Lee Baxandall
Encyclopedia
Lee R. Baxandallhttp://naturistaction.org/AlertsAdvisoriesUpdates/ADVISORIES/Lee_Baxandall_11-28-08/lee_baxandall_11-28-08.html was an American
writer, translator, editor, and activist, first known for his New Left
engagement with cultural topics and then as a leader of the naturist movement.
, Wisconsin
. He attended the University of Wisconsin in Madison
, where he obtained a B.A. (1957) and M.A. (1958) in English
, studied comparative literature
at the doctoral level, and became one of the editors of Studies on the Left
, a New Left
intellectual journal known for its free-wheeling qualities. In 1960, Baxandall traveled to revolutionary Cuba
. In 1962, he married Roslyn Fraad; she would become an early women's liberation activist and they would have a son, Phineas. Living in New York City
from 1962 to 1977, they were active in the movement to end the Vietnam War
.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Baxandall demonstrated a strong interest in the relationship between culture
, particularly theatre
, and radicalism
. He translated plays by Peter Weiss
and Bertolt Brecht
, edited a collection of writings by the German social critic and psychologist Wilhelm Reich
, compiled an annotated bibliography on Marxism
and aesthetics
, and wrote numerous essays on major literary figures, including Bertolt Brecht
and Franz Kafka
. In 1973, he edited a collection of writings by Karl Marx
and Friedrich Engels
on art
and literature
with Polish
philosopher Stefan Morawski. Baxandall's writing appeared in a wide variety of venues, from left-wing periodicals such as The Nation
, New Politics
, The National Guardian
, and Liberation
, to mainstream publications including The New York Times
and intellectual-cultural outlets such as Partisan Review
, The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, and New German Critique
.
Naturism
would by the late 1970s become the main focus of Baxandall's activism. He first took up the activity as an Eagle Scout
in Wisconsin and would frequent a free beach
with his family at Cape Cod National Seashore
in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1974, he travelled to the West Coast of the United States
to meet founders of the free beach
movement there: Eugene Callen and Cec Cinder. This became Beachfront USA. Having inherited his family's publishing business in Oshkosh in 1970, which he managed by traveling back there monthly and then by relocating to there permanently in 1978, Baxandall began to publish Free Beaches magazine and created the Free Beaches Documentation Center, collecting data from all over the world on nude beaches. He published Lee Baxandall's World Guide to Nude Recreation, a color guidebook locating places to go nude all over the world, which he succeeded in getting distributed through major book channels.
Baxandall's view was that nudism fostered body acceptance and broke down the alienation and repression that stood in the way of the realization of full human potential. He founded The Naturist Society
in 1980 and was the first editor of its magazine, Clothed with the Sun, launched in 1981 and renamed Nude & Natural
in 1989. The Naturist Society welcomed everyone from nude bikers to gay and lesbian and transgendered naturists to nude massagers and everyone in between, in contrast to the more conservative American Association for Nude Recreation
.
Baxandall was one of the originators, along with Eugene Callen, of "National Nude Weekend," later "National Nude Week," which he used to generate media attention for the cause. He helped organize and sponsor the first nationwide and later regional annual Naturist Gatherings, with seminars and nude fun for everyone. He also commissioned Edin and Ethel Vélez to produce a series of videos (World of Skinnydipping, etc.) depicting the naturist lifestyle and debunking myths surrounding nude recreation.
Baxandall founded the Naturist Action Committee
, the primary group responsible for early warning and defense against those who would legislate naturists out of existence in the United States. He was the first to retain the services of a professional lobbyist to get the movement's viewpoint heard in state legislatures and Congress. He founded the Naturist Education Foundation, devoted to improving awareness and acceptance of naturism and body acceptance throughout North America.
In 1992, Baxandall remarried, to longtime companion Johanna Moore. In 1995, Baxandall was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease
and he retired from public life from 2002 until his death on November 28, 2008.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
writer, translator, editor, and activist, first known for his New Left
New Left
The New Left was a term used mainly in the United Kingdom and United States in reference to activists, educators, agitators and others in the 1960s and 1970s who sought to implement a broad range of reforms, in contrast to earlier leftist or Marxist movements that had taken a more vanguardist...
engagement with cultural topics and then as a leader of the naturist movement.
Career
Baxandall was born and raised in OshkoshOshkosh, Wisconsin
As of the census of 2000, there were 62,916 people, 24,082 households, and 13,654 families residing in the city. The population density was 2,662.2 people per square mile . There were 25,420 housing units at an average density of 1,075.6 per square mile...
, Wisconsin
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...
. He attended the University of Wisconsin in Madison
Madison, Wisconsin
Madison is the capital of the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Dane County. It is also home to the University of Wisconsin–Madison....
, where he obtained a B.A. (1957) and M.A. (1958) in English
English literature
English literature is the literature written in the English language, including literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from England; for example, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Joseph Conrad was Polish, Dylan Thomas was Welsh, Edgar Allan Poe was American, J....
, studied comparative literature
Comparative literature
Comparative literature is an academic field dealing with the literature of two or more different linguistic, cultural or national groups...
at the doctoral level, and became one of the editors of Studies on the Left
Studies on the Left
Studies on the Left was a journal of New Left radicalism in the United States published between 1959 and 1967 in Madison, Wisconsin, and later in New York....
, a New Left
New Left
The New Left was a term used mainly in the United Kingdom and United States in reference to activists, educators, agitators and others in the 1960s and 1970s who sought to implement a broad range of reforms, in contrast to earlier leftist or Marxist movements that had taken a more vanguardist...
intellectual journal known for its free-wheeling qualities. In 1960, Baxandall traveled to revolutionary Cuba
Cuba
The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
. In 1962, he married Roslyn Fraad; she would become an early women's liberation activist and they would have a son, Phineas. Living in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
from 1962 to 1977, they were active in the movement to end the Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Baxandall demonstrated a strong interest in the relationship between culture
Culture
Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...
, particularly theatre
Theatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...
, and radicalism
Extremism
Extremism is any ideology or political act far outside the perceived political center of a society; or otherwise claimed to violate common moral standards...
. He translated plays by Peter Weiss
Peter Weiss
Peter Ulrich Weiss was a German writer, painter, and artist of adopted Swedish nationality. He is particularly known for his plays Marat/Sade and The Investigation and his novel The Aesthetics of Resistance....
and Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...
, edited a collection of writings by the German social critic and psychologist Wilhelm Reich
Wilhelm Reich
Wilhelm Reich was an Austrian-American psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, known as one of the most radical figures in the history of psychiatry...
, compiled an annotated bibliography on Marxism
Marxism
Marxism is an economic and sociopolitical worldview and method of socioeconomic inquiry that centers upon a materialist interpretation of history, a dialectical view of social change, and an analysis and critique of the development of capitalism. Marxism was pioneered in the early to mid 19th...
and aesthetics
Aesthetics
Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty, art, and taste, and with the creation and appreciation of beauty. It is more scientifically defined as the study of sensory or sensori-emotional values, sometimes called judgments of sentiment and taste...
, and wrote numerous essays on major literary figures, including Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...
and Franz Kafka
Franz Kafka
Franz Kafka was a culturally influential German-language author of short stories and novels. Contemporary critics and academics, including Vladimir Nabokov, regard Kafka as one of the best writers of the 20th century...
. In 1973, he edited a collection of writings by Karl Marx
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His ideas played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement...
and Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels was a German industrialist, social scientist, author, political theorist, philosopher, and father of Marxist theory, alongside Karl Marx. In 1845 he published The Condition of the Working Class in England, based on personal observations and research...
on art
Art
Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect....
and literature
Literature
Literature is the art of written works, and is not bound to published sources...
with Polish
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
philosopher Stefan Morawski. Baxandall's writing appeared in a wide variety of venues, from left-wing periodicals such as The Nation
The Nation
The Nation is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. The periodical, devoted to politics and culture, is self-described as "the flagship of the left." Founded on July 6, 1865, It is published by The Nation Company, L.P., at 33 Irving Place, New York City.The Nation...
, New Politics
New Politics (magazine)
New Politics is an independent socialist journal founded in 1961 and still published in the United States today. While it is inclusive of articles from a variety of left-of-center positions, the publication leans strongly toward a Third camp, democratic Marxist perspective, placing it typically to...
, The National Guardian
Guardian (United States)
The Guardian was a radical leftist independent weekly newspaper published between 1948 and 1992 in New York City. The paper was founded by James Aronson, Cedric Belfrage and John T. McManus.-Formation:...
, and Liberation
Liberation (magazine)
Liberation Magazine was a monthly magazine, of the New Left compared with Dissent , and Studies on the Left.-Early days:"Liberation" was founded, published, and edited by David Dellinger, A. J. Muste from 1956–1975 out of New York. A. J...
, to mainstream publications including The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
and intellectual-cultural outlets such as Partisan Review
Partisan Review
Partisan Review was an American political and literary quarterly published from 1934 to 2003, though it suspended publication between October 1936 and December 1937.-Overview:...
, The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, and New German Critique
New German Critique
The New German Critique is a contemporary academic journal in German studies. It is associated with the Department of German Studies at Cornell University...
.
Naturism
Naturism
Naturism or nudism is a cultural and political movement practising, advocating and defending social nudity in private and in public. It may also refer to a lifestyle based on personal, family and/or social nudism....
would by the late 1970s become the main focus of Baxandall's activism. He first took up the activity as an Eagle Scout
Eagle Scout (Boy Scouts of America)
Eagle Scout is the highest rank attainable in the Boy Scouting program of the Boy Scouts of America . A Scout who attains this rank is called an Eagle Scout or Eagle. Since its introduction in 1911, the Eagle Scout rank has been earned by more than 2 million young men...
in Wisconsin and would frequent a free beach
Nude beach
A nude beach is a beach where users are legally at liberty to be nude. Sometimes the terms clothing-optional beach or free beach are used. Nude bathing is one of the most common forms of nudity in public. As beaches are usually on public lands, any member of the public is entitled to use the...
with his family at Cape Cod National Seashore
Cape Cod National Seashore
The Cape Cod National Seashore , created on August 7, 1961 by President John F. Kennedy, encompasses on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. It includes ponds, woods and beachfront of the Atlantic coastal pine barrens ecoregion...
in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1974, he travelled to the West Coast of the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
to meet founders of the free beach
Nude beach
A nude beach is a beach where users are legally at liberty to be nude. Sometimes the terms clothing-optional beach or free beach are used. Nude bathing is one of the most common forms of nudity in public. As beaches are usually on public lands, any member of the public is entitled to use the...
movement there: Eugene Callen and Cec Cinder. This became Beachfront USA. Having inherited his family's publishing business in Oshkosh in 1970, which he managed by traveling back there monthly and then by relocating to there permanently in 1978, Baxandall began to publish Free Beaches magazine and created the Free Beaches Documentation Center, collecting data from all over the world on nude beaches. He published Lee Baxandall's World Guide to Nude Recreation, a color guidebook locating places to go nude all over the world, which he succeeded in getting distributed through major book channels.
Baxandall's view was that nudism fostered body acceptance and broke down the alienation and repression that stood in the way of the realization of full human potential. He founded The Naturist Society
The Naturist Society
The Naturist Society is a national naturist organization based in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, USA. It publishes a quarterly periodical called Nude & Natural which documents and coordinates naturist activities and provides information about issues related to naturism. The Naturist Society was established...
in 1980 and was the first editor of its magazine, Clothed with the Sun, launched in 1981 and renamed Nude & Natural
Nude & Natural
Nude & Natural: The Magazine Of Naturist Living or simply Magazine is a quarterly 100+ page naturist magazine published by The Naturist Society in Oshkosh, Wisconsin and distributed throughout the United States and internationally...
in 1989. The Naturist Society welcomed everyone from nude bikers to gay and lesbian and transgendered naturists to nude massagers and everyone in between, in contrast to the more conservative American Association for Nude Recreation
American Association for Nude Recreation
The American Association for Nude Recreation is a nudist organization in the United States. Founded in 1931, the organization advocates nudity and nude recreation in appropriate settings. The AANR charters approximately 259 independent U.S. nudist resorts and parks...
.
Baxandall was one of the originators, along with Eugene Callen, of "National Nude Weekend," later "National Nude Week," which he used to generate media attention for the cause. He helped organize and sponsor the first nationwide and later regional annual Naturist Gatherings, with seminars and nude fun for everyone. He also commissioned Edin and Ethel Vélez to produce a series of videos (World of Skinnydipping, etc.) depicting the naturist lifestyle and debunking myths surrounding nude recreation.
Baxandall founded the Naturist Action Committee
Naturist Action Committee
The Naturist Action Committee is a nine-member volunteer committee that functions as the political adjunct to The Naturist Society , based in Oshkosh, Wisconsin...
, the primary group responsible for early warning and defense against those who would legislate naturists out of existence in the United States. He was the first to retain the services of a professional lobbyist to get the movement's viewpoint heard in state legislatures and Congress. He founded the Naturist Education Foundation, devoted to improving awareness and acceptance of naturism and body acceptance throughout North America.
In 1992, Baxandall remarried, to longtime companion Johanna Moore. In 1995, Baxandall was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease
Parkinson's disease
Parkinson's disease is a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system...
and he retired from public life from 2002 until his death on November 28, 2008.
Quotes
- When the culture into which we are born strays too far from nature’s laws, we suffer; a ‘naturalization’ is in order.
- Body Acceptance is the idea, Nude Recreation is the way. Popular motto of The Naturist SocietyThe Naturist SocietyThe Naturist Society is a national naturist organization based in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, USA. It publishes a quarterly periodical called Nude & Natural which documents and coordinates naturist activities and provides information about issues related to naturism. The Naturist Society was established...
- Every civilized nation has nude beaches. That's a mark of a civilized nation. from video: The Beginner's Guide to Skinny Dipping. The Naturist SocietyThe Naturist SocietyThe Naturist Society is a national naturist organization based in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, USA. It publishes a quarterly periodical called Nude & Natural which documents and coordinates naturist activities and provides information about issues related to naturism. The Naturist Society was established...
. Fast Forward Images, Inc. 1991.
Publications
- Marxism and Aesthetics: A Selective Annotated Bibliography (1968; reissued 1978) ISBN 0391002988
- Marx and Engels on Literature and Art (1973) Ed., with Stefan Morawski ISBN 0-914386-01-8 ISBN 0-914386-02-6
- Radical Perspectives in the Arts (1973) Ed. ISBN 0-14-021423-2
- World Guide to Nude Beaches & Recreation (1980) ISBN 0-517-54983-2
- International Guide to Nude Beaches and Recreation (1981) ISBN 0-88373-107-X
- World Guide to Nude Beaches & Resorts (1995) ISBN 0-934106-20-7
- Lee Baxandall's World Guide to Nude Beaches & Resorts: New for the '90s (1997) ISBN 0-934106-21-5
See also
- Studies on the LeftStudies on the LeftStudies on the Left was a journal of New Left radicalism in the United States published between 1959 and 1967 in Madison, Wisconsin, and later in New York....
- Clothes free organizations
- List of public outdoor clothes free places
- Social nudity
- Nude & NaturalNude & NaturalNude & Natural: The Magazine Of Naturist Living or simply Magazine is a quarterly 100+ page naturist magazine published by The Naturist Society in Oshkosh, Wisconsin and distributed throughout the United States and internationally...
- Public nudityPublic nudityPublic nudity or nude in public refers to nudity not in an entirely private context. It refers to a person appearing nude in a public place or to be seen from a public place. It also includes nudity in a semi-public place, where the general public is free to enter, such as a shopping mall...
- Skinny dippingSkinny dippingNude swimming, colloquially called skinny dipping, is a term used to describe swimming naked.-Etymology:The term skinny dip, first recorded in English in the 1950s, includes the somewhat archaic word skinny, known since 1573, meaning "having to do with skin", as it exposed the naked...
- The Naturist SocietyThe Naturist SocietyThe Naturist Society is a national naturist organization based in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, USA. It publishes a quarterly periodical called Nude & Natural which documents and coordinates naturist activities and provides information about issues related to naturism. The Naturist Society was established...
- Nikki CraftNikki CraftNikki Craft is an American political activist, radical feminist, artist and writer.-Activism:In 1975, she presented the Rockwell International Board of Directors with "...naked doll[s] splashed with blood-colored paint" to protest their B-1 bomber called "The Peacemaker".The same year, Craft...