Riesel, Victor

Victor Riesel (1917-1995) was a nationally syndicated labor journalist, and an advisor to labor leaders and politicians. A product of New York's Lower East Side Jewish community, Riesel graduated from City College, and from its progressive political milieu to become a knowledgeable and militantly anti-communist social democrat. After work for a news service and writing for various publications, including a stint as managing editor of the New Leader (a social democratic weekly), in 1946 he began his syndicated daily labor column, which appeared in hundreds of newspapers over the next three decades. He also appeared regularly on radio and television. His exposure of labor racketeers is thought to have led to his blinding in 1956, by a man who flung acid into his eyes. Riesel traveled to some fifty countries, interviewing their labor and political leaders. Riesel's politics became more conservative, and in the early 1970s he became an unofficial, but important advisor to the Nixon administration on labor matters and on Republican outreach to the labor community and to white working class voters, meeting with cabinet level officials.

From the guide to the Victor Riesel Papers, Bulk, 1940-1980, 1929-1994, (Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Labor Archive)

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