A Red Family: Junius, Gladys, and Barbara Scales by Michaela Thompson

Author:Michaela Thompson [Thompson, Michaela]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Communism; Post-Communism & Socialism, United States, Political Ideologies, Biography & Autobiography, 20th Century, Political Science, History, Political, General
ISBN: 9780252091315
Google: 1-g1Eys9Ip4C
Goodreads: 17196069
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Published: 2009-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

ten

Barbara

I’ve been raised in a different way, raised with different principles than most people in this country. And because of that—even before I knew what it was to speak out—for some reason I’ve always felt that I’ve had something to say to the people of the United States, that I know something they don’t know. I’ve been in contact with people who live by principles which enable them to survive, I think, in a much healthier, more productive, and much more gratifying way than most people of their background.

And I’ve always wanted to know what really happened, what they went through, where their principles come from, and what it’s all about, because I think there’s something there that’s very important.

In the last couple of years, I’ve been at the age of consciousness, and able to talk to people instead of just being a kid, hanging around. And now that I’ve talked to my parents’ friends, I realize more and more that, although many of them are bitter, and many of them are very sorry and sad about their lives, at least they have a kind of vitality, with principles and morality. They pay a special kind of attention to the world. They don’t use words like these, but whatever the words are, it’s a different way of living in this country, an almost separate kind of culture. And I come from that, different even from people I know in the movement today.

I was born in Durham, North Carolina, and anything I know about that time is completely reconstructed. For a long time all I could recall was a picture of me on a tricycle at about two and a half. Then, gradually, in the last few years more of the story of my early life became clear to me. My mother told me that the night the Rosenbergs were killed as spies I was in a little basket on the porch, and she heard the news on the radio. My father was underground at that time, and she came running out, very, very frightened, because at that time anybody who was a Communist, and certainly my father, a known Communist being pursued, was very threatened. She was not just terribly troubled, and very sorry about the Rosenbergs, and bitter, but very frightened. And it had been a nightmare of hers for the three years before.

There were stories about me playing with the girl across the street. Vicki was my age, and I’d always thought, you know, nice Vicki, nice policeman, neighbor policeman. Then we moved from there when I was three.

Last summer, I decided I was tired of not knowing anything at all about what had happened there. So I hitched down to Chapel Hill with a friend, and we were traveling together and exploring. We met all sorts of people and went looking for Abernethy’s Intimate Bookshop, which just wasn’t there anymore.

I decided to go and try to find the house that we lived in. I figured it must

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