Jean Wilkinson dies at 96; one of the first Los Angeles teachers to be fired during Red Scare

[proud2BlibKansan]

During the McCarthy era, Jean Wilkinson refused to cooperate when questioned by the California Senate Fact-Finding Committee on Un-American Activities. She was blacklisted for 12 years.

Jean Benson Wilkinson, who became one of the first Los Angeles public school teachers to be fired for refusing to cooperate with McCarthy-era investigators, died Dec. 28 in Berkeley. She was 96.

<skip>

During the Red Scare of the early 1950s, Wilkinson was teaching at the East Los Angeles Girls Vocational School when she was called before the State Senate Fact-Finding Committee on Un-American Activities about possible connections to the Communist Party. She declined to answer the committee's questions and in 1953 was fired by the Los Angeles Board of Education, along with five other teachers.

She had been targeted for scrutiny because she was married to Frank Wilkinson, who lost his job as a director of the Housing Authority of the city of Los Angeles after refusing to testify before the same state committee. Five years later, in 1958, he became one of the last two men ordered to prison for rebuffing the House Un-American Activities Committee's questions.

Both Wilkinsons had been members of the Communist Party at one time, according to their son, Tony, but they believed it was un-American to be persecuted for their political beliefs. Frank Wilkinson later fought to abolish the House committee and co-founded the nonprofit First Amendment Foundation.

Jean Wilkinson was blacklisted from public school teaching for more than a decade. According to journalist Griffin Fariello, who interviewed her for his 1995 oral history book "Red Scare," she was one of more than 60,000 teachers throughout the country who were investigated during the McCarthy era. Of those, more than 500 were forced to resign or were fired and blacklisted. Fariello said none of the teachers were ever accused of incompetent teaching or reliably proven to have propagandized in the classroom.

more . . . http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-jean-wilkinson-20110106,0,3049217.story

[defendandprotect]

1. K/R --

The McCarthy Era purged liberals from government --

and that's still going on!

[chill_wind]

2. K & R.

[DBoon]

3. this is why teachers have tenure

most firings in the private sector of professionals and management are for purely political reasons

If public schools were run like the private sector, you would see political firings in abundance

BTW, I heard Frank Wilkinson talk about his experiences. It was a very formative experience