The Albert & Vera Weisbord Archives

This is the internet archives of Albert & Vera Weisbord, Leading Communist Radicals of the 1930's. Organizers of 1926 Passaic Textile Strike, 1929 Gastonia Textile Strike, leaders of the Communist League of Struggle 1931-37.

Albert Weisbord was born in New York City on December 9, 1900 of poor Russian Jewish parents. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the College of the City of New York in 1921. Upon graduation from CCNY he applied for the Harvard Law School ("not so much to study law, but to examine at close hand how law was the resultant of the action of social forces.") graduating with honors.

Albert joined the Brooklyn Branch of the Socialist Party, by 1920 he became an active organizer. In 1921 he was elected National Secretary of the Young Peoples Socialist League and later a member of the National Executive Committee of the Socialist Party. In 1924 he was a delegate to the Convention of the Conference for Progressive Political Action. Soon he would resign from the Socialist Party to join the Workers (Communist) Party. He moved to Paterson N.J. where he formed the United Front Committee of Textile Workers, and involved himself in a strike of Silk Mill Workers in West New York, N.J. From there he was on to Passaic where he organized a strike of over 16,000 workers. In Passaic he met Vera Buch.

Vera Buch was born August 19, 1895 in Forestville, Connecticut. As a child, she survived poverty in the tenements of New York. Vera attended Hunter High School (Valedictorian) and Hunter College where she won three First Prizes in French competition among colleges in the USA and Canada.

In a tuberculosis sanatorium Vera first became interested in the class struggle. In 1919 she joined the left wing of the Socialist Party, beginning a long period of work as a labor activist. She soon joined the Industrial Workers of the World, and then the Communist Party when it first formed in 1920. In 1922 she joined the Workers (Communist) Party. In 1926 she was sent to Passaic to help in the strike, there she met Albert Weisbord, who like Vera was a committed revolutionist.

After Passaic Albert and Vera were involved with the miners in the coal fields of Penn. (United Mine Workers) and in 1929 the Gastonia Textile Strike, where Vera was arrested for murder. In 1930 Albert and Vera separated from the Communist party and were briefly associated with The Left Opposition that was led by James P. Cannon and Max Shachtman (Communist League of America). At one point Albert was a Trotskyist but by 1931 he had moved outside of The Left Opposition towards a policy and program of his own.

In 1931 "The Communist League of Struggle" was formed with its official organ "Class Struggle". During the entire publication of Class Struggle (1931-1937) Albert was the main contributor. In 1932 Albert visited with Leon Trotsky for three weeks in Turkey. Latter he traveled to Germany and Spain, of these visits articles can be found in the collections of Class Struggle.

In 1937 Albert's book, "The Conquest of Power" was published, in 1964 his book "Latin American Actuality" was published. Vera's book "A Radical Life" was published in 1977 by Indiana University Press.

Albert Weisbord died in 1977.

Vera Buch Weisbord died in 1989.

ARTICLES:

Passaic Textile Strike of 1926:
Passaic
Passaic Reviewed
Strike Bulletins Part 1
Strike Bulletins Part 2
Strike Bulletins Part 3

Gastonia Textile Strike of 1929:
Strike at the Loray Mill

The Spanish Revolution:
The Spanish Revolution
The Spanish Revolution at the Crossroads
Long Live The Spanish Socialist Republic
The Underground Railway To Spain
Two Visits to Barcelona
Outcast Spain
The Huesca Front in Aragon
The Provocations of Bourgeois Democracy in Spain
Barricades in Barcelona
Perspectives of the Spanish Revolution
Collectivization in Catalonia
The Fight Within the Spanish Left
The P.O.U.M. in Spain
An Analysis of the Barcelona May Days
Unique Problems of the Spanish Revolution
Covering the Evacuation of the Refugees