Militant Foe of Communism
The Elizabeth Dilling case in Chicago, summer of ‘42, so-called because she was certainly the most public figure called before the grand jury on “Axis activity” at the time, dragged on for months and called dozens of witnesses.
In approaching the case of cartoonist Otto Brennemann, I just want to throw open some pages of old newspapers which first shed light on his predicament, closely attached as it was to the Liz Dilling case.
Here is some illustrated Chicago Tribune coverage:
^That page from Fulton History is much appreciated and free to all comers, but the contrast there is quite dark, so I am sniping the images from another source and will paste them in below, again, because there are mugshots of men whose faces we rarely see but whose names come up again and again in the sedition indictments of 1942-44.
That image of Hans Diebel is so useless we might as well have a better look at him now. His name is most often mentioned in connection with the Aryan Bookstore, Los Angeles and the German-American Bund.
^The Aryan Book Store changed addresses and I have been led to believe that a book booth also operated out of the Deutsches Haus, seen here with Hermann Schwinn out front…
More coverage and details from the Brennemann case next time.