Tag #153775 - Interview #102451 (Solomon Manevich)

The second campaign was openly anti-Semitic. Mass media had publications about struggle against ‘rootless cosmopolites’ 22 – Jewish intellectuals and workers of culture. In both Colleges where I worked Jewish lecturers were not allowed to participate in commissions during entrance exams or even were dismissed. Party officials found formal reasons to fire people. Many Jewish employees from our College lost their job. I don’t know whether any Jewish employee kept his job at that time. We didn’t discuss this subject since we might be punished for such discussions. People didn’t trust one another. I was also fired from the Polytechnic College in 1948.

At the end of the academic year 1947–48 the director of the College of Civil Aviation Pochasov told me that I was to be dismissed since the program in chemistry was reduced. I asked to resign after vacation to be able to find a job during vacation. I couldn’t find a job at any College or scientific institute since they also were firing their Jewish employees. I was given polite refusals at all institutions.