Biography
Helen R. Bryan was the executive secretary of the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee, which aided refugees from Franco's Spain. Convicted of contempt of Congress for refusing to surrender the committee's records to HUAC, she served a three-month sentence at the federal women's reformatory at Alderson in 1950–51.
Helen R. Bryan, the executive secretary of the JAFRC was one of the officers and executive-board members of the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee (JAFRC) — the New York relief organization that aided refugees of the Spanish Civil War and survivors of Nazi concentration camps — who were jailed for defying the House Un-American Activities Committee. Subpoenaed in 1946, the board refused to hand over the committee’s records and lists of donors, and in June 1947 a federal jury convicted all of them of contempt of Congress. Their appeal, Barsky v. United States, was rejected, and after the Supreme Court declined to intervene they surrendered in 1950 to serve their sentences. She refused to divulge the committee’s records and donor lists and served three months in prison for it.
