{{Short description|American activist (born 1936) }} {{Infobox person | name = Alan Haber | image = Alan Haber (2007).jpeg | caption = Haber in 2007 | birth_date = {{birth date and age|1936|07|29}} | birth_place = | death_date = | death_place = | occupation = Activist<br>Cabinetmaker | education = University of Michigan (BA) | known_for = First president of Students for a Democratic Society }} '''Robert Alan Haber''' (born July 29, 1936) is an American activist. In 1960 he was elected the first president of the now-defunct Students for a Democratic Society, a left-wing student activist organization.<ref>{{cite book| last=Sale| first=Kirkpatrick| title=SDS: Ten Years Towards a Revolution| publisher=Random House| year=1973}}</ref> FBI files at the time indicated his official title as Field Secretary.<ref>{{cite book |author=Scholarly Resources, Inc. |title=Guide to the Microfilm Edition of the FBI File on the Students for a Democratic Society and the Weatherman Underground Organization |year=1991}}</ref> Described variously at the time as "Ann Arbor's resident radical" and "reticent visionary",<ref>{{cite book |author=James Miller|title=Democracy Is In The Streets: From Port Huron to the Siege of Chicago, (Harvard Univ. Pr., 1994), 22-23}}</ref> Haber organized a human rights conference in April of that year which "marked the debut of SDS"<ref>{{Cite journal| last=Zulick| first=Margaret D.| title=Movement Chronology from the Civil War to the Present| place=from course on American Rhetorical Movements (COM 341)| publisher=Wake Forest University| year=1996| url=http://www.wfu.edu/%7Ezulick/341/341chronology.html}}</ref> and invited four organizers of the 1960 NAACP sit-ins against segregated lunch counters in Greensboro, North Carolina.
==Early life and education== Haber "came from a leftist background".<ref name=Towne1998>{{Cite journal| last =Towne| first =David, J.D.| title =SDS: Rage Against the Machine| place =Albion College| publisher = Unpublished undergraduate research paper| year =1998}}</ref> His father, William Haber, was an economics professor at the University of Michigan.<ref>{{cite book| last=Miller| first=James| title=Democracy is in the Streets: Port Huron to the Siege of Chicago| url=https://archive.org/details/democracyisinstr0000mill| url-access=registration| publisher=Simon and Schuster| year=1987}}</ref><ref name="Port-Huron-50">{{cite web|url=http://michigantoday.umich.edu/a8402/|title=Port Huron Statement turns 50|author=Frederic Alan Maxwell|work=umich.edu|date=June 20, 2012|access-date=September 7, 2015}}</ref> Haber's parents named him after former Wisconsin governor, congressman and senator Robert M. La Follette Sr., advocate of the Wisconsin Idea political reforms in the late 19th century and early 20th century.<ref>{{cite book| last=Levine| first=Peter| title=The New Progressive Era: Toward a Fair and Deliberative Democracy| publisher=Rowman and Littlefield| year=2000}}</ref> Haber has one brother.<ref>{{cite news| author =Sam Howe Verhovek| title =William Haber, Who Directed Aid To Jewish Refugees, Is Dead at 89| newspaper =The New York Times| date =January 3, 1989| url =https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/03/obituaries/william-haber-who-directed-aid-to-jewish-refugees-is-dead-at-89.html| access-date =September 7, 2015}}</ref>
In 1954, Haber enrolled at the University of Michigan.<ref>{{cite news| author =Wendy Ochoa| title ='60s activist Alan Haber predicts today's 'enslaved' students will rise again| newspaper =The Washtenaw Voice| date =September 2010| url =http://archive.washtenawvoice.com/2010/09/60s-activist-alan-haber-predicts-todays-enslaved-students-will-rise-again/| access-date =September 7, 2015| archive-url =https://web.archive.org/web/20160305190915/http://archive.washtenawvoice.com/2010/09/60s-activist-alan-haber-predicts-todays-enslaved-students-will-rise-again/| archive-date =March 5, 2016| url-status =dead}}</ref> He graduated in 1965.<ref>{{cite news| author =Chelsea Landry| title =Famous 1960s activists visit Occupy Ann Arbor site| newspaper =The Michigan Daily| date =November 1, 2011| url =https://www.michigandaily.com/news/famous-activists-visit-occupy-ann-arbor| access-date =September 7, 2015 }}</ref><ref>{{cite news| author =Jeremy Allen| title =U-M professors' first teach-in 50 years ago launched a national movement| quote =Haber, an Ann Arbor resident and the co-founder and first president of Students for a Democratic Society...| newspaper =MLive.com| date =March 22, 2015| url =http://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/index.ssf/2015/03/u-m_plans_50th_anniversary_cel.html| access-date =September 7, 2015}}</ref><ref name="Port-Huron-50"/>
==Activism== Haber's political activism began in the mid-1950s. He worked unsuccessfully to bring concert singer and blacklisted political activist Paul Robeson to University of Michigan campus, protested the firing of three U-M professors for their refusal to sign a loyalty oath, and picketed Ann Arbor Woolworth’s and Kresge’s stores for refusing to serve African Americans in the Jim Crow south.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last=Miller |first=Janet |date=2012 |title=Activism in 2012: SDS founder Alan Haber and Odile Hugonot-Haber leading discussion on Occupy movement |url=http://www.annarbor.com/news/sds-founder-alan-haber-and-activist-odile-hugonot-haber-to-appear-at-crazy-wisdom-salon/ |access-date=2023-03-13 |website=AnnArbor.com}}</ref>
Haber attended the National Student Association convention in Minneapolis in August 1960. There he witnessed a dramatic intervention by Sandra Cason (Casey Hayden) urging support for the fledgling Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). She recalls that Haber "scooped" her up for the SDS, and that she in turn drew in Tom Hayden, editor of the University of Michigan newspaper.<ref name="Smith">{{cite book |last=Smith |first=Harold L. |title=Texas Women: Their Histories, Their Lives. |date=2015 |publisher=University of Georgia Press |isbn=9780820347905 |editor-last1=Turner |editor-first1=Elizabeth Hayes |pages=365 |chapter=Casey Hayden: Gender and the Origins of SNCC, SDS, and the Women's Liberation Movement |editor-last2=Cole |editor-first2=Stephanie |editor-last3=Sharpless |editor-first3=Rebecca |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/texaswomentheirh0000turn/page/295}}</ref> While collaborating with Haber, Hayden was the principal author of the ''Port Huron Statement,''<ref>The Port Huron Statement. http://www2.iath.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/Resources/Primary/Manifestos/SDS_Port_Huron.html</ref> refined and adopted at the first Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) convention in June 1962.
Haber was increasingly disaffected by the factionalism that marked the SDS as it mobilised on-campus opposition to the Vietnam War. By 1969, after Haber had moved to Berkeley, Calif., SDS splintered with the Weather Underground faction turning to violence. Haber regretted that the movement had "turned very hard edged."<ref name=":0" />
Haber makes a living as a cabinetmaker.{{citation needed|date=April 2023}}
He helped found the Berkeley, California Long Haul Infoshop, an anarchist resource center and community space.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/07/02/18432805.php|title=An evening with Alan Haber, founder of S.D.S. and Long Haul Infoshop : Indybay|work=Indybay|date=July 11, 2007|access-date=7 September 2015}}</ref>{{Unreliable source?|date=April 2023|reason=This is an event entry with seemingly autobiographical information}}
==Personal life== Haber lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan with his partner Odile Hugonot-Haber.<ref>{{Cite news|title = Activism in 2012: SDS founder Alan Haber and Odile Hugonot-Haber leading discussion on Occupy movement|newspaper=The Ann Arbor News|date = Feb 1, 2012|url = http://www.annarbor.com/news/sds-founder-alan-haber-and-activist-odile-hugonot-haber-to-appear-at-crazy-wisdom-salon/|last = Miller|first = Janet|access-date = 2014-04-19}}</ref>
== References == {{Reflist}}
== External links == * {{LocalWiki|ann-arbor|Alan_Haber}} * {{LocalWiki|ann-arbor|Megiddo_Peace_Project|Megiddo Peace Project}} * [http://theannweb.com/node/20126 "Has Ann Arbor Lost its Liberal Mojo?"]{{dead link|date=December 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}, ''The Ann'', October 2011
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Haber, Alan}} Category:Living people Category:Members of Students for a Democratic Society Haber, Robert Alan Category:University of Michigan alumni Category:20th-century American Jews Category:Jewish American activists Category:Place of birth missing (living people) Category:1936 births Category:21st-century American Jews Category:Activists from Berkeley, California