Harry, Tom, and Father Rice

Accusation and Betrayal in America's Cold War
Erscheinungsjahr 2007
ISBN: 978-0-8229-5966-3
Verlag: University of Pittsburgh Press

Buch, Englisch, 344 Seiten, Paperback, Format (B × H): 165 mm x 229 mm, Gewicht: 499 g

John Hoerr tells the story of three men - his uncle, Congressman Harry Davenport, union leader Tom Quinn, and Father Charles Owen Rice - whose lives became intertwined during the anti-Communist witch hunts of the McCarthy Era. The story helps illuminate one of the most repressive periods in American history, when thousands of Americans guilty only of enlisting in leftist causes were caught up in dragnets cast by overzealous Communist hunters on behalf of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and other bodies. Much has been written about well-known cultural figures (the Hollywood Ten) and prominent writers (Arthur Miller and Lillian Hellman) who contended with HUAC. Hoerr tells of mostly ordinary Americans who were largely unknown at the time, but whose stories are nonetheless remarkable. Writing from personal experience with the title characters as well as archival research, Hoerr recreates the events of the 1949 HUAC hearings, where rigged testimony by a few workers cast suspicion on their union brothers. The results would echo through the years, causing people to lose jobs, marriages, and self-respect. Hoerr traces the paths followed by ""Harry, Tom, and Father Rice"" and relates their individual experiences to the great conflict between anti-Communist and Communist forces in the American labor movement, which led to the eventual demise of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO).

Autoren/Hrsg.

Hoerr, John

Über Autor(innen)

John Hoerr is a freelance writer and author with over thirty years of experience as a journalist for UPI, the Daily Tribune, and public television. His published work includes And the Wolf Finally Came: The Decline of the American Steel Industry and We Can't Eat Prestige: The Women Who Organized Harvard.