Abel Meeropol, author of Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit” mentioned by UFT | JD2718

Abel Meeropol, author of Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit” mentioned by UFT | JD2718

Abel Meeropol, author of Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit” mentioned by UFT

I get this newsletter in my email. And it is true. But maybe a bit incomplete.

Abel Meeropol was a member of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) – but not in 1937 when he wrote “Bitter Fruit” (Billie Holiday first sang it two years later, as “Strange Fruit” and it became a signature song.) The UFT did not yet exist. Meeropol was a member of the Communist-led New York Teachers Union (TU). Not only that, it was the TU that  published the poem in its newsletter. Before I continue, if you do not know the song – go listen to the song. If you do not know the words,

Southern trees bear a strange fruit
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root
Black bodies swingin’ in the Southern breeze
Strange fruit hangin’ from the poplar trees

Pastoral scene of the gallant South
The bulgin’ eyes and the twisted mouth
Scent of magnolias sweet and fresh
Then the sudden smell of burnin’ flesh

Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck

For the rain to gather
For the wind to suck
For the sun to rot
For the tree to drop
Here is a strange and bitter crop

(the link is to an website with some more history, and annotations)

So this poem was first published in 1937 in “The New York Teacher” – not the UFT newspaper, but the NYC Teacher Union magazine. The TU was red-baited out of existence, but in any case was never the bargaining agent for all NYC teachers. The TU was actually still around in 1960 when the UFT was CONTINUE READING: Abel Meeropol, author of Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit” mentioned by UFT | JD2718