Victor Perlo was an American Marxist economist, government functionary, and a longtime member of the governing National Committee of the Communist Party USA.
21 Facts About Victor Perlo
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2.
Victor Perlo's father, Samuel Perlo, was a lawyer and his mother, Rachel Perlo, was a teacher.
3.
Victor Perlo received his bachelor's degree from Columbia University in New York City in 1931 and master's degree in mathematics from the same school in 1933.
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Late in 1932 or early in 1933, while still a student at Columbia, Victor Perlo joined the Communist Party USA, an organization with which he was affiliated throughout his life.
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Victor Perlo married his first wife, Katherine, in 1933 and divorced in 1943.
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Victor Perlo had varied interests, which included tennis, mountain climbing, and chess.
7.
Victor Perlo then moved to the Federal Home Loan Bank Board where he was an analyst for the Home Owners' Loan Corporation, establishing statistical analyses for properties mortgaged to the corporation and projecting long-term financial accounts.
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Harry Hopkins 8.
In October 1937, Victor Perlo left government service to work in the Brookings Institution, a liberal think tank established in 1916, where he stayed as a researcher for more than two years.
9.
In November 1939, Victor Perlo went to work in the US Department of Commerce, where he worked as a senior economic analyst in the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce.
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Victor Perlo moved to the Office of Price Administration in November 1940, where he was head of the economic statistics division.
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Victor Perlo remained in that capacity until leaving to become head of the aviation section of the Bureau of Programs and Statistics at the War Production Board.
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About December 1945, Victor Perlo went to the US Treasury Department, where he worked in the Monetary Research department.
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Victor Perlo left government service in 1947, when his loyalty was called into question during an investigation by the House Un-American Activities Committee.
14.
Victor Perlo denied allegations that he had spied for the Soviet Union.
15.
The Victor Perlo ring included several important US officials, including a Senate staff director, and the ring supplied the Soviet Union with economic, political, and military intelligence, including United States aircraft production figures.
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Victor Perlo infiltrated through the United States Department of Commerce in 1938 to gather economic intelligence, and passed on intelligence concerning basic economic decisions he presented to Harry Hopkins, Secretary of Commerce.
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Victor Perlo transferred to the Division of Monetary Research, and served under Harry Dexter White, followed by Frank Coe and Harold Glasser, all of whom were later alleged to be Soviet agents.
18.
In 1948, Victor Perlo obtained a position as an economist for the Progressive Party, assisting the Presidential campaign of former US Secretary of Agriculture and Vice President Henry Wallace.
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Victor Perlo died on December 1,1999, at his home in Croton-on-Hudson, New York.
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Victor Perlo was 87 years old at the time of his death.
21.
Victor Perlo's papers are housed in the special collections department of Lewis J Ort Library at Frostburg State University in Frostburg, Maryland.