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Pacific Street Films. Photographs, 1919-1980.

Title: Photographs, 1919-1980.

While there are too many photographs relating to individual anarchists and organizations (listed below) to give an account of each, a few must be specifically mentioned. Mollie Steimer (1897- July 23, 1980) was a lifelong anarchist activist who began her political career by opposing United States intervention in Soviet Russia during the First World War. In the course of this, she was arrested under the Sedition Act, and became one of the defendants in the landmark free speech case, Abrams v. United States. She, like her good friends Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman, was deported from the United States to the Soviet Union. She was later also deported from the Soviet Union. Senya Fleshin, an anarchist whom she met while in the Soviet Union, became her lifelong companion. He later became a photographer, and they operated a photography studio, "SEMO" (Senya and Mollie) in Mexico City. (For more information on Steimer, and for more photographs of Steimer and her friends, see memorial pamphlet, Mollie Steimer--Toda Una Vida De Lucha: La Rebelion De Una Anarquista Condenada Por Ambos Imperios (Mexico 12, D.F.: Ediciones Antorcha, 1980).). Rudolph Rocker (1873-1958) was a German anarchist who became enamoured of Yiddish language and literature, and became one of its primary exponents and champions; he was responsible, also, in his capacity of editor of important Yiddish language publications, for having getting translated and publishing for the first time in Yiddish many of the great writers of nineteenth century literature. He was also a leader in the Jewish anarchist movement, and in the Jewish labor movement in England in the years before World War I. Milly Witkop Rocker was his companion (it is said that for reasons of principle they were never legally married). Valerio Isca is an Italian immigrant anarchist, who was, among other things, very active in the defense of Sacco and Vanzetti. He is a photographer, and many of his photographs are represented in this collection. Rose Pesotta (1896-1965), a friend of Mollie Steimer, was an anarchist who was also an organizer for the International Ladies Garment Workers Union for many years; she also served as its vice-president for a number of years. The Freie Arbeiter Stimme (Free Voice of Labor) was a leading, and when it ceased publication, the oldest, Yiddish anarchist newspaper (1890-1977). Some photographs in the collection are of various individuals involved in the newspaper and of annual picnics given by the paper. The Mohegan Colony, at Crompond, New York, was founded in 1923. The community, which at one time convered as much as 450 acres, was a liberal and radical one (many anarchists were among its residents, including Harry Kelly, and Valerio and Ida Isca) established (as outlined in its constitution) "to free ourselves and our children from at least some of the diseases of city life; to give free rein in our thoughts and ideals; to offer our children a libertarian education which will fit them to be fighters for a better world."

ArchivalResource: .5 linear feet.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/477247993 View