Rubin family correspondence - letter from Larry Rubin to parents

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	Larry Rubin: Well, for the past two weeks I have been oriented. I have been oriented to [Comsol?]; I’ve been oriented to being a hall advisor. I have been oriented, in fact, up to my eyeballs. Actually, its been very interesting. I’ve learned quite a bit about the Antioch community that I never realized before. We have quite an interesting place here. For the first two days that we were here, we spent an orientation period in the Glen, where we discussed various problems of the community. Lot of new aspects of it were opened to me. For example, we discussed what would happen in the case of a girl who violated the sex standards of Antioch, and we learned about the way that the administration handles this and the philosophical background of all of this. And the same thing with the meetings involving orientation to serving on Comsol. Everything is very abstract, very philosophical. Its of course being a heretic to say this around here—I wouldn’t say it in front of anybody for the world—but sometimes philosophical questions, philosophical discussions get very tedious and tiresome. Someone defined a liberal as one who searches for the truth but doesn’t think he’ll ever find it. Well I tend to believe that, and anyway I’m under the influence right now of Barrows Dunham’s book and the section on the myth that there are two sides to every question. This, of course, is very prevalent in—prevalent at Antioch. Well in any case, I think I’ve mastered the Antioch-language and technique and I can discuss any question on the most abstract, philosophical basis. For example, after that meeting with one of the government professors here, who discussed the community, we had discussion groups afterwards—discussing the speech and discussing the community. Well I was one of the discussion leaders, and what you’re supposed to do is sit there and look profound and make statements which confuse a simple issue, which of course I did. The discussion we were having was about responsibility to the community—the individual’s responsibility to the community as whole.	0:00
	And we took, for example, cheating: why shouldn’t one cheat? Well, of course, there are—everybody came up with solid reasons why one shouldn’t cheat, which I promptly knocked down, thus leaving everybody totally confused about why you shouldn’t cheat at Antioch. And somebody asked the question of, what is the purpose of the community. They asked us at the beginning of the program, the beginning of the discussion. Well, after all this talk about cheating and why shouldn’t she and why you can get away with it very easily at Antioch, I said, very profoundly—somebody asked before, ‘what was the purpose of the community’—well, maybe this is the purpose: to question. Well, everybody patted me on the back; this is a very profound thing. However, this is just a technique that I’ve been copying off of the teachers, whose main purpose, evidently, is to question. We question this and we question that here. Well, I’m sounding very cynical now ‘cause it’s kind of late at night and, like I said I’ve been through a week and a half questioning, but it’s very interesting and is good mental exercise and it’s fun. And like I said, all you do is sit around and look profound.	2:52
	I hope there is a tape recorder there at Crystal Lake so you can, so you could hear this. I was going to, to write you a letter but my typewriter got broken in, in transit here along—on TWA and it’s at the repair shop. And, anyway, I have a lot to say and I rather spend a half-hour talking and typing or, or writing.
	And, anyway, I wanted to try out my new tape recorder here, this is what I’m doing it on. I got a few days ago and I’ve had a lot of fun with it so far. I’m very glad I have it. Thank you very much. I sound—I, I feel like an executive: instead of writing things like the common slobs, here I am dictating it into a little machine. It’s a lot of fun. And, I, I can see some serious use for it later on, when studying comes up. Well, like I said I had a lot of things to say. I hope you’re having a good time there. Did you meet any of your old friends from your past times? Who’s, who’s the, the entertainment? People notable like the Weavers, or, or such. I imagine there is a tape recorder there since—pardon the expression, such a bourgeois place must have some tape recorder.	4:51
	A terrible thing happened. Vicki Levine, who you met here—remember, in the cab? She was the one—she was the girl that I drove to California with. Well, she was visiting California over div-change, she was a terrible accident. She was driving down the steep hill at Berkeley with several mutual friends and they are in this old car—one of the guys from Acts for Peace, and, actually it was donated to Acts for Peace, it was this old Austin—and he couldn’t afford to have it fixed up so you try to fix it up himself. Well, he wasn’t driving. He was in the car; somebody else is driving who is a new driver—just got his learners permit, in fact-- and wasn’t used to driving altogether and wasn’t use to driving such an old car. Anyway, they were coming down the steep hill and the brakes failed. Another car was coming along a street at the bottom of the hill which ran perpendicular to it. The car that Vicki and my friends were in hit the second car broadside. It was an elderly couple, and an elderly lady who was sitting in the front seat beside the driver was killed, and the old man was hurt.
	Vicki’s hip was broken, and she’s now in Berkeley in the hospital, and she can have to stay in bed, she says, for six months. I called her up as I heard about the accident. She had an operation on her hip two days ago, and I spoke to her the day before she was going to have the operation and she said she felt lousy, which I can imagine, but she sounded pretty good. I got a letter from, from a friend of mine in Berkeley, who is working with us, who is working with Vicki and I. He told me the details of the accident, and he also said that Vicki has partial amnesia about it: she can remember what happened the day before, nor can she remember details of the accident, or she doesn’t even remember where she was going. And this is the part I’m worried about: I don’t know whether I told you this, but her parents and her brother and sister were all killed in one big car accident when she was 14, and she’s had all kinds of psychological difficulties since then about this incident. And this other car accident, it might psychologically scar her for life. But, as soon as they realized—as soon as the hospital in Berkeley realized she had partial amnesia they sent in a neurologist talk to her. I understand she’s improving; she’s remember certain details now. Anyway, she was in traction and she, she might have to wear a brace the rest of her life on her hip. The first thing she asked when she came out of the original unconsciousness was will she folk dance again, and nobody knows. She might not have to wear a brace. I mean, maybe everything will be okay.	7:25
	She—her life was saved by a passerby because when the car’s crashed, Vicki’s car caught on fire and she was pinned in the front seat, and this passerby put it out the fire extinguisher. So, everybody here has been very upset about that. I took care of arrangements, arrangements here for her, and a lot of red tape to go through. I, I did that for her. Had to change your address to Berkeley, and she’ll stay there. This is a terrible, terrible, terrible thing that happened to her.	9:20
	Well, thank you very much for the thank you note you sent, dad. That was a beautiful note I’m going to keep it. I have it in my, among my mementos, and I’m in a keep this forever. It was a very beautiful note.
	My sports, my new sports jacket in my new pair of pants came from, from Wanamaker’s, and I haven’t worn them yet but at least they’re here. And a few of the things I ordered from Wanamaker’s came, like a pants stretcher for when you wash and wear pants, you don’t have to iron them you just put them on there.
	Oh, as you notice, the bill for the year is enclosed, so we got to take care of that within 10 days I think, but I hope it doesn’t spoil of your vacation.
	Oh, another thing that happened on TWA. My—the suitcase that I was using, one of the handles ripped off when they were transporting it. I don’t know, I guess I had too much stuff in the suitcase; it was too heavy. Anyway, TWA is going to fix it free, and I had to mail into the repair shop, which I did yesterday. So, they should mail that back. They even paid for the postage. They were pretty nice about it, but at the time I was pretty mad.
	I’m taking some very interesting courses this quarter.
	taking a course in evolution, which is fascinating. I’ve always been interested in biology, and the, the—this course in evolution has a lot of philosophical overtones. In fact, the professor used to be in philosophy before he went into biology, so he approaches it from this way. And, of course, my knowledge in biology—my previous knowledge in biology, I’m sure will help me. In fact, the professor who teaches this course is the academic advisor for our hall, for the freshmen in our hall. And, so, I’ve been talking to him, you know, on a person-to-person basis. He invited us over his house and we met his wife and his kids and all. He’s a very nice guy. He used to—he went to school in Berkeley, in fact. So, he, in his wife and I had Lotta reminiscence, mutual friends and all. But anyway, he’s a nice guy in the course will be pretty interesting. The only thing is it starts at 8 o’clock in the morning, and sometimes 8 o’clocker’s are just useless simply because they are at 8 o’clock, and I don’t begin to function until 10 or 11 o’clock in the morning. But maybe I can bring a tape recorder to class and, and tape-record the lectures so I finally wake up I can play back again. I’ll have to do something. [Small laugh] also, I’m taking a course—oh, a very interesting course-- a new course, which they haven’t offered before. It’s called problems in social science, and what it is, there’s a group of visiting—a number of visiting lecturers are coming from Antioch—coming to Antioch—from various other universities and schools. And they are leaders, the top men in their field. Like they’re having a social psychologist come and an economist and a government—a political science professor, and several others.	12:02
	All in different areas of social science. A psychiatrist coming too. And each of them, each of them is going to give a lecture about how his individual field approaches certain social questions and approaches the, the idea of the individual. And, this is all the course is: just, you have to go to these lectures and there’s a lot of reading involved. Each of these visiting professors submits his own reading list to the school and you read and then you listen to a lecture and then there’s exams at the end. I’ll be visiting papers or anything in it. And this is really, really fascinating. It’s new blood. You get to hear new people, non-Antioch people. I’ve had most of the professors in the social science departments and, you know, after a while to get used to the teacher and having new blood come in is really great, especially such top men. And this—the—well, actually the main reason I took it is I feel this might help me decide which area I would like to go into. Here are these various people and accuracy which, which has an interest me the most, and then maybe I—maybe this will help me, at least, decide what my vocation will be. So, I’m pretty excited about that, and, anyway, there’s very few classes involved. There is only six or seven lectures. And the third course I’m taking is a course in labor relations, which is in the economic department. This is going to really be interesting. We study the rise of trade unionism, the collective bargaining, the theory of wage analysis, the political overtones of unions—how unions apply to the capitalist scene, how they relate to the capitalist society. We are going to study automation; just about every aspect of trade unionism. I’ll continue telling you about it but the time has now come to make the big switch to the other side of the tape. So, you turn it over, and, like I said, I hope you have a tape recorder there, listening to this in the first place.	14:12
	I have more tape left that I thought. It’s winding around. It’s going. It’s almost finished; turn me over now, I think.	16:47
	A nifty thing about this tape recorder is that it has an on and off switch right on the microphone, sign pacing up and down the room now—I can’t think better when I pace up and down. And I can turn it on and off at will without coming back to the, to the machine. It’s really great. Anyway, about this labor course. I – did I mention that, the teacher said that the same course that he’s going to give us now, it usually takes in two years to teach at Indiana where he, where he’s professor. And, see, he’s here only for the summer. He is an ex-Antiochian. I forgot if I mentioned that on the other side or not. What happened was, was, I was talking on the other side and the I, I, the machine stopped in the middle of a sentence. So, I stopped it and erased some to tell you to turn in over, now I forgot what I said. Anyway, he said it usually takes him two years to teach the same course he is going to teach in ten weeks here, because all the areas I mentioned before, wage analysis, collective bargaining, history etc. He has a separate course in Indiana, now he is giving it all to us in one course. Anyway, it should be fascinating. I’m a little, I don’t know, I get in these moods, but my mood right now is that I’m sick of philosophy, I’m sick of looking at things in perspective. I’m leaning now, just, I feel like I need some concrete analysis, some analysis of present situations instead of speaking in the abstract. That’s why I took this course in labor relations, it talks about the American scene today, although of course it’s a historical approach. It talks about living things and living forces in the country. This guy is kind of a liberal, he grew up in a union movement. One of his jobs growing up in Antioch was being an organizer for the CIO.
	He is an ADA type I guess. Sort of a center of the road liberal democrat who uh, thinks that trade union is inevitable but doesn’t put any moral connotation on it, and is objective. It was pretty funny, today we had the first class, he speaks very fast he gives you all kinds of information, you really feel under pressure. We have a young conservative in our class, a member of Young Americans for Freedom, and we also have a member of YPSL, Young Peoples Socialist League, and they are sitting on opposite sides of the class and I was watching them. Every time the professor would say something that tended towards liberal, the socialist would glower at the conservative and kind of giggle. And every time he said something that sounded antiunion, the conservative would make motions towards the socialist. Anyway, it should be very interesting. Oh, and the most interesting part of it was we get to visit trade union meetings, its one of the reasons I took it. My dad never lets me visit his union, but now I can visit some unions in Dayton, which I don’t even imagine as advanced as unions on the east coast. I don’t even know what kind of unions we will visit, but in the past all the teachers who have taught it, its always the most interesting part. We visit several trade union meetings. So it should be a pretty good course.	19:56
	I have been very busy, I have just been trying to get myself organized here. I have all these things all these courses. Uh, being on Comsol and being an adviser, but I’m improving at getting things done and not being carried away with my work. And I’m learning to say no to people. I have decided that the only things I’m going to do this quarter are Comsol and advising. I’m not going to get involved with any of the political groups, although everybody keeps asking me to, I kind of have an image on campus, a leader of the student left, which can get very tedious. I always look at it as a job itself rather than for the glory. Its kind of fun, and everyone knows me and everyone says hello and hi, how are you doing Larry? And everyone is very friendly, its OK. But uh, I’m more interested in the jobs itself, it mires, it gets in the way of work. One second…

	00:22:06.000 --> 00:24:17.000
	That was one of my freshmen asking a question. They have to fill out the form for uh, they are having the first meeting of their extramural, their job, you know, about getting jobs tomorrow. They have to right a self-analysis type paper and have to fill out various forms. I really pity these guys, there are so many forms to fill out, so many meetings to go to. But anyway, he's doing it, they are doing it I mean, but they have a lot of questions they ask. I guess its all necessary. Coop jobs, I don’t have a coop job yet, although I have a great opportunity. I spoke to, my advisor is on vacation right now, but I was speaking to another one and he said that Antioch has some possibilities of jobs in Canada. The Department of Immigration and something, the Department of Immigration and, farming, I don’t know. Has in Alberta and Saskatchewan is working with various private groups to uh, create farmer and consumer coops. Its kind of a socialist venture in these two provinces, the labor party up there is in the majority. Anyway, the professor thought it would be interesting if I could get a job with them in this area of adult education. He is not too sure what it involves, but he pictures it as something like going out in the field and working with farmers and, teaching them about the Department of Immigration and etc. I guess the first thing I’ll have to learn is the name of the department.
	And what these various private organizations, what their programs are, this is really education. It sounds great. Now, this is just the kind of thing I want, its in politics, but its working directly with individuals, which would use my psychological knowledge, not only working with people en masse, but working with them individually. It sounds perfect, but there are many problems involved. First of all, I would like to go back to Berkley for three months, because I’ve just been traveling around so much, I’d like to go back to a place where I’m known, instead of just starting over and over again each time and meeting new people. I like to go someplace where I have a lot of friends and a lot of roots, where I don’t have to start over, where I can develop things that I started before. I just hate to leave things floating, I’m getting lonely really, moving place to place. I know a lot of people a little. I don’t have any real close friends anywhere just because I haven’t been in any one place long enough to develop friends. But, anyway, I thought I could go to Berkley in my next coop period which is three months and then over next Spring and Summer when I have six months to work, work in Canada. The problem though is I haven’t decided yet if I want to go to Europe or not, go abroad or not. If I want to go abroad I probably won’t have that six-month period. So, everything depends on everything else and again I’m in the place of making decisions and I keep putting it off because I don’t know where I am. It would help me a lot if I could be sure of a major, if I could be sure of what I want to go into, but I’m not. The worst thing in the world for something like this is to jump into it, you know, I don’t want to pressure myself, I have a lot of important decisions to make and I always slow at making decisions, but I always make the right ones in the end and I always stick by them. So, I’m going to take my time and think about it and see counselors here and talk to people and get help then I’ll decide exactly what I want to do. Anyway, I have to write to Canada myself, they put it all in my hands. The coop advisor thinks I am mature enough to work it out myself rather than go through the college, which I would much rather do anyways because it eliminates all kinds of red tape. I’ll let you know about that as it develops.	24:17
	Oh, here’s something very important, when you get home there are two things I’d like you to send me. First of all, uh, the book by C Wright Mills called White Collar, I used that in another course and I’m using it also in this union course, instead of buying it here, and spending all that money, we have it at home so you might as well mail it to me.
	If you remember you mailed it to me once before and I brought it back, so now you will have to mail it to me again, oh anyway. Meanwhile, I’m using a library book on white collar. I’d like you to mail me that and also, I’m not sure where it is, its among my books in my room, it’s on the bookshelf somewhere so you will have to look for it. The other thing is this, on my, I think it’s on the record player, or its, its either on the record player in my room or near the old tape recorder. There is this cardboard box, there are a whole bunch of little things in it, it’s a small cardboard box. The top opens halfway down, its’ on a hinge. It’s a black box on a hinge and in it is a transistor battery and two small flashlight batteries and a thing that looks like a transistor with a wire attached to it to plug in. This transistor battery with the wire is a converter and I can use that on this, I think I can use this, on this tape recorder here so I don’t have to use the batteries all the time, I can just plug it into the wall socket, but you can’t, it’s not included with the set here. I think I can use that one. So, what I would like you to do, send me the whole box, I think that would be the simplest thing to do. If you can find this little box with the battery in it, with this converter in it, send me the whole thing along with the book. I appreciate that very much. Keep in mind when you get home to do that.	27:29
	Let’s see, I’ve told you about my courses and my extracurricular thing, which hasn’t been anything solid of course so far, it’s just been orientation. Half of its been orientation, half of its been resistance to forces. I think once I get more organized, I’ll be able to see my way clearer, I’m still in confused state, I’ve been putting off getting solidly organized, like I said I am doing better than I was before as far as getting things done. I’ve gotten more done at this point, in this quarter than I have done in past quarters. So, you go slow and you improve. The only real problem I am having in the social area.
	For some reason it is very difficult to get a good solid relationship going with a single girl, I don’t know, I think I am very inhibited. There have been so many times, I was sitting on the union today watching the girls go by, and I was counting all the girls who at one time or another I could have could have started something going with, but I just chickened out, it’s hard to describe. I am afraid to open myself I think. It’s a few things, I am afraid of commitment to one single person, you know I feel I want my freedom. I want to be free. Part of it is fear of opening myself up, to build a relationship you have to give a little and I am afraid of that. But again, as long as I recognize the problem, all I have to do is work on it and it gets solved. I must take one problem at a time though. I must take organization and getting work done and all my [unsure: (0:31:13)] about writing. About writing and reading, I go to take one at a time. Like I said before, I have improved tremendously in the writing and reading area, I really have. You know every time I improve in something it gives me more motivation to improve in something else. It gives me an ego boost. Now the problems are easier to solve than they were in the past. One second please, I have someone else who just came into the room.	29:57
	It’s been about half an hour since I just signed off. In that time Paul showed me a letter that he wrote to Vicky and my observation is, I didn’t tell him this of course, but I felt that it was kind of stilted. The editor of The Record, the school paper here, made a very astute observation, people that write in a stiff style and use many words and are very flowery, are those tend to be those who are afraid of themselves, afraid to reveal themselves, afraid of what they have to say, any maybe I write a sloppy coddy style, but at least I am not afraid of myself. Anyway, after that happened, it seems that someone had pinned a prophylactic full of chocolate milk up on the wall. So that was a little crisis we had, we had to throw the prophylactic away. And then another freshmen came in, the washing machine downstairs broke, and we fixed that for him. Anyway, now I am back. The tape is just about to run out and I have said everything I have to say. I hope you have a very good time and again I hope you get to hear this thing. Give my regards to all your friends up there. Don’t feel like you need to send back a tape. Write me a letter from Crystal. I am not necessarily going to send tapes every week of course. Like I said, it was just I had a lot of things to say and I did not feel like writing tonight, but some other time I might write. And don’t forget about the book and the thing, I’ll see ya.

	Larry Rubin: [in a southern accent] Howdy y’all. I’m here in a house smack dab in the middle of the rural area of Georgia. Where about 30 miles from Albany, Georgia. There’s no roads out here, just a red clay pass almost. There is no paved roads, I mean. The red clay roads of Georgia. The area around here is rather flat. There’s not too many swamps, although there is some. And there’s real beauty and the land. The, there, there’s many colors. There, there’s the red clay hills and the roads and the sort of shade green color of the fields. This is the pecan and peanut center of the world. Right here. It’s mostly because of peanuts they grow. They also grow cotton and corn. A friend of mine who is working with us, in fact our boss, Charles Sherrod, said that’s why they going to classes here: rich and poor. That is, white and black. There’s, you know, the theory of the unity between the poor whites in the Negroes, that, well this really existed after the Civil War. But there are no poor whites here. The whites of the owners of the vast plantations in the farms, and the Negroes work for them. Very few p- poor whites. There are some fairly wealthy Negroes who own some small farms, who own businesses or who are in the professions: lawyers, doctors, etc. (0:02:38)	0:00
	In fact, the structure, the structure of society is that there is a cast of voters, that is the whites, who through the Negro elite, that is, ministers, the teachers, and the professionals, transmit their system of segregation to all Negroes. Of course, is not as simple as all that. The leaders of the Albany movement are by in large, in fact 100%, Negro businessmen and lawyers and doctors.	2:38
	Larry Rubin: And, also, there’s quite a large group of ministers, who are the, in some cases, unwilling allies of the movement, but a lot of ministers have to do it or they lose a lot of members of their churches. I’m talking about the Albany movement, which is the movement for equal rights for Negroes in Albany. Actually, it was started by SNCC, or rather, it was started through SNCC instigation last year. And the group has now become—well there’s many conflicts between the adults in the Albany movement and the young people in SNCC. You know, there’s always conflicts in any movement. But, I was thinking about the ministers. A lot of them have to go along with the Albany movement or they, they lose members, and a lot of the Al-- ministers in the county’s, Lee County in Terrell County, that is rule areas, live in Albany and have come in contact with movement there and so Linda’s their churches in the counties and help us out quite a bit. The leading minister in the movement is a Reverend Wells. You know, when I say minister they are all Baptist down here, there is nothing else but Baptist, a few Methodist. Most of these people are not full-time ministers.
	Rev. Wells, for instance, who, who, who has four churches, for small churches in, in the counties, is a sandblaster out at the Marine bases here in Albany. I don’t know whether the majority of these have been ordained or whether they are lay ministers, but the, the position of the minister in, in Negro society here is very analogous to, oh the, let’s say union leader among, among workers. I mean, their word is taken [audio cuts out (0:05:42)] to be said, and they’re really, they have quite a bit of respect. Of course, they are losing it now as the young people are—become more educated and, and go to schools more. And, this makes a very uneasy, and this is one of the reasons, I think, why we get as much support as we do from the ministers.	4:52
	Larry Rubin: The school situation out here is just awful. I mean, the Negro high schools are, will you graduate; many people graduate from high school without ever learning how to read or write. Basically, high schools, the Negro high schools, and some of them are called—like in Lee County they call it the Monroe Negro Training School—and that’s just what the high schools do: they train the kids how to be Negroes. One doesn’t come to an overnight. There’s a lot of things to be learned. He got to learn to say ‘Yassa boss’ to every white man that talks—you got to learn to scratch your head and to laugh. It’s quite an art here. It—Negroes to become niggers. It’s quite a—its, its quite difficult.
	Larry Rubin: We’ve been working, well, about half our time in the city and have our time in the counties. There’s been a series of demonstrations the past week or so, the past week and a half in Albany. There’s a big boycott going on downtown, boycotting the downtown shopping centers because they don’t hire Negroes. Well, demonstrations are illegal in Albany and picketing is illegal in Albany. Actually, there is no law as such it’s taken as a matter of course that everybody who demonstrates will be arrested. In fact, the, the leader of the Albany movement sold out at one point and wrote an agreement with Chief Pritchett, who is the chief of police in Albany, that there would be no more demonstrations.
	Anyway, since there can’t be demonstrations, what we do is, kids walk through town, not in a line, just wander individually wearing T-shirts saying “don’t buy uptown or downtown.” SNCC people, and when I say kids I mean 13 and 14-year-olds from the high schools, SNCC people don’t take part in these because we don’t want to get arrested, we don’t want to stop our work. When we get arrested, our, our, our work is stopped. We can’t canvas we can’t go from door to door in the rural areas getting people to vote. We do everything we can to avoid arrest, in fact. Every time we are stopped by the police we are very polite. We, we avoid situations. We try not to drive in cars in an integrated group. We try not to walk through strange towns (there’s a lot of little towns around here) in an integrated group. Our main job is talking to Negroes and getting them to register to vote. There’s a lot more to it than that, I mean, I look at it in terms of this is, this is the first level of any real movement for social change. I hope, of course, that there will be unionization down here of the workers. They were very careful to, to not arrested. We take many safeguards. We’re, we’re, with were eating regularly. We, when we live out in the counties, we live with people who, well you know, give us a lot of whatever they got. When we live in Albany, we have good food, it’s not extravagant, but we eat three meals a day and we get a lot of sleep. The work isn’t that hard physically. For one thing, we can’t work too much during the day because people aren’t home from, aren’t home from work, so we have to go for three or four hours a day. That’s all we can work. The rest of the time we write reports to the central office or we read or talk or do research. This past week has been pretty busy, working on this demonstration behind-the-scenes. But, see, every move we take, every fart we make, we have to write a report. I carry around a little green book, and I mean, every time I, I blow my nose, I have to write this down this book.	8:15
	And, each day we write up reports for the central office in Atlanta. And each week we make a summary of these daily reports. And we also have to fill out an activity chart, that is, where were going to be every second of every day. So, everybody, you know in Southwest Georgia, in Atlanta, knows where everybody is every second of the day that way if something happens, they get on it right away. I mean, for instance, when we were put in jail, Atlanta heard about it within an hour. Atlanta knew that we were in jail. And, it’s done this way. I mean, it’s not a haphazard thing.	11:04
	Larry Rubin: The people that are in charge—one thing that really tickles me down here is the attitude that people have towards Jews. You know, it’s no exaggeration to say that every Jew down here is rich. Albany was founded, evidently, by a group of Jewish businessmen back before the Civil War. In fact, Albany was named after Albany, New York in the hope that it would become an industrial center of the South, which it never did become. It’s becoming a, the transport center if anything. Anyway, everybody down here—I mean the concept of Jew is totally out of people’s thinking. Everybody maybe knows one Jew, and they work for him. Everybody has worked for a Jew. I was, I was—when I hitchhiked to Albany, I was—I got a ride from a truck driver, and he was telling me that the owner of this truck company was a full-blooded Jew, and that this was the only Jew he had ever seen in his life.
	It, it, it was amazing. He said that this guy looked amazing. He was kind of short with dark hair and a big nose. There’s no a—there’s no real anti-Semitism as such. It’s just a Jew is an oddity. Jew is considered somebody who is very shrewd and rich. I’ve attended to Jewish services here, I took your advice Ma, and the first thing I did when I got here was go to synagogue, they’ve got a lot of people of the Jewish faith. And, the stereotype is [unsure: (0:13:57)], they’re rich and they stick together. They stick together because they have a real moral superiority. Remember that the Jews here are not second or third generation. They’re, they’re not peoples whose parents were immigrants. Jews have been in this area for hundreds and hundreds of years. A lot of them, a lot of their parents fought in the war for the South. Its—you run across people named Stonewall Cohen. There, there’s somebody in the phonebook named Abner Israel. They’re part of the Southern tradition. They have a southern accent. They, by in large, consider themselves outside of the southern problems, and, and they don’t associate the South, really, with themselves, although, I mean, they, they do in the historical sense that they’ve been here a long time.	13:17
	But, they’re, they, well they consider themselves above the whole situation. They consider themselves above both white and Negroes, you know, the typical white southerner and the Negro. You really can’t discuss the problem with them. They’re much wrapped up in their own affairs. They tend to be much more intellectual than most people here. And they, of course, are very proud of, of being Jews. And, like I said, they have this superiority complex. I spoke to the Rabbi. I became pretty good friends with the Rabbi, in fact, of Albany, Rabbi Friedman. And—well he’s, he’s only been here about three years. He’s from Connecticut, and he says he believes in separate but equal, and that he doesn’t understand why people are coming down here to—you know, why they are so interested in the problem. And I told him why it’s an important problem, and, you know, we discuss it. I went after services—he invited me over to his house one night.	15:07
	Larry Rubin: Well, I’ve got a lot more to say but the tape is running out, so flip it over. It’s, it’s going. I’m going to stop now. Oh, you know, to put this thing on three and three-fourths rotations per minute there.
	[no voice (0:16:43) –(0:17:02)]
	Larry Rubin: Interesting that a lot of the Negroes here feel that the situation would have been a lot worse if the Ne—if the Jews hadn’t been the bosses because they still feel a sense of identification with the concept of Jews, because the Jews, they feel, were an oppressed people just like they are now.
	Larry Rubin: Ma and dad, I’m going to have to do something that I know is going to upset you very much, and I can only hope that it doesn’t upset you too much, you’re not overly upset by it. Remember I told you that I need to stay here extra weeks to make up credit for school, that I didn’t spend enough weeks at my other jobs. Remember, I’ve come home after every job. I even came home when I was in San Francisco, and—you know, I, I cut some time off my jobs because I stay home longer than I should have. Well, I’m going to have to stay here straight through until school starts to get this credit.
	I’m going have to do that, and I, I will be able to come home. I know that, under the circumstances, that it would be better if I came home, and I know that this is—I know that you both had a very hard time of it while I’ve been down here, and I—you, you know, I just can’t tell you how much it hurts me that you are going through this. I mean, every time I speak to you I, I can’t do anything for the rest of the night. I just sit there and, and, and—I mean, every time I even hear from you, when you—when Ma called Faith and Penny, Faith I think she spoke to, and told her to write—I, I just couldn’t do anything for the rest of the time. I just had to sit and, and, and worry. I know, I know this hurts you, and I wish I could come home, but I just can’t. And, you know, I love both of you very much. It’s the truth, but I just can’t do it. I, I hope that you are, that you’re not disa—you know, that you’re not any more upset than you are upset now. And Ma, please don’t worry. Everything is, is fine here. This—I’m doing something which I feel is, is very important. I’m getting a lot out of it. And tell the Greiber’s that I’m, I really am sorry that I can’t come to the wedding, it just can’t be done. I can’t do everything. And, I have to live up to my responsibilities. It’s very important.	18:22
	Larry Rubin: Oh, I’m sending, in this package here, the movie that I took so far. Actually, I made a bad mistake.
	I should’ve brought the, you know, camera, the regular camera, to take slides or snapshots. For one thing, I’m not always around a place where I have electricity to take indoor movies. Most of my movies is indoors instead of outdoors. And, it’s really a pain on the people that I take it, too, when I do find electricity, because a movie has to be on a long time in the light is very bright and it breaks up the meetings, you know, that I take it from, and I have to make more of a big deal out of it that I wanted to. Also, it’s, it’s too big. If I had just a little camera, it would be a lot better. And, anyway, there is no projection down here to see them. A lot of people want to see the movies that I took and I, I don’t have anything to show it on. But, be that as it may, I would appreciate it very much if you would develop these pictures. I’m going to, of course, take the rest of the films and use up all the films that I have. There’s plenty of things to take pictures of down here. And, it’s fun. It’s a lot of fun for me to use the movie camera. I’m experiment with different things. I’m experimenting with the telephoto lens and with taking pictures from automobiles and with close-up shots. That’s why a lot of the pictures, I guess, won’t come out because this is the first time that I’ve done it with this. But it is a heck of a lot of fun, and the telephoto lens adds quite a bit to things that I can do. I’ve also experimented with taking slow, slow-motion movies and things like that. So, if you could develop them, don’t send them down here because there’s nothing we can do with them, and as I take more movies, I’ll send them back. I would, you know, I would love to see them, but there’s no way to do it. But I’ve become known for taking movies of things, and, you know, this is what I do. And they requested that I take some movies for them; that is, the officials of SNCC requested that the movies I take be used for SNCC.	20:37
	Maybe they’ll pay for the film, I don’t know, if I get anything good. But, like I say, a lot of the things that I’ve done our new and experiments. So, so I don’t know how it’s, how it’s going to be, and if you could develop, develop them I, I would appreciate it. I would like to take the movie camera with me to Antioch to take movies there. You know, I really get a kick out of this. I, I really enjoy it. Oh, but, I remember that dad want remember that dad wanted, dad wanted to take movies of the show. I could mail the camera to you, I could send it, if you could give me the name—the, the time synagogue show will be. And, then, when you’re finished with the camera, you could just mail it back to Antioch. Once I get finished here there will be any rush, you know, to take movies at Antioch. In fact, I could just take it—you know, even if it just got there in the last week or so, even if, even if I just had it at Antioch a few days, and then I could bring it home when I come home after next quarter, you know, next quarter at Antioch. I will be home then. So, I, you know, like I said, if you just tell me when the date is, I could send it back.	23:17
	Larry Rubin: How is everybody? Is Graham okay, both grandmas? Would you please, please give my regards and my love to grandma Rubin and grandma Pauline. I know I should write to both of them, and I haven’t written to anybody, you know the way I am, and it’s especially—the way I am about writing letters, it’s hard, and it’s especially hard down here when I’m so interested in what I’m doing; I’m so engrossed in the whole atmosphere down here.
	Well, give, give them my love, and be sure to tell Goldie and Bobby that I’m sorry that I can’t come to the wedding. I’ll, I’ll send them a card or a gift or something. I am very sorry.	25:32
	Larry Rubin: Oh, speaking of the camera. I’m very glad that dad bought that filter holder for the telephoto lens. I’ve used that quite a bit. I’ve taken a lot of outdoor movies with my indoor film. Like I say, most of my film was taken indoors.
	Larry Rubin: Good news! A lot of good news. I got the Antioch record today, and it said that the NSA—remember that’s what I fought so hard for last quarter—won. They said that the Antioch committee to abolish NSA didn’t even form this quarter, and NSA isn’t very gratified to that, because of that. I think that NSA, the National Student Association, is a very important thing for Antioch, and could serve a very good, a good purpose there. Speaking of the record that I got, I want to read an editorial to. It said—I, I want to read this—it says—this is the editorial column:
	“Southern salutes”—that’s the name of the, the headline—it said: “Larry Rubin”—that’s me—“is doing something useful this quarter, and he didn’t have to spend four days in jail to know it. We had to hear of his arrest to know that he was doing something useful. We salute Larry. The unfortunate aspect of our salute is that it’s become ritualized and disbelieved. It’s hard to be taken seriously, but we mean it. We salute Larry. It’s heartening to know that Sheriff Zeke T. Matthews, called all sorts of names by the New York Times and even more reputable sources, did not try any funny business this time. We refuse to question people’s motives. We also salute sheriff Zeke T. Matthews of Terrell County, Georgia this week.”
	Larry Rubin: And you asked me why I love Antioch so much. Antioch is undoubtedly the greatest place on earth. I just miss a lot. Wherever I go I miss Antioch. I’m always talking about things.
	Larry Rubin: As I was making this very serious recording, one of my fellow coworkers, Jack Chatfield, bust into the room and rudely interrupted this recording. He’s, he’s pushing his way forward and insist on saying something to you, some going to give him the chance before he socks me over the head with his [unsure (0:28:40)] which he suing over his head in the air right now.	28:16
	Jack Chatfield: Hello, Mrs. Rubin, I’m certainly glad to be speaking with you from Southwest Georgia. Things are required around here now. I just got out of jail, myself, [unsure: (0:28:52)]. Things were all right jail. First, I believe in equality, of course, I believe that one people is as good as the next.
	Larry Rubin: Jack, Jack is our interpreter of the southern mind. He does a very good imitation of our good white brothers down here. He got put in jail during the demonstration. He was walking down the street and he stopped to talk to one of the girls that had a T-shirt on. When the police stopped him and asked for his identification and he refused to give it, he thought he was being a big civil rights—you know, that this was a terrific civil liberties position. Myself, I thought it was idiotic: it wasn’t necessary for him to go to jail. He was put in jail for refusing to obey a, obey an officer. You know, these cops don’t put you in jail unless they have something on you. Now, I was stopped also. I happen to be driving down the street during this demonstration. But they let me go because I was very polite to them, and, you know, I’m not interested in going to jail. Jack, I don’t know, maybe he likes it in jail or something.
	Larry Rubin: Well, anyway, I hope you have a very good Thanksgiving weekend.
	We’re going to Nashville, Tennessee this afternoon. This is—today is—Wednesday, and were going to Nashville. There’s going be a big conference in Nashville over, over the Thanksgiving holiday. Can be a lot of fun. People from all over the country are going to be there. This can be parties and dancing around, and everybody kind of lets loose, let’s all their tensions out. And, of course, there serious business too. I’ve never been to Nashville. We’re leaving pretty late tonight. We have a meeting to go to tonight and then were leaving. So, I’m looking forward to it. You know, it sounds like a lot of fun. Everything down here isn’t work.	30:13
	Larry Rubin: You know, while I’ve been down here, I’ve read quite a bit and I’ve written quite a bit too. I’m really trying to get over my phobia against writing. You know, all these reports I have to write—is what I’ve been writing, and I think it’s helped me. And I, I have read—I’ve read this collection of books. Dad might be interested in getting this: it’s a book called The Nonconformers. It’s a paperback put out by, by Valentine. I’m sure you can get it on any newsstand. It’s a collection of about 40 essays on all sorts of different subjects. They have things in here by Martin Luther King, by James Reston, by Bruno Bettelheim, by Basil Davison, and he goes on and on Carey McWilliams wrote something. And on all sorts of subjects: on, on the European situation, on the American situation. It’s, it’s very good and its encapsule gives a lot of the, not radical, but liberal interpretation of national and international affairs.
	Larry Rubin: I know that dad wanted to discuss with me the possibilities of my future, I guess generally, and staying down here. I’m very interested to discuss this with him. I would like to do it. Sorry that I will be home to do it. I, I guess the best way, dad—I would appreciate very much if he did it—would be to tape your ideas and send them down here.
	I hope you have enough tape up there. If not, you can just buy some or erase this and send it up. If you can tape your ideas to me, see, then I could send back a tape back and forth, and we can discuss it like this. It’s better than doing it over the phone or through letters. And is the next best thing to doing it face-to-face, to me being home.	32:44
	Larry Rubin: Well, it’s getting about the end of the tape. I’ll be signing off. We’re, we’re going to Nashville. I’m sorry I had to cut you off the telephone so, so abruptly last time, but the—everybody was yelling at me, and I, I just couldn’t keep talking. Well, everything down here is okay, and I’m happy and doing a lot of good work. I’ll be home at the end of next quarter.
	[end of audio]

Item Info

Title:

Rubin family correspondence - letter from Larry Rubin to parents

Date:

July 16, 1962
November 21, 1962

Creator:

Rubin, Larry, 1942-

Description:

The audio in this recording has been digitally processed to reduce noise and enhance clarity. The unprocessed preservation file can be requested by contacting the John Hope Franklin Research Center for African and African American History and Culture https://library.duke.edu/rubenstein/franklin.

Subject:

Format: