BILL BRUST:

Bill Brust was born in Budapest, Hungary on May 20, 1919. As a result of his father's participation in the failed 1919 Hungarian revolution, Brust's family emigrated to Minneapolis in 1920. He graduated from Minneapolis North High School in 1937 and entered the University of Minnesota the same year. During world War II Brust left the university and served in the Army Air Corps and Army Infantry (1942-1945). During his military service he was able to continue his education and received his baccalaureate from the University of Minnesota in 1944.

After the war Brust returned to Minneapolis and went to work at the Armour meat packing plant (1946-1949). He entered graduate school at the University of Minnesota in 1950 and obtained a master of arts degree in German with a minor in French in 1953. Unable to find a teaching position, Brust worked as a manager of the insurance division of Tilsenbilt Homes, Inc. in St. Paul (1953-1959). He returned to the University of Minnesota in 1959 to work on a Ph.D. in German, which he received in 1968. During this period he worked at the University as a teaching assistant and instructor in German (1959-1964) and accepted a teaching position at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota (1965).

Throughout his life Brust was an active socialist. He joined the Young Communist League at the age of 18, became a member of the Trotskyist youth movement called the Young People's Socialist League in 1938, and a member of the Socialist Worker's Party (SWP) in 1939. Brust played a leading role in the 1946 and 1948 national strikes against the meat packing industry. After being expelled from the SWP in 1964 for his opposition to the party's repudiation of Trotskyism, Brust joined the newly formed American Committee for the Fourth International, which became the Workers League in 1966. He served on the League's central committee and as a member of the party's control commission.

During the 1980s Brust reported on numerous strikes and labor issues in the Midwest. In 1986 he ran as a candidate of the Workers League for governor of Minnesota. As part of his political work Brust made several trips to Europe, including a final trip in 1989 to participate in the joint election campaign of the German and British sections of the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICIF) for the European parliament.

Brust met Jean Tilsen inside the Trotskyist movement and they were married in 1948. The couple had three children: Cynthia Moore, Leo Brust, and Steven Brust. Bill Brust died on September 15, 1991.

Biographical data was taken from Brust, Jean, ed. Defending Principles: the Legacy of Bill Brust (Southfield, Michigan: Labor Publications, 1993), and from the collection.

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Papers documenting the life and career of a Minnesota Trotskyite and modern language scholar. Includes correspondence (1942-1989), articles, essays, notes, grade transcripts (1937-1968), diplomas (1953, 1968), passports, certificates of naturalization (1927-1928), photographs, newspaper clippings, newsletters (1948), and leaflets. Some of the correspondence is in German.

Bill Brust became an active socialist at the age of 18, was a long-time member of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP), and a founding member and leader of the Workers League. The bulk of the papers reflect Brust's political activism, particularly his involvement with the labor movement in Minnesota, his writings for the party press, and his work with European socialists.

The papers also document Brust's academic career including his graduate education, which culminated in a doctorate in German (1968), and his position as an associate professor of modern languages as Carleton College (Northfield, Minn.).

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These records are divided into the following sections:

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Availability:

The collection is open for research use.

Preferred Citation:

[Indicate the cited item and/or series here]. Bill Brust Papers. Minnesota Historical Society.

See the Chicago Manual of Style for additional examples.

Accession Information:

Accession Number: 15,142

Processing Information:

Processed by: Frank P. Hennessy, July 1996

Catalog ID number: 990017330360104294

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Included among the personal papers are a groups of travel documents including Brust's parent's naturalization certificates (1927 and 1928) and a number of tributes to Brust written by family members and colleagues after his death. There is also a group of material (1992-1993) contained a draft table of contents, bibliography, and outline for a book intended to be published under the title "On Guard for Trotskyism: the Life of Bill Brust."

Includes a group of letters Brust sent to his family during World War II, the majority written while he was stationed at the Salt Lake City Air Base (1942-1944) and a few from Europe during his service with the Army infantry (1944-1945). A few of the letters are written in Hungarian. Topics include Brust's continuing education at the University of Utah, work and daily life on the air base, social activities, and a description of his encounter with prisoners of war and forced laborers returning to their homes after the war (March 24, 1945).

Students and fellow language scholars comprise a large segment of the correspondents found in a file of correspondence with relatives and colleagues (1951, 1960-1991). There is also correspondence in German (1963-1964) with Natz Striehling, a member of the Austrian underground whom Brust met immediately following World War II and visited again on a trip to Europe in 1963; a copy of Brust's letter of resignation from the SWP (Oct. 31, 1964); congratulatory notes on his 70th birthday (1989); and letter of support during his final illness (1991). Other correspondents include Henry Schultz (1965-1966), a long time comrade and national committee member of the SWP, and a group of German authors including Ulli Harth (1970-1971) and Kurt Piehl (1986-1989). The correspondence with the authors is in German.

The largest group of correspondence consists of letters Brust sent to his family during several trips to Europe in which he discusses family matters, living arrangements, finances, and political work. The trips included one in 1963 to do research for his doctoral thesis and to meet with Gerry Healy, a leader of the British Socialist Labour League and a member of the International Committee; a visit to Germany in 1970 during which he worked with young Trotskyites in laying the foundation for the establishment of the Bund Sozialisticher Arbeiter, the German section of the ICFI; another trip to Germany in 1975; and a visit to Hungary during a 1989 trip to cover the European parliament election campaign. Brust reported on the 1989 campaign for the Bulletin in a series of articles entitled, "European Journal," which are included elsewhere in the papers.

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Includes articles, interviews, newsletters, leaflets, and newspaper clippings related to Brust's coverage of various labor disputes in the Midwest. Among the more significant labor related materials is a set of newsletters entitled, Area Strike Bulletin (March-May 1948), edited by Brust during a national strike by the United Packinghouse Workers of America in 1948, and a series of memoranda and other papers related to Brust's arrest during the Local P-9 strike at the Hormel meat packing plant in Austin, Minnesota (1986).

The largest group of Brust's writings is a collection of articles (1968-1989) for the Workers League weekly paper, Bulletin. Other papers connected with his writings consist mainly of notes and drafts of articles on various topics including the political history of Germany and the history of left wing politics in the United States. There is also a collection of articles entitled, "European Journal," which Brust wrote while covering the 1989 election campaign for the European parliament, and a group of articles he translated from the German publication Neue Arbeiterpresse.

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Brust, Bill. Defending Principles: the political Legacy of Bill Brust is in the Minnesota Historical Society book collection.

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This collection is indexed under the following headings in the catalog of the Minnesota Historical Society. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons or places should search the catalog using these headings.

Topics:

Geo. A. Hormel & Company Strike, Austin, Minn., 1985-1986.

Hungarian Americans -- Minnesota.

Socialism -- Europe.

Socialism -- United States.

Socialists -- Minnesota.

Strikes and lockouts -- Nursing -- Minnesota.

Strikes and lockouts -- Packing-house workers -- Minnesota.

Strikes and lockouts -- Minnesota.

Persons:

Braun, Uwe-Rudiger.

Brust family.

Brust, Jean T.

Harth, Ulli, 1948-.

Piehl, Kurt, 1928-.

Schultz, Henry.

Organizations:

Carleton College (Northfield, Minn.) -- Faculty.

Fourth International. International Committee.

Socialist Workers Party.

United Packinghouse Workers of America.

Workers League (U.S.).

Place:

Germany -- Description and travel.

Type of Documentation:

Photographs.

Occupation:

German teachers.

Title:

Area strike bulletin.

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