Brownsville Labor Lyceum

1914 - ?

Founded in 1914, the Labor Lyceum in Brownsville was a space for leftist organizing in the early 20th century. Serving as the home for the local Socialist Party and other labor organizations, the Labor Lyceum saw heated debates between socialists, communists and other left-leaning organizers, as described in Alfred Kazin's class memoir of Brownsville, A Walker in the City. The Lyceum provided an important meeting space for striking organizations, rallies, and political protests. It also served as an entertainment venue for the neighborhood, after the building management was taken over my Sol Hurok, a leading concert organizer in the country. The Lyceum featured a library, bowling alleys, billiards rooms, and a large auditorium. It hosted weekly lectures, including A. Phillip Randolph delivering a lecture,"The Negro Problem in America" in 1923. Beginning in 1912, the Lyceum held a Socialist Sunday School, hosting thousands of students throughout the 1910s, which declined following the Red Scare after World War I, after the Lyceum building itself was raided during the Palmer Raids. During World War II, local labor and tenant organizations protested landlord and grocer hikes in rent and prices through the local Congress of Industrial Organizations.