A Salute to My Friend Dianne Feeley on Her 70th Birthday
Friday, December 11th, 2009A Salute to My Friend Dianne Feeley on Her 70th Birthday:
I got to New York City from Detroit in l97l to work in the publicity and sales department of Pathfinder Press. Dianne was already there. She came to New York from California to work with The Catholic Worker people. She knew Dorothy Day. She left the Catholic Worker movement on the issue of abortion, becoming a revolutionary socialist and early feminist. She joined the Socialist Workers Party, which in those days was a pretty good and promising outfit, and went to work at Pathfinder.
Pathfinder published a number of early feminist titles on history, literature, and anthropology. Dianne was there during its halcyon days. George Novack, one of the “New York Intellectuals” that Alan Wald wrote about, was an editor. He was very fond and admiring of Dianne. His companion Evelyn Reed wrote Women’s Evolution, about the pre-history of women, and their great accomplishments in advancing humanity. Also an editor was George Breitman, who had come from Detroit and had edited Malcolm X Speaks and written Malcolm X: The Evolution of a Revolutionary. He too greatly appreciated Dianne as a young and thoughtful comrade.
We published books on the labor movement, like Farrell Dobb’s 4 volume history of the l934 Minneapolis strikes and the rise of the Teamsters and Fred Halstead’s definited history on the anti-Vietnam war movement, Out Now, Ernest Mandel’s Introduction to Marxist Economic Theory, and books on John Coltrane and Lenny Bruce. We also published more pamphlets than practically any other publisher except the government.
It was Dianne’s job to promote the books and pamphlets and mine to sell them.
I remember my first day. Alighting from the 9th St. cross town bus, and walking over to our building at 4l0 West Street, which had been an old ship repair building next to an elevated highway. We had raised the money and bought and fixed up the place. It was on l0th St. and the West Side Highway, which in those days was a seedy industrial venue. Now of course the neighborhood is quite fashionable. The old SWP headquarters has been knocked down and in its place sit two toney all glass buildings by the famed archetect Richard Meirs.
But back then, we, because all the work was paid for and performed by party comrades, redesigned the 5 story wreck. In it we had Pathfinder’s office, as well as the offices of the SWP, the Young Socialist Alliance, the International Socialist Review, the magazine we published, the editorial offices of The Militant, our newspaper, the editorial offices of Intercontinental Press, a weekly Marxist news magazine, and the editorial and business offices of Pathfinder Press. Our warehouse from where we shipped cartons of books was next door in a separate outbuilding. Dianne was part of what we all proudly thought was “the big red machine.”
I opened the door, there was but one small sign for security purposes, identified myself, and was buzzed in and told to walk up to the 4th floor. There I found Dianne in an inner windowless office, sitting behind one of four desks. The two others were occupied by Karolyn Kerry and Louise Armstrong. They both smoked. Alot. Dianne had the third desk and the forth was mine. All mine. I entered the hazy room, introduced myself, and sat down amidst the cloud. There we spent several years and got to be friends and comrades. And we got out a lot of excellent literature to the movement across the country. Tens of thousands of titles.
Dianne moved on to Pittsburgh, going into industry, and then on to Detroit, where you all were lucky to be with her. I remained in New York CIty, where I am active with The Marxist School and the Center for Constitutional Rights and occasionally write for Against the Current. We were both expelled in the early 80s by a degenerated SWP, an act of liberation as we now see it. After we were kicked out the kicker outers adorned our building with a huge 4 story mural of various revolutionaries. Dianne and I joked that it was sort of a Dorian Grey event, for as they grew more into a shriveled sect, their building was festooned by the working class’ finest.
Dianne went on to do fine work for the movement, in her plant as a union activist, and in Solidarity, as is being recounted tonight. She is an admirable accomplished woman of grace and kindness and of superior intelligence. She and my wife Debby have remained on the same political wavelegnth for all these years. We so much enjoy seeing her and hosting her when she comes to New York City. We are sorry not to be here with you.
Dianne, you’re wonderful.
With comradely greetings,
Michael Smith
New York, NY
November l5, 2009
