Cold War Orphans

Ethel and Julius Rosenberg



Today in class we discussed Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, the couple convicted of espionage for giving nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union and subsequently executed in 1953.  At the time, they had 2 sons, Robert and Michael, who were 6 and 10.

Robert (now 66 years old) shares...

"After my parents’ arrests, my relatives were so frightened of being associated with "communist spies" that they refused to take me into their homes. First I lived in a shelter. Later I lived with friends of my parents in New Jersey, but I was thrown out of school after the Board of Education found out who I was. After my parents' execution, the police even seized me from the home of my future adoptive parents, and I was placed in an orphanage."

Then, at a Christmas party hosted by W.E.B. Du Bois, the boys were introduced to Abel and Anne Meeropol.  Eventually, they became their adoptive parents and the boys took the Meeropol surname as their own.



Abel and Anne Meeropol

 

But, there is even more to this story!  Abel Meeropol, a high school English teacher for 17 years was also a poet, musician, and communist activist.  Disturbed by the extreme racism in America and after witnessing a photograph of a lynching (which haunted him for days), he wrote a poem entitled "Strange Fruit".  He later set his poem (a strong anti-lynching metaphor) to music which was popularized when it was performed and released by Billie Holiday in 1939. 

 

The complicated...the tragic...yet beautiful fruit of history.

 

Robert and Michael together in 2003

 

THE HOUSE I LIVE IN

What is America to me?
A name, a map, or a flag I see?

A certain word, democracy.

What is America to me?

The house I live in?

A plot of earth, a street?
The grocer and the butcher or the people that I meet?

 

The children in the playground, the faces that I see.
All races and religions.
That’s America to me.

 

                                                    - Abel Meeropol