Hirsch, Samuel, 1923-2009

Samuel Hirsch (1923-2009) life-long labor and community activist, was raised in the East New York section of Brooklyn, New York. While attending Thomas Jefferson High School he joined the left leaning American Students Union. He later joined the Young Communist League and the Communist Party before enlisting in the army in 1942 where he served in the Signal Corps. After the war, he went to work for the Cooks Union, Local 89 where he served as welfare fund administrator for the next twenty years.

From this base, Hirsch maintained an intense level of political and trade union activity, often "loaned" to other unions by Local 89's progressive leadership. His political involvement during the 1950s included the following: civil rights work with the Harlem NAACP and the Civil Rights Congress, union organizing, anti-Korean War activism through Veterans for Peace, and his first arrest during his leaderhip in a protest campaign against police brutality. Although he had long-standing conflicts, Hirsch kept close ties to comrades in the community and in the labor movement. It was not until 1957 that he left the Communist Party. For years the FBI harassed him, trying unsuccessfully to enlist him as an anti-Communist witness.

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