Tracy Blake teaches Social Studies at Olmsted Falls High School in northeastern Ohio. Born and raised in Oregon, he has been in the classroom for more than 20 years. He has participated in two ALBA teacher institutes and is one of the co-authors of ALBA’s Social Studies lesson plans available on the newly launched...
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Human Rights Education has been around for some thirty years. How can we give students a deeper understanding of human rights and the skills they need to pursue positive social change? Thoughts from a veteran in the field.
Human Rights Education has been around for some thirty years. How can we give students a deeper...
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Bill Aalto’s brief, intense life (1915-1958) spanned the turbulent mid-20th century. He was an intelligent, street-wise Finnish-American boy from New York who in Spain became a Republican guerrilla fighter and a poet. After Spain, he found himself burned, betrayed, and persecuted. Aalto’s is one of five lives featured in Helen Graham’s new book.
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It’s because of each of you, our community, that we are able to succeed in our mission to promote social activism and defend human rights as the legacy of the Lincoln Brigade.
This work, of course, requires us all to renew our commitments.
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Racial equality and civil rights live at the core of the Lincoln Brigade. About 90 African Americans volunteered to serve in the ranks—as soldiers, drivers, mechanics, nurses, doctors, journalists, and social workers. The only prominent entertainer who visited the U.S. volunteers in Spain was Paul Robeson.
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From bone-dry Afghan mountains to fertile Salvadorian highlands, from the hell of Guantánamo prison to Texas deserts, from paradisiacal Pacific islands to battlefields of the Spanish Civil War, ALBA’s annual Human Rights Documentary Film Series, held in New York at Pace University last November, featured seven films depicting stories of struggle against oppression and...
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ALBA's 78th reunion on Sunday, April 27 honors the memory of Pete Seeger and features Bryan Stevenson, winner of the 2014 ALBA/Puffin Award. Tickets | Video | Press Kit
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Bryan Stevenson, the founder and Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative, will accept the fourth ALBA/Puffin Award for Human Rights Activism award at ALBA’s annual event in New York on April 27.
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Pete Seeger, the most important progressive musician of his generation, and the most revered, died of natural causes on January 28. He was 94. He was a faithful friend of VALB and ALBA for sixty years. His legendary Songs of the Lincoln Battalion came out in 1944. “As long as I live,” he said...
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The visitor enters a small passageway leading to the 17 room Pablo Casals Museum in Vendrell, Spain, at once immersed in cello music and a voiceover narration from the diary of a young Casals. The music surrounds a display of some of the first instruments belonging to the artist. This multisensory approach to the...
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Dear Friends,
This has been an ambitious year for ALBA as we continue to grow our human rights initiatives and strengthen our educational programming. We recently wrapped up our Third Annual Human Rights Documentary Film Series, Impugning Impunity, at Pace University. It was a terrific showing that included powerful films on a range of...
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Dear Editor,
Fine piece about Bart van der Schelling in the September issue. I recall going along with Alvah and Bart on two occasions, somewhere between 1949 and 1951, where Alvah spoke about Spain, and Bart sang. The place where one was held was at the old mission in Santa Barbara, California. I vividly recall...
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Paso a la juventud. Movilización democrática, estalinismo y revolución en la República Española. By Sandra Souto Kustrín. (Valencia: PUV, Universitat de Valencia, 2013.)
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The Faith and the Fury: Popular Anticlerical Violence and Iconoclasm in Spain, 1931-1936. By Maria Thomas. (Brighton: Cañada Blanch Centre for Contemporary Spanish Studies/Sussex Academic Press, 2013.)
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Carlos Blanco Aguinaga, a preeminent scholar of Spanish literature, a refugee of the Spanish Civil War, and a great friend of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and ALBA, died on September 11. A prolific, rigorous and charismatic scholar, he helped reshape the field of Hispanic Studies in the United States and Spain.
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In June 1935, nearly 2,000 young, unemployed, and angry men living in western Canada and intent on demonstrating their discontent hitched a ride on a train of boxcars to Ottawa. The men who participated in the “On-to-Ottawa Trek” were fed up with the abhorrent conditions in Prime Minister Richard Bennett’s ‘relief camps’ and...
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In every issue of The Volunteer we introduce two members of the ALBA community. Meet Spanish professor Evelyn Scaramella and author Victor Grossman.
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El bombardeo de Gernika es un evento muy complejo. En este artículo he procurado dar respuesta a uno de los aspectos más críticos sobre el bombardeo, su naturaleza. Procuraré asimismo exponer una cuestión íntimamente ligada a la historia del bombardeo y de gran relevancia tal cual es el negacionismo producto de la política propagandística...
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The bombing of Gernika, in April 1937, continues to be shrouded in mystery and lies. Xabier Irujo has spent six years researching 12,000 documents from Basque, Spanish, French, British, United States and Italian archives. A summary of his findings.
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Last May, in a historic verdict, former Guatemala dictator Ríos Montt was found guilty of genocide. Ten days later the verdict was vacated in a controversial split decision by Guatemala's highest court. Pamela Yates and Paco de Onís filmed the entire trial.
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In February 1940, one year after the end of the Spanish Civil War, eight members of the Lincoln-Washington Battalion still languished in Spanish prisons. Among them were Peter Kerhlicker, Rudolph Opara, and Larry Doran. Buried in the Spanish military archives are documents of their trials. An original investigation.
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A principios de febrero de 1940, casi un año después de finalizada la guerra civil española, aún habían 8 brigadistas norteamericanos encarcelados en prisiones españolas. Estos voluntarios no habían sido liberados junto al resto de sus compatriotas, pues habían estado sometidos a Causas Judiciales militares por el Ejército vencedor y condenados por supuestos delitos...
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Carl Geiser, political commissar of the Lincoln Battalion, prisoner of war held in Spain until 1939, and author of Prisoners of the Good Fight, left the letters he wrote to his family to the ALBA collection. The complete letters, edited by Peter N. Carroll and Fraser Ottanelli, have just published by Kent State University...
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Jewish volunteers from Palestine and the central role of the Virgen del Pilar in the rise of Spanish National-Catholicism are the topics of this year’s award-winning essays.
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ALBA is proud to announce a new website for high school teachers in Social Studies, Spanish, and English Language Arts, featuring resources and lesson plans aligned with the Common Core State Standards.
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ALBA’s third human rights film series, held at Pace University this past November, featured eight compelling documentaries. Richard Rowley’s Dirty Wars (2013) lays bare the dirty little secret of America’s War on Terror with the help of investigative reporter Jeremy Scahill; Tatiana Huezo’s The Tiniest Place (2012) tells the story of Cinquera, a village literally wiped off the official...
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“Singing was an important part of our life in Spain,” wrote Lincoln Brigade volunteer Carl Geiser. And music was a strong theme at the West Coast ALBA annual reunion held at the Freight & Salvage music hall in Berkeley, California on October 6.
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An unprecedented 71 New York high school teachers—who collectively teach more than 7,000 students every day—gathered at the King Juan Carlos I of Spain Center on November 5 for a full-day workshop. The ALBA institute, taught by Peter Carroll, James Fernández, and Sebastiaan Faber, introduced teachers of Social Studies, Spanish, and English Language Arts...
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In Spain with Orwell: George Orwell and the Independent Labour Party Volunteers in the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939, by Christopher Hall (Tippermuir Books, Perth, 2013) £12.50
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In and Out of the Lion’s Den: Poverty, War and Football by Julie Ryan (2013) £9.99
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Franco’s International Brigades: Adventurers, Fascists and Christian Crusaders in the Spanish Civil War, by Christopher Othen (Hurst & Company, London, 2013) £15.99
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The Spanish Civil War: Exhuming a Buried Past, edited by Anindya Raychaudhuri (University of Wales Press, Cardiff, 2013) £90
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Norman Bethune in Spain: Commitment, Crisis and Conspiracy, by David Lethbridge (Sussex Academic Press, Eastbourne, 2013) £25
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Physical Resistance: A Hundred Years of Anti-Fascism, by Dave Hann (Zero Books, Winchester, 2013) £18.99*
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A Short History of the Spanish Civil War, by Julián Casanova (IB Tauris, London, 2012) £12.99
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The Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives (ALBA) is an educational non-profit dedicated to promoting social activism and the defense of human rights. ALBA’s work is inspired by the American volunteers of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade who fought fascism in the Spanish Civil War (1936-39). Learn more at our website or
sign up to receive email updates from ALBA. Support ALBA through a tax-deductible gift! To inquire about a donation, please contact the ALBA office at info@alba-valb.org or 212-674-5398.
My grandfather (Nana), Suresh, moved to the United States in 1959 as a young man on a student visa pursuing his master’s degree. His parents, my great grandparents, sought value in being ‘foreign educated’ and bringing his education home – to Mumbai, India to run their family business. 2 years after my Nana moved...
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Peter N. Carroll, a respected and prolific writer, poet, and US historian, died after a short illness on September 16, surrounded by his family. He was 80. Born in New York City in 1943 to a secular Jewish family, Peter grew up in the Bronx and Queens, where his father worked as a composer,...
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LA RÉPUBLIQUE -QUOTIDINEN DE COMBAT RADICAL ET SOCIALISTE, February 5, 1938 Foreign Volunteer Arrested On March 27 last, 29 North Americans were arrested on board the boat Sans-Pareil while they were attempting to reach the Spanish Coast. They were sentenced to a prison term for violating the decree of February 18, 1937 on the...
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The “Spanija” series translates selected autobiographical accounts by Yugoslavian and Montenegrin volunteers of their actions in the Spanish Civil War. Dr. Ray Hoff used Google translate from Croatian to English and he edited the selections. As this is a machine translation, the idiomatic features of Croatian or Serbian and the translation of names and...
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The Spanija series translates select autobiographical accounts by Yugoslavian and Montenegrin volunteers of their actions in the Spanish Civil War. Dr. Ray Hoff used Google Translate from Croatian to English and he edited the selections. As this is a machine translation, the idiomatic features of Croatioan or Serbian and the translation of names and...
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Peter Verburgh’s translation from the French Newpaper Le Journal about a group of 29 Americans arrested in France. “29 American Volunteers Arrested in Muret” Le Journal, 5 April 1937 Toulouse, 4 April- The Control services of the Non-Intervention Committee do not remain inactive, especially with the help of the French Police and Gendarmerie. Thus...
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ALBA Board Member Steve Birnbaum made the trek on Memorial Day to the Home of Eternity Cemetary in Oakland, California to pay tribute to ALB veteran Hans Joachim. Joachim was born in Berlin, Germany in 1906 and moved to the US in 1924. He served in Spain with the George Washington Battalion and later...
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Please find attached photos of my visits to the graves of Lester Rowlson and Tersil Obriot last weekend. I left a brigade flag and a fresh white rose at each. ,,, I was also proud to include aspects of my Clapton CFC scarf; you might have heard of this small football club in London that...
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Peter Verbergh translated this article from CeSoir describing the arrest of the Dallet-Nelson Group. “The Interrogation of the Passengers of the Sans-Pareil”, CeSoir, March 29, 1937 (From our Special Correspondent) Perpignan March 28 (By Telephone) Yesterday morning around 10am, The Coast Guard Vessel Cebère docked in the port of Port-Vendres alongside the torpedo boat...
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Only five veterans of the Spanish Civil War are known to be buried in Virginia outside of Arlington National Cemetery: two in Richmond, two in Norfolk, and one in Big Stone Gap. ALB Tribute visited the graves of Harry Edward Farris and Thomas Moore in Richmond as well as Manuel Lizarrago and Crawford Morgan...
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ALBA's project to provide a complete list of the more than 2,800 individuals who left from U.S. territory to fight with the Spanish Republic
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