On this World Art Day, sharing a sobering exhibition by artist and former fashion designer Nicole Farhi. Entitled "J’Accuse," the piece displays 25 busts of victims of injustices, serving time in prison—or facing a death sentence—for an offense they did not commit. Among the faces is Ethel Rosenberg, who was wrongly convicted and executed during the McCarthy era for conspiracy to commit espionage.
In a recent publication for Monthly Review, elder son of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg and RFC Advisory Board member Michael Meeropol shares an in-depth history of Judge Irving R. Kaufman, who presided over his parents' trial and sentenced them to death.
Today’s Rosenberg Mention of the Day comes from a fascinating review of current TV series, including “Fellow Travelers.”
Author Victoria A. Brownworth clearly is a fan of the show, and a historian, which is evident in the following political commentary, which introduces the review:
Folks in the Boston area might be interested to know that "Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes. Part 2: Perestroika," presented by Central Square Theater and Bedlam, continues at Central Square Theater through Oct. 8. “Part 1: Millennium Approaches” is staged Oct. 7.
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….”
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.
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 on April 20th marked the anniversary of Billie Holiday recording "Strange Fruit" in 1939. The song was originally written by Abel Meeropol, a Jewish activist, poet, and high school English teacher, in protest against the lynchings of Black Americans. (Abel and his wife Anne later adopted the Rosenbergs' two young sons after Ethel and Julius' executions.)
Book Riot issued a list of 8 contemporary Jewish fiction books, and among them is "Ethel's Song: Ethel Rosenberg's Life in Poems," a collection written for teenaged readers by Barbara Krasner. (You can check out the other recommended reading from the list here: https://bookriot.com/jewish-contemporary-fiction-books/)
On this day, we mark 70 years since President Eisenhower denied Ethel and Julius Rosenberg's first bid for executive clemency on Feb 11th, 1953. It was one of the first decisions Eisenhower faced in his time as president after the outgoing President Truman declined to respond before leaving office.