This is a special guest column from Robert’s daughter, Jenn, current RFC Grantmaking Coordinator and future Executive Director.

My name is Jennifer Ethel Meeropol, and I am Robert’s older daughter. I never knew my grandparents, but I’ve felt their impact on my life as deeply as I’ve known their absence. In the midst of my sadness and anger about what was done to my grandparents, I feel a fierce pride in who they were and what they stood for. That’s why I joined the staff of the Rosenberg Fund for Children in July 2007. And it’s why I want to become the next director of the RFC when my dad retires in a few years.

While I believe I would have supported any organization my father started in his parents’ memory, my involvement in Celebrate the Children of Resistance performances and all but the first Gathering has strengthened my connection and commitment to the RFC and our beneficiaries. Listening to courageous young people tell their stories; seeing our beneficiaries come together and create community, and in some cases second families, despite the different ways they experienced and responded to their parents’ targeting; and enjoying the peace and just plain fun at Gatherings held at the summer camp I attended, have all been powerful examples of the “constructive revenge” my dad advocates.

I’m proud of the incredible organization my father has created from the pain he experienced as a small child. And I’m grateful to be part of a community of people committed to supporting today’s progressive activists and their children in the same way previous generations supported my dad and uncle.

The activists’ particulars might have shifted over the years: more Green Scare cases as prosecutors use the PATRIOT Act and Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA) to treat non-violent activists as “terrorists” and sentence them to lengthy prison terms; and an increase in the number of soldiers jailed for refusing to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan [click here for video of one of their stoires.] Our supporters have also changed as we lose the stalwarts who fought to save my grandparents and reach out to a new generation of activists who connect via Twitter, Facebook, texting and email around a mix of local and global concerns.

As I look to my future with the RFC, I am excited to meet our long-term contributors and engage a new generation of supporters, many of whom — like my sister and me — grew up within progressive communities and are committed to giving back and carrying on the social justice efforts of our grandparents and parents. And as someone who has experienced the transformative experience of the Gatherings, I am committed (along with the rest of the staff and Board) to re-instituting them for current and future beneficiaries.

As a former grantee said at the Celebrate performance in Boston, “I hope that someday, the RFC won’t be needed…But in the meantime, the RFC community welcomes us, and helps us understand that even though our families are targeted and our situations may be difficult, we are not alone,”  [click here to see video of that statement]. I’m thrilled to join “the family business” and grateful to be a part of this amazing legacy; and I look forward to continuing to “pass it on” to a new generation of RFC supporters, targeted activists, and their children.