Collection context
Summary
- Creators:
- Ellie Schnitzer, 1922-1996
- Language:
- English.
Background
- Scope and content:
-
The Ellie Schnitzer Collection is divided into five series: PARTY BUILDING, LINE OF MARCH, FRONTLINE POLITICAL ORGANIZATIONS (FPO), CROSSROADS, and OTHER POLITICAL INTERESTS.
The first four series contain records of a particular political tendency associated in its origins with the Guardian Newspaper. Ellie Schnitzer was actively involved in this tendency from its beginnings in 1978 to its eventual dissolution in 1992. Each of these four series represents a particular political and organizational stage in its development. The tendency as a whole is generally known as "Line of March," the form it assumed during its most influential period, 1980 - 1989.
- Biographical / historical:
-
Ellie Schnitzer (1922-1996), a lifelong, political activist, was born in Munich Germany. She and her family fled the Nazi regime, settling in California in 1937. She attended Pasadena City College, U.C. Berkley, and Columbia University, graduating with an MSW. For 35 years she worked with children in Los Angeles as a social worker for Vista del Mar and other Jewish family agencies. She retired in the early 1980's to become, in her own words, "a full-time revolutionary."
As a social worker, she was active in her union. She was also a member of the Communist Party, USA (CPUSA). She and her first husband went underground and moved to Seattle during the McCarthy era. She met and married her second husband, Jerome Schnitzer, in the late 1950's. In the late 1970's, having left the communist party, she became involved with Line of March and its newspaper, Frontline. She was a study-group leader for the Line of March led, Marxist-Leninist Education Project (MLEP) as well as a writer and distributor for Frontline. She was also a leading activist in many of the organization's initiatives.
She continued her involvement with this political group as it developed into the Frontline Political Organization, and finally Crossroads, founded in conjunction with the Freedom Road Socialists. Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, Ellie was also involved in many local and national political initiatives which were supported by Line of March or related political organizations. She was sometimes represented Line of March (or its affiliates) while participating in these initiatives, which included the Committee for Justice (See Scope and Content), the movement to free Geronimo Pratt, a Black Panther Party member who was imprisoned under questionable circumstances, and the Rainbow Coalition, a political organization founded by Jesse Jackson. Ellie was a member of the Advisory Board of KPFK, Pacifica Radio's local affiliate station. She also become actively involved with the Committees of Correspondence (C0C), a leftist organization formed in 1992 by CPUSA members and other activists. Ellie participated in the COC's pre-foundation conference in Berkeley in 1992, and served as a member of both its local and national coordinating committees.
- Physical description:
- 2 Record Storage Boxes (2 Cubic Feet)
Access and use
- Location of this collection:
-
6120 S. Vermont AvenueLos Angeles, CA 90044, US
- Contact:
- (323) 759-6063