Houston: That Word

When George Ebey first arrived in Houston a year ago to be deputy superintendent of schools, the Houston Post reported: "He chuckled at reports circulating here that he will be a storm center, a controversial educator." George Ebey had chuckled too soon.

In Houston, as elsewhere, "controversial" is quite a fighting word. Last year the city's schools banned their annual U.N. essay contest because, in Houston's eyes, the U.N. had become controversial. In 1951 a group of citizens barred Willard Goslin, former superintendent of schools in Pasadena (TIME, Nov. 27, 1950 et seq.), as a guest speaker ("a very controversial figure," said one school-board member, although he added: "I don't know anything about the man.") Last May, when able Deputy Superintendent Ebey's contract was up for renewal by the school board, he too became controversial. A noisy, crusading anti-Communist lawyer named John P. Rogge* charged that Ebey was proCommunist.

Rogge reported that Ebey had 1) been chairman in 1947 of the California American Veterans Committee, an organization which, he charged, was laced with Communists; 2) been a member of the Portland, Ore. Urban League, and sponsor of an "intercultural program" of Negroes and whites while assistant superintendent of schools in Portland; 3) introduced in 1953 a banquet speaker who in 1945 had allegedly sponsored a dinner for Paul Robeson. Rogge claimed to represent hundreds of "taxpayers, school patrons and citizens," but refused te say who they were. Though the slur upon the non-Communist Urban League was obviously absurd, the board thought Rogge's charges required investigation, hired a firm of former FBI men to do the job.

By last week the report was in. It covered 117 interviews and 348 pages, produced no evidence that Ebey had ever been a Communist, a fellow traveler, or disloyal to the U.S. It did show that, in the A.V.C., he had failed to take a strong stand against the Communist faction, had even seemed at times to collaborate with them "to save the organization." Was this enough to cost him his job? One night last week, the school board met to decide.

Before a packed audience, the members were polled one by one as to whether Ebey's contract should be extended. All agreed that, at worst, Ebey had been too soft toward Communists in the A.V.C. When six members had voted, the count stood three to three. The deciding voice was Chairman James Delmar's. Delmar made no charges of disloyalty, but, he said, "the community is already split wide open over this matter. [If Ebey] stays in the position, I can only see further conflict." In short, George Ebey was "controversial."

Last week he was out of a job.

* Cousin of Manhattan Lawyer O. John Rogge, who took an opposite tack, became one of the leaders of the fellow-traveling Progressive Party, later a registered lobbyist for Tito.

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