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# 74 •nECEMBER 14 , 2015
fellow travelers,” which
was a term used to describe communists. ” In the
eight years following “The
House I Live In,” Sinatra
was named twelve times
in HUAC hearings. The
New York Times Index has
only one entry for Sinatra
in 1949: “Sinatra, Frank:
See US-Espionage.” The
Hearst gossip columnists
went after him; in 1947 he
punched one of the most
abusive, Lee Mortimer, at
Ciro’s in Hollywood. The
Hearst papers ran whole
pages on the punch, and
on the crooner’s political
problems; one headline
read “Sinatra Faces Probe
on Red Ties.” Sinatra said
Mortimer had called him
a “dago.” Mortimer had
been saying in his column
that HUAC regarded Sinatra as “one of Hollywood’s leading travelers o n
the road of Red fascism.”
He pledged to “continue
to fight the promotion of
class struggle or foreign
isms posing as entertainment”–like “The House I
Live In.” (Excerpted from
“Frank Sinatra: His Way The bell ring-a-ding-dings
for Ol’ Blue Eyes,” by Jon
12 | WE THE ITALIANS
www.wetheitalians.com
Wiener, June 15, 2009, ting students called for his
dismissal. When an inveThe Nation.)
stigation of Nuzum was
2) Student Strike in Gary, opened on October 1st,
Indiana - Also in 1945, Si- the boycott ended–temnatra was invited to Gary, porarily. After three weIndiana where white stu- eks, however, Nuzum was
dents from the Froebel found to be a fit principal,
School (Gary’s only inte- and the outraged white
grated school at the time) students resumed their
were boycotting classes. walkout. When the schoThe boycott began on ol’s administrators had no
September 18th as an at- luck in convincing studentempt to have Froebel’s ts to return to classes, they
black students removed. invited both Sinatra and
champion
The school’s Principal, Ri- heavyweight
chard A. Nuzum, who had Joe Louis to visit the schobeen fighting against the ol. While Louis was unable
oppression of black stu- to break previous commitdents at Froebel was also ments, Sinatra cancelled
scrutinized, as the boycot- a $10,000 gig to speak