The Cold War on the Homefront by Derek Gamlam

The Cold War not only had large effects in other parts of the world, however the war also had an astounding effect on America. The response to the Cold War manifested in multiple ways. The blacklist was the suspicion and resistance by publishers and editors of any media which was thought to use socialist ideology. The U.S. also prepared for a physical attack with preparations like air raid drills and fallout shelters. The U.S. also tried to keep its relationship with the Soviet Union in a state where there was as little violence as possible.


Interviews

Bob Nelson –Singer/Songwriter, Folklore Music.

Did you know anybody who was part of the communist party?

Oh yeah sure, I knew lots. Back in the mid 50’s there were a lot of folk singers around town who were communists. You gotta remember one thing back in the 30 ‘s during the depression there were 38 different political parties that many people turned to because we were going through desperate, desperate economic times. There was the communist party, the Nazi party, Democratic Party, Republican Party, Independent party and on and on and on. The communist party of the 1930’s is not the same party that arrived after WWII with the rise to power with Stalin. The communist party under Lenin was pure communism in theory and was very attractive to the poor and the downtrodden. With Stalin he became a dictator and killed millions of people and it was Stalin that ruined the communist party that was started in the 1880’s.
Yeah, I knew a lot from that were faculty at the University of Washington and labor union organizers.

Were these people active?

No, no, at the time I was 16 years old and we were invited to hoots or hootenannies at private homes of faculty members. Joseph McCarthy was starting his witch-hunts and a lot of people I knew were running scared. When I was 16, 17 I would sing for anybody who’d pay me $5 bucks a beer and bowl of spaghetti, so 1955 I join the army and had to sign the loyalty oath and the major who signed me in had me sign a 3 page oath and the major said, “do you have any affiliation of any of these organizations?” I said, oh sure, so I checked off half a dozen different organizations. Well he bout freaked out and said, “So, you’re a communist?” I said, “no I’m not a communist” and he said, “So why do you sing these songs?” I said, “cause they have the best songs.”
I checked off like Seattle Labor Council, Committee to Overturn the Smith Act, and Committee to Protect the Foreign Born.

Were you very active them?

No, I just sang for them, give me $5 bucks and beer and I’ll sing.

Do you think the blacklist in Seattle was as prominent as in California?

Oh yeah, it put a lot of actors out of work in California.

How did you and your friends survive?

I was never blacklisted just around the scene.


But you knew some that were?

Oh sure, they did anything to survive, look up Earl Robinson. He was raised in West Seattle and was a very, very famous international musician who wrote plays, operas, and beautiful songs; he just died a few years ago and he was hurt real bad by the blacklist. He was completely thrown out of work.
Pete Seeger got hurt real bad by the blacklist. In 57 I was with the Seattle Folk Singing Society and we broke the blacklist for Pete. We sponsored him at the Moore Theatre in ‘57. It was the first concert tour he had that broke the blacklist.

Did you know people who were afraid of Blacklisted?

Yes, several were and come to my memory and very, very afraid. They were fearful that they would lose their income. The government puts screws on you; that all comes down to economics. I knew a semi retired nuclear physicist for the Manhattan project and terrified that his past communist membership would be come known and he would lose his retirement.

Were the fears then similar to fears today?

Very much the same. We have friends losing their houses today. But perhaps a little scarier because there was a social significance to being blacklisted that isn’t present today. But it is socially acceptable today but McCarthy was painting everybody as a commy and it had a social stigma that people never experienced before.

Were people afraid of communists being in the country or more afraid of being victims?
There was hysteria sweeping the country. End of WWII we lost our enemy. No Japan, no Hitler. We had a big war industry built up. We had to find an enemy. There was a concerted effort to find the enemy and it was the communists. Government spent six years; 1945-51; there was a public relations campaign to build up the red-scare, which brought us Nixon in California.

When you played for communist groups, did their spread ideology?

No. They were just groups that met and I was entertainment after singing I would go home then they had speakers. These were the labor organizers and faculty of UW and I was singing in houses.

Did your friends that were blacklisted recover and are they still blacklisted today?

Some did and some didn’t. Burl Ives woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, Will Geer, fought tooth and nail. Some committed suicide. Edward R Murrow was a famous guy who challenged McCarthy on TV. He had a high nationwide rep and faced McCarthy and broke the bubble.

Were you angry at time and still today?

Not personally I was 16-18 and thought the whole thing was funny. I was learning 100’s of songs per year and knew 7000 and now 4000 songs people told me not to sing certain songs because they were communist songs. I sang marching songs that the blacks used to march on capital of South Africa and in the 1950’s I was told it was a communist song. Oleanna, about the farmers revolt in Norway 1870’s over poverty. We sang it in the 50’s but McCarthy said it was a commy song. But hell, it was just a great song.
I was angry when I was joining the army at age 18 and had to check off who I had sung for. FBI agents went to all my neighbors to ask if I was a communist. It pissed off my mom and my dad and me.

John Gamlam – experienced cold war during childhood

What experiences did you have with the cold war?
Most of the experienced I had were when I was younger. They had sirens that went off at school.
When I was 4 -5 years old my mother made me go down in the basement where we had a table to hide under. I think she went down there with me to make sure I went under the table.
I remember walking downtown Seattle and seeing signs showing the location to bomb shelters. We never actually went to a bomb shelter but I recognized the signs around town.
There were notices on TV that this was test with certain things to do in case we were attacked or had a nuclear war.

When they were practicing these were you ever afraid of an attack?
The government made us a little suspicious of the Russians. It is always in the back of your mind that you might be attacked. We didn’t trust them.

So you went back to the way you were living?
Yes. The cold war was just verbal attacks between the 2 countries. Nothing ever really happened.

When your mom had you go down to the basement? That wasn’t issued by the government mainly just your mom made you do it?
Yes, I was around 5-7 when this happened. My mother would round me up and I remember going down there by myself so my sister must have been at school.

Was there anything down there special?
WE were told the basement walls would protect us from radiation and so would the table we hid under.


Bill Arkins – Salesman for Swissair in 1964

What was your profession at the time?

I was a salesman for Swissair and I was sent on a trip to Eastern Europe. It was a fact finding trip because they wanted to develop travel business from eastern Europe to and from the United States, so that’s what I was doing there.

Where was it you went again?

The situation arose through having gone to Romania and Yugoslavia and when I returned to the United States going through immigration and customs, they looked at my passport and spotted that I had been in Romania. At that time I already had a visa for Romania and Yugoslavia but nonetheless at that time they instituted a new rule that anyone traveling to those countries that had been in the United States but was not a citizen of the US, was required to get a special visa from Washington DC to go there as a resident alien of the US.

Why do you think it was only non-citizens that had to get this visa?

Well, if an American has an American passport then they will get an endorsement on that to go but as I was traveling on an alien passport; the Republic of Ireland, I understand that when I got back, I was to have obtained an endorsement on my passport to say I could go there from the US government. It was not known to me and frankly I think it was a new rule that they instituted while I was already in Europe, so I wasn’t to be aware of it. Now having landed in New York, the immigrations officer asked me about what was in the passport and he said to me “Were you behind the Iron Curtain?” It was back I must say during the Kennedy administration and Robert Kennedy is the attorney general. I said, “yes I was,” he said “is Romania behind the iron curtain?” Well I laughed to myself because it was and he should have known that. Well anyway he says, “I can’t give you your passport back.”

Is this what happened during the trial?

There was no trial; it was an investigation. So I surrendered the passport and they said, “there is a likelihood that you may not get it back and you may be deported as having gone behind the iron curtain without the special permission that is required.” But I said, “I have the endorsements of the visa’s from Romania and Yugoslavia to cover the facts that I went there.” They said, “nonetheless you should have also got this from Washington.” Well, it was news to me.

So you didn’t feel like you did anything wrong?

I don’t believe I ever did anything wrong but it was a little bit of a twist in their way of looking at the rules I suppose. Generally, I suppose if they had that little rule on the books then they should have told me about it and I should have gotten that endorsement. So anyway, they said, “report here tomorrow morning in downtown Manhattan, to the office of immigration, and bring your lawyer if you will, and we will have to look into this because it’s cause for deportation.” So I called the general manager of the company in downtown Manhattan and he said not to worry about it, “just meet me at the office in the morning and we will go down in the company car.” So he arrived with the lawyer and himself and we went in and discussed this whole matter. They didn’t give me the passport back right away but they said, “we will let you go and continue to work within the company and we will let you know what the result will be.” I waited a week or two and I got the facts back from them that my passport would be returned but I didn’t really know what was the outcome because behind closed doors as they do in government, they trashed us out and one day I was in New York and the general manager called me into his office. This is some months later; he showed me this huge big thick book, leather bound, with huge big studs through it, holding it together, and emblazoned on the front cover were these huge big letters “Attorney General, United States of America, Robert F Kennedy vs. William Arkins”

Versus you?

Versus me. You’d think I had shot somebody. Crazy. So I looked at this thing and what they had discovered was that I had infringed upon this particular rule and as a consequence I had aught not to have gone behind the iron curtain but because I went on business for my company and it was the company that sent me there and they were also unaware of this rule, they fined my company. The fine was not upon me; it was upon my company as having sent me.

Were you relieved to hear that?

Yeah, in a way I didn’t have to pay a thousand bucks that they charged Swissair. The general manager never gave me the book back. I said, “don’t I get to keep this?” He said, “No, I’m keeping this, I paid for it.” He said, “it’s a beautiful piece on my bookcase, very few people ever have a case brought against them by the attorney general of the United States, so this is being kept here in the library.” I don’t know what ever became of this and I don’t care really. I did find out that my daughter pulled up this whole thing on the computer; the web really and there is this whole story.

Yeah, there is the whole thing on the web. Thank you for the story.