344:; badly worn and dangerous to shoot, but I bought it for five dollars and I had this. When I was confronted with 'Either pay for this red ticket or get off the train!' I decided that wasn't the way it would be and I displayed this firearm that should have had wheels on it. Anyway, these two guys just took off, jumped off the train into the sagebrush head-over-heels. That's all I saw of them. That was one of my experiences with labor organizing.
415:. In the process of interviewing auto workers, Canwell began to observe what he believed was dissonance between the actual perspective of rank-and-file workers, who in general did not express "any resistance to management that had substance" and the agenda of the union leadership. Canwell felt that the turmoil was "created by professional radicals who were, in general, Communists and Communist-trained labor leaders." He later declared:
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757:. Washington State Oral History Program. pp. ii (Jewitt), 1 (family), 5–6 (Spokane), 7 (father), 43 (homeschool), 46–48 (public schooling), 64 (fruit picker), 68 (hobo), 74–78 (quote on Wobblies), 86–88 (moves), 92 (moves), 89 (Seattle), 92–93 (INS), 105 (Yakima), 98 (Communists), 98–99 (Depression), 99 (New Deal), 101 (Spokane), 102 (photo-journalism), 105–106 (WWII), 135 (cattle), 229 (Kohlberg)
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Canwell was elected to the
Washington state House of Representatives in November 1946. He made two primary promises to the voters of his Spokane district during the 1946 campaign — to oppose new taxes and to take action against the spread of Communism in America. In an effort to fulfill this campaign
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area. I had worked down there and ended up with a little money — not very much — and decided to ride a freight train back to
Spokane. I boarded a flatcar and somewhere along the line a couple of fellows were working the train. You either had to have a Wobbly card or get off the train. That's cold
635:
and his wife were
Communist agents. The suit gained national media attention and resulted with the jury finding in favor of the plaintiffs on 5 of 9 primary claims and awarding $ 40,000 in damages — at the time one of Washington's largest defamation verdicts.
611:
Following his electoral defeat
Canwell continued as a professional anti-communist, launching a business called the American Intelligence Service from a downtown Spokane office. In this capacity he published an anti-communist newsletter called
34:
920:
535:— also hailing from the Eastern Washington city of Spokane — tapped Canwell as the chairman of this interim committee. The committee consisted of 5 Republicans and 2 Democrats. The committee consequently became known as the
319:. He would continue traveling seasonally, working somewhat more lucratively as a fruit and produce packager until 1928 — a trade which included short stints riding freight trains and staying for a day or two in hobo camps.
586:
In 1952, Washington was awarded another seat in
Congress as a result of the census of 1950 and Canwell ran for the new at-large seat. Although he emerged victorious in the Republican primary, he was defeated by Democrat
463:, taking numerous photographs of prominent people. He also began systematically collecting and organizing files of radical publications and maintaining research notes on leading participants in the radical movement.
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until the age of 8, being taught to read and write at home under the tutelage of his mother. The family moved to
Spokane in 1916, where his father would ultimately become a member of the
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I don't think there would be any organized activity back here in the labor field in the way of strikes without the
Communist experts working there. I remember discussing the thing with
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In the election of 1948 Canwell attempted to move from the House to the State Senate, running as the
Republican nominee in the November general election. He was defeated in that bid.
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promise, Canwell actively participated in helping to write the House resolution which established a
Washington State legislative committee to investigate the activities of the
531:
On March 8, 1947, the legislature's House
Concurrent Resolution No. 10 established a Joint Legislative Fact-Finding Committee on Un-American Activities. Speaker of the House
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The Wobbly organization or IWW was very, very prominent and very active. In general they were not a very desirable lot. I remember one incident. I was coming home from the
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turkey — supposed to pay a dollar for a red card, and that wasn't the sort of think I was likely to do. In Kennewick, I had bought a regular horse pistol. It was a
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In the years after the war, the young Canwell took time off school to work as an itinerant fruit picker, earning money and traveling to see the states of the
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925:
424:... he, among others, said that the ablest organizers and the ablest leadership in labor was provided by the Communist element; they specialized in it."
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After 1928, Canwell left produce packing for good, taking a job as an employee of a large Spokane bookstore for two years before going to work for the
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With the end of the war Canwell left the employ of the Sheriff's Office and took up life as a small scale cattle rancher.
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His father mustered out of the cavalry in 1900 and with his wife, Ingeborg Christina Espelund Canwell (1876-1967), the
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as "a socialist venture and a repudiation of our free-enterprise, capitalist system." He would remain a committed
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Identification Bureau, attached to the Spokane County Sheriff's Office, replacing an individual who had been
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315:. He also worked briefly as an assistant to an explosives specialist in the construction of a dam on the
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568:. "We had become, I’d say, good friends or people who respected each other, as the years progressed."
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before being taken as a prisoner-of-war. His father also served in the U.S. Cavalry as a member of the
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era, Canwell again came face to face with radical labor organizers, this time in the orbit of the
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from 1947 to 1949. He is best remembered as the namesake of the Washington legislature's
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In 1938, Canwell returned to his native Spokane, motivated to do so by his co-thinker
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Albert Franklyn Canwell, known as "Al" to his friends, was born January 11, 1907, in
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478:. He also simultaneously worked for one year with the Identification Office of the
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Due to their physical distance from the facility Canwell was held out of the local
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daughter of immigrants to the United States, decided to settle in a rural part of
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883:
Cold War on Campus: Academic Freedom at the University of Washington, 1946-64.
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866:"Seeing Red: Northwest Communist Hunter Offers No Apologies 50 Years Later,"
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Canwell died age 95 on April 1, 2002, in Spokane of an unspecified illness.
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33:
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His paternal grandfather, James Canwell (1840-1876), was a farmer from the
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Un-American Activities in the State of Washington: The Canwell Committee.
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The Canwell Committee met for the first time on January 27, 1948, at the
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400:. He continued to maintain a home base in Yakima throughout this period.
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of 1919 shook up the rather progressive Seattle area (here, cover of the
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392:(INS), for whom he covered such fare as ongoing labor disputes in the
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In addition to his written journalism, Canwell began developing as a
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Republican Party members of the Washington House of Representatives
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area, where he made important contacts with the publisher of the
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U.S., Headstone Applications for Military Veterans, 1925-1970.
330:(IWW), commonly known as "Wobblies." Canwell later recalled:
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journalist, state representative, professional anti-communist
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suit when he intimated that Washington state representative
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In covering the sometimes sensational labor strife in the
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and emerged as a leading West Coast supporter of Senator
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It was in this period that Canwell was first exposed to
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journalist and politician who served as a member of the
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in 1950, but fell to defeat in the Republican primary.
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In the early 1940s, Canwell worked as the chief of the
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Canwell became a general assignment news reporter for
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selling books door-to-door. In 1932 Canwell moved to
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The committee was funded by the private donation of
579:Not deterred by his 1948 loss, Canwell ran for the
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885:Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press, 1979.
890:No Ivory Tower: McCarthyism and the Universities.
780:Al's father, Adelbert Lee Canwell, served in the
750:Canwell, Albert F.; Frederick, Timothy (1997).
627:In 1963 Canwell was the subject of a $ 225,000
48:Washington House of Representatives
837:"Albert F. Canwell, 95; Anti-Communist Zealot"
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892:New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1986.
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878:Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1951.
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52:from the Fifth District (Spokane) district
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186:House Committee on Un-American Activities
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916:Politicians from Spokane, Washington
752:"Albert F. Canwell: An Oral History"
215:who served on the Union side in the
659:Washington House of Representatives
539:among the public and in the press.
489:Washington House of Representatives
931:People from Ellensburg, Washington
591:in the November general election.
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926:20th-century American legislators
556:Canwell's national supporter was
806:"Albert F. Canwell (1907-2002)"
804:Kershner, Jim (July 28, 2011).
328:Industrial Workers of the World
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603:Canwell supported US Senator
595:American Intelligence Service
307:for Monday, February 3, 1919)
277:. Albert passed the years of
504:(1947) appointed Canwell as
474:for military service during
351:Seventh-day Adventist Church
170:Washington State legislature
572:Subsequent political career
324:radical industrial unionism
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452:, political editor of the
445:for the rest of his life.
390:International News Service
382:Seattle Post-Intelligencer
281:as a schoolboy in various
266:near the city of Spokane.
869:Spokane Spokesman-Review,
398:1933 Chicago World's Fair
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480:Federal Narcotics Bureau
455:Spokane Spokesman-Review
162:Albert Franklyn Canwell
93:Albert Franklyn Canwell
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299:Seattle General Strike
190:United States Congress
184:, patterned after the
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439:Franklin D. Roosevelt
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782:Spanish–American War
581:United States Senate
413:Communist Party, USA
235:as a private in the
233:Spanish–American War
231:, and served in the
229:4th Cavalry Regiment
225:1st Cavalry Regiment
515:Communist Party USA
326:in the form of the
245:Territory of Alaska
202:Spokane, Washington
164:(1907–2002) was an
16:American politician
874:Verne Countryman,
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533:Herbert M. Hamblen
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502:Herbert M. Hamblen
369:, settling in the
367:Western Washington
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264:Eastern Washington
237:United States Army
217:American Civil War
888:Ellen Schrecker,
841:Los Angeles Times
808:. HistoryLink.org
654:Canwell Committee
537:Canwell Committee
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521:Canwell committee
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227:and later of the
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468:Spokane County
443:anti-communist
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589:Don Magnuson
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69:Succeeded by
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911:2002 deaths
906:1907 births
558:China Lobby
407:during the
279:World War I
209:New England
900:Categories
675:References
431:Republican
363:Ellensburg
317:Hood River
196:Background
138:Occupation
133:Republican
99:1907-01-11
472:called up
337:Kennewick
260:Norwegian
211:state of
178:communist
146:Known for
63:1947–1949
59:In office
847:21 March
812:21 March
761:21 March
648:See also
500:Speaker
435:New Deal
379:and the
342:.45 Colt
166:American
620:in the
560:leader
394:Detroit
371:Seattle
355:Montana
219:in the
123:Spokane
106:Spokane
359:Yakima
289:Career
755:(PDF)
640:Death
629:libel
508:chair
213:Maine
849:2020
814:2020
763:2020
297:The
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113:Died
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