AUTHOR TALK: SUSAN DEMASI on Henry Alsberg: Driving Force of the New Deal Federal Writers’ Project

Venue Name:   Huntington Public Library

Address:   338 Main Street, Huntington, NY 11743

Title: AUTHOR TALK: SUSAN DEMASI on Henry Alsberg: Driving Force of the New Deal Federal Writers’ Project

Date: Wednesday, February 22, 2017

Time: 7:00 pm

Cost:  Free

Description: Susan DeMasi presents her biography about journalist and social justice pioneer Henry Alsberg. She looks at Alsberg’s work as a pre-civil rights era human rights champion and provides close-up examinations of WPA ex-slave narratives, including photographs, and print and audio oral histories from the 1930s. During the 1920s, Henry Alsberg led the struggle to aid Jewish pogrom survivors in Eastern Europe and initiated the first major effort to assist international political prisoners. During the Great Depression, he directed the WPA Federal Writers’ Project, which employed thousands of writers and produced more than 1,000 publications from 1935-39. He recruited African Americans to help write their own history and gathered oral histories from former slaves. Some writers went on to storied careers. Alsberg’s friends included literary and cultural luminaries like Richard Wright, Emma Goldman, Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter, and NAACP leader Walter White. DeMasi’s book will be on sale after the talk with 10% of proceeds donated to the Friends of Huntington Public Library.    

Open to all.  Call 631-427-5165 to register.