Mr. Tavenner. Will you tell the committee, please, to what extent did this training that you had in this particular school prepare you for the role you later played in the Communist Party? Did it amount to anything? Was the instruction effective? Did it serve to instill the spirit of the Communist Party in you?
Mr. Dennett. I certainly felt that it did. As a matter of fact, I was one of those teachers who considered that most of our teaching methods were quite inappropriate for the best benefit to the child. I felt that what is characterized as the lock-step system of education is inadequate to our modern needs. And I finally despaired of ever hoping to be able to do what I felt should be done as a teacher.
Mr. Moulder. Just what do you refer to there? I mean in what respect?
Mr. Dennett. The rigidity with which big school systems are straitjacketed. Courses of study are laid out in an ironclad fashion, and there is no opportunity for teachers to attempt to satisfy the needs or the growing needs of the child.
Now remember this was in 1932. There have been a great many changes in most of the school systems since then. And while I was personally not under that kind of restraint, I knew many teachers in the city of Portland who felt that they were at that time. And I was an active member of the Classroom Teachers Association in Portland—or not in Portland, but in the State of Oregon.
We were always concerned with this problem, and we felt that it was very difficult, almost hopeless to expect to make the improvement which needed to be made.
The Communists introduced me to some of the writings of Frederick Engels and Nicolai Lenin, and I found these writings to be very illuminating. I found them to throw a great deal of light on the development of economic and political crises. And they intrigued me by showing me a set of what is known as the Lenin library. I believe there were about 8 or 10 volumes of it published at that time. And I purchased the whole business. I think it cost me about $15. And I proceeded to read voraciously. I read everything there was in it, and I was very much impressed by the analysis, the penetrating analysis which Lenin made of all of the various political movements that existed way back at the turn of the century in 1900. All these things caused me to feel that there was more here than the average person realized, and I hoped that I was finding the solution to the problems which beset mankind.
Mr. Tavenner. Inasmuch as all persons in attendance were not members of the Communist Party, I am not going to ask you to give me the names of all who participated in that school. But I will ask you to give us the names of any of those who participated in that school who later became functionaries in the Communist Party during the period of time that you were a member.
Mr. Dennett. That is an awfully long time ago, and I did not keep any record of those persons.
Frankly, outside of Fred Walker and Paul Munter and this fellow Rodney, I do not recall distinctly enough to be certain in my own mind. I think that a couple of persons attended there whose names would come up at a later period. But I couldn’t be certain of identifying them in that period.