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Celebration of Walter Rybeck, Part One
Assorted friends gathered on Zoom this afternoon to celebrate Walter Rybeck, a journalist, author, Georgist activist, Reform Jew, and veteran of World War Two. He and his wife Erika are still alive and able to talk, I am happy to say, but when a man is in his later nineties, we don’t know how long the situation will last.
Alanna Hartzok spoke at first, recounting some of Mr. Rybeck’s experiences and accomplishments. She mentioned an occasion in the 1980s when a bunch of poor people were squatting in a public park, and someone asked Walter Rybeck what he thought about it, to which he replied, “We are all squatters on this planet; the question is on what terms some of us are allowed to squat.”
We heard from Ted Rybeck, son of Walter’s late brother Arthur (Walter’s own son Rick was physically present with his parents). Walter and Erika have been married for sixty-six years.
We heard from various other people. I myself posted something to chat about how, when I first came int9 contact with organized Georgism back around 1980, I had heard of Walter Rybeck and his “Tale of Five Cities.” Decades later, after graduate school, when I had a well-paid job with annual leave, I met Walter Rybeck and his brother Arthur at Georgist conferences, which I was then able to attend. Alanna read this aloud, and then let me say a few words, which I did.
Someone asked the honoree what had kept him going despite setbacks. Mr. Rybeck replied that being a Georgist is like being one of the advocates of female suffrage in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, who lost and lost, and finally won. You need to keep your sense of humor and your sense of perspective.
To be continued.
Alanna Hartzok spoke at first, recounting some of Mr. Rybeck’s experiences and accomplishments. She mentioned an occasion in the 1980s when a bunch of poor people were squatting in a public park, and someone asked Walter Rybeck what he thought about it, to which he replied, “We are all squatters on this planet; the question is on what terms some of us are allowed to squat.”
We heard from Ted Rybeck, son of Walter’s late brother Arthur (Walter’s own son Rick was physically present with his parents). Walter and Erika have been married for sixty-six years.
We heard from various other people. I myself posted something to chat about how, when I first came int9 contact with organized Georgism back around 1980, I had heard of Walter Rybeck and his “Tale of Five Cities.” Decades later, after graduate school, when I had a well-paid job with annual leave, I met Walter Rybeck and his brother Arthur at Georgist conferences, which I was then able to attend. Alanna read this aloud, and then let me say a few words, which I did.
Someone asked the honoree what had kept him going despite setbacks. Mr. Rybeck replied that being a Georgist is like being one of the advocates of female suffrage in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, who lost and lost, and finally won. You need to keep your sense of humor and your sense of perspective.
To be continued.