Howard Clifford Rushmore (July 2, 1913 – January 3, 1958) was an American journalist, nationally known for investigative reporting. As a communist, he reported for The Daily Worker; later, he became anti-communist and wrote for publications including the New York Journal-American and Confidential magazine. Rushmore killed himself and his wife in a murder-suicide in 1958.
Background Howard Rushmore was born in Mitchell, South Dakota, the only child to Clifford Glen Rushmore (1877–1947) and Rosa Lee Rushmore (née Palmer; 1882–1955). He was a tenth-generation American whose father's New England ancestors fought in the Revolutionary War. His mother's ancestors "came to the dark and bloody ground" of the Great Plains "with Daniel Boone from the East." Ancestors of both parents were among the first American settlers of Missouri Territory. One of Rushmore's grandfathers fought for the Confederate Army.Anonymous (Newsweek, Incorporated, January 1, 1940), "Notice to Our Readers," Newsweek, New York City, p. 27
Rushmore described his own inauspicious beginnings: "When I was eight, my father lost his job in the railroad yards of Sheridan, Wyoming and took advantage of the government homestead offers to 'prove up' a 320-acre claim. We had no irrigation, no modern machinery; a flat-bed wagon was our only means of transportation." He worked from dawn to dusk, seven days a week, while his mother milked the cows and slopped the hogs and tended a large garden. His father, now "a fifteen-hour-a-day farmer pitted two hundred pounds of muscle and bone against the black gumbo (local soil) and finally lost." Rushmore's parents worked hard for very little in return. "They grew old before my eyes," he would write.
Rushmore and his parents returned to his mother's hometown of Mexico, Missouri, sometime during the mid-1920s, where they settled temporarily at her nearby family's house. Rushmore's father found work as a brickyard workerTheo Wilson (Thursday, January 9, 1958), "Mixed Epitaphs for Rushmore—The Ex-Missourian, Who Killed His Wife and Himself, Had Often Turned on Those Who Were His Friends," The Kansas City Star (Kansas City, Missouri), p. 8 but the family was hit hard economically by the Great Depression, which started Rushmore's lifelong interest in politics. He grew up in poverty in Mexico, and his family moved constantly from house to house. A defeated man, Rushmore's father was apolitical, but his wife was an optimistic Democrat and strong supporter of President Franklin Roosevelt, which influenced her son's early political outlook.
In appearance, Rushmore was usually described as a gangly, 6'5" teenager. Political columnist and friend George Sokolsky would later describe Rushmore as "at heart a hillbilly, proud of his colonial ancestry ... he himself was an enormous disappointment to himself ... a sad mountain boy, morose, looking for something he could never find."George Sokolsky (January 9, 1958), George Sokolsky, The Plain Speaker (Hazleton, Pennsylvania), p. 6 As a result of his appearance and manner, he was held in ridicule by his peers in high school.
Rushmore wanted to make his mark as a progressive journalist and at the age of 16 wrote for two newspapers—the Mexico High School Yellow Yap and The Mexico Ledger. During his junior year of high school, he was expelled for publishing several exposés in the Ledger that the school administration regarded as defamatory about themselves and the teaching staff. Rushmore's parents then enrolled him in St. Brendan's Catholic School, despite the family being Methodists. There Rushmore was even further ostracized, resulting in his quitting school altogether.
Career
Communist publications Rushmore continued as a reporter for the Mexico Intelligencer.Douglas C. Wixson (University of Illinois Press, October 1, 1998), Worker-Writer in America: Jack Conroy and the Tradition of Midwestern Literary Radicalism, 1898-1990, p. 368 On January 12, 1931, he witnessed the lynching of Raymond Gunn,Lawrence O. Christensen, William E. Foley, Gary Kremer (University of Missouri, October 7, 1999), Dictionary of Missouri Biography, pp. 359–361 in which the African-American suspect was seized from the local sheriff, doused with gasoline atop a roof and set aflame while several thousands watched. The event made an indelible mark on the 17-year-old Rushmore, who, even at the height of his anti-communist career, would maintain Gunn's complete innocence.
In the 1940s, when the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) in Kansas City organized an anti-lynching committee led by Harlem-based party organizer Abner Berry, Rushmore was impressed by the bravery and anti-racist stance of the communists. Through the committee, Rushmore met Jack Conroy, editor of The Anvil, a communist literary magazine. Conroy encouraged Rushmore's literary ambitions by suggesting he submit short stories. Albert F. Canwell, et al. (The Committee, 1948), Second Report, Un-American activities in Washington State, 1948, p. 145 By April 1935 Rushmore had become an associate editor of the magazine.Anonymous (Tuesday, April 9, 1935), "Jack Conroy Speaker Before Mexico Club," Moberly Monitor-Index (Moberly, Missouri), p. 1 Later that year, Rushmore joined the Young Communist League USA (YCLUSA) in St. Louis despite having neither a technical knowledge of Marxist philosophy nor its history. This lifelong ignorance would hamper his authority as a professional communist and anti-communist as critics would question his qualifications on the subject.
As a member of the YCLUSA, Rushmore organized farmers in the Dakotas and Iowa. Conroy then sent Rushmore to New York City in May 1935,Douglas C. Wixson (University of Illinois Press, October 1, 1998), Worker-Writer in America: Jack Conroy and the Tradition of Midwestern Literary Radicalism, 1898-1990, p. 445 where he attended the American Writers Congress. There he was asked to join the editorial staff of the Young Worker, the organ of the YCLUSA. Taking advantage of his perceived all-American background, the CPUSA rapidly promoted Rushmore.Murray Kempton (NYRB Classics, reprint edition, May 31, 2004), Part of Our Time: Some Ruins and Monuments of the Thirties, p. 173 All staff members of the Young Worker were assigned to a political unit of the YCLUSA; Rushmore belonged to the Harlem unit, where he met Ruby Bates, a recent recruit to the youth league. Bates was one of the two women who had accused the Scottsboro Boys of rape, only to later recant her original testimony during the Patterson trial. Albert F. Canwell, et al. (The Committee, 1948), Second Report, Un-American activities in Washington State, 1948, p. 150
Rushmore graduated to The Daily Worker as "a $25-a-week writer."Loren Ghiglione (Columbia University Press, reprint edition, April 12, 2011), CBS's Don Hollenbeck: An Honest Reporter in the Age of McCarthyism, p. 176 After a series of girlfriends, he began dating Ruth Garvin, who wrote the women's column for the Sunday Worker Progressive Weekly. They married on October 12, 1936, when Rushmore was aged 23. Rushmore rose to become the paper's official film critic by 1939, but in December he was fired for giving an ambivalent review of Gone with the Wind; despite describing the film as a "magnificent bore" Jay Maeder (February 26, 2001; accessed May 3, 2014), "Turncoat: The Estrangements of Howard Rushmore, January 1958, Chapter 282÷", New York Daily News (New York City, New York) and holding to the standard CPUSA line that the film was "racist," his review was regarded as insufficiently negative by the editorial board because he admired the film's technical aspects.Carlton Jackson (Madison Books, April 14, 1993), Hattie: The Life of Hattie McDaniel, p. 49. In Jackson's account, Rushmore quit the Daily Worker in protest, rather than being fired. The chief editor of the Worker, Benjamin J. Davis, Jr., who personally fired Rushmore,Jay Maeder (Sports Publications, January 1, 1999) Big Town, Big Time: A New York Epic : 1898-1998, p. 114 was particularly incensed at Rushmore's refusal to rewrite the review. However, the sacking backfired as it made the front page of all the major New York newspapers, including the New York Journal-American, New York Post and The New York Times, as well as mainstream papers across the country,AP (Friday, December 22, 1939), "Communist Film Critic Lose Job Rather Than Rap 'Gone With Wind'," Panama City Pilot (Panama City, Florida), p. 1AP (Friday, December 22, 1939), "Red Critic Quits Because He Wouldn't Blast 'Gone' Movie," Pampa Daily News (Pampa, Texas), p. 1AP (Friday, December 22, 1939), "Too Cool For Reds—Film Critic's Job's Gone When He Fails To 'Blister' Movie In Communist Paper," The Iola Register (Iola, Kansas), p. 1Anonymous (Saturday, December 30, 1939), "Red Critic Fired For Not Rapping 'Gone With The Wind," The Pittsburgh Courier (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania), p. 1 which were supportive of Rushmore. The resulting publicity made the 26-year-old an instant celebrity in anti-communist circles. One of the most prominent columnists of the era, Westbrook Pegler, gave Rushmore rousing support in his December 29, 1939, column.Westbrook Pegler (Friday, December 29, 1939), "Fair Enough! Daily Worker Puts Itself In Same Class With Those It Hates By Firing Critic," News-Journal (Mansfield, Ohio), p. 2
Hearst years After his firing from The Daily Worker, Rushmore joined the anti-communist Hearst-owned Journal-American. On December 22, 1939, the day most papers published news of Rushmore's firing, the Worker published an official notice of his termination and gave the reasons. The next day, the Journal-American published "Red Paper's Lies Bared by Ex-Critic", in which Rushmore defended his film review.
In early 1940, Rushmore applied for a job at Time magazine via fellow ex-communist Whittaker Chambers. Not knowing Rushmore and fearful as to how he realized he was a fellow ex-communist, Chambers turned him away.
At the Journal-American, Rushmore reinvented himself from a communist sympathizer to an anti-communist investigator of the very industry that produced the films he once reviewed.David M. Oshinsky (Oxford University Press, USA, September 29, 2005), A Conspiracy So Immense: The World of Joe McCarthy, p. 252 In 1943, his wife Ruth gave birth to one daughter named Barbara.Earl Wilson (Monday, January 13, 1958), "Gleason Losing 70 Pounds; 'At's What The Man Said," It Happened Last Night, The Terre Haute Star (Terre Haute, Indiana), p. 4 In 1940 he began to write anti-communist articles for the American Mercury,Howard Rushmore (June 1940), "Life on The Daily Worker, The American Mercury, pp. 215–221 continuing up to the mid-1950s with his "Heard on the Party Line" column.Howard Rushmore (May 1955), Heard on the Party Line, p. 50 As his celebrity increased, Rushmore hired a Broadway press agent to manage his career. Columnist Walter Winchell began mentoring him.