Biography
Lorine Norman, also known by her married name Lorine Kinz, was a Sacramento labor activist. Born in Texas, she picked cotton as a child, worked for three years at the California State Library and served as secretary of the Socialist Party’s Northern California Valley Conference. Police arrested her at the Workers’ School on July 20, 1934, during the crackdown on the Cannery and Agricultural Workers’ Industrial Union. She was one of eight defendants convicted of criminal syndicalism in 1935 and sentenced to one to fourteen years. While pregnant, she was released on $1,000 bail to avoid giving birth in jail. The later Tehachapi prisoner roster and May 1936 parole-application report establish subsequent confinement, so the pregnancy-related bail release does not show that she remained continuously free through the 1937 appellate reversal.
A Sacramento dispatch dated February 1 in the Daily Worker of February 2, 1935, page 1, individually names Lorine Norman among five defendants bailed out that day by the International Labor Defense because they were ill from their treatment in custody. The other four named defendants were Nora Conklin, Pat Chambers, Martin Wilson, Harry Collentz. This establishes an interim bail release on February 1, 1935, within the Sacramento prosecution; it is not the final disposition or proof of uninterrupted custody. The source prints Lorine Norman as Lorrine on page 1 and Loraine in the page 4 collective appeal.
In a letter published in the January 1936 Labor Defender, page 19 (PDF page 20), Norman identifies herself as one of the Sacramento criminal-syndicalism defendants out on bail. Writing from the county hospital, she says her son was born Saturday, November 30, at 1:30 p.m., three weeks overdue and weighing over seven pounds; he initially was not expected to live but was improving. In this January 1936 issue the named Saturday corresponds to November 30, 1935. She and her husband had not yet named him. Her hoped-for Tuesday hospital discharge is prospective. The letter documents childbirth while on bail, without establishing a new custody interval or altering her earlier February 1935 interim release.
Daily Worker, August 23, 1934, page 1: The Sacramento dispatch individually lists this defendant among seventeen facing six criminal-syndicalism counts. It describes the Sacramento prisoners collectively as crowded fourteen to a cell, with no beds or blankets for two weeks and a hole in the floor for a toilet. The stated six-to-eighty-four-year range was potential exposure if convicted, not an imposed sentence. The account’s unnamed Chinese detainee is not identified with any named defendant.
Daily Worker, May 12, 1936, page 5: The paper prints Lorene Norman with Caroline Decker and Nora Conklin as applicants for parole at Tehachapi, with a hearing planned for May 15 after service of the minimum. This is a reported parole application, not proof of a granted parole or executed release. Norman’s earlier bail history is not replaced by this later confinement report. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1936/v13-n114-NY-May-12-1936-DW-Q.pdf
The May 27, 1936 Daily Worker reports that Norman obtained bail shortly before having her baby. It separately dates Norman Mini’s San Quentin release to April 27; that precise date is not assigned to Norman. Her individual release day and complete custody remain unestablished by this article. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1936/v13-n127-NY-May-27-1936-DW-Q.pdf#page=5
A February 21, 1935 Sacramento trial dispatch reported medical affidavits describing serious illness attributed to bad food and treatment during seven months of confinement. It expressly said these three defendants were then out on bail. The rounded interval is not an exact completed total and does not establish uninterrupted custody or a new release day. This source prints Lorene Norman for the existing Lorine Norman. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n046-Nat-feb-22-1935-DW-LOC.pdf#page=2
A Sacramento defense statement dated February 27, 1935, printed in the Daily Worker on March 5, included this defendant among fourteen signers. The statement defended the International Labor Defense and its conduct of the trial and bail campaign against factional criticism. It also named Luther Mincy and John Fisher as acquitted about a week before the statement. Its allegations about other defendants’ cooperation with police are partisan claims, not independently established facts. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n055-NAT-mar-05-1935-DW-Q.pdf#page=3
The October 26, 1935 New Militant reports that Norman’s request for parole while pregnant had failed and that she obtained temporary bail to enter a hospital for childbirth. It describes pressure to return her after birth, which was still prospective. This distinguishes temporary hospital bail from a granted parole; her later documented Tehachapi confinement remains part of the chronology. Source: https://themilitant.com/1935/0144/NM0144.pdf#page=4
The December 29, 1934 New Militant identifies Lorine Norman as secretary of the Sacramento International Labor Defense in its named account of the Sacramento defendants. Its bail and pending-trial descriptions are a contemporary snapshot, separate from later verdicts and prison custody. Source: https://www.themilitant.com/1934/0751/NM0103.pdf#page=1
Pages 24 and 26 of Solow’s August 1935 pamphlet name Lorine Norman among the eight convicted Sacramento defendants and report that she and Norman Mini rejected recommended probation and entered prison maintaining their innocence. This is evidence of actual imprisonment beyond the recommendation alone. The pamphlet’s conflicting collective trial chronology is not used to replace separately sourced dates or to infer a completed fourteen-year term. Source: https://dai.mun.ca/PDFs/radical/UnionSmashinginSacramento.pdf#page=24
The report confirms that Norman, whose married name is Mrs. Edward Kinz, had been freed on $1,000 pregnancy-related bail. Commutation papers were said to await the governor’s signature, so commutation was not yet accomplished. This corroborates the temporary bail interruption already distinguished from her subsequent Tehachapi confinement. Labor Defender, December 1935, original PDF page 22. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1935/v11n12-dec-1935-orig-LD.pdf#page=22
The prisoner letter coauthored by Donald Bigham and Martin Wilson recalls this defendant’s earlier life: picked cotton in Texas and hoped to escape that labor. It identifies all six as young workers drawn to California agricultural labor and union organizing, then held in Sacramento in the1934criminal-syndicalism prosecution. The letter is undated, so its publication on March 12, 1935 is not treated as proof of renewed or uninterrupted custody overriding independently established bail gaps. Its four-to-fifty-six-year exposure is possible punishment, not an imposed sentence. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/new-masses/1935/v14n11-mar-12-1935-NM.pdf#page=22
Daily Worker, February 2, 1935; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Decker’s Sacramento jail account says Norman had picked cotton in Texas from age seven, worked three years at the State Library, and served as secretary of the Socialist Party’s Northern California Valley Conference. It reports her July 20 arrest at the Workers’ School and confirms actual jail detention by August 10. The July 30 attempted release of five defendants was blocked by the district attorney; it is not recorded as a release.
Asked to apply for probation, Norman refused because she regarded an application as an admission of guilt. She said the judge had dismissed counts alleging overt acts against her and that she had earlier rejected a proposed suspended sentence conditional on a guilty plea. The article records her statements, not an independent ruling that all evidence was absent.
Labor Defender, January 1936; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
The complete Sacramento roster on PDF pages 17–18 individually names this defendant among seventeen indicted for criminal syndicalism during the 1934 strike crackdown. Printed variants include Lorent Norman, W. H. Huffine and Harry J. Collentz. The threatened six-to-eighty-four-year range is exposure, not an imposed sentence or actual service. This corroborates the existing Sacramento prosecution; no new arrest, personal prison admission, release day or verdict is inferred from the roster.
The June 4 editorial individually names the seven Sacramento labor organizers, including Lorine Norman, as then imprisoned at San Quentin or Tehachapi for agricultural-strike organizing, while advocating repeal of criminal syndicalism and their release. This is contemporary confirmation and defense context for the existing case, not a new conviction or physical custody endpoint.
The biography describes cotton-picking childhood, prior Socialist activity, Communist affiliation in early 1934, and maritime-strike/Sacramento defense work. The caption identifies her among the defendants; no fixed custody total follows.
The editorial says the three women were then confined at Tehachapi after more than a year, with a May 15 prison-board meeting scheduled to fix individual service within one-to-fourteen-year sentences. The board’s earlier terms for five male co-defendants are separate. A future parole-board hearing is not an actual release or a final term for these women.
