Elinor Ferry (1915–1993) was an American journalist, labor organizer, and socialist. She was member of the

Independent-Socialist Party John Thomas McManus (1904 – November 1961) was an American journalist active in progressive politics in the 1950s and 1960s best known as co-founder of the ''National Guardian'', a left-leaning newspaper. Background John Thomas McManus was bo ...

and lifelong supporter of

Alger Hiss Alger Hiss (November 11, 1904 – November 15, 1996) was an American government official who was accused of espionage in 1948 for the Soviet Union in the 1930s. The statute of limitations had expired for espionage, but he was convicted of perjur ...

. She was married for about a decade to ''

The Nation ''The Nation'' is a progressive American monthly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper ...

'' publisher George Kirstein.

Background

Ferry was born in 1913 in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania.

Career

At age 16 (), she became a female sports reporter (as "Betty Moore") for the ''

Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph The ''Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph'' was an evening daily newspaper published in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from 1927 to 1960. Part of the Hearst newspaper chain, it competed with '' The Pittsburgh Press'' and the ''Pittsburgh Post-Gazette'' until be ...

'', a Hearst newspaper. She helped organize the American Newspaper Guild (now simply the

Newspaper Guild The NewsGuild-CWA is a labor union founded by newspaper journalists in 1933. In addition to improving wages and working conditions, its constitution says its purpose is to fight for honesty in journalism and the news industry's business practic ...

), founded in 1933 by sportswriter

Heywood Broun Heywood Campbell Broun Jr. (; December 7, 1888 – December 18, 1939) was an American journalist. He worked as a sportswriter, newspaper columnist, and editor in New York City. He founded the American Newspaper Guild, later known as The Newspape ...

(who in 1930 had run unsuccessfully for Congress as a Socialist) and journalists

Joseph Cookman Joseph Cookman (February 6, 1899 – August 12, 1944) was an American journalist, critic and a founder of The Newspaper Guild. Life and career Early life Born in 1899, in Batley, England, Joseph was the oldest of three children born to John ...

and Allen Raymond.

Whittaker Chambers Whittaker Chambers (born Jay Vivian Chambers; April 1, 1901 – July 9, 1961) was an American writer and intelligence agent. After early years as a Communist Party member (1925) and Soviet spy (1932–1938), he defected from the Soviet u ...

mentions the founding of the Newspaper Guild in his 1952 memoir: She became an assistant to Mike Quill of the Transport Workers Union, founded in 1934 by Quill for subway workers in New York City and which had leadership dominated by the

CPUSA The Communist Party USA (CPUSA), officially the Communist Party of the United States of America, also referred to as the American Communist Party mainly during the 20th century, is a communist party in the United States. It was established ...

during its early years up through 1948 during the presidential campaign of

Henry A. Wallace Henry Agard Wallace (October 7, 1888 – November 18, 1965) was the 33rd vice president of the United States, serving from 1941 to 1945, under President Franklin D. Roosevelt. He served as the 11th U.S. secretary of agriculture and the 10th U.S ...

. She worked for the

Steel Workers Organizing Committee The Steel Workers Organizing Committee (SWOC) was one of two precursor labor organizations to the United Steelworkers. It was formed by the CIO ( Committee for Industrial Organization) on June 7, 1936. It disbanded in 1942 to become the United Ste ...

, founded in 1936 by the

Congress of Industrial Organizations The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) was a federation of Labor unions in the United States, unions that organized workers in industrial unionism, industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. Originally created in ...

(CIO), disbanded in 1942 to become the United Steel Workers of America, now the

United Steelworkers The United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, commonly known as the United Steelworkers (USW), is a general trade union with members across North America. Headqua ...

(USW) union. She also served as secretary of Emergency Civil Liberties Union, founded in 1951 under the direction of Clark Foreman, formed as a breakaway from the

American Civil Liberties Union The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is an American nonprofit civil rights organization founded in 1920. ACLU affiliates are active in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. The budget of the ACLU in 2024 was $383 million. T ...

(ACLU), known after 1968 as the

National Emergency Civil Liberties Committee The National Emergency Civil Liberties Committee (NECLC), until 1968 known as the Emergency Civil Liberties Committee, was an organization formed in the United States in October 1951 by 150 educators and clergymen to advocate for the civil libertie ...

(NECLC), and merged in 1998 with the

Center for Constitutional Rights The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR; formerly Law Center for Constitutional Rights) is an American progressive non-profit legal advocacy organization based in New York City. It was founded in 1966 by lawyers William Kunstler, Arthur Kin ...

(CCR). She was still secretary (as "Elinor Ferry Kirstein") in 1958. In the 1950s, her name appears in print in various political capacities. In 1957, her name appears in a "

Trotskyite Trotskyism (, ) is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Russian revolutionary and intellectual Leon Trotsky along with some other members of the Left Opposition and the Fourth International. Trotsky described himself as an ...

" debate in the '' International Socialist Review''. In 2001, her name receives mention as an Independent-Socialist Party "campaigner."

Hiss case

During the 1950s, Ferry documented

McCarthyism McCarthyism is a political practice defined by the political repression and persecution of left-wing individuals and a Fear mongering, campaign spreading fear of communist and Soviet influence on American institutions and of Soviet espionage i ...

and

First Amendment First most commonly refers to: * First, the ordinal form of the number 1 First or 1st may also refer to: Acronyms * Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty-Centimeters, an astronomical survey carried out by the Very Large Array * Far Infrared a ...

defendants. Defendants whom she contacted include

Anne Braden Anne McCarty Braden (July 28, 1924 – March 6, 2006) was an American civil rights activist, journalist, and educator dedicated to the cause of racial equality. She and her husband bought a suburban house for an African American couple during ...

. She spent many years writing about the

. Her correspondence appears in the Hiss papers at Harvard. According to

Allen Weinstein Allen Weinstein (September 1, 1937 – June 18, 2015) was an American historian, educator, and federal official who served in several different offices. Under the Reagan administration, he was cofounder of the National Endowment for Democracy i ...

, Ferry was a "friend and defense researcher" of Hiss who "worked closely with Helen Buttenweiser on research for Hiss's retrial motion." He also noted that "Links between ''The Nation'' and the Hiss defense had been close from the beginning of the case," starting with publisher Frida Kirchwey and followed by succeeding publisher George Kirstein (Ferry's husband). According to G. Edgar White, she was "Helen Buttenweiser's research assistant." Her work was to result in a negative "political history" of

and a defense for Hiss. In ''The Nation'', she once called her unpublished book ''Whittaker Chambers: Agent Provocateur''. As early as 1952, other writers began to draw on her research to discredit Chambers. Author John Chabot Smith cited Ferry's interview with Max Bedacht (whom Chambers claimed had delivered his summons to the Soviet underground) and wrote that "Bedacht denied the whole story; he told journalist Elinor Ferry it was a flat lie, and that he had never had any connections with an underground of any sort, Russian or American". In his "psychobiography" on Chambers, author Meyer Zeligs cites copious usage of materials from Ferry. Author Julia M. Allen cited Ferry about Chambers' wife, "Recollections of Esther Shemitz reflect the gender rigidity of the time and help to explain why both Hutchins and Rocher felt especially protective of her. In interviews conducted by Elinor Ferry in the 1950s, Shemitz was characterized as being 'masculine'."

FBI

The

Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

investigated Ferry from 1952 through 1968.

Personal

Ferry married at least twice, the second time to George Kirstein for ten years. (Kirstein bought ''

'' magazine in 1955 and ran it until 1965). She had at least one child, James. She resided mostly in

Mamaroneck Mamaroneck ( ), is a town in Westchester County, New York, United States. The population was 31,758 at the 2020 United States census over 29,156 at the 2010 census. There are two villages contained within the town: Larchmont and the Villag ...

, New York, and died in 1993. Friends since the mid-1950s included Nora Ruth Roberts ("a good friend of mine and valued comrade since 1957" she wrote in 2013) and Matthew Mills Stevenson.

References

External sources

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ferry, Elinor 1915 births 1993 deaths People from Chambersburg, Pennsylvania 20th-century American journalists 20th-century American women journalists American socialists 20th-century American women writers 20th-century American non-fiction writers