Child of the Sit-Downs_ The Revolutionary Life of Genora Dollinger - Carlton Jackson [10]
Returning to Los Angeles, Genora vented her anger against UAW president Bieber because he cozied up to GM management. Despite all these heady events, and despite numerous health problems, she and Sol departed for Moscow in 1987. Neither was prepared to see the paucity of accommodations in the Soviet Union. Genora suffered heart troubles on this trip, and the couple was alarmed, to say the least, by what they saw in Moscow hospitals. Apparently, the only thing that pleased the Dollingers about their trip to Russia was that at this time—the late 1980s—Leon Trotsky’s reputation in the Soviet Union was in the process of being redeemed. Back at home, Genora continued a barrage of letters to anyone she thought might listen to her. The chapter ends with Genora’s helping to form the Labor Party of America (LPA) for working people. This went nowhere. Two weeks before her death she was giving a speech for LPA and for Socialist causes in general. She died in October 1995.
Chapter 9 is devoted to a summary and analysis of Genora’s life and her contributions and their meanings in the context of the major issues that affected and influenced the United States from the 1930s to the late 1990s. Her life spanned much of the twentieth century, from its progressive impetus to its negative connotations. She read widely, not only in labor history but in feminist history as well. Authors such as Nelson Lichtenstein and Sidney Fine in the labor field caught her attention. Ann Gordon, Eleanor Flexner, and Sherna Gluck in feminist studies are among those who enlightened her about second and third waves of feminism in the United States. Despite all these learned treatises, Genora still fretted that not enough attention was given by either labor or feminist historians (or a combination of the two) to the foundations of all these movements. A sense of the past, especially with third wave feminism, seems to have gone by the wayside.
In the belief that it is important to gauge the feelings of those who come after us, included in this chapter are some statements from the classroom of professor Lauren Coodley of Napa Valley College. She showed the film With Babies and Banners to her students and then elicited statements from them. They gave concise, often charming opinions of their take on this Oscar-nominated movie.
There are many ways a person can become a revolutionary: family influences, educational experiences, or circumstances. None of these conditions would necessarily apply to Genora. She was raised in a devoutly religious family, she never finished high school, and the circumstances of her upbringing were far from suggesting any kind of poverty-stricken environment to justify antiestablishment revolts. She entered the revolutionary life through the back door, so to speak. One can be a revolutionary by departing from family norms, by epiphany, by observation, and by a combination of all these factors. One frequently hears the comment, “Don’t forget your upbringing!” Genora became a revolutionary on several fronts in spite of her upbringing. She possessed a minority mindset most of her life. This caused her to fight racism, poverty, religious bigotry, and ethnic hatreds and to support the idea of nobility of work in relation to fair treatment from the big corporations.
This book tells Genora Dollinger’s story in the context of the major events that were happening in the country during her lifetime—the Great Depression, World War II, the Cold War, the civil rights movement, politics, liberalism, environmental and educational concerns, international affairs, and, above all else, labor