The Rand School of Social Science was formed in New York City by adherents of the Socialist Party of America in 1906. The school aimed to provide a broad education to workers, imparting a politicizing class-consciousness, and additionally served as a research bureau, a publisher, and the operator of a summer camp for socialist and trade union activists. The school changed its name to the "Tamiment Institute and Library" in 1935 and it was closely linked to the Social Democratic Federation after the 1936 split of the Socialist Party. Its collection became a key component of today's Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Archives at New York University in 1963.
Contents |
The idea for the Rand School of Social Science began with the Christian socialist minister, George D. Herron, and his mother-in-law, the widowed lumber baroness from Burlington, Iowa, Caroline (Carrie) A. Rand. Due to his radical and overtly anti-clerical ideas, Herron was forced from his position as head of the department of Applied Christianity at Iowa College (now Grinnell) in November 1899.
He married in 1901 Mrs. Rand's only daughter (also named Carrie), and they resided together in New York City in an apartment at 59 West 45th Street. After joining the Social Democratic Party in late 1900, Herron rose to a position of influence among American Socialists and played a key role in the formation of the Socialist Party of America at Indianapolis in the summer of 1901. He also authored the SPA platform in 1904 and gave the nominating speech for the party's presidential candidate, Eugene V. Debs. In a detailed letter to the prominent New York socialist Morris Hillquit, Herron outlined the Rand School's origins, beginning with the germ of the idea back in Iowa in the 1890s:
“Mrs. Rand originally had under consideration the establishment of school of Social Science in connection with Iowa College. But when she became aware that it would be impossible to establish such foundation, especially following my enforced resignation, she gave up the thought of what she had in mind at Iowa College…The school is, in fact, some such thing as Mrs. Herron and I had planned and talked about for many years, and to which I expected at the time, to give my own life personally, as a teacher and organizer of the same.”[1]
The school was established in 1906, made possible by a $200,000 endowment by Mrs. Rand at the time of her sudden death in 1905.[2] The fund was administered by Rand's daughter, Carrie Rand Herron, and Morris Hillquit.[3]
Operations of the Rand School were governed by the American Socialist Society, incorporated in 1901, and its board of directors. The initial board members included Algernon Lee, Job Harriman, Benjamin Hanford, William Mailly, Leonard D. Abbott, and Henry Slobodin.[2]
In its early years, the school conducted regular lectures and night courses. Beginning in 1911–12, the Rand School implemented a full-time training course, in which students devoted themselves to the study of history, economics, public speaking, and socialist theory without interruption for a period of six months.[3] During the first four years of the existence of the full-time course, 38 men and 8 women completed the program, with 15 others withdrawing before graduation.[3]
The Rand School maintained a close relationship not only with the Socialist Party of America proper, but also with the Intercollegiate Socialist Society and such trade unions as the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union and the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union.[4]The school's Labor Research Department declared:
"The school had a very definite object — that of providing an auxiliary or specialized agency to serve the Socialist and Trade Union Movement of the United States in an educational capacity — to offer to the outside public an opportunity for studying the principles, purposes, and methods of this movement; and to offer to the adherents of the movement instruction and training along the lines calculated to make them more efficient workers for the Cause."[3]
Starting in 1913, the Rand School established a Correspondence Department, conducting coursework by mail with socialists and sympathetic unionists around the country. Some 5,000 people took courses by mail from the Rand School by 1916.[3] In addition to classes and public lectures, the Rand School also maintained a reading library and a book store.[3]
Instructors and occasional lecturers at the school included Algernon Lee, Scott Nearing, Bertrand Russell, Morris Hillquit, Charles A. Beard, John Spargo, Lucien Sanial, James Maurer, David P. Berenberg, and August Claessens.[3]
In 1917, with the assistance of a significant financial gift from international gem merchant A.A. Heller, the Rand School moved into a new headquarters facility located a 7 East 15th Street in Manhattan's Union Square neighborhood–a building which it purchased from the YWCA.[5]
During World War I the Rand School was prosecuted for alleged violation of the Espionage Act for publishing the radical anti-militarist pamphlet, "The Great Madness," written by Scott Nearing. In a sensational trial, conducted in 1919 after conclusion of the war itself, Nearing was acquitted of the charges against him, but the Rand School was found guilty for having distributed Nearing's work and was fined $3,000.[6]
The Rand School was also raided in the summer of 1919 by the New York State Legislature's Lusk Committee, searching for evidence of connection to the Communist Party of America. No prosecution followed from this raid although records were seized providing the names of students through the years.
In 1921, individuals close to the Rand School opened a summer school in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania called "Camp Tamiment."[6] The summer camp idea, pioneered by the Fabian socialist movement in Great Britain, allowed socialists and trade unionists the opportunity to escape the summer heat in the city and to attend courses with their fellows in a pastoral setting. Among those teaching classes at Camp Tamiment over the years were Norman Thomas, Jessie Wallace Hughan, Solon DeLeon, and Stuart Chase.[7]
By 1924, the Rand School boasted a library with over 6,000 bound volumes, as well as a wide array of pamphlets, magazines, and newspapers.[5] The school was responsible for the publication of an annual almanac of the labor movement entitled The American Labor Year Book and was instrumental in the establishment of the Labor Education Council, together with the Furrier's Union, the Amalgamated Knit Goods Workers, and other unions centered in New York.[5]
In 1935, the Rand School changed its name to the "Tamiment Institute and Library,"[7] although it continued to use the imprint "Rand School Press" for its printed publications.
During the Socialist Party split of 1936, the Rand School of Social Science followed the Old Guard faction out of the party and into the new Social Democratic Federation.
In 1956, the economically failing school was purchased by the operators of Camp Tamiment, who formally terminated its educational operations while continuing to maintain its library, renamed after the camp's managing director, Ben Josephson. This status ended in 1963, when the Josephson Library was made a part of the special collections library at New York University, known today as the Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Archives.
The Rand School is not related to either the New School for Social Research, a separate and unaffiliated institution of higher learning also located in New York City[8] or the RAND Corporation, a non-profit global-policy think tank.