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...and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth. ABRAHAM LINCOLN TheThe Volunteerolunteer JOURNAL OF THEV VETERANS OF THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN BRIGADE Vol. XXVIII, No. 2 June 2006 Vet John Penrod, with his wife Carol Giardina, carries on the spirit of the Lincoln Brigade at the New York reunion. Page 13. Photo by Richard Bermack. NYU ALBA Archives Open for Business, page 2 VALB Reunions from Coast to Coast , page 12 Middle School Poster Project, page 4 Spanish Culture Behind Barbed Wire: 1939-1945 by Three Wars Couldn't Stop Fred Stix, page 7 Francie Cate-Arries, book review, page 16 The Shame of Spain, a conversation with Francesc Torres, page 10 Letter From the Editor This has been a season of many events. The olunteer On April 1, Tamiment Library director Michael Nash V Journal of the announced the completion of the organization of the ALBA Veterans of the collection. The full archive is now open to researchers, with Abraham Lincoln Brigade guides to the collection online (see page 2). an ALBA publication This spring, the Lincoln vets in the San Francisco Bay 799 Broadway, Rm. 227 Area and in New York City acknowledged the work of New York, NY 10003 Veterans for Peace in continuing the dissenting traditions (212) 674-5398 of the Lincoln Brigade (see pages 12 and 13). In 2002, when the current war was warming up in the corridors of Editorial Board Peter N. Carroll • Gina Herrmann Washington, Veterans for Peace voted to accept the mem- Fraser Ottanelli • Abe Smorodin bers of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade into their organization, something the federal government’s Veterans Book Review Editor Shirley Mangini Administration never got around to doing. In both venues, speakers filled in that missing link by placing the volun- Art Director-Graphic Designer teers of the Spanish Civil War within the narrative of Richard Bermack antiwar soldiers. Both programs featured the musical pre- Editorial Assistance sentation, Songs Against War: Music of the Anti-Warriors, Nancy Van Zwalenburg performed by Barbara Dane, Bruce Barthol, and musicians Submission of Manuscripts of the San Francisco Mime Troupe. The tunes ranged from Please send manuscripts by E-mail or on disk. “Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye” to “Si Me Quieres Escribir,” E-mail: [email protected] “Fixin’ to Die Rag,” “Cakewalk to Baghdad,” and “Bring ‘em Home”—a grand tradition of soldiers’ songs that ex- press what war survivors know better than anyone. tion, “The Ultimate Volunteers: New York City and the ALBA’s educational programs also advance. We’ve seen Spanish Civil War.” Thanks to a generous grant from the a sudden rise in the number of submissions to the annual Puffin Foundation and cooperative sponsorship from the George Watt essay contest from graduates and undergradu- Cervantes Institute of New York, the show will open in ates. The winners will be announced during the summer. March 2007 at the Museum of the City of New York. We On the high school level, this year’s National History Day hope to see it travel to Spain as well. saw two classes—one in Minneapolis, the other in Without your support none of this would be possible. Reading, Massachusetts—develop projects about the Please participate and contribute whenever you can. Lincoln Brigade, thanks to the content on our educational Peter N. Carroll website. The Massachusetts group won the state finals, ad- vancing to the national competition in Washington, D.C. This is the second time in the past few years students studying the Lincoln Brigade have made it to the national Letters to the Editor competition. Another student’s history day essay reached Dear Sirs, the finals in Pennsylvania. I am currently working on a book on the subject Meanwhile, ALBA has introduced an arts program for “Norway and the Spanish civil war” and am seeking infor- younger students in a middle school in the Bronx (see page mation regarding Norwegians or Norwegian-Americans 4). To help them along, we are continuing to develop curri- and the civil war. People who have any information, pic- cula on our website—www.alba-valb.org—and plan to tures or whatever, can contact me. unveil new programs in time for the next school year. Jo Stein Moen, Oslo, Norway In September, ALBA’s newest book will be in print: The [email protected]. Good Fight Continues: World War II Letters from the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, published by New York University Press. We offer a sample in this issue (see page 19). We are also working hard to produce our new exhibi- Letters continued on page 21 Antiwar Poet Launches ALBA Lecture Series That bore silent witness By Joe Butwin North Dakota, and the poets of Spain To a grief as old as the ages. n January 2003, while Bush and and Latin America in the ‘30s, Pablo Blair were strapping on their hol- Neruda, Federico Garcia Lorca, and Always—in the eyes of the un- Isters, Sam Hamill, a peaceful poet Antonio Machado. bearable Bush or with this small in Port Townsend, Washington, let Hamill had lived quietly on the child—it is the eyes. Many of Hamill’s some poets know that their response Olympic Peninsula beside Port heroes—Homer, Milton, Borges—have to the mounting war talk would be Townsend for 30 years without any been blind. What he sees is what he welcome. Right away, quicker on previous invitation to read at the hears. At the end of “Eyes Wide the draw than Bush and his side- University of Washington. It was Open,” we are told to listen. kick, 11,000 poems shot through the about time. The invitation coincides But internet. The Nation, in conjunction with his charming self-description: Listen. And you will hear her small, soft, plaintive voice with Thunder’s Mouth Press, quickly “thrust on an international stage with it’s already there within you published a sampling—263 pages Poets Against the War after living 30 a heartbeat, a whisper, of poems. Since then the original years in the woods with my nose in a a promise broken submission has doubled to 20,000. Chinese dictionary.” if only you listen I’ll leave you to check in at http:// Not exactly. Poetry has its activists with your eyes wide open. www.poetsagainstthewar.org/. Feel as surely as politics do. From his post The soft-spoken poet insists on be- free to submit your own poems. on the Olympic Peninsula—Chinese ing heard, and as Abe Osheroff On March 3, 2006, just about three dictionary notwithstanding—Hamill pointed out in remarks that followed years after Bush declared his “mission has been as active in his domain as Sam Hamill’s reading, poetry, the accomplished,” Sam Hamill, the ge- Reed and Osheroff have been in theirs. kind you hear and sing, has always nius behind Poets Against the War, He is a translator and an editor, for figured in popular movements. In was invited to deliver the first annual years he was the publisher at the Spain in 1937 and in Nicaragua in Bob Reed-Abe Osheroff-ALBA lecture Copper Canyon Press, and he is con- 1985, literacy rates were low and rever- at the University of Washington in stantly a working poet. That’s activism. ence for the poets was high. In both Seattle. Sam Hamill, a Zen Buddhist Above all, it is the poetry itself cases, poetry was more frequently and a pacifist, explained that “what that gives definition to his activism. heard than seen, more frequently sung the Lincoln Brigade stood for we must “What you read,” says Hamill, “is than read. This has been a constant stand for.” There is no contradiction what you feed your soul.” His audi- theme for Osheroff. In an exhibition of between the willingness of men like ence was particularly well-fed at the Spanish Civil War posters called Bob Reed (who died in Seattle a year University of Washington on March 3. “Shouts From the Wall” and in his re- ago) and Abe Osheroff (who was very In “State of the Union, 2003” cent documentary film, Art in the much alive at the speaker’s right hand Hamill is bitter: Struggle for Freedom, poetry and picto- that night) to go to Spain together in Soon, the President will speak. rial images speak to the hearts and 1937 and vigorously oppose Bush’s He will have something to say minds of a people engaged in struggle. about bombs war 70 years later. There is no question: Sam Hamill, and freedom and our way of life. The selection of Hamill by the or- I will turn the tv off. I always do. his 20,000 friends, along with the stu- ganizers of the lecture, including Abe Because I can’t bear to look dents, faculty and citizen-activists of Osheroff, Tony Geist, and Peter Carroll at the monuments in his eyes. Seattle, are fine companions for Bob of ALBA, was entirely appropriate. In a poem called “Eyes Wide Reed and Abe Osheroff at the begin- Sam Hamill ascribes his lineage as an Open” he is tender as he regards a ning of this new series of lectures. “engaged poet” to Euripides in ancient photograph of a small girl, probably Joe Butwin teaches English at the Greece, John Milton in 17th century Middle Eastern: University of Washington. England, his friend Tom McGrath in With her eyes wide open, Deep brown beautiful eyes THE VOLUNTEER June 2006 1 NYU Archive Open and Accessible By Michael Nash he three-year project to preserve and catalog the entire Abraham TLincoln Brigade archive at New York University’s Tamiment Library has been successfully completed.

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