John Gerassi

John Gerassi (July 12, 1931 – July 26, 2012), also known as Tito Gerassi or mononymously Tito, was a French-American leftist professor, journalist, author, scholar, political activist, and revolutionary. At birth, Tito's parents, artist Fernando Gerassi and Ukrainian feminist Stépha Gerassi, were members of the Montparnasse circle of artists and intellectuals that included Pablo Picasso and his godfather Jean-Paul Sartre. Initially working as a journalist for Time magazine and later a foreign correspondent for The New York Times, he grew close to Che Guevara and Fidel Castro during the Cuban Revolution and analyzed the American policy against Latin America in his 1965 book The Great Fear in Latin America. In 1966, Tito would investigate the Boise homosexuality scandal in The Boys of Boise, exposing the persecution of homosexuals in the city that was carried out under the guise of a moral panic. Tito also utilized his close ties to figures to construct biographies, creating the only authorized biography of Sartre, Hated Conscience of His Century in 1989.

Tito also spent his life as an educator, teaching at institutions including San Francisco State University, The University of Paris (XII, Vincennes), the JFK Institute of the Free University of Berlin, UC Irvine, and Bard College. At the time of his death, he was the senior professor of Political Science at Queens College, City University of New York, where he had been teaching since 1978.

Early life and background
John Gerassi was born in Paris on July 12, 1931 at the Clinique Tarnier to father Fernando Gerassi (d. 1974), a Turkish-born artist of Sephardic Jewish heritage, and Ukrainian-born mother Stépha Gerassi (Stephania Awdykowicz; d. 1989), a writer and feminist and daughter of Klymentyna Avdykovych, a famous Lviv candy factory owner. Moving between Barcelona and the Montparnasse artistic hub in Paris, Tito's parents belonged to a cosmopolitan circle of artists and intellectuals who congregated in cafes to argue art and politics, and counted Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir as close friends. At his birth, Fernando was socializing with Andre Breton, Marc Chagall, Alberto Giacometti, Simone de Beauvoir, and Joan Miro. Fernando was eventually coaxed into drinking until he passed out; Jean-Paul Sartre, the couple's best friend who recently arrived from his professorship at Le Havre, was the only sober member of the group and came in time to check on Stépha, who named the newborn Jean-Paul in his honor. When Fernando came to lucidity, he protested against the middle name, so Jean-Paul became Jean, John or Juan in Spanish, which was shortened to Juanito and then to the nickname Tito. Sartre became Tito's godfather, or "non-god father" because of his atheism.

When Spanish Civil War broke out in Spain in 1936, at the agitation of André Malraux Fernando Gerassi joined the Loyalist forces under the International Brigade, and after distinguishing himself, was assigned by Colonel Georgy Zhukov under the Czech General Lukacz. After Lukacz's death, Fernando was promoted to a general. Fernando later served later as the inspiration for the figure of Gomez, the artist and revolutionary in Sartre's trilogy "The Roads to Freedom".

The situation for the Loyalists became untenable, but Fernando continued fighting until the fall of Barcelona. Fernando later became wary of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and of the prospect of a new war, and went to Paris to insist on the establishment of Spanish Republican refugee divisions to fight the Germans. Rebuffed by the French government, when World War II became a reality, Fernando was assigned as a colonel to defend the Franco-German frontlines in the Vosges. Returning to Paris with his battalion, Fernando used his friendship with Dominican diplomat Porfirio Rubirosa to secure passports and visas for his friends and 8,000 Spanish refugees. After assuming the role of diplomats on behalf of the Dominican Republic after the flight of Rubirosa and his embassy, the family fled first to Lisbon, and after an assassination attempt from Franco's agents, finally arriving in New York City on September 3, 1941, as political refugees disguised as Dominican diplomats.

As the family were technically diplomats, Fernando was pressed into service for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), serving in Latin America and later Spain and North Africa, earning a medal and commendation from William J. Donovan for his efforts in assisting the North African campaign. After Fernando left the OSS, the Gerassi family was harassed by the office's successor, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), who questioned the family in disguise as immigration agents into the presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson until Abe Fortas petitioned the government on the family's behalf and attorney general Bobby Kennedy apologized to the family and made them citizens.

After the family's emigration, Tito was raised in New York City and attended Columbia University. Tito was drafted to fight in the Korean War, and lost his best friend during the conflict, which, in addition to the conduct of American forces there, only formented his radicalism. He spent a decade in journalism, worked as an editor for Time and, later, Newsweek before serving as a foreign correspondent for The New York Times. He left journalism at one point to pursue a career in academia and earned his doctorate at the London School of Economics.

Leading the Vanguard
Tito was one of the most important and influential thinkers and participants in the U.S. and International Left movements throughout his lifetime. As a New York Times correspondent he became a supporter of the Cuban revolution, a friend of Che Guevara and a voice for revolutionary movements throughout Latin American and the world. As a professor of political science at San Francisco State in 1968, he participated in (and was arrested during) the student strikes, which were led by the Black Student Union. Initiated in response to suspension of a radical Black Panther graduate student instructor, these strikes escalated into violent protests resulting in police confrontations and occupation and a complete four month long shut down of the university. During that period, Tito was also a co-founder and contributor to Ramparts Magazine.

One of his students from Queen's College shared these stories about Tito's activism in the 1960's in the Knight News, the Queens College's student-run newspaper. This anonymous student chose to spell ‘America’ with a ‘k’ to verbalize his opinion that the U.S.A has a white supremacist nature.

"His revolutionary convictions, worldviews and beliefs were steeled by what he had seen in his life. As a youth he witnessed one of the most horrible crimes, the lynching of a black youth. When telling us this story in class, he would burst in tears. During his service in the Korean War, he saw how a sergeant made US soldiers indiscriminately shoot innocent women and children crossing a bridge. He worked as a New York Times correspondent and participated in the Cuban revolution along with Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. He had seen firsthand how the imperialist ‘amerikan’ empire dropped bombs on Vietnam. He met Ho Chi Minh and Vo Nguyen Giap who were both head of the revolutionary forces which defeated ‘amerika.’ In ‘amerika,’ he was active in fighting against the police riot in the ’68 Democratic National Convention at a time when all people of color in this country and worldwide were fighting for their liberation. He earned his battle scar when a cop hit him with a baton in his lower spine. From then on, Tito lost his sense of touch on his soles and hands"

Returning to His Roots at Home and Abroad
With Tito's termination from San Francisco State, he was black-listed from other college teaching positions in the U.S. He subsequently moved to Paris in the early 70s, where he had an established a relationship with Jean-Paul Sartre and began conducting a series of interviews with Sartre. His intention was to help the world better understand Sartre's contribution to cultural and political thought beyond the realm of elite intellectuals and academics. He continued to teach American Foreign Policy at the University of Vincennes, where following the 1968 political uprising in Paris, its campus had been abandoned to various left wing factions debating the failure of the 68 revolution and American expatriates hoping to better understand U.S. imperialism and ways to oppose it.

The early 1970s were also significant for Tito's continued developing relationship with black nationalist leadership in the U.S. During this period, he maintained a dialogue with the various competing ideological factions that had developed within the Black Panther Party leadership. A portion of his extensive written correspondence and letters with George Jackson were published posthumously in "Blood in My Eye", four months after George Jackson was murdered during an alleged attempted escape from San Quentin prison. In Blood in my Eye, George acknowledged the depth and relevance of Tito's historical, ideological and lived experience in advancing the liberation of peoples throughout the world from imperialistic exploitation and oppression and cites excerpts from "Overview: The Future Is Revolution" from The Coming of the New International: A Revolutionary Anthology.

John "Tito" Gerassi was admitted into hospice care in June 2012. He died at the age of 81 from cancer in the hospice careunit at the Mount Sinai Beth Israel hospital in New York City at 11:30 pm on July 26, 2012, watched over by two of his students. He died half an hour after the anniversary of the attack on the Moncada Barracks, led by Gerassi's acquaintance Fidel Castro, an event which signaled the start of the Cuban Revolution. Gerassi was survived by two daughters. At the time of his death, he was the senior professor of Political Science at Queens College, City University of New York, where he had been teaching since 1978.