESEARCHER-UPDATE: Andrew I. Sverdlove; 13-Mar-2005; Source documentation. (11) BIOGRAPHY: Interview, Leon Sverdlove conversation with Andrew Ira Sverdlove, 11-Mar-2005. (12) Ancestry.com, 1930 United States Federal Census: Manhattan, New York County, New York ([database online] Provo, UT: Ancestry.com, 2000). (13) CITATION: Sverdlove, Leon, Who's Who in Labor 1976. (14) CORRESPONDENCE: Marc Sverdlove, email to Andrew I. Sverdlove, 3-Sep-2004, From: Marc Sverdlove [mailto:marc@!sverdlove.com] Sent: Fri 9/3/2004 8:29 PM To: Andrew I. Sverdlove Cc: 'Laurie Sverdlove Goldman'; 'Zolita Sue Sverdlove'; 'Myra Broodney' Subject: Sverdlov Geneology Dear Distant Cousin Andrew, I can confirm and expand upon some of the information you have sent me. I am the son of Leon Sverdlove (born December 14, 1910? in Philadelphia) who married Sema Posner. He was the President of the International Jewelry Workers Union. My full name is Marc Selig Sverdlove and I have a younger sister named Eve Sverdlove Schoenthal. I was born, August 11, 1947 and Eve was born March 27, 1954. We lived at 266 Second Avenue and moved to 39-49, 44th Street in Long Island City (Sunnyside), Queens when my sister was born. My son’s name is Max Samuel Franklin Sverdlove and he was born June 5, 1984 at Tarrytown Memorial Hospital in New York. Laurie’s brother’s name is Ronald and their father is Harry who married Freddie. Lily’s husband is Hy Berkowitz, which he changed to Davis, and they have a daughter Barbara. Hope this helps you. I wish everyone a healthy, happy, prosperous New Year. - Marc, email to Andrew I. Sverdlove in his possession. (15) BIOGRAPHY: Sverdlove, Leon, Volunteers of America - Greater New York, http://www.voa-gny.org/AboutUs/article.asp?id=37, Vintage Volunteer 5/12/2004 Jim Fitzgerald This feature article appeared on Newsday.com on May 12, 2004. VINTAGE VOLUNTEER Throughout his long, left-leaning life, Leon Sverdlove has been guided by one idealistic principle _ "the idea that by helping our fellow man, we can have a better world." The age of 93 is no time to give it up, he says. "I'm never going to abandon the idea," Sverdlove said in an interview before serving lunch to the homeless at the Yorktown Country Residence, a shelter in northern Westchester County. After spending a couple of hours there, he drove to the Hudson Valley Hospital Center in Cortlandt, where he checks on former patients by phone. It's his regular Monday-to-Friday routine, nearly 20 hours a week. Andrew Martin, a spokesman for the Volunteers of America, says Sverdlove is probably the oldest volunteer in the state doing that much work. "You know how it is these days," Sverdlove jokes. "You need two jobs to get by." At the lunch, Sverdlove dons a white apron and clear plastic gloves and dishes out hot dogs, sauerkraut, tangerines, fruit juice and the occasional wisecrack to the clients, some of them addicts or mentally troubled. One woman flirts with him, saying, "Aren't you my sweetheart?" "Definitely," he says. Andrea Jarrett, the program director, said, "Leon is wonderful. He's so respectful of the clients. When he tells us he's going on vacation, we say, "What are we going to do without you?" Suzanne Scott, director of volunteers at the hospital, says Sverdlove calls 800 former patients a month for "satisfaction surveys" and gets fan letters from patients he's contacted. "We're like his second family and to us he's like our grandfather," she says. Sverdlove looks and acts about 70 years old. Besides driving, he does his own shopping and cooking. He has his own rooms in a house in Yorktown Heights he shares with his daughter's family of four. He says his diet in unremarkable, except that his favorite dish is filet mignon and "I'm overeating it, never mind the price." He generally has a bagel with cream cheese for breakfast, a sandwich for lunch, and meat or fish for dinner. Sverdlove, born in Philadelphia in 1910 to Russian immigrants and raised in Montreal, Los Angeles and Manhattan's Lower East Side, said he and his younger brother and sister were orphaned as teens and relied on other relatives as hard times descended. Sverdlove left school after ninth grade. "The Depression made me a socialist," Sverdlove says. "I became socially conscious." He remembers "when we didn't have anyplace to go, when we didn't have enough to eat." When he talks to schoolchildren about his experiences, "They always ask me, `Why didn't you go on welfare?' and I have to tell them there was no welfare then. We had to go to the police station for some bread or rice." When he was 15 or 16, Sverdlove became an apprentice stone setter in the jewelry district, then centered on Fulton Street in Lower Manhattan. He quickly began militating for a union _ "it cost me a job now and then," he says _ and helped found the International Jewelry Workers Union, which won its first contract in 1936. From 1941 on, he was employed by the union and eventually became international president, the position he held when the union was merged with the Service Employees International Union. He then served on the SEIU's executive board. Meanwhile, he got married in 1936 and served during World War II in the Army Air Force, repairing the gun turrets on B-26 bombers in England and France, he said. "Sometimes they came back (from bombing missions) pretty shot up," he said. "The worst was when they didn't come back at all." He was older than most of the airmen _ 34 when the war ended _ but even then didn't look his age, he said. In his time with the jewelers, he said, he heard a lot of, "We can't have a kid running the union." Sverdlove admits to a youthful flirtation with radicals _ the dance at which he met his wife-to-be "was organized by some left-wing group, maybe the Communists." He lost faith in the Soviet Union in the 1950s but holds fast to many of the tenets of socialism. "I marched in every demonstration," he said. "I was always interested in making things better for the poor. The right to organize, civil rights. I think being interested in people, in how people are doing, helped me live this long. I want to see how things turn out." He speaks with pride of some landmark gatherings _ he went to the Paul Robeson concert-turned-riot in Peekskill in 1949 and heard Martin Luther King in Washington in 1963, he said. "I bought 500 Paul Robeson stamps when they came out," he says. "Everybody I write to gets a Paul Robeson stamp." He demanded to see his FBI file and received "about 35 or 40 pages, two-thirds of it blacked out," he says. "What I could read was mostly innocuous, `Sverdlove opposed the Rosenberg executions' or `Sverdlove signed this petition.' They didn't really have anything on me." He does not try to hide his dismay over the war in Iraq. "This was a pre-emptive kind of war," he said. "That's not what we should be doing. I was opposed from Day One. Vietnam, too." Sverdlove travels widely, and expects to attend the SEIU convention in San Francisco next month. He takes cruises with his daughter's family and recently surprised his 92-year-old brother with a visit to his Florida home. "He doesn't get around as well as I do," Sverdlove says. His sister is also still alive, at 88. After he retired in 1980, Sverdlove remained available to the union for such troubleshooting chores as becoming trustee of a troubled upstate local, he said. But it wasn't enough. His wife, Sema, died in 1982, and "I realized it wasn't enough just doing chores, taking care of the trees and the flowers. You can read The New York Times every day, but then what do you do?" Six years ago, he pounced on an ad for the Volunteers of America and has been happily engaged ever since in what he finds to be a logical extension of his career. "All those years in the union, I fought for things like Social Security, pensions, all the things people needed. Now I'm helping to feed the hungry and help the sick.", Google search for SVERDLOVE on 9-Feb-2005. (16) MARRIAGE: Certificate, Certificate and Record of Marriage of Leon Swerdler and Simone Posner (NYC Dept. of Health, Certificate 15399, Brooklyn, September 8, 1936), Married by Cantor M. Crell, 321 Ave. N, Jewish Center. (17) CORRESPONDENCE: Sverdlove, Zolita, email Correspondence, 8-Jul-2004, From: Zolita Sverdlove [mailto:zsverdlove@earthlink.net] Sent: Thu 7/8/2004 11:21 PM To: Sverdlove, Andrew Subject: Geneology Dear Andy; Laurie's uncle Leon was born in 1910 in Philadelphia and ended up being head of the jewelery union in New York. He is still alive and does volunteer work at 93. I asked her to send me her father's name. Apparently her Uncle Leon's son is whom Myra accessed but they are estranged because of the wife.The old man has never met his grandson who is a musician at the U. of Penn. He has a website. Love, Zolita, email to Andrew I. Sverdlove in his possession. (18) Ancestry.com, 1930 United States Federal Census: Manhattan, New York County, New York ([database online] Provo, UT: Ancestry.com, 2000), Leon Sverdlove. Living with 75 year-old Morris Swerdlove and his wife Mary, who was born Sverdlov according to my notes although I don't have a source. Listed as a 19 year-old "relative" which means it could be either Morris or Mary. Working as a Setter - Jewelry. His 18 year-old brother Harry is with him. They are listed as born in Pennsylvania. RESEARCHER-UPDATE: Andrew I. Sverdlove; 2-Sep-2004; Source Documentation. (19) CITATION: Leon Sverdlove, F.B.I. Files (release under the Freedom of Information Act). (20) BIOGRAPHY-CITATION: Paul Robeson, Riot at Paul Robeson concert, [online database] http://www.historychannel.com/speeches/archive/speech_454.html, "Go on back to Russia, you n-----." (Cortlandt, New York, September 4, 1949) In the 1920s and '30s, Paul Robeson achieved worldwide fame as a singer and stage actor. The son of a runaway slave, Robeson attended Rutgers University, where he was an All-American football player and graduated at the head of his class. He later received a law degree from Columbia University, but because of the lack of opportunities for African Americans in the legal profession, he became an actor. In 1924, his appearance in the title role of Eugene O'Neill's play The Emperor Jones caused a sensation, and he soon became known the world over for his powerful bass-baritone singing voice. He spoke out tirelessly against racial discrimination and joined the Communist Party, visiting the Soviet Union in 1934 and openly supporting left-wing causes. As the Cold War intensified after World War II, he came under increasing fire for his leftist views. On August 27, 1949, a concert by Robeson and other left-wing singers in Peekskill, New York, was called off after a mob smashed chairs and beat concertgoers. In the aftermath, Roberson was invited back to Westchester County, this time to play in a field in Cortlandt, just outside of Peekskill. On September 4, more than 10,000 people turned out to see Roberson sing songs like "Go Down, Moses," "Song of the Warsaw Ghetto," and "Ol' Man River." Police and civilian guards kept anti-communist protestors at bay during the performance, but violence broke out after the concert, with concertgoers having to run a gauntlet of rock throwers as they attempted to drive away. No one was killed, but hundreds were injured. In 1950, Robeson refused to sign an affidavit disclaiming his membership in the Communist Party, and the U.S. State Department took away his passport. Blacklisted in the United States and unable to travel abroad to perform, he was effectively silenced until 1958, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the affidavit ruling. He then spent five years traveling and living in Western and Eastern Europe, returning to the United States in 1963. He died in Philadelphia in 1976. (21) RESIDENCE: Telephone Directory; 1995, ProPhone, Select Phone CD-ROM, 1st Ed 1995, New York Public Library Mid-Manhattan Library, 2nd Flr, L. Sverdlove, River Road, Scroon Lake, NY 12870 518-532-7203. RESEARCHER-UPDATE: Andrew I. Sverdlove; 06-Mar-1996; Source Documentation. (22) INTERVIEW: Interview by Debra Bernhardt 10/23/79 of Leon Sverdlove, Leon Sverdlove On the Taft-Hartley Act, Wagner Labor Archives/Tamiment Library [online] http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6930/, Guide to the New Yorkers at Work Oral History Collection, 1979-2000. Tamiment Library/Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives; Elmer Holmes Bobst Library, 70 Washington Square South, New York, NY 10012, The Taft-Hartley Act, passed in 1947, symbolized the anti-labor climate of postwar America. The act expanded the power of employers and the government to prevent union organizing and strikes, and made it difficult for unions to take industrial action. The most difficult aspect of the bill for many unions to swallow required labor leaders to declare themselves to be non-Communist if they wanted to participate in NLRB elections. While many union members, like Leon Sverdlove of the Jewelry Workers union in New York, resented having to divulge their political views, they accepted the act’s requirement in order to protect what union rights they had left. As Sverdlove found, however, even accepting the act’s dictates did not protect unions and their members from accusations of communism, and many unions and workers suspected as communist sympathizers were forced out of organized labor. ---------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------ SVERDLOVE: So people were looking down their noses at us, as having sold out, or betrayed the interests of the working class, but it made no sense to us. And it was even more dramatic when it came to the Taft-Hartley Act. If you didn’t sign the Taft-Hartley Act, you couldn’t have elections, you couldn’t present grievances against the employer for unfair labor practices. And a lot of unions, with people like myself, who felt the way we did, were heroic about it. “We’ll never sign. Why should we have to? Asking us our politics under the American constitution . . .” It all sounded good, but it wasn’t for real.; it just wasn’t for real. So, if we don’t sign, we’re going to leave ourselves wide open to charges by the International that we’re not protecting the interests of the members of the union, which would be very true. And it would make us subject to charges and possible expulsion and then what? So we’d have a group, a few of us left-thinking, progressive-thinking people who would be bounced out, after all the years of work... And then what? And that’s exactly what happened to so many left-wing unions. It’s as if somebody had just a few firecrackers to shoot off, and he shot’em off before the Fourth of July, and on the Fourth of July he had nothing. That’s the way we felt about it. So we signed the Taft-Hartley Act, you know, we signed whatever the document was that to be signed that could resort to the Labor Board. How could you exist? We would say, “How can we get along without the Labor Board?” You just couldn’t do it. We made the turn, and we became, what shall I say — more moderate. But that didn’t prevent us from continuing to sponsor, to participate in anything that was progressive. I would say that the connection that was severed was one of a specific left-wing policy sponsored by the Communists at that time. That’s what we broke with. I’m not ready to dump that whole period, and flush it down the drain. I don’t think so. For me, it was a real developmental thing and I have to admit, depending on what you want to call it, any education that I had, was during the course of the years that I spent in the left-wing movement, closely associated and related to the Communist Party. There’s no question about it, that whatever inherent abilities I might have had were sharpened and developed in that period. From 1947 to 1959 were the twelve years in which the political factor was used by those who were posed against us. But they had changed in character from being social democrats to being out-and-out racketeers. [In the 1947 election] we were defeated on the basis of speeches made that we were agents from Moscow — that was the height of the McCarthy period — it was just the beginning of that rather. That’s all they could say against us, that we were Communists. They dug up leaflets and they clobbered us. From then on, until 1959, it was one big struggle to get rid of them. We’d go to conventions really concerned for our physical well-being. Telephone calls to our homes, to our wives, three o’clock in the morning, “You want to see your husband tomorrow? He knows what he’s got to do.” Things of that sort. But we finally caught up with them and from then on out I would say that, first of all the racketeering locals disappeared — some left on their own, some we expelled — till we got rid of all of them. Some of them went to jail. Others are still under indictment. But that was the fight that took place in all those years up to '59. Then [Harry] Spodick was elected, and it was after that that I would say that the political atmosphere changed. We still battled, but it wasn’t what it had been before. It wasn’t a question of getting the racketeers out anymore. To the point where in 1968 when I ran, I ran unopposed. That was amazing. To run unopposed after all those years. Source: Interview by Debra Bernhardt 10/23/79 Courtesy Wagner Labor Archives/Tamiment Library, RESEARCHER-UPDATE: Andrew I. Sverdlove; 9-Feb-2005; Source Documentatio (23) RESIDENCE:Telephone Directory, Queens County, NYNEX, Telephone Directory, Jun 1994-Aug 1995, 39-49 44th Street, Sunnyside, NY 11104 718-784-3615. (24) Ancestry.com, 1930 United States Federal Census: Manhattan, New York County, New York ([database online] Provo, UT: Ancestry.com, 2000), 18 year-old Harry Sverdlove is living with 75 year-old Morris Swerdlove and his wife Mary, who was born Sverdlov according to my notes although I don't have a source. 19 year-old Brother Leo [sic] is working as a Setter - Jewelry. They are called "relative" which means it could be either Morris or Mary. They are listed as born in Pennsylvania. RESEARCHER-UPDATE: Andrew I. Sverdlove; 3-Sep-2004; 1930 Census Source Documentation. (25) BIOGRAPHY: Interview, Leon Sverdlove conversation with Andrew Ira Sverdlove, 11-Mar-2005. (26) RESIDENCE: tel dir, Brooklyn Telephone Directory, 1940 (Aug 1940), call *ZAN-G60 reel 12; pg 630; NY Public Library, Central Research Library, Microforms Reading Room, 315M. Sverdlove, Harry 300 Ocn Pkwy WIndsr 6-6924. RESEARCHER-UPDATE: Andrew I. Sverdlove; 05-Oct-1995; Source Documentation. (27) RESIDENCE: Ancestry.com, Phone and Address Directory, [database online]. Provo, UT: MyFamily.com, Inc., 2003., Original data: 1994 White Pages. Little Rock, AR: Acxiom Corporation, 19--. (28) CORRESPONDENCE: Marc Sverdlove, email to Andrew I. Sverdlove, 27-Mar-2005. (29) CORRESPONDENCE: Barry Eisenberg, Email to Andrew I. Sverdlove, 04-Jan-2005, Hi Andrew -- I don't know much about my Uncle Harry Sverdlove's family. I am related to him by marriage. My grandfather was Charles Uger. One of his sisters, Freda (my aunt), married Harry Sverdlove. They live in Florida now and are in their late 80s. They lived in New York most of their life together and were excellent dancers - - they danced (as a hobby) all over the world. Laurie Goldman is their daughter. I think I have heard that Harry's ancestors came from the Siberia area of Russia. If you have any specific questions, I could try to ask Harry for you. Cheers, Barry Eisenberg Rockville, MD. (30) Switchboard.com, Phone and Address Directory, 2005, [database online] (31) Ancestry.com, 1930 United States Federal Census - Brooklyn, Kings County, New York, [database online] Provo, UT: Ancestry.com, 2001-. Lukin, Ossias Roll: T626_1521; Page: 3A or 248; ED: 1349; Image: 1080.0. (32) Index to Naturalization Petitions of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York, 1925-1957, NARA, microfilm M1164, NARA Rolls M1164-28 to M1164-142, NATURALIZATION: Sverdlove, Lillian; Eastern District Court (Brooklyn & Queens) DOB 1916 Address 5598405 371307 July 1, 1943. Notes Note (1) b. 1878 per Manifest Note (2) in Russian: Belostok. Bialystok, Bialostocki Poviat, Podlasksi (Poland) Note (3) Bialystok, Poland today Note (4) possible 60-62 East 9th Street, Philadelphia Note (5) Note (6) Went to live with wife's sister, Rose Yellen Bernstein. Note (7) listed as "relative" living with 75 year-old Morris Swerdlove and his wife Mary Note (8) First experience with bed bugs. Note (9) a tenament Note (10) Living with 75 year-old Morris Swerdlove and his wife Mary Note (11) purchased two family home with help of GI load Note (12) listed as "relative" living with 75 year-old Morris Swerdlove and his wife Mary Note (13) Living with 75 year-old Morris Swerdlove and his wife Mary Note (14) after Selig died, she was raised by her aunt and uncle Lukin Witness Witness (1) Henry GREEBLATT Witness (2) Solomon TARSKI please updated information, write stories, and furnish scanned photos etc. Andrew Ira Sverdlove asverdlove@!nyc.rr.com (delete the !) 145 Central Park West, Suite 1A cell tele: 917-863-4559 New York, NY 10023-2004 fax (night only) 212-877-3566 Name Index