Biography
Albert Kalzenbuch was a member of the National Textile Workers Union in Paterson, New Jersey. He and four other silk workers were initially charged with malicious assault after mill owner Max Urban was injured in a February 18, 1931 fight outside his shop. After Urban died, the five were rearrested on March 21 and held without bail on first-degree murder charges. International Labor Defense organized their defense.
The Daily Worker of May 18, 1931, page 1, reports the Paterson five’s expected Saturday bail release was revoked after a leaflet called workers to greet them at the jail. It says Judge Harlan (as printed) had previously fixed $3,500 for each of four men and $1,000 for the woman, and a renewed motion was to be argued Monday. The article prints Hart where other reports name Bart. Revoked/anticipated bail is not an actual release and does not replace later documented release dates; the Harlan/Harley judge spelling is preserved as source variance.
The May 1931 defense account on printed page 90 says Max Urban died at midnight March 20 and that the five textile defendants were rearrested at 3 a.m. the following morning, March 21, on first-degree murder charges and held without bail. It attributes the earlier confrontation to a February 18 strike dispute over a wage cut and changing two twelve-hour shifts into three eight-hour shifts. It cites a newspaper report of an autopsy finding meningitis. The defense’s account and alibis are attributed claims, not independent judicial findings. The article names Kalzenbuch among the five rearrested defendants; no new sentence or final release is established.
The May 25 Paterson dispatch reports Lieb and the defendant printed Kutzcbuck as actually released yesterday, May 24, on $3,500 bail each. Harris, Bart and Gershonawitz had already received a May 23 welcome. The five still faced the murder prosecution; bail was not acquittal. Kutzcbuck is retained as a same-cohort variant of the Albert Katzenbuch/Kalzenbuch records, which are possible preexisting duplicates and are not automatically merged.
