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Highlander Folk School — Part 14
Page 30
30 / 69
made for spreading the revolutionary theories
out the South.” Mr. Frey further texifed: in cone
tion with this I might mention that the Highlander Folk
School at Monteagle, Tennessee, was mixed up in this
secret convention, in which these three C.1.0. or
izers took a very prominent part.” (See Dies Com.
mitiee Hearings, Volume 1, page 126.)
Paul Crouch testified before the Senate Subcommiit-
fce on Internal Security, as follows: “The Highlander
Folk School is a school operated at Monteagle, Tennes-
see, ostensibly as an independent Jabor school, but
actually working in close cooperation with the Com-
Munist Party.” (See Hearings, page 47.) Dombrowski
“ - at instructor at the Highlander Folk School for a
number of years,
The following colloquy took place between Senator
Eastland, Committee Counsel Arens, and Mr. Crouch
during the latter's testimony:
SENATOR EASTLAND. Mr. Crouch, did you
ever visit Dr. Dombrowski's home?
MR. CROUCH. I visited the Highlander Folk
School where he was working. I didn’t visit at his
home, but we spent a night at the same home to-
gcthe:, Caroline Stevenson’s and he and Leo Sheiner
discussed in my presence the actual hideout of Com-
runist leaders the night we were traveling to Winter
Haven.
MR. ARENS. He and Sheiner discussed in your
preseace the hideouts for Communist leaders, top
Right leaders; is that correct?
MR. CROUCH. That is correct, sir. (See hearings,
p. 52.)
Don Wesi, who has already been mentioned as con-
rected wth the Highlander Folk School, was district
director of the Communist Party of North Carolina.
(See House Committee Hearings, May 6, 1949, page
191}
At the New Orleans hearings of the Senate Commit-
tee, On March 20, 1954, Myles Horton was ejected
by the United States Marshal from the witness stand
and the hearing room, for disorderly conduct.
James Dombrowski'’s record of pro-Communist ac-
.+.ue and connections will be discussed under the sec-
» ac SOuthern Conference Educational Fund, an
organization which is playing a key role in the drive
for integration in the South,
Abner W. Berry
The presence of a prominent Communist Party Negro
leader at the Highlander Folk School seminar is of
major significance. Through Abner W. Berry, the Com-
munist Party established personal contects with the
Southern leaders of the fight for integration. The Party,
9 Me precert-day strategy, sets the highest value on
18
guch personal contacts. It is the curtent strategy of
etration.
Abner W. Berry is a veteran Communist Party leader.
More than 25 years ago, he was a member of the na-
tional council of the League of Struggle for Negro
Rights, a Communist spuinik which will be discussed
later, For 20 years, Berry bas been a member of the
national committee of the Communist Party. He has
also been a menober of the smaller central committee of
the Party (Daily Worker, May 23, 1938, p. 5). In
1946, he was educational director of the Communist
Party of Michigan (Daily Worker, Jan. 21, 1946, p. 5).
He was an instructor at the Communist Party’s Jefferson
School of Social Science for several years before the
school closed in December, 1956.
Abner W. Berry is, and has been for years, a feature
writer for the Daily Worker, In this newspaper of the
Communist Party, Berry made a tengthy report on his
visit to the Highlander Folk School. In his report,
Berry said:
Here for four days Negro and white Jeaders of the
South representing millions of southerners, had the
precious communications established with each other
that had been disconnected during the past few years.
(Daily Worker, Sept. 10, 1957, p. 5)
Berry has been a writer for other Communist pubii-
cations: Masses & Mainstream, Michigan Herald, New
Masses, People's Daily World, and Political Affairs. He
served for a number of years on the editorial board of
Political Affairs, the theoretical organ of the Communist
Party.
It is apparent that Abner W. Berry is a high ranking
leader of the Communist Party. It goes without saying
that the Party sent him to the Highlander Folk School
seminar. Such leaders receive their assignments from
the highest command of the Communist Party; they do
not go anywhere on their own. The cordial reception
which Berry was accorded at the Highlander Folk
School is convincing evidence of the school’s ideological
orientation.
Berry states that “two southern NAACP branch
presidents” attended the Highlander Folk School semi-
nar on integration.”
Pete Seeger
Another individual who has a long record of Com-
Mmunist affiliations and activity was also a prominent
participant in the Labor Day weekend conference at
the Highlander Folk School, namely, Pete Seeger.
Peie Seeger is a nationally known folk singer who
has been prominently identified with the Communist
movement in this country for many years. He has been
named as a member of the Communist Party in swern
imony.
~
a
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