(Testimony of George William Fehrenbach)
Mr. Griffin.
Well now, before this you indicated that one of them had asked you to join the Communist Party?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
Well, you mean when I knew all of these men belonged to the Communist Party?
Mr. Griffin.
No; when did you know that any one of them--
Mr. Fehrenbach.
That would have been in 1942 that was shortly after I went to work for Sam Jaffe, Phil Jasser spoke to me.
Mr. Griffin.
You formed the opinion then that Phil Jasser was a Communist?
Mr. FEHRENBACH, Yes; I did.
Mr. Griffin.
Are there any of these men that you have mentioned whom You don't think were Communists?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
No.
Mr. Griffin.
Well now, you have indicated you didn't think Sam Jaffe was a Communist?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
Well, Sam Jaffe.
Mr. Griffin.
How about his son-in-law, Max Pritcher? Do you have any doubts about his being a Communist?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
No; I don't.
Mr. Griffin.
What makes you think he was a Communist?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
Because he was always there at the meetings; whenever they were going to have a meeting upstairs why he was always there. They would all be up there in the afternoon and they would talk about being at the meeting at night.
Mr. Griffin.
How many people attended the meetings that you are talking about?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
I don't know; because the days or the evenings that they had their meeting, I had never been in the building, but I would Judge there must have been quite a few from the list of names that I picked up.
Mr. Griffin.
You never attended any of those meetings; did you?
Mr, FEHRENBACH. No.
Mr. Griffin.
Do you know what time the meetings took place?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
No; I couldn't tell you that.
Mr. Griffin.
Well, did they take place in the afternoon?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
No; they was in the evening, usually at night, anyway it was after everything was closed, after 5:30.
Mr. Griffin.
I see. How many of these men would come to your shop at any one time before these meetings?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
Very seldom would there be over three or four at any one time.
Mr. Griffin.
What would they do--what would they do when they would come into your shop?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
They would go into the office with Sam and usually talk about different ones who were going to come and things like that. Whenever they got to talking about what the meeting was about I never overheard anything like that because they usually lowered their voices.
Mr. Griffin.
So when they said--what you would do is see two or three men come into the shop and they would go into Sam Jaffe's office. They would have a conversation but you wouldn't know what the conversation was about?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
No.
Mr. Griffin.
Well now, then upon what do you base your conclusion that the meetings that you think they had upstairs were Communist meetings?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
Well, back at that time there was no actually secret among any of them to the fact--they didn't actually publicize it, don't get me wrong, but they didn't deny that they were Communists, and Sam, of course, had told me that the majority of them were all Communists.
Mr. Griffin.
Sam Jaffe had told you that?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
Yes; and told me not to listen to them and not to pay any attention to them.
Mr. Griffin.
Did he tell you that his son-in-law, Max Pritcher, was a Communist?
Mr. Fehrenbach.
Yes; he said that Max and all of them, and he said, now he says, "I don't think Max or Seymour will ever say anything to you because,"
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