FBI records responsive to a former head of the Harvard Observatory, Dr. Harlow Shapley (1885-1972), were obtained from the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). The December release was part of an ongoing negotiation of a Freedom of Information Act request originally submitted to the FBI in 2022. Access a master folder containing all records obtained to date.
The Bureau initially replied to the request with responsive records while also advising Expanding Frontiers Research of the existence of eight additional files in the custody of NARA. The additional records were subsequently requested and EFR learned through emails with NARA that Shapley was not the subject of any of the files, but cross-referenced in the records during the course of other Cold War era investigations. Shapley's recurring reference in numerous FBI reports indicates the extent the astronomer was involved in social circles of concern to the Bureau.
In the more recently obtained material, for instance, Dr. Shapley was noted to have been a speaker at a 1956 event attended by the subject of the file, Helen Neuenschwander, and sponsored by the Oregon Federation of Social Activists. The file on Neuenschwander was compiled during a Domestic Security Investigation. The section, or serial as NARA calls it, obtained by EFR details FBI documentation of the subject's activities with members of the Communist Party and other groups identified as aligned with its objectives. The Oregon Federation of Social Activists was one such group. It was therefore noted that Neuenschwander was in attendance when the Federation hosted Shapley as a guest speaker. Records also reflect that previous FBI investigations led to suspicions Shapley may have allowed himself to be used for Communist Party purposes. Suffice it to say the Bureau was well acquainted with the man who ran the Harvard Observatory from 1921-1952.
Why Examine These Records?
Reviewing these files serves multiple purposes. For one, examining FBI records on individuals such as Harlow Shapley provides context of Ivy League involvement in politics, social activism, and the intelligence community – and doing so gives us insights into current events. For example, if we make ourselves aware of the FBI and CIA histories with Harlow Shapley and Donald Menzel, then the reasons may seem much clearer why the FBI has a file on current Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb's reported search for ET technological footprints.
Another reason to review such records is it brings into sharper focus how special interest groups and their members, most certainly including UFO enthusiasts, are often so very uninterested in the activities of those willing to champion their beliefs, just as long as those figureheads tell them what they want to hear. This should cast reasonable doubt on the work and analysis they produce, particularly when based primarily in conjecture. The fact UFO investigators spend decades poring over virtually every minute yet often unverifiable detail of sensational narratives, all while neglecting to obtain and publish investigative records on the central figures that are available for the asking, is relevant and telling. It might seem if you'd been talking about a UFO case for years, then you'd ask the FBI for its files on the people that helped promote it and the surrounding beliefs in the first place.
Harlow Shapley was quoted as a UFO advocate by Maj. Donald Keyhoe, front man of the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena. Keyhoe and NICAP widely distributed the statements of Shapley and other scientists and intelligence officers when deemed advantageous to do so, as shown below in NICAP literature (NICAP_Keyhoe_1957_1958.pdf, pp34-35).
NICAP public relations substantially contributed to the evolution of popular belief that Earth is regularly visited by interplanetary spacecraft. FBI Dir. J. Edgar Hoover expressed the view that Keyhoe's tactics were an open attempt to capitalize upon the names and titles of former United States military officers (FBI Records: The Vault - National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP), Part 2, p12).
FBI and CIA records serve as documentation of the activities of Gen. Albert Wedemeyer, Nicholas de Rochefort, Col. Joseph Bryan III, Maj. Donald Keyhoe (pictured right) and many others who were directly involved in both NICAP and the manipulation of public opinion about supposed extraterrestrial visitors. Omitting activities of key figures (as reflected in documents released by intelligence agencies) from either pro-UFO or skeptical assessments forms an incomplete picture, lacks significant context, and is a disservice to the public.
Yet another and important reason to review these FBI records is they stand to inform our positions on social dynamics we are experiencing today. “Un-American activities” may often be in the eye of the beholder, and the same actions denounced as sacrilege at one end of the political spectrum may actually be celebrated at the other. The FBI material at hand serves as documentation of investigations of activists who supported civil rights movements, protested deportation of immigrants, and opposed a Cold War in favor of good will. Those are not exactly actions of people who should be criminalized, yet these were, in fact, activities identified as red flags by the mid-20th century FBI. It is equally noteworthy the Bureau is now known to have overreached its authority and infiltrated the ranks of otherwise lawful activists and protesters for reasons that included sowing dissent and ineffectiveness: COINTELPRO. Therefore, when viewing FBI criticism of one's patriotism and moral standing, it is reasonable to say we might at times be wise to consider the source.
It is much more complicated, however, than simply labeling either the FBI or the subjects of its investigations as virtuous, choosing to frame one or the other as right or wrong, lawful or criminal, democratic or fascist. While the FBI should be accountable for criticism it is due - and we might indeed competently argue there continues today to be a right-wing extremism problem within the law enforcement and intelligence communities - the fact remains global adversaries manipulated certain protest movements with the intent to undermine the United States. The FBI was not entirely wrong in investigating those who opposed state policies, expressed antiwar sentiments, brought attention to social injustice and distributed related literature. Simultaneously, people were certainly not wrong for exercising their civil rights and supporting such causes, but it was indeed the job of the FBI to identify the people using the topics with the intent to manipulate activists for covert and nefarious reasons. It is such circumstances that require us to exercise caution and recognize nuance when exploring these complicated scenarios.
Moreover, this same dynamic as the FBI documented among other political and social movements was at play among UFO advocates: they showed a willingness to turn a blind eye to potentially dishonest and treasonous activity as long as they felt it beneficial to their special interest. That is the very reason FBI agents found individuals of the era particularly dubious who migrated from one lobbying group to another, all while distributing newsletters and flyers advocating criticism of the federal government. We would be wise to take such history into account. A significant social problem is bound to arise when people are willing to ignore such precedence and the accompanying implications, also a form of motivated reasoning, when deeply held beliefs and cherished values become the vehicles of exploitation.
These are reasons we should examine and discuss Cold War FBI records. The circumstances are at no less issue today than they were 70 years ago as described in records responsive to Harlow Shapley.
NARA Shapley Files
After EFR was alerted to their existence by the FBI, a total of eight Bureau files responsive to Harlow Shapley were requested from NARA in 2022. NARA responded in 2024 with descriptions of each file (The turnaround time for correspondence from NARA was better prior to 2020-2022 and has improved since). EFR requested the five files listed below, keeping the total number of pages under 50, as larger requests go into a different track and take substantially more time to process. The remaining three files, totaling an estimated 46 pages, were recently requested after the first five were received.
Case file 100-HQ-334986 serial 19 with a subject of Helen Neuenschwander was compiled as part of a Domestic Security Investigation, created on November 19, 1956, and consisting of an estimated 21 pages.
Case file 140-HQ-20283 serial 1 with a subject of Harold Lindes and Ludwig Domherr was compiled as part of a Security of Government Employees Investigation created on October 1, 1959, and consisting of 10 pages.
Case file 100-HQ-435676 serial 1 with a subject of the American Astronomical Society and International Astronomical Union was compiled as part of a Domestic Security Investigation, created on July 24, 1961, and consisting of 4 pages.
Case file 100-HQ-433419 serial 32 with a subject of the Chicago Committee to Defend the Bill of Rights was compiled as part of a Domestic Security Investigation, created on March 19, 1962, and consisting of 2 pages.
Case file 65-HQ-62562 serial 142 with a subject of Sylvia Press was compiled as part of an Espionage Investigation, created on September 4, 1955, and consisting of an estimated 12 pages.
The final of the five, a serial from a file on Sylvia Press, was withheld in full. We will revisit it further below. The others are each linked to the corresponding pdf on Google Drive and explored in the following section.
Helen Neuenschwander
Helen Neuenschwander and the Oregon Federation of Social Activists (OFSA) were identified by the FBI as aligned with the Communist Party (CP). The FBI was therefore conducting an investigation of Ms. Neuenschwander that eventually determined she declined to provide financial support to the CP. Deeper understanding of the situation and the reasons for the Bureau's investigation would require obtaining more of the file but, in addition to the reference to Shapley as described above, the serial obtained describes conflict and splintering within the group.
The FBI relied partially on confidential informants while documenting her attendance at OFSA meetings as well as the agendas and activities of the meetings. OFSA leadership overlapped heavily with CP members, including two, Donald Wollam and John MacKenzie, who were convicted of Contempt of Congress for their refusal to answer questions for the House Un-American Activities Committee.
The stated resolutions of the Oregon Federation of Social Activists, documented by the FBI to have been read by Neuenschwander during a 1956 meeting, at which she was re-elected to another term as secretary:
Arguments and heated differences in opinion within the OFSA included Neuenschwander's concern for the plight of civil rights movements, specifically, activists in Alabama who were protesting “busses enforcing segregation regulations.” She expressed concern the OFSA was more interested in gaining publicity by contributing funds to the work of those in Alabama than actually helping the cause. Alerting the press to their financial support, she notably argued, would potentially bring problems to the Southern civil rights activists, in that the OFSA was aligned with the Communist Party and this association would, in turn, be used to criticize the Alabama activists. Neuenschwander proposed that discrete dispersion of funds would be more effective if the objective was, in fact, to advocate for civil rights.
The FBI further noted that in 1956 a Paul M. Sweezy was a guest of OFSA and attended its events. Sweezy was described as a former economics instructor at Harvard, co-editor of “the 'Monthly Review,' an independent socialist magazine,” and, quite interestingly, former employee of the Office of Strategic Services during World War II. Informants advised the Bureau that Sweezy's selected topics for discussion included capitalism, comparisons between the USSR and United States, and casting Russia in a positive light, which included asserting it was providing economic support to Asian countries with no accompanying obligations.
Other special interests and groups platformed by OFSA and supported by its members included the Methodist Federation for Social Action, quoted by the FBI to be described by the California Committee on Un-American Activities as “among the more conspicuous fronts for Communist activity in the field of relief, assistance, and welfare work and dealing with the problems of the unemployed and underprivileged.” Another group of concern to the Bureau was the Committee for the Protection of Oregon's Foreign Born, “dominated during its entire existence” by past and present Communist Party members.
This all wound around to the National Committee to Secure Justice in the Rosenberg Case, or the NCSJRC. See how this progresses here? One might have strong values about aiding immigrants working towards the American Dream, support their plight, and soon find them self being urged to advocate for, essentially, espionage against the United States. This is also the type of guilt-by-association the Alabama civil rights activists would have been well served to avoid, as argued by Helen Neuenschwander.
The NCSJRC was a New York-based outfit focused on protesting the 1951 espionage convictions and subsequent 1953 executions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. It also advocated the retrial of their imprisoned accomplice, Morton Sorbell.
Now is as good a time as any to direct the reader's attention to the fact previously mentioned NICAP consultants Albert Wedemeyer and Nicholas de Rochefort were not only experts in psychological warfare, but had expertise in the Far East and, specifically, opposing Red China. Moreover, longtime NICAP staple Joseph Bryan III operated a psychological warfare team for the Office of Policy Coordination, a covert and powerful arm of the CIA and State Department. The team included a CIA man, Lewis “Pinky” Thompson. As reported in Wayward Sons: NICAP and the IC, the minutes of a 1953 CIA meeting documented Allen Dulles presenting a memo for group consideration obtained from Mr. Thompson and concerning the Rosenbergs:
This is pointed out to emphasize the many chefs and their diverse range of recipes that made up the Cold War kitchen. To arrive at conclusions while failing to factor all of these complexities is extremely ill advised.
The Remaining NARA Records
Ludwig Domherr, according to 1959 FBI records, was the Russian editor of America magazine. It was published monthly by the United States Information Agency (USIA) and distributed in Russia. Intended to be a propaganda tool for U.S. interests, a confidential informant from the USIA advised the FBI that articles selected for publishing were not consistently framing the U.S. in a positive manner. The informant suggested the magazine was being either carelessly or deliberately subverted, and that Domherr was directly responsible.
An article cited by the informant and brought to the attention of the FBI was authored by Dr. Harlow Shapley. Here, it gets even more complicated than a propaganda magazine potentially hijacked by rival propagandists.
The FBI documented the informant pointing out that Shapley's article cast doubt on miracle births and supernatural phenomena. A passage of Shapley's apparently loosely translated, “But the many researches conducted in the field of micro molecules during the later years have made all hypothesis regarding the conception of life with the aid of miracles or the supernatural phenomenon superfluous.” We might reasonably suspect Shapley was framing immaculate conception as unlikely, or circumstances to that affect.
The problem with this, the informant argued, was that it promoted an atheistic, Communist worldview, while a majority of Americans believed differently. Therefore, this was further evidence Russians and foreigners employed at the United States Information Agency, publishing America magazine, were actually distributing Communist propaganda rather than American. The Special Agents who interviewed the informant presented their reports for information purposes but, and arguably of significance, it was indeed noted that Shapley was considered a known Communist apologist and previously suspected to have allowed himself to be used for Communist Party purposes.
A 1961 memo composed as part of a Domestic Security Investigation into the American Astronomical Society and International Astronomical Union begins with significant redaction. One can surmise from the released text, however, that concerns arose over a potential negative assessment that might be issued from three individuals about then-President Kennedy's space program. Shapley is mentioned as a member of the International Astronomical Union and that his loyalties might be in question. Consideration is suggested as to whether Shapley and his peers might be sincere if they criticize the space program or if they are more likely to be politically motivated.
The fourth file recently received contains a 1962 FBI memo pertaining to the Chicago Committee to Defend the Bill of Rights, composed as part of a Domestic Security Investigation. The memo addresses petitions for clemency on behalf of Carl Braden and Frank Wilkinson. Braden was a civil rights activist, while Wilkinson was an advocate for public housing. Both were imprisoned for charges stemming from their refusal to testify to the House Un-American Activities Committee. The 1962 FBI memo contains documentation that petitions contained some 3,000 signatures, and that the names would be entered into a national index for future reference.
It is not overtly clear why the memo is responsive to Harlow Shapley. Reasonable speculation might include a relationship between Shapley and organizers or that the astronomer simply signed the petition.
Frank Wilkinson would go on to receive awards for his activism from the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Lawyers' Guild, among others. He campaigned to abolish the House Un-American Activities Committee and led the National Committee Against Repressive Legislation until his death in 2006.
Last but not least, FBI case file 65-HQ-62562, serial 142, with a subject of Sylvia Press and compiled as part of an Espionage Investigation, was withheld in full. Further research revealed Sylvia Press was the female author of a 1958 “nightmare novel,” The Care of Devils, about CIA abuse of a woman. Hailed as a terrifying and shocking view into the world of espionage, the author was apparently a former intelligence officer. The book was removed from distribution until some eight years after its release when Esquire magazine proposed the possibility the CIA may have been behind its removal from newsstands.
A search of the CIA online reading room revealed a single page document archived of a 1966 Sylvia Press interview with WTOP Radio of Washington, D.C. Ms. Press apparently told listeners, according to the document, “I'm not anti-CIA per se. I think the concept is a necessary one. As long as we live in a world where we have the kind of threat hanging over all of us that we do, we want to know what everyone's doing and thinking, even if we don't have to act on it. But I don't think that you can operate, if you go blasting it all over the place, and getting personal publicity while you're doing the job. I think it has to be done discretely. I don't think it should be done barbarously.”
NARA cited FOIA Exemption (b)(1) for the withholding of the document in full. The exemption allows information to be kept secret in the interest of national defense or foreign policy. It is not currently known why the records are responsive to Harlow Shapley. Expanding Frontiers Research appealed the withholding, and a ruling remains pending as of this writing.
The final three FBI files responsive to Harlow Shapley, as described in an email from NARA:
Case file 100-HQ-353404 serial 286 with a subject of Linus Carl Pauling was compiled as part of a Domestic Security Investigation created on January 29, 1962, and consists of an estimated 25 pages.
Case file 140-HQ-20283 serial 29 with a subject of Harald Lindes and Ludwig Domherr was compiled as part of a Security of Government Employees Investigation created on October 1, 1959 and consists of 1 page.
Case file 100-HQ-352498 serial 37 with a subject of Armenian Youth of America, was compiled as part of a Domestic Security Investigation created on July 22, 1954 and consists of an estimated 20 pages.
EFR requested the above records.
There are many lessons to be learned from intelligence community activity during the Cold War. Among them is the moral of the story involving the valid reasons the FBI had for investigating architects of political dissent but, in doing so, increasingly took on the characteristics of the very monster it purported to fight. While looking for bad actors infiltrating protest movements with the intent of sowing unrest, it infiltrated protest movements with the intent of sowing unrest. It was an authoritarian agency with the implied and often stated purpose of preserving democracy and protecting the United States from authoritarianism. The lines of reasoning become complex and sometimes irrational, yet their consideration is necessary in order to better understand the people, threats, and culture of the era. In doing so, we better understand the present and future.
Excellent work again. Many thanks