Frank Collin

Last updated
Frank Collin
Frank Collin, leader of the National Socialist Party of America (1978).jpeg
Collins giving a press conference in 1978
1st President of the National Socialist Party of America
In office
1970–1977

Francis Joseph Collin (born November 3, 1944) is an American former political activist and Midwest coordinator with the American Nazi Party, later known as the National Socialist White People's Party. After being ousted for being partly Jewish (which he denied), in 1970, Collin founded the National Socialist Party of America. (N.S.P.A.) [1] In the late 1970s, his planned march in the predominantly Jewish suburb of Skokie, Illinois was challenged; however, the American Civil Liberties Union defended Collin's group's freedom of speech and assembly in a case that reached the United States Supreme Court to correct procedural deficiencies. Specifically, the necessity of immediate appellate review of orders restraining the exercise of First Amendment rights was strongly emphasized in National Socialist Party v. Village of Skokie, 432 U.S. 43 (1977). Afterward, the Illinois Supreme Court held that the party had a right to march and to display swastikas, despite local opposition, based on the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Collin then offered a compromise, offering to march in Chicago's Marquette Park (where Martin Luther King had been attacked in 1966) instead of Skokie. [2] [3] After Collin was convicted and sentenced in 1979 for child molestation, he lost his position in the party. [4] [5]

Contents

After being released early on parole from prison, Collin created a new career as a writer, publishing numerous books under the pen name Frank Joseph. He wrote New Age and hyperdiffusionist works supporting the pseudoarchaeological idea that Old World peoples had migrated to North America in ancient times and created its complex societies of indigenous peoples. This thesis is rejected by mainstream scholars.[ citation needed ]

Early life, family and education

Collin was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, where he attended local schools. His father, Max Frank Collin, was born Max Simon Cohn in Munich, Germany, on August 23, 1913, [6] the son of Jewish parents who were murdered in The Holocaust, and was a survivor of Dachau concentration camp. [7] Frank's mother, Virginia Gertrude née Hardyman, was born in Chicago on August 18, 1920, and was Catholic. [8]

Adult life and career

As a young man, Collin in the 1960s joined George Lincoln Rockwell's National Socialist White People's Party. [4] He became the Midwest coordinator. [9] He broke with the NSWPP due to a disagreement with Rockwell's successor, Matt Koehl, [4] who was elected as the party leader by popular vote after Rockwell was assassinated on August 25, 1967. The falling out stemmed in part from published accounts by Max Collin, Frank's father, who said that he was a Jewish Holocaust survivor and had changed his name from Cohen (or Cohn) to Collin. [10] [11] Frank Collin denied having Jewish roots and maintained that his father was not telling the truth. [11]

In 1970, Collin formed another organization, the National Socialist Party of America (NSPA), later known as the American Nazi Party. It attracted other disaffected members of the NSWPP, [4] as well as Michael Allen, Gary Lauck and Harold Covington. [4] Covington helped buy a building for the group which they called Rockwell Hall, [4] where Collin and some other members lived in a barracks in upper floor. [11] Collin ran for alderman of Chicago in 1975 and pulled 16% of the vote. [4]

The NSPA began holding anti-black demonstrations in Chicago's Marquette Park. [12] The Chicago authorities became concerned about violence and passed an ordinance which required demonstrations to post large insurance bonds. [12] [13] Collin went to the ACLU and they filed a suit. [13] While the case was proceeding without public notice, Collin attempted to contact other cities about holding demonstrations. [13] Skokie, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, responded with a notice that the group would need to post a bond, similar to the recently enacted ordinance in Chicago. [13] Collin's plan for his neo-Nazi group to march in uniforms through Skokie, which was heavily Jewish with numerous residents who were Holocaust survivors, generated public outrage and the media attention which Collin sought. [4] [12]

Also in 1977, Koehl's NSWPP began a campaign in their paper White Power about Collin's father being Jewish, [4] including publications of what they stated were Max Simon Cohn's naturalization records. [4] Collin and the NSPA leadership continued to deny the claim and said the images were fakes. [4]

Child molestation conviction

During this time, according to Jeffrey Kaplan, Covington found pictures in Frank Collin's desk that linked Collin to the sexual abuse of young boys. [14] In what Kaplan described as a play for power in the organization, Covington and the other NSPA members turned the evidence on Collin over to the police. [14] After Collin was arrested, Covington took over leadership of the NSPA and moved the headquarters from Chicago to North Carolina. [4] A 1980 article in The New York Times reported that "Frank Collin was expelled from the American Nazi Party for illicit intercourse with minors and the use of Nazi headquarters in Chicago for purposes of sodomy with children. The report indicates that the Nazis "tipped" the police who arrested Collin. [15] Collin was convicted of child molestation [14] [16] and sentenced to seven years in prison at the Pontiac Correctional Center in 1979. He served three years. [14]

Author

Upon his release from prison, Collin "reinvented himself under the pseudonym of Frank Joseph, a New Age writer and pagan worshiper." [16] His time in the Pontiac Correctional Facility in Illinois had coincided with the period when Russell E. Burrows worked there as a prison guard. [17] He subsequently wrote many books and articles in support of Burrows Cave, an alleged cache of ancient treasure in an unrevealed location, supposedly discovered by Russell Burrows in southern Illinois." [18] In 1987, he had his first New Age book published, The Destruction of Atlantis: Compelling Evidence of the Sudden Fall of the Legendary Civilization .

He wrote articles for Fate magazine, and he was also the editor of The Ancient American magazine. [19] The Ancient American focuses on what it says is evidence of ancient, pre-Columbian transoceanic contact between the Old World and North America, with the implication that all complex aspects of North America's indigenous cultures must have originated on other continents. The magazine's claims are similar to discredited nineteenth century theories, and as a result, they are considered dubious or exploitative by scholars. [20]

Books (as Frank Joseph)

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nazi Party</span> Far-right political party active in Germany (1920–1945)

The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party, was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor, the German Workers' Party, existed from 1919 to 1920. The Nazi Party emerged from the extremist German nationalist, racist and populist Freikorps paramilitary culture, which fought against communist uprisings in post–World War I Germany. The party was created to draw workers away from communism and into völkisch nationalism. Initially, Nazi political strategy focused on anti–big business, anti-bourgeois, and anti-capitalist rhetoric; it was later downplayed to gain the support of business leaders. By the 1930s, the party's main focus shifted to antisemitic and anti-Marxist themes. The party had little popular support until the Great Depression, when worsening living standards and widespread unemployment drove Germans into political extremism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Skokie, Illinois</span> Village in Illinois, United States

Skokie is a village in Cook County, Illinois, United States. According to the 2020 census, its population was 67,824. Skokie lies approximately 15 miles (24 km) north of Chicago's downtown Loop. The name Skokie comes from a Potawatomi word for "marsh". For many years, Skokie promoted itself as "The World's Largest Village". Skokie's streets, like that of many suburbs, are largely a continuation of the Chicago street grid, and the village is served by the Chicago Transit Authority, further cementing its connection to the city.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Lincoln Rockwell</span> American Neo-Nazi politician (1918–1967)

George Lincoln Rockwell was an American fascist activist and founder of the American Nazi Party. He later became a major figure in the Neo-Nazi movement in the United States, and his beliefs, strategies, and writings have continued to influence many white supremacists and Neo-Nazis.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Francis Parker Yockey</span> American far-right author and attorney (1917–1960)

Francis Parker Yockey was an American fascist and pan-Europeanist ideologue. A lawyer, he is known for his neo-Spenglerian book Imperium: The Philosophy of History and Politics, published in 1948 under the pen name Ulick Varange, which was dedicated indirectly to Adolf Hitler and called for a neo-Nazi European empire.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">American Nazi Party</span> Fascist political party in the United States

The American Nazi Party (ANP) is an American far-right and neo-Nazi political party founded by George Lincoln Rockwell and headquartered in Arlington, Virginia. The organization was originally named the World Union of Free Enterprise National Socialists (WUFENS), a name to denote opposition to state ownership of property, the same year—it was renamed the American Nazi Party in order to attract 'maximum media attention'. Since the late 1960s, a number of small groups have used the name "American Nazi Party" with most being independent of each other and disbanding before the 21st century. The party is based largely upon the ideals and policies of Adolf Hitler's Nazi Party in Germany during the Nazi era, and embraced its uniforms and iconography.

Cohen v. California, 403 U.S. 15 (1971), was a landmark decision of the US Supreme Court holding that the First Amendment prevented the conviction of Paul Robert Cohen for the crime of disturbing the peace by wearing a jacket displaying "Fuck the Draft" in the public corridors of a California courthouse.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">National Socialist Party of America</span> Political party in United States

The National Socialist Party of America (NSPA) was a Chicago-based organization founded in 1970 by Frank Collin shortly after he left the National Socialist White People's Party. The NSWPP had been the American Nazi Party until shortly after the assassination of its leader George Lincoln Rockwell in 1967. Collin, a follower of Rockwell, developed differences with his successor Matt Koehl.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joseph Tommasi</span> American neo-Nazi

Joseph Charles Tommasi was an American Neo-Nazi who founded the National Socialist Liberation Front. He advocated extremism and armed guerrilla warfare against the U.S. government and what he called its "Jewish power structure." Tommasi wanted anarchy and lawlessness so that the "system" could be attacked without protection. Tommasi was derisively nicknamed "Tomato Joe" by rival neo-Nazis because of his Italian heritage and "less than Nordic complexion." He was later expelled from the group for using drugs and misusing group funds.

The National Youth Alliance (NYA) was an American right-wing political group founded by Willis Carto, head of the right-wing Liberty Lobby.

John Patsalos, formerly known as John Patler, is an American former neo-Nazi who was convicted of the August 25, 1967, murder of American Nazi Party leader George Lincoln Rockwell.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marquette Park (Chicago)</span> Public park in Chicago, Illinois

Marquette Park, the largest park on the southwest side of Chicago, Illinois, at 323 acres (1.31 km2), is located at 41.768°N 87.703°W in the city's Chicago Lawn neighborhood. The park is named for Father Jacques Marquette (1637–1675).

Harold Armstead Covington was an American neo-Nazi activist and writer. He advocated the creation of an "Aryan homeland" in the Pacific Northwest and was the founder of the Northwest Front (NF), a white separatist political movement that sought to create a white ethnostate.

William John Beattie is a Canadian Neo-Nazi who was the founder and former leader of the Canadian Nazi Party. The establishment of the Canadian Nazi Party, re-named the National Socialist Party in 1967, marked a re-emergence of organized neo-Nazi activity in Canada that had been dormant since the days of Adrian Arcand.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cueva de los Tayos</span> Cave in Ecuador

Cueva de los Tayos is a cave located on the eastern slopes of the Andes mountains in the Morona-Santiago province of Ecuador and became infamous for reportedly having 'golden plates' that contains the history of Mankind. It owes its name to being the home of the native nocturnal birds called Tayos, which live in numerous caves in the Andean jungles of South America. The cave shot up in popularity thanks to the writings of Erich von Däniken and the 1976 BCRA expedition that Neil Armstrong took part in. Despite numerous expeditions, these plates have never been recovered or photographed. The consensus from the archeological community is that the Golden Library was a hoax.

National Socialist Party of America v. Village of Skokie, 432 U.S. 43 (1977), arising out of what is sometimes referred to as the Skokie Affair, was a landmark decision of the US Supreme Court dealing with freedom of speech and freedom of assembly. This case is considered a "classic" free speech case in constitutional law classes. Related court decisions are captioned Skokie v. NSPA, Collin v. Smith, and Smith v. Collin. The Supreme Court ruled 5–4, per curiam. The Supreme Court's 1977 ruling granted certiorari and reversed and remanded the Illinois Supreme Court's denial to lift the lower court's injunction on the NSPA's march. In other words: the courts decided a person's assertion that speech is being restrained must be reviewed immediately by the judiciary. By requiring the state court to consider the neo-Nazis' appeal without delay, the U.S. Supreme Court decision opened the door to allowing the National Socialist Party of America to march.

<i>Skokie</i> (film) 1981 American drama TV film

Skokie is a 1981 television film directed by Herbert Wise, based on a real life controversy in Skokie, Illinois, involving the National Socialist Party of America. This controversy would be fought in court and reach the level of the United States Supreme Court in National Socialist Party of America v. Village of Skokie.

Sol Goldstein was a leader in the Chicago Jewish community, a Zionist activist and a philanthropist. He survived imprisonment by Nazi Germany in World War II, and later moved to the US.

Dovid Kaplan is an Orthodox Jewish rabbi, kiruv educator, author, and speaker. He is known for his inspirational and humorous storytelling both in his international speaking engagements and in his Impact! series of books.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marquette Park rallies</span>

From the mid-1960s until the late 1980s, Chicago's Marquette Park was the scene of many racially charged rallies that erupted in violence. The rallies often spilled into the residential areas surrounding the park.

James K. Warner (b.1939) was an early recruit to George Lincoln Rockwell's American Nazi Party (ANP) as part of the core of the party and national secretary. He later became involved with the National States' Rights Party (NSRP). After moving to Los Angeles, he was converted to Christian Identity by Wesley Swift and started the New Christian Crusade Church. Warner succeeded Richard Girndt Butler as leader of the Christian Defense League. He eventually moved both the New Christian Crusade Church and the Christian Defense League to Louisiana. Warner later became the Louisiana Grand Dragon of David Duke's Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.

References

  1. ↑ Wheaton, Elizabeth (1988). Codename GREENKILL: The 1979 Greensboro Killings. Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press. pp.  3–4. ISBN   978-0820309354.
  2. ↑ Grossman, Ron (10 March 2017). "'Swastika war': When the neo-Nazis fought in court to march in Skokie". chicagotribune.com. Retrieved 27 November 2020.
  3. ↑ Berlet, Chip (2001). Dobratz, Betty A.; Walder, Lisa K.; Buzzell, Timothy (eds.). "Hate Groups, Racial Tension and Ethnoviolence in an Integrating Chicago Neighborhood 1976–1988". Research in Political Sociology. 9. Bingley, West Yorkshire, England: Emerald Group Publishing: 117–163. doi:10.1016/S0895-9935(01)80010-3. ISBN   9780762307562.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Kaplan, Jeffrey (2000). Encyclopedia of White Power: A Sourcebook on the Radical Racist Right. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield. p. 62. ISBN   9780742503403 . Retrieved 21 January 2014.
  5. ↑ Steiger, Brad; Steiger, Sherry (2012). Conspiracies and Secret Societies: The Complete Dossier (2nd ed.). Detroit, Michigan: Visible Ink Press. p. 18. ISBN   978-1578593682. In 1979 Collin's ambition to lead a new Nazi America was thwarted when he was arrested, convicted, and sent to prison on child molestation charges.
  6. ↑ Grossman, Ron (March 10, 2017). "Flashback: 'Swastika war': When the neo-Nazis fought in court to march in Skokie". Chicago Tribune .
  7. ↑ Pick, Grant (2008). The People Are the News: Grant Pick's Chicago Stories. Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press. p. 68. ISBN   9780810124455.
  8. ↑ Peters, John Durham (2010). Courting the Abyss: Free Speech and the Liberal Tradition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. p. 159. ISBN   9780226662756.
  9. ↑ Durham, Martin (October 23, 2007). White Rage: The Extreme Right and American Politics. London: Routledge. pp. 23–. ISBN   9780203012581.
  10. ↑ Watia, Victor (July 1, 1970). "Frank Collin is Leader of Own Party". The Times-News . Burlington, North Carolina: New Media Investment Group. United Press International . Retrieved January 23, 2014.
  11. 1 2 3 "Nazi denies Jewish blood, but dad claims otherwise". The Bulletin . Bend, Oregon: Western Communications. United Press International. April 24, 1970.
  12. 1 2 3 Marcovitz, Hal (September 1, 2010). Extremist Groups. Edina, Minnesota: ABDO Publishing Company. pp. 32–. ISBN   978-1604538595 . Retrieved 21 January 2014.
  13. 1 2 3 4 Walker, Samuel (1994). Hate Speech: The History of an American Controversy . Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press. pp.  120–. ISBN   9780803297517 . Retrieved 21 January 2014.
  14. 1 2 3 4 Kaplan, Jeffrey (January 1, 2001). Radical Religion in America: Millenarian Movements from the Far Right to the Children of Noah. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press. pp. 36–. ISBN   9780815603962 . Retrieved January 21, 2014. Covington, his rival for NSPA "power", made the fortuitous discovery (while rifling through Collin's desk) that the half-Jewish fuehrer also had a weakness for pedophilia and did not hesitate to photograph his dalliances with a number of young boys. As a result, Collin was sent to prison.
  15. ↑ Horowitz, Irving Louis; Bramson, Victoria Curtis (Spring 1979). "Skokie, the ACLU and the Endurance of Democratic Theory". Law and Contemporary Problems . 43 (2). Durham, North Carolina: Duke University School of Law: 328. doi:10.2307/1191205. JSTOR   1191205.
  16. 1 2 Bernstein, Arnie (2013). Swastika Nation: Fritz Kuhn and the Rise and Fall of the German-American Bund. New York City: St. Martin's Press. p. 301. ISBN   9781250006714.
  17. ↑ Wilson, Joseph AP (2012). "The Cave Who Never Was: Outsider Archaeology and Failed Collaboration in the USA". Public Archaeology . 11 (2): 75–93. doi:10.1179/1465518712Z.0000000007. S2CID   162312493.
  18. ↑ Joseph, Frank (2003). The Lost Treasure of King Juba: The Evidence of Africans in America Before Columbus. Rochester, VT: Simon and Schuster. p. 224. ISBN   9781591438519 . Retrieved November 20, 2018.
  19. ↑ American Villains, Volume 1: Joe Adonis–Jim Jones. Ipswich, Massachusetts: Salem Press Inc. 2008. p. 125. ISBN   978-1-58765-453-4.
  20. ↑ Birmingham, Robert A.; Eisenberg, Leslie E. (2000). Indian Mounds of Wisconsin . Madison, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press. p.  64. ISBN   978-0-299-16874-2.
  21. ↑ Hanson, Amanda J.; Witry, Richard J. (2010). Images of America: Skokie. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing. p. 115. ISBN   978-0-7385-8443-0.
  22. ↑ "The Politics of "The Blues Brothers"". WMAQ-TV. Chicago, IL. February 14, 2013.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.