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Not exactly the highest tech equipment, but it works. Today is March 14th, 1994, and this is an interview with Alex Cohen. And I'll ask you just first to um give me your full name and your birth date and where you were born. Uh, Alex Cohen, uh,

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Alex Cohen, I was born, uh, actually it was Alexander, but, uh. I go by Alex. Um, nobody but substitute teachers in elementary school called me Alexander. I was born October 8th, 1950 in Brooklyn, New York. And who were your parents? My parents were Nathan and Mary

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Cohen, um. How old were they? Oh, let's see, I believe my mother was. Yeah, she was 33 actually she was, I was her birthday present. Uh, I was came a week before her birthday and my father would have been, uh, just a couple of months short

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of his 36th birthday. No, they were born in Brooklyn. They were brought up in uh Brownsville. My father's actually my mother was born in Connecticut but soon thereafter moved to uh. Brownsville, East New York. My father was born in Brownsville and his first language was Yiddish.

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Yes, from the Ukraine, whatever that meant, right, yeah, um, and what were their lives like and what do you know about the important influences on their lives before you were born, even their childhoods and then, um, through their early adulthood. Let's see, my father actually left,

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uh, some writing that I've gone over a bit, um. As I said, he was brought up in East New York. Uh, his father was a tailor and actually ran a a tailor shop for a while in, in the twenties, uh and they were actually um lower

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middle class, middle class. They owned a house um throughout the depression. Uh, his family was poor, um generally the family was poor and uh. He often used to tell me stories about um how the family would get into terrible arguments between those who read the Fry

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height and those who read the forward, um. Throughout the 30s since the depression was on and, and people did not have places to live, often they stayed with my grandparents, I believe, and there were always these arguments about uh you know, between the socialists and uh

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the communists, uh very heated. My father became uh involved in politics, uh in the communist movement probably at Brooklyn College, as did my mother. My mother, um, actually her parents had been in the party, um. Her father had joined the party in 1929 and got kicked

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out six months later, uh, and I'll never forget, I, uh. In his 80s he told me the story. um, the party at that time had uh a policy of dual unionism, setting up separate unions, and he said this is stupid. They, they, they changed uh within

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4 or 5 years, I believe, by the beginning of the 30s, they had changed, but he was a premature anti-unionist. And he was thrown out of the party in 29 and never looked back basically. Did he, what kind of politics, did he change his politics? Or

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just change his party. No, he, uh, his party was Sam Levine, and, uh, one of the things I admired about him most was family dinners of ours usually at Christmas or whenever we get together, uh, everybody belonged to some, uh, sect of the left and they

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were terrible fights, but they were all unified in one thing they'd always attacked Sam. Because they always felt that he was wrong, uh, later on in his life, uh, you know, he began to support Israel more and was critical of the left, and he was Sam,

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um. But in fact, I think. His standing up to the party in 1929 was one of the few really courageous political acts, I think in, in my family. I mean, I think he took a. A stance and stood by it and was proved correct and uh

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never looked back um and so your mother grew up in Connecticut? No, she was born in Bridgeport. My grandfather was a carpenter. He moved. He and my, oh, he and my grandmother moved to Bridgeport, I believe in World War One to take part in shipbuilding, uh,

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during the war. And my mother was born in 1917 and I think soon after the war they um moved to Brooklyn and that's where they stayed. And um let's go back to your father. You said he became involved politically during college. Yeah, I think soon after

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he met my mother, my mother sort of uh like I sort of had a genetic streak of radicalism in her and I, I believe it's, it's kind of sad for me because I can't check these stories anymore since both my parents are gone, uh. But I

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seem to remember his writing, uh, somewhere that she had been the one or certainly one of the people who had, uh, gotten him interested in, uh, the Communist Party or young socialist leader whatever YCL I one of the alphabets, but she was, um, so despite her

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father's experience, well, her mother was a member of the party and So your mother's in fact, and this is kind of jumping ahead, but um I always thought uh there was a story in the family that my grandmother had been a member of the party until

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the day she died uh in 1970, but in fact I learned recently that she. Because she stood up for my parents in 1950, she was thrown out, but I think she didn't tell anybody or it was kept very quiet. Uh, so both my, yeah, both my,

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uh, mother's parents were active. My mother used to tell me stories of how her mother, who was all of 410 or 411, would lead rent strikes, uh, in Brooklyn, and, uh, the landlord would come along and evict them throw their, uh, furniture out on the sidewalk,

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and then the neighbors would come around and bring it all back in, and apparently she was quite a fiery speaker. So your parents met in Brooklyn College in their early twenties. Uh, no, actually. My mother went to Brooklyn College, I think at the age of 15

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or 16 or something, uh, so it was their late teens. And um that would have been in the mid-30s so there was a lot of activities then were they involved in Spanish Civil War, aid that was even before you know, I don't. I don't believe. Well,

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I don't remember they're talking about being involved in uh Spanish Civil War, but I'm sure they were, uh, if they were members of the party or very close they could not have been and uh. I'm sure they knew people who went and um so when they

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both finished college, what kind of jobs were they able to find? Let's see. No, my mother was a school teacher, but I'm not exactly sure if she began that as soon as she left college or not. I'm, I'm sort of embarrassed. I don't know. My father,

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um, I'm not sure exactly when he got into it, uh, became a tool and die maker, uh, and a union organizer, a labor organizer, uh, which upset his parents tremendously because they wanted him to be a doctor, uh, but he. Was an organizer in and around

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New York for many years and uh yeah for the party um. During the war he was at a place called Columbia Machine Works in Brooklyn. After the war he was in Toledo briefly. He was actually, and I believe it was during the war, Second World War,

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he was a member of the Central Committee. In fact, I believe he was the youngest member of the Central Committee ever. Uh-huh, so he would have, well, I don't know who. The leadership, uh, who were, who were the other leadership? Gus Hall was an actually he

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knew all of those people. So he was your mother also involved in leadership? I don't believe so, um, she did not talk about her experience in the party as much as my father because uh she was incredibly bitter. And angry we'll talk you know we'll get

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to that. Um, then, uh, when you were born in 1950, uh, what was your family's situation economically like when you and politically when you were born? I actually was born into perhaps one of the worst periods of their lives. Uh, I'm not exactly sure when my

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father was expelled from the party, but I believe it was 1950. Actually I'm sure it was 1950 or 1949, but. Um, what happened, and I've never quite gotten the story straight, but my father got into a fight basically with Gus Hall over some, he accused him

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of incompetence. The story he told me is that he accused Gus Hall of incompetence and suspected him of being an FBI agent. Um, I have a feeling that this went back to their days in Toledo where they got into some organizational scuffle and Gus Hall came

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out on top and my father was in disfavor, uh, in the party actually I discovered he was in disfavor in the party through uh FBI records. Um, because he had never talked about that, and I suspect. He didn't like that position and gone into this fight

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with Gus Hall and lost and I was thrown out of the party. He actually told me that. The party at the time um tried to buy him off by uh offering him the editorship of the paper but he wouldn't take it. So what happened was he

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and my mother were expelled from the party. Which meant no one would talk to them. The circles and everyone, um, I mean. My grandparents actually I believe my grandparents were living with us at the time we're all in one house, um, my mother's sister and her

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husband remained members of the party, but I believe the relationship with my parents was strained. I could not, uh, how could it not have been. There was one couple. Who stood by my parents, um. Who basically said, well, if the party does this to people, we

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don't want any part of it, um. But then what happened besides being ostracized by the party. Uh, excuse me, was your father still as um? Well, I'm kidding, yes, he was, uh. I'm not sure where, but it being 1950, um. The FBI was looking for disgruntled

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party members to testify. And this is the other courageous act I believe in my family. My father refused to testify although he hated the party and was probably ripe for wanting to turn everybody in. He wouldn't. So on the one side, he was damned from both

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sides. What kind of pressure uh do you know that he was blacklisted as far as I know, uh, a lot of, uh, visits from the FBI, a lot of calls, and he was blacklisted. He could not hold a job, uh, in New York, uh, he would.

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If I remember correctly from the family stories, you know, used different names, and he would work the night shift hoping that he wouldn't be recognized because he was so well known in the labor movement in New York somebody eventually would always say, oh, there's Nat Cohen,

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uh, you know, he's a communist, uh. And the reason I know he was working nights around the time I was born is that there was a story in the family that uh I would wake up every morning at 5 o'clock or 4 o'clock when he'd come

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home and I'd hear his key in the door and I'd wake up and have breakfast with him, uh. So it was an awful time and it continued to be awful for several years. In fact, so bad that my parents were looking to get out of the

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country. Yeah, I mean, imagine, uh, their entire lives they were. I mean, from the mid-30s through 1950, their entire lives had been that part. I mean, everyone they knew, um. Both his friends and professionally, well, you know, in terms of work and then that was all

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gone and on the other side having to look through the McCarthy era. Um, So they were looking to get out of the country and uh we eventually moved to Canada. And when was that? June of '53, which is the same month that the Rosenbergs were executed.

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Now, I was only 2.5 then. Uh, but one of my sisters has told me that it was very scary, you know, it just, yeah, I have two sisters, uh, one. 5 years older than I and the other 7 years older than I and we sort of

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straddle a period in my parents' life because they actually remember them being politically active as little girls they would hand out leaflets on street corners and such, uh, but I don't. Yes, they both live in New York. Yeah, so in a sense you were born into

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a different family. Yes, I was absolutely and our political views, uh. Reflect that I'm not sure if they reflect that. Well, I think they reflect that and also the fact that they were products of uh the early 60s, late 50s, early 60s and I was a

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product of the mid to late 60s, so they wound up doing political work much closer to party type work, not in the party, but another organization and I wound up in SDS and uh. And being more flooding, um, so you moved to Canada, you probably don't

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have memories of this, I do, um. Now this was a really This is the changing point in my father's life basically because his brother-in-law was in the plastics business and toy business and wanted to open a factory in Toronto and was looking for somebody to run

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it for him. And my father wanting to get out of the country, jumped at the opportunity. From that moment till his death in 1985. Um, he was a boss. And in fact it was really very sad. I mean he, he had this terribly contradictory life and

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he became uh the runner of a sweatshop basically uh as his father was. I mean, in effect he became his father. And he understood what was happening. Yes and no, yes and no. I'm never really sure. I mean. I'm not sure how much. Did um did

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he abandon left politics? I mean, in personal politics as well as organizational, I mean, did he. Certainly through the 60s and uh he got into some really violent fights with uh my sisters and I over politics and the anti-war movement and in fact, I remember. One

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of my sisters got into a fight with him over the demonstrations at the Chicago convention in '68 and they didn't speak to each other for six months. Uh, I was more on my sister's uh instigation. Well, uh, they sort of moved into a sort of, you

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know, that's interesting, um. The first place we lived in Canada. And I remember it Um, I have some memories of it and we didn't live there for very long, but it, it was out in the country. And I remember our next door neighbor had chickens and

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there were tremendous fields behind the house and actually there was a rail railroad line that went through a couple of 100 yards behind the house and I would wake up from naps, you know, when the trains came through and I remember walking back there with my

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mother. And um. I came to suspect in the last few years that The reason they moved out to the country in such an isolated place. Was because they're afraid of being watched, uh, or just wanting to be away. I actually asked my mother about this not

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long ago, uh, and she denied that and said, oh, it was, you know, that was what was available, but I still have my doubts. I think they were kind of drawn to wanting to be isolated and yeah. Yeah, at the moment it's probably right in the

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heart of Toronto. I mean, we lived in Toronto when the subway was open there, so it was quite a different place. 3 years until '56 basically until the fall of MacArthur and my father came back and uh went into business with his brother. What um what

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do you remember about the tenor um within your family family life during those very early years if you have have memories of that was your how how and how do you think or know that your parents dealt with the stress of the change and the move

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and. You know, I think I was too young, uh, to know, uh, I, you know, I was less than 3 when we moved to Canada, um. But I've always suspected that it was an extraordinarily stressful time for them. How could it have not have been? So

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you started school in Yeah, I went, I went to kindergarten in Canada. I remember seeing God Save the Queen. But um they were, they felt confident enough that they would be left alone coming back in. So my father had a great story about this. um, he

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had to, uh, before we moved back, um. He had to make a trip into New York. And the FBI, I think, was still hounding him in Toronto and they were you aware of any of that? No, my sisters were, uh, I never was, uh, my family

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did not like to talk about stuff and, uh, I being so small, I just kind of got left out. I mean, I had no idea why I like Pete Seeger or the Weavers or any of this stuff, but in any case. My father had to make

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a trip back to New York. And about that time the FBI was calling him and Asking him to testify, so he said, and this is his story, he said, well, all right, I'll name names, and he named like a mayor of Cleveland or a mayor of

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Toledo and the governor of Ohio. I mean he had been, you know, a political organizer and um. In Toledo for a while and knew lots of powerful people and FBI said to him, Oh no, those aren't the names we want. And he and my father said,

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Well, those are the names you're going to get. And I'll be at, uh, I don't think Kennedy Airport was open, you know, probably going to LaGuardia, you know, I'll be at LaGuardia Airport at such and such a time if you want to see me, you know,

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I'll be there and they never bothered him again. I, it's not that they never bothered him again. They never asked him to testify, in fact. The FBI and some branch of military intelligence kept an eye on him well into the 60s. Long after he had moved.

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Yeah, and in fact, um. He suspected that there was somebody who worked in the business who was being paid off. Actually, his brother-in-law was informing on him to the FBI. During this uh during the 50s and he, my father actually brought this guy into the business

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with him. This goes back to when we were in Toronto, um. As I said, my, my father's parents had a house in Brooklyn, and when we left, my father stored all his pamphlets and books and 78 records of the Spanish Civil War songs and you know.

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Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger and all and Paul Robeson in the in my grandparents' basement. And this brother-in-law. got panicked and convinced. Um, my father's parents, my grandparents destroyed them all, so my parents lost all that literature and all those records. My father, oddly enough, still

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brought this guy into the business. Even suspecting him, well, he knew that he had been behind um. Getting rid of the yeah. Um, how do you think, excuse me, just to go back to that point, he also hired um. As a bookkeeper, somebody had known in

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the party. And had been in the Spanish Civil War actually who had not left the party, but my father being the forgiving sort of generous man he was hired him anyway. He sort of took people in. So you think it was that kind of impulse. That

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allowed your father to look beyond the fact that people had, you know, had. Sort of betrayed him. I don't know what it was. My mother was not ever able to do this, um. I'm not sure what it was and my father that because in some ways,

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you know, it was crazy for him. I'm thinking is it that here they are so isolated, you know, they can't even within the family be certain of whom to trust. And you have to trust somebody, so maybe just out of that sheer need you extend a

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hand to. Very possibly very or maybe he really wanted to be back and maybe he really missed that life and this is some way for him to hold on to it, but my mother. would have none of it. Um, what kind of community did they build

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for themselves then in '56 when you came back? Well, Um, Certainly not political. Um we moved to actually a very interesting community in Queens, New York, uh that had been built by the UN in the late 40s for its employees when the UN was out on

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Long Island and when we moved there, um. The UN still held many of the leases. It was um. About 45 acres of garden apartments called Parkway Village in Queens. And It's a very interesting place to grow up because my friends were from India and Pakistan and

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well at that time, uh, Ceylon and England and France and South America and we played uh. Besides baseball and football, uh, soccer and you know, actually somebody had a cricket bat. I don't know if we actually ever played cricket, but we, you know, pitched the ball

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to each other and, uh. So you know, uh, my friends were named Ingradit Kumar Swami and Ibn Chaco and uh Jean Pierre and Michael Silverman. Um, you described your mother as reacting very differently from your father in her willingness to maintain connections or resume connections with

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people who she felt had betrayed your family. Was that a source of tension for them throughout? I think it was at times because um. Later on in my father's life, uh, when the fires of all of this had died a little bit or at least lessened,

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uh, he began to become a little bit more politically involved with some people, um, who were had become disaffiliated from the party. This would be, uh. Oh, in the mid to late 70s and early 80s, um. Reflecting also changes in Eastern Europe and uh. Just think

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of political scene in general. And I think it was a source of tension at times because my mother just didn't like these people, but interestingly enough, she eventually, uh. To became more involved, uh, although again I'm jumping around all over the place during the war, the

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Vietnam War. My father would not. Was not active at all. In fact, the very opposite he didn't, of course he did not support the war, um, but it was only my mother who would go to demonstrations, and I believe it was a while before she started

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to go. She was at that time an assistant principal in uh New York City High School and was always very, very worried. About being named as a party member, uh, a former party member because she had had to sign a loyalty oath at some point and

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she was afraid of losing her pension and, you know, all sorts of things. Um But my grandfather, bless his soul, uh, would go to demonstrations, um. I don't know if you remember the first Pentagon demonstration in 1967. It's the one that Abby Hoffman, um, uh, got

00:28:35.550 - 00:28:50.069

a bunch of people and tried to levitate the building. Well, of course, you know, I went, I was in high school and my sisters went and my grandpa Sam, who I was trying to figure this out the other day, he must have been 75. Made the

00:28:50.069 - 00:29:10.430

trip down from New York and as people were getting gassed I actually had to leave before the gassing's happened something I've always been embarrassed about um he was handing out handkerchiefs to people. Well, um, as you, as you grow grew up, how, when and how did

00:29:10.430 - 00:29:38.000

you become aware of your parents' political history? You know, I have no idea. It almost just kind of seeped in, um. My my sisters were aware of it and so I grew to Uh, You know, listen to Pete Seeger and the Weavers and um. So they

00:29:38.000 - 00:30:06.300

were still culturally affiliated but they weren't. I don't, you know, it's very odd. I don't know because The thing that I associate culturally with my mother. At that time is the opera. Mhm Because I remember as a kid on Saturday afternoons she'd clean the house and

00:30:06.300 - 00:30:23.319

turn on um the Met with Milton Cross and uh. The only thing I associate with my father at that time is working. I mean, he worked all the time, uh, you know, work every, you know, 6 days a week and then on Sundays he'd read the

00:30:23.319 - 00:30:47.540

New York Times and take naps, but it was my sisters who had been somewhat older than I, uh. And who still had I suppose some affiliation um with political movement and. I think it was more through them. That I began to be oriented toward left politics

00:30:47.540 - 00:31:04.599

and the anti-war movement and the civil rights movement, but I, I remember. I guess it was 1964 when I went to high school. I remember after being in a high school just a couple of weeks, I came home really disgusted. I said to my mother, I'm

00:31:04.599 - 00:31:23.020

dropping out and going to Mississippi. And she of course informed me that I was not gonna do that um but I think it was more for my sisters they were in SNCC I mean before uh SNCC became uh an organization of black power in the very

00:31:23.020 - 00:31:45.319

early days, you know, it was very much integrated and uh. They were in college by then. Uh, actually. He actually one sister had left college already. She dropped out her first year, but Naomi, I believe, was in college or toward the end of college and you

00:31:45.319 - 00:32:03.130

know they went to the Ethical Culture Society in New York and uh so they were more imbued with that. Uh, culture. Well, before we go back to the question about your parents' community and who, who their friends were after they no longer had political friends. Well,

00:32:03.250 - 00:32:26.949

I mean. This couple who uh stood by them were uh actually uh. The woman was also a teacher and uh my parents remained friends with them for many years and my father had business associates, some of whom were friends um. They were neighbors who they became

00:32:26.949 - 00:32:50.239

quite friendly with actually uh there's. One woman who and her husband who lived across the street from us who I continue to send pictures of uh our baby to who actually offered not long ago to be my son's grandmother since he was lacking one. Um, Interestingly

00:32:50.239 - 00:33:08.199

enough, they knew Carroll O'Connor and his wife, uh, Carol O'Connor was a struggling actor at the time and his wife was an art teacher in my mother's high school, and they had absolutely no money and I remember actually going to visit them in Far Rockaway. And

00:33:08.199 - 00:33:33.550

we went to a lot of theater, um. Would you describe it as a fairly normal middle class upbringing? No. I mean, in some ways, yes, um. Parkway village where I grew up was was odd in itself or for the collection of people, but in many ways

00:33:33.550 - 00:33:54.410

it was. You know this typical, uh not typical, it was a middle class upbringing and my parents were certainly middle class. Um my father was actually doing quite well through the end of the 60s in business, um. But there is always this undercurrent of politics, and

00:33:54.410 - 00:34:18.179

again I'm not sure exactly where I picked it up, although I'm talking about it now I suspect it was from my sisters. Well, but you gathering that's true. Uh, no, that's true. I mean, um. whenever the family got together, uh actually later on in the 60s,

00:34:18.449 - 00:34:41.320

late 60s, 70s, the arguments began, but uh. I remember my grandparents going to the Soviet Union in 1962 and you know that was pretty unusual actually remarkably enough my grandmother's sister had survived the war and my grandmother had not seen her in 50 years, so my

00:34:41.320 - 00:35:00.489

grandparents when it was very interesting when they got back my grandfather saying, uh, you know, I preferred here and my grandmother was, you know, touting it as, you know, you know, the utopia of socialism. What um At some point your parents shared this history with you,

00:35:00.500 - 00:35:18.399

or did it come through your, your sisters? No, my, my father. Now I'm remembering my my father used to regale us with stories of not only his childhood as a pool hustler in Brownsville, but also his organizing days. I mean that was the period of his

00:35:18.399 - 00:35:34.479

life that had the most meaning to him. My mother was much more present oriented, um. Because she was doing important work in one of the more most difficult high schools in New York, uh, but you know that was the period of my life that a period

00:35:34.479 - 00:35:57.110

of my father's life, um, that was most important to him. And I remember when I was in high school, you know, this. The contradiction of his life just struck me as being awful, you know, here he was running a sweatshop basically, you know, um. Toy manufacturer

00:35:57.899 - 00:36:19.959

when in fact he'd been an important labor organizer, uh you know, in the 30s and 40s. Um, and he obviously related to that time of his life much more than his present. I Uh, so this, uh, you know, contradiction in his life was always a, a

00:36:19.959 - 00:36:39.320

sore point because, you know, I admired these stories. I mean, I took great pride in in his stories about labor organizing as well as his, uh. Being a great pool player. contradiction or no for me and my sisters and I would always angrily say, well, I,

00:36:39.459 - 00:36:55.540

you know, I wish you'd go bankrupt because, you know, it'd be better for you. I mean, later I discovered how stupid I was to be saying such things. But it was always a sore point and of course he always thought that uh the political activities that

00:36:55.540 - 00:37:15.360

either me or my sisters were taking part in were, you know. stupid or uh infantile or you know whatever uh so of course that was. Another uh did, did you grow up, excuse me with um or did he continue to have a left analysis of issues

00:37:15.360 - 00:37:39.070

and events? Yes, except inside the factory walls where he was absolutely paternalistic and sort of the padrone actually so very great contradiction um but uh certainly I mean he. This is a man who read the complete works of Marx, Lenin and probably Stalin. Uh, and, um,

00:37:39.320 - 00:37:57.500

believed in them till the day of his death, probably. I mean, certainly his views of the world had changed considerably, but you know that. That that was his world view that was his worldview um but they were not when you were growing up when you were

00:37:57.500 - 00:38:19.000

in school in elementary school, um, junior high school, they were not working within any political organization, no, I mean how could they? Um, you know, they had been, well, they could have, but they were frightened, I think. Uh so I think my mother was frightened and

00:38:19.000 - 00:38:44.610

my father had just turned to a different life. I mean, uh, you know, he had made, you know, this opportunity had come up in Toronto and he had grabbed it and. And that was it. Mhm. Um, when. When you were in school, um, did you feel

00:38:44.610 - 00:39:03.600

that in some way that, uh, were you outspoken politically? Oh yeah, yeah, and your parents supported you in that? Oh yeah, all the time and uh. You know, when I got to high school in a time when uh if your hair was below, you know, the

00:39:03.600 - 00:39:18.280

top of your ear, you'd get in trouble, my parents always backed me up and uh basically told the school to go to hell. We did you ever have the sense that they were fearful for you in any way reflecting any fears that they've had in terms

00:39:18.280 - 00:39:40.510

of politics? No. Yeah. Uh, no, and always supported me. I mean, I was quite active in high school and You know, the anti-war movement and Organizing students and being outspoken and uh. That was probably more the reason I'd get into trouble with the principal than the

00:39:40.510 - 00:40:02.120

fact that my hair was a little bit long um throughout your your years at home, um, were you, what, what, what was your sense of the role of the Soviet Union in political struggles, your parents' views of the Soviet Union? Mm Very ambivalent, I think, and

00:40:02.120 - 00:40:24.739

I'm not sure where I got this from certainly, but. You know, as a member of SDS certainly, uh, I was, had very mixed feelings about the Soviet Union, you know, it was. Yeah it was fine that it was there and supporting liberation fronts but uh wouldn't

00:40:24.739 - 00:40:45.370

wanna live there you know it just sounded deadly and and horribly bureaucratic. And really had very little loyalty to such a thing. I'm not sure what I had loyalty to besides Bob Dylan actually. So you, unlike your father, did not read Marx and Lennon. You know,

00:40:45.459 - 00:41:04.149

I kept every time I go to an SDS conference or a meeting I'd always stop by. You know, the handbooks and you know, and I pick up, um. I remember at some conference I picked up Mao's work on art and literature or something because I was

00:41:04.149 - 00:41:18.850

a writer at the time and I was writing songs and poetry and stories and stuff, so I figured, you know, I should take the correct line and I read a couple of pages and just didn't speak to you when we moved from. Not sure whether it

00:41:18.850 - 00:41:36.199

was No, it was from LA up to here last year. I think I finally got rid of my red book or maybe it was when we moved to LA. I mean, I bought it. I never read it. Um, I bought lots of things, um. What I

00:41:36.199 - 00:41:53.110

would read politically was New Left notes and I'll never forget, uh, sitting on the subway one day and reading the original position paper in New Left Notes for the Weather Underground, uh, and I actually still have that and I've read that and I always had something

00:41:53.110 - 00:42:09.040

of an odd affinity for the weather people, but, uh. Mm, um, when you were still in high school before you left home, did you feel different than your peers, your friends at school because of what you, I assume by then knew to be your own political

00:42:09.040 - 00:42:34.010

background. Yeah, but it was mushed up with my cultural, um. Background too because you know, uh, listening. To Bob Dylan in the mid and late 60s was as much a political act as demonstrating against the war practically, or at least mark me, you know, um, actually

00:42:34.010 - 00:42:54.820

it's interesting I I this. Will mark the 30th year since I first started, first heard Dylan, and that was as much of a revelation as anything political that I went through, uh. But you know there was always this. I don't know how to describe it. It,

00:42:54.830 - 00:43:11.709

it was just, I mean, it was from my sisters or from the political discussions and, you know, just. In my home, you know, just this different view of the world than I was getting at school, you know, in elementary, junior high school or high school, and

00:43:11.709 - 00:43:34.879

by the time I got to high school, you know, I was opposed to the war and you know. I was very outspoken and you know, fairly radical. Um, What were your parents' expectations for you as a young person, an adult? No I'm not sure, I think.

00:43:38.370 - 00:43:56.719

I mean, I spent 7 years in analysis trying. What do they want from me? And of course now that they're gone, I'm, I feel guilty that I was ever angry at them, but you know I was born, I've always been. Convinced that I was born into

00:43:56.719 - 00:44:14.489

an extraordinarily difficult time for them and that shaped my life. And shape their attitude toward me. I think they're always very nervous about me than yours. Oh yeah, I mean you were the youngest child and most parents, you know, ease up as they go along. Oh,

00:44:14.500 - 00:44:33.429

they were very easy with me, but they're always worried. I also had a serious illness as a child and that always made them very nervous and. It was difficult for them to let go of me. Mhm. Um, So I'm not sure what they wanted. I think

00:44:33.429 - 00:44:54.189

my mother, you know, wanted me to go to college and become a professional of some sort. My father. I had very mixed feelings. Uh, in his heart of hearts. He wanted me to take over the business in his heart of hearts, uh, up until his death,

00:44:54.260 - 00:45:07.820

he wanted me to take over his business, and in fact, by his dying I did. Because by that point I was working with him, uh, actually I was what I was doing in New York was going to analysis and working out my relationship with him, but,

00:45:08.790 - 00:45:31.919

uh, so I did finally take over the business. Um But what I eventually wound up doing. I, uh, I became an anthropologist. But it was a long process. I lost this, well, the 70s and half of the 80s. I just. Sort of don't know where they

00:45:31.919 - 00:45:50.010

where they went. And I don't know if that's a result of my parents' mixed expectations about me or what or I just kind of feeling lost. What kind of values do you, do you think your parents wanted you to hold? Oh, I think the values that

00:45:50.010 - 00:46:16.620

I have now pretty much, uh, you know, um. A sense of social obligations, um, a sense of. Obligation toward people who are disadvantaged and poor, um. Actually, my mother had a 75th birthday party last October, a year ago, October of '92 that I went back to

00:46:16.620 - 00:46:31.560

New York for. My wife wasn't able to go because she was six months pregnant and didn't want to uh. And I got up and spoke and it was really to both of my parents that I said this, but you know, uh, I found myself in anthropology,

00:46:31.729 - 00:46:53.679

um, tilting toward, uh, social issues in this country. My dissertation is on homeless mentally ill people and continued to work in that area. And I really thanked her for that and uh intended to imbue my son with the um. And the tape's gonna run out