Today’s literary Rosenberg Mention of the Day comes from the Times of India courtesy of Sylvia Plath: “'It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs and I didn’t know what I was doing in New York.’ The opening sentence of Sylvia Plath's 'The Bell Jar' sets a foreboding and disorienting tone as it describes a peculiar, stifling summer during the execution of the Rosenbergs in the 1950s….”
On this day in 1950, Ethel Rosenberg was arrested and charged with "conspiracy to commit espionage" after testifying before a grand jury.
This unusual Rosenberg Mention of the Day focuses on a new short dance film:
In what has become an annual 4th of July tradition, we’re sharing this remarkable alternative "National Anthem: Arise Arise" by activist artist and RFC friend, Jean Rohe. It's gorgeous and hits on so many topics, so gracefully… We love to imagine stadiums of people rising to sing an anthem that references "Strange Fruit" and the electric chair and back alley abortions and slavery and class issues and everything else this gorgeous song explores. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ay1iC1zt24A
Now available to stream: "The Rosenberg Case 70 Years Later: Fighting Fascism Then and Now"
For folks who missed either of our live screenings in June 2023 (or would like to rewatch or share it), our short film is now available!
Watch the film here: www.rfc.org/70th
Today's #RosenbergMOTD is this excellent essay by Paul Von Blum in Truthdig, which begins, "On that June 19th evening in 1953, I was a small kid in a suburb of Philadelphia, concerned above all with baseball, when I noticed that something had made my parents very upset. When I asked them what was wrong, they informed me that Julius and Ethel Rosenberg had been killed in the electric chair, in a place called Sing Sing in New York, and that it was a horrible injustice. I had never before heard of the Rosenbergs or Sing Sing.
BREAKING: Rosenberg sons Michael and Robert Meeropol call on Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines to direct the NSA and the National Archives to declassify hundreds of thousands of pages pertaining to their mother, Ethel Rosenberg.
The Rosenbergs were convicted of "conspiracy to commit espionage" and were executed 70 years ago on June 19th, 1953.
Thank you to Renée Graham of the Boston Globe for this thoughtful tribute to the late, great Harry Belafonte. We loved this sentiment and are honored for our organization to be counted among the humanitarian causes he supported:
Graham writes, "Often, you can measure the impact and reach of a person’s life by the variety of those who mourn their passing.
Earlier this month marked Paul Robeson's 125th birthday. Robeson was a fierce civil rights and antifascist activist, musician and a supporter of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg (he even participated in a rally to save the Rosenbergs in 1953).
According to The Progressive, even the words inscribed on his tombstone encapsulate his passion and resistance. They read, "The artist must elect to fight for freedom or slavery. I have made my choice. I had no alternative."
Happy birthday to a human rights legend.
Today's Rosenberg Mention of the Day comes from Washington, D.C. where the Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater will present a free, one-night-only reading of "Angels in America" on Monday, April 17.
Among the many vignettes in the play is the famous scene of the ghost of Ethel Rosenberg visiting Roy Cohn, the man who "sent her to the electric chair." In an act of compassion, she calls an ambulance for him when he is close to death.