Collection Guide
Collection Title:
Collection Number:
Get Items:
View entire collection guide
Search this collection
Table of contents
Title: C.
Frank
Glass
papers
papers
Date (inclusive): 1913-1987
Collection Number: 2004C12
Contributing Institution: Hoover Institution Library and Archives
Language of Material:
English
Physical Description:
3 manuscript boxes
(1.2 Linear Feet)
Abstract: Correspondence, writings, police reports, personal documents, printed matter, photographs, and postcards, relating to Trotskyism
in South Africa, China and the United States. Includes many letters by Rayna Prohme, American revolutionary journalist in
China and sister-in-law of Glass.
Creator:
Prohme, Rayna, -1927
Creator:
Glass, C.
Frank
(Cecil Frank), 1901-1988
Glass, C.
Frank
(Cecil Frank), 1901-1988
Physical Location: Hoover Institution Library & Archives
The collection is open for research; materials must be requested in advance via our reservation system. If there are audiovisual
or digital media material in the collection, they must be reformatted before providing access.
For copyright status, please contact the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
Acquired by the Hoover Institution Library & Archives in 2004.
[Identification of item], C.
Frank
Glass
papers, [Box no., Folder no. or title], Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
Frank
Glass
papers, [Box no., Folder no. or title], Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
| 1901 | Born, Birmingham, England |
| 1909 | Immigrated to South Africa |
| 1921 | Founding member, Communist Party of South Africa |
| 1931 | Relocated to China |
| 1932-1933 | Tass News Agency writer, Shanghai |
| 1934-1935 | Shanghai Evening Post and Mercury reporter |
| 1935-1936 | Shanghai Times reporter |
| 1935-1937 | Secretary, Communist League of China |
| 1938-1941 | China Weekly Review writer, Shanghai |
| 1942 | Relocated to the United States |
| 1944-1963 | National Committee member, Socialist Workers Party |
| 1988 | Died, Los Angeles, California |
Scope and Content of Collection
Cecil
Frank
Glass
was a radical journalist and revolutionary political activist on three continents. He was a founding member of the Communist
Party of South Africa in 1921, and in 1928 became an early adherent of the International Left Opposition led by Leon Trotsky.
After relocating to Shanghai, China, in 1931, he spent most of the next decade there, working as a journalist. Concurrently
he was actively involved in rebuilding the Trotskyist movement in China, and was a member of the Central Committee of the
Communist League of China. Glass was closely associated with radical American journalists in Shanghai, including Wilbur Burton
and Harold Isaacs. There he also met the American Grace Simons (1901-1985). She was first married to Burton and afterwards
to Glass. Grace's older sister Rayna Simons Prohme (1894-1927) had been a prominent figure among Western revolutionaries involved
with the Left Guomindang, had edited the
Peking People's Tribune and other journals, and had been an associate of Mikhail Borodin and Song Qingling (Madame Sun Yat-sen). Rayna accompanied
Madame Sun to the Soviet Union following the failure of the 1927 revolution in China, and died suddenly in Moscow, evidently
of a brain tumor.
Frank
Glass
was a radical journalist and revolutionary political activist on three continents. He was a founding member of the Communist
Party of South Africa in 1921, and in 1928 became an early adherent of the International Left Opposition led by Leon Trotsky.
After relocating to Shanghai, China, in 1931, he spent most of the next decade there, working as a journalist. Concurrently
he was actively involved in rebuilding the Trotskyist movement in China, and was a member of the Central Committee of the
Communist League of China. Glass was closely associated with radical American journalists in Shanghai, including Wilbur Burton
and Harold Isaacs. There he also met the American Grace Simons (1901-1985). She was first married to Burton and afterwards
to Glass. Grace's older sister Rayna Simons Prohme (1894-1927) had been a prominent figure among Western revolutionaries involved
with the Left Guomindang, had edited the
Peking People's Tribune and other journals, and had been an associate of Mikhail Borodin and Song Qingling (Madame Sun Yat-sen). Rayna accompanied
Madame Sun to the Soviet Union following the failure of the 1927 revolution in China, and died suddenly in Moscow, evidently
of a brain tumor.
After two trips to the United States and Mexico (where he conferred with Trotsky) during the 1930s, Glass relocated permanently
to the United States during World War II. There, he was for years a leading member of the Socialist Workers Party, but eventually
developed a more sympathetic view of the Maoist government of China than could easily be reconciled with an orthodox Trotskyist
position.
In political work
Glass made use of the pseudonyms
Frank
Graves, Li Fu-ren and John Liang. He is the subject of a biography by Baruch Hirson,
The Restless Revolutionary:
Frank
Glass
(London: Porcupine Press, 2003).
Glass made use of the pseudonyms
Frank
Graves, Li Fu-ren and John Liang. He is the subject of a biography by Baruch Hirson,
The Restless Revolutionary:
Frank
Glass
(London: Porcupine Press, 2003).
The C.
Frank
Glass
papers in the Hoover Institution Library & Archives were acquired from Susan Weissman in 2003. The collection is small. Glass
papers are also a component of the S. A. Rochlin collection of South African political and trade union organizations (Fonds
C009), held at Concordia University Library Special Collections, but it seems likely that many other papers did not survive.
Frank
Glass
papers in the Hoover Institution Library & Archives were acquired from Susan Weissman in 2003. The collection is small. Glass
papers are also a component of the S. A. Rochlin collection of South African political and trade union organizations (Fonds
C009), held at Concordia University Library Special Collections, but it seems likely that many other papers did not survive.
The collection is arranged in four series:
Correspondence,
Speeches and Writings,
Subject File, and
Audiovisual File. Of particular interest are many lengthy letters by Rayna Prohme, some written to her sister Grace, and some written to her
second husband William Prohme and passed on to Grace when Prohme died in 1935. The collection also includes printed copies
of political articles by Glass, and photocopies of surveillance reports on Glass and associates made by British, French and
American police and consular authorities in Shanghai.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Communism -- United States
Americans -- China
Communism -- China
China -- History -- Republic, 1912-1949
Communism -- South Africa
Fourth International