Series consists of files of correspondence, newspaper clippings, articles and reference material related to Lee and Grace Lorch's activities as social activists and community organizers. These include detailed legal case files and correspondence transferred from law firms who represented Prof. Lorch in various court cases in the 1950s regarding charges laid by the House Committee on Un-American Activities and his dismissal from Penn State and Fisk University. Also includes material regarding Grace Lorch's case against the Boston School Board in 1944-1945 and her activities during the Little Rock Crisis of 1957.
Also includes subject files and correspondence accumulated by Prof. Lorch in later years regarding various subjects including racism, sexism and political discrimination in academia; political prisoners and academic freedom; mandatory retirement; socialist movements in Latin America and Africa; the civil rights movement; peace efforts and nuclear disarmament; Chile ; Cuba ; The German Democratic Republic (GDR) ; Lituania; South Africa; the USSR; Vietnam; First Nations rights in Canada; Canadian socialist organizations and unions; and his research on the first African-American to receive a PhD (in physics) in the United States, Edward Alexander Bouchet (1852-1918).
Also includes correspondence, meeting minutes and reports from various committees, local events, societies and community organizations in which Lorch was active.
