Karl Liebknecht, the patron of Communist youth, is celebrated in the small mining town of Neffs, Ohio by the Young Workers League in 1923. Largely home to eastern European immigrants, Neffs was a stronghold of the Socialist Party for a generation before it became a bastion of the Communist Party until the mining crisis of the 1930s and the movement of peoples initiated by World War Two decimated both the community and the movement in Neffs.

‘Liebknecht Day at Neffs, Ohio, 1923’ by Adolph Rattay from Young Worker. Vol. 2 No. 3. March, 1923.

Liebknecht Day 1923, was the first celebration, the Neffs branch of the Young Workers League of America was able to take a part in. Organized in September, by the Polish branch of the Workers Party, it is already doing good work.

Liebknecht Day was set for Jan. 20th at 7 o’clock p.m. to proceed with the program at 8 o’clock. Long before this date, the comrades were active in arranging a program. To pull a big crowd, we put out our local posters, besides those of the national office to advertise especially an one act play, which was a part of the program and admission tickets were sold in advance.

Saturday, Jan. 20th, came about and promised to be a nice day, but about noon, it started to rain and kept on the whole afternoon and evening. This made us believe, that our work was in vain. But nevertheless the hall was crowded by 7:30 already, many had to stand. This made us proceed with the program at 7:40 o’clock.

Comrade Emitt Krotky opened the celebration with an inspiring talk for about 15 minutes, explaining the purpose of this day and received long applause. This comrade acted as chairman for the whole entertainment. He introduced five boys and five girls of the junior group who presented the “Origin of the Red Flag”, a song with recitation, a snappy entertainment event. Next was a recitation, “In Memory of Karl Liebknecht and Rose Luxemburg”, by Mary Hornik. This is a very fine recitation and produced by her father, member of the Workers’ Party, especially for this day.

The chairman then presented the main speaker, comrade J.J. Hoge of Bellaire, member of the Workers’ Party. He spoke for about one hour on the subject Karl Liebknecht’s and Rosa Luxemburg’s Life and Work.” “He is well known in the revolutionary movement for years and in the last miners election was the candidate for president of the 5th subdistrict of district 6 on the program of the T.U.E.L.

The Neffs branch of the Young Workers League took an active part in his campaign. But he was defeated this time, because nothing was too low and too dirty for the reactionaries to use in the campaign against him.

Next was the play “A Free Union” by Mary Marcy, played by members of the Young Workers’ League to the great satisfaction of the audience. All the players were young people and for the first time on the stage, but one would think, that their occupation is the stage only. Several other interesting numbers combined to make this the most successful meeting ever held in Neffs by the Y.W.L. Adolph Rattay.

The Young Worker was produced by the Young Workers League of America beginning in 1922. The name of the Workers Party youth league followed the name of the adult party, changing to the Young Workers (Communist) League when the Workers Party became the Workers (Communist) Party in 1926. The journal was published monthly in Chicago and continued until 1927. Editors included Oliver Carlson, Martin Abern, Max Schachtman, Nat Kaplan, and Harry Gannes.

For PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/youngworker/v2n3-mar-1923-yw-G-LB.pdf