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pti “TEs * . i a » Te ee ie ee ee ee | Re ere | ee ee a eee eeeeeEeEeeEeEeEeEeEeeEeEeEeEeEeEeEeEeEeEeEeEeEeEeEeeeeEeeee 3 4 4 3 dom" became favorites as the : Pree pwitened to civil | rights. In a library of 8,000 volumes thera were a few books on communism — perhaps 20, In- . cluding # well-worn capy ef . rie Daz Kapital. Merchants of this town of ; 1,547 sold groceries and other Y supplies at Highlander — but they don’t want to talk for the record about the school. “ One of them that I had inter- viewed a few years back when : om _ I was up this way, told me re- | cently he doesn’t think that © “the changes of time—in the have helped Highlander's local _ reputation, ? have the general impression People up here, he said, still "Nat Caldwell Tells how it was . area of Jabor and civil rights— | No Question ———» | There was never any ques- ‘ tion about Highlander bring inter-racial school. And there was never any problem either about getting a drink The school was located in a _femote, if not private, part of the county. it was just twelve “T rights workers “and, ‘earlier, for union labor org Proud of Kindergarten , é Horion was proud of the kindergarten at Highlander. It was for those under & years. ‘old, not unlike today's Opera- miles from Tracy City =~ about . three fourths of the way to Monteagle by Highway 56, a right turn up » country lane and on about a mile to Sum- moerfiald. Summerfield, before High- . lander started in 19327 and aft- er it left in 1962, was just a little rural community like ’, Allardt and Rugby and Pleas- ant Hill —- other Cumberland plateau towns. In Highlander’s 30 years Schoo! President Horton al- ways boasted — and weather : records back up his claim — that no northern visitor ever falled to call for blankets on the hottest summer night .. - ; “Our money always gocea for . books, food, instruction or . echolarships.” he would say, “Air conditioning is for Lake Junaluska.” . ‘ The Tracy City businessman T talked with said he ia proud that “for vears I kept the FBI and the American Legion cur- » rent on Highlander.” : t He did not amile at the re- collection of Horton's famous | warm-up introduction to High- . Iander for visitors. Often, he sald, it was a prelude to an apreal for donations. the businessman said. Horton has never denied that the achool he ran was “different,” but he offers to reporters Who ask about the Communist charge the fact ‘that when he applied for a oe RR yy yg ge tion Headstart. He boasted to visitors about the kindergarten as he did about the weather. It was staffed, he claimed, by the hation's top Instructors, vaca- .tioning at Highlander and paying their own way. They wers, he said, regular staff. enambers of the nation’s most famous kindergarten, the Chase School. - There were other Horton beasts in addition toe weather and kindcrgarten, He malin- tained his school had dons a better Job than the labor move | tment in training labor leaders. © And probably hecause of this criticism of fabor he was squeezed down io two or three minutes on a atate CIO son. vention program, a state labor federation meeting and « ral Toad brotherhood'’s program, This waa in the late Forties, A Loud Griper During that -very period Horton $griped louder and. More and more publicly as he. called attention to his school’s “right to be heard” in labor ‘ circles. The more the unions tried to ignore him, the more ‘he compilqined. “Everybody wants to forget | we had that mess up here,” Highlander was switching during this period from labor leadership training to integra< tion Jeadership training. Most of the Tennessee unions, at the time, took a dim view of com- bining the two. Most laber leaders thought union deseg- iregation in the South would that Highlander wax Commu. | passport to England tn the — nisi. And, he zaid, it doesn't change anybody's mind be- cause "President Johnson now gaya the same things that Miles Horton used to aay.” Last Thuraday was the - fourth anniversary of the auc- tion sale that disposed of the school’s Grundy County prop- : erty for $43,700, That sais came after a Grundy county jury found the school “guilty” of being a de- segregated institution in de- fiance of state laws, and ruled Horton was guilty ef running the school for his personal gain and guilty also of selling beer without a licenta. Com- ‘munism was not involved in the Jury's verdict. " : personal A circuit judge, on the basis ‘ of these findings by the jury i ordered the school's charter revoked. The Tennessee 5u- Preme Court upheld the judge on the grounds of operating for personal gain and selling becr — but threw out the ser- regation count. In Gctober, ‘middle of the 1959 Tennessee ' legislative committee probe of . “communism” at Highlander, he got his passport quickly and without « hitch. He war going te England to act as! . chairman at an international educational conference. Horton also points out the Treasury Department revoked the school's tax exempt status after the U.S, Supreme Court's 1962 refusal to hear an ap-!. peal from a Tennessee Su-' i preme Court decrees revoking : Ste charter, ; i But Internal Revenue agents . checked the charges of sub. i version as well as the charges of operating the school for gain. After a few , Months the tax exemption for ‘1861 the U.S. Supreme Court | “refuse hear an appeal or ; school stored for the successton High- dJander school. Horten now rune in Knoxville, Also the ex- emption was made retroactive so the school could collect en ite past due foundation grants. Horton, while denying the Communist charge, boasts of Highlander's achievements "ax | --~"No.”. 2 | teeinine nantes Pau nti i wreck their organization. = When Congressional com- mittee investigaters placed Horton on their grill in the following years as though he was 8 well known Communist | Horten entered inte a name | kupporters was ra-j- firing contest with investiga- tors. He nearly panicked the Eastland Committee's New Orleans hearing in 1933. He was ejected from hearing rooms for upsetting hearings, 4S a nuisance, and once as ® disturber of the peace. . This reporter questioned him at a Tennessee lahor con- vention after the New Or- jeans hearings. About that time, probably based on his weird performances, informa- tlon spread that Highiander might be a training bass fer professional FBI and commit- tee informer-infiltrators. Following the New Or . hearings this reporter ques- tloncd him at a Tennessee Labor Convention about whether he had accepted | funds from J. Edgar Hoover or Senator Joseph McCarthy, . Horton’s reply was: : von :