Schwab, Justus H. b. (?) 1847; Frankfurt am Main d. December 18, 1900; New York City
German American saloonkeeper who, from 1870 until his death, played a pivotal role in New York’s Socialist and anarchist movements. Schwab was an imposing man, broad shouldered with curly blonde hair and a stentorian voice.
A friend once described him as a “Viking,” a figure too large for his cozy little tavern. Another characterized him as a muscular fellow with an enormous appetite, a sense of humor, and a popular joviality befitting a southern German.Schwab was the son of a Forty-Eighter who had served four years in prison for rioting against the Prussians. The young Schwab learned the masonry trade and possibly participated in the late 1860s labor movement in Germany. He immigrated to New York in May 1869 and joined the German section of the International Workingmen’s Association. Difficult economic times during the 1870s led unemployed workers to demand public assistance from city authorities. Schwab participated in the protests, believing a government should be run by and for the workers. In January 1874, for example, he marched together with thousands of the unemployed in a demonstration in Tompkins Square that was ultimately violently dispersed by police officers. Schwab was promptly arrested and accused of inciting to riot and “waving a red flag.”
Sometime after these events, Schwab married and had four children. It is at this time that he opened a corner saloon on 50 First Street in the heart of Little Germany. This saloon would become a prominent
Justus Schwab played a pivotal role in New York’s socialist and anarchist movements. (Leslie's Weekly, February 21, 1874)
bohemian meeting place for French communards, Russian revolutionaries, German anarchists, and American artists and was well known throughout the Lower East Side. Inevitably, Schwab’s cafe became a target for police and antisaloon leaguers.
Twice, in 1876 and 1877, he was arrested for selling lager beer on Sunday and for disorderly conduct, but was released each time.In 1879 Schwab was still a prominent member of the New York section of the Socialist Labor Party, but by 1880 he strongly opposed the party’s hierarchy and reformism. Expelled as a dissident, Schwab became a leader of a group of antistatist Socialists. In October 1881 he was chosen as a delegate for New York at the Chicago convention of social revolutionaries. In 1882 Schwab was instrumental in moving Freiheit, the London radical paper edited by Johann Most, to New York. The two men remained close friends until 1886, when Schwab broke with Most because of his involvement with arsonists. His saloon, however, remained an important hub of radical activities, frequented by such luminaries as Emma Goldman and Ambrose Bierce.
Aside from providing a space for countercultural groups, Schwab himself remained active in the movement. He contributed to legal defense funds for anarchists and free speech campaigns. He was also a member of the Internationale Arbeiter-Liedertafel, a popular German anarchist musical society in New York.
Tom Goyens
See also Anarchists; Forty-Eighters; Most, Johann; New York City; Socialist Labor Party
References and Further Reading
“Defense of Justus Schwab.” Outlook 48 (November 25, 1893): 957.
Goldman, Emma. Living My Life. 2 vols.
London and New York: Knopf, 1931.
Lynch, Denis Tilden. The Wild Seventies. New York and London: Appleton-Century, 1941.