|
|
|
Reviews
Hazel Wolf: Fighting the Establishment
|
By Susan Starbuck
|
University of Washington Press, Seattle, 2002. Illustrations, photographs, notes, index. 408 pages. $29.95 cloth.
|
Reviewed by Sandy Polishuk
Portland State University, Portland, Oregon
|
|
|
|
Hazel Wolf was born in 1898 in Victoria, British Columbia, where
she grew up poor. She was one of "the boys," living an outdoor life,
fearless in her adventures, and swimming year-'round in the Victoria
inlet. She married in 1918, had a daughter, left her husband in
1920, and immigrated to Seattle in 1921, where she became involved
in the Workers' Alliance and the Communist Party and organized unions
at her workplaces. She proved to be a gifted organizer. Although
she had wanted to be a doctor and, later, a social worker, her primary
paid work was as a legal secretary. In 1949, she became a target
of deportation efforts that she fought, successfully, until her
case was dismissed in 1963.
|
1
|
|
In 1964, after a friend insisted she join the Audubon Society and invited her on a birding trip, her life took a new course. Renewing the outdoor lifestyle of her youth, Wolf became an avid birder, kayaker, and backpacker and a national figure in the environmental movement. She organized Audubon chapters throughout Washington state and drew the society into the environmental movement and into alliances with other groups, most notably Native Americans. In 1984, she traveled to Nicaragua, where she experienced "a synthesis of her past as working-class organizer and her present as environmental organizer" (p. 225). A photograph of Wolf in her kayak at age 96 testifies to her astonishing stamina. She died less than two months shy of her 102nd birthday. |
2
|
|
Although Wolf married twice, less than two pages are devoted to her marriages. We could think that she lived a celibate life after leaving her second husband in 1929, if she had not been denied U.S. citizenship in 1939 for failing "to establish good moral character" — that is, for living with a man without benefit of marriage (pp. 101, 326–7). "Let's skip over this marriage business," she said (p. 59). The lack of insight into this side of her life might at first be a disappointment to readers, but it does not undermine the oral history. On the contrary, Wolf emerges as a distinct and eccentric personality with a well-formed philosophy. Her causes changed over the years, but readers can follow the logical trajectory of her thinking and activism. Her memory for detail was extraordinary, making her accounts of her activities informative and engaging. |
3
|
|
Susan Starbuck writes that, while she had more than two hundred hours of interviews with Wolf, taped over the course of twenty years, and boxes of documents, she was at first stymied as to how to shape the book. Wolf's style of telling stories that ended with a punch line did not lend itself to conventional autobiographical narrative (p. xi). Starbuck's solution of grouping the stories into six sections corresponding to the major periods of Wolf's life is successful. Each section begins with a short introduction, and then Wolf's voice takes over. Starbuck allocates further commentary and historical context to endnotes. The voices of friends, colleagues, and family appear in appendixes, along with a narrative on Wolf's deportation case, her recounting of two other important deportation stories, and a speech she delivered at Seattle University in 1997, when she was presented with an honorary doctorate. |
4
|
|
The stories are not only inspirational and instructive but as enjoyable as a good novel. Although she was wise, resourceful, and unafraid of confrontation, humor was Wolf's primary vehicle: "I'm not opinionated. I'm just always right," she said (p. 215). On another occasion, she remembered "sitting down at a banquet next to the Boise [lumber company] vice president and saying, 'Oh, hi, John. How are you coming along with the destruction of our national forests?' " (p. 184) |
5
|
|
Full of nitty-gritty details about organizing and Wolf's philosophy of how to get along and how to get things done, this book could be used as a textbook for effective activism. "... it all comes down to the organizing skills I learned in the thirties — that is, getting everyone involved," Wolf stated (p. 176). Anyone wanting to win friends for their cause and to influence people will benefit from this book. It could be used in courses in conflict resolution, organizational development, and the history of any of the movements that Wolf's life touched. General readers who are interested in history or who just want to meet a fascinating person will also find it well worth their time. |
6
|
|
|
Content in the History Cooperative database is intended for personal, noncommercial use only. You may not reproduce, publish, distribute, transmit, participate in the transfer or sale of, modify, create derivative works from, display, or in any way exploit the History Cooperative database in whole or in part without the written permission of the copyright holder.
|