Disinformation Book of Lists (13 page)

1.
Gibraltar Steamship Company

Used to cover activities related to the Bay of Pigs invasion.

2.
Air America

Supposedly a civilian air service whose planes were allowed to buzz all over Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, this was a huge CIA operation that shuttled spooks, military brass, arms, drugs, and other people and contraband.

3.
Brewster Jennings & Associates

CIA operative Valerie Plame—whose cover was blown by two senior Bush Administration officials and conservative columnist Robert Novak—listed this nonexistent company on a public form. Its address is supposedly 101 Arch Street, Boston, Massachusetts, even though the office tower there has no such tenant. The
Boston Globe
reports:

A spokeswoman for Dun & Bradstreet Inc., a New Jersey operator of commercial databases, said Brewster Jennings was first entered into its records on May 22, 1994, but wouldn't discuss the source of the filing. Its records list the company at 101 Arch St. as a “legal services office,” which could mean a law firm, with annual sales of $60,000, one employee, and a chief executive identified as “Victor Brewster, Partner.” That person isn't listed elsewhere.

4.
Aroundworld Shipping, Inc.

This and the following companies were created for gun-running by Edwin Wilson, a former CIA officer who supposedly was kicked out of the Agency and then supplied arms to Libya.

5.
Consultants International, Inc.

6.
Delex International Corporations

7.
Egyptian-American Transport Service Company

8.
Inter-Technology, Inc.

9.
Scientific Communications, Inc.

10.
Systems Services International

Note:
Some legitimate companies may also be using these names, so don't assume that any company with one of the names is a spook operation.

1.
Bud Abbot

According to a snitch for the Los Angeles Police Department, funnyman Bud Abbot “is a collector of pornography and allegedly has 1,500 reels of obscene motion pictures which he shows in his home where he has a projector of his own.”

2.
Gracie Allen

Comedian Gracie Allen and her friend Mary Livingston were said to have smuggled clothes and jewelry into the US without paying duty tax. Their husbands-George Burns and Jack Benny (respectively) ended up paying fines.

3.
Desi Arnaz

The feds wanted to make sure that Arnaz wasn't a Cuban commie, and they kept tabs on some of his TV productions. In an ass-kissing letter in 1959, Arnaz says that he's considering buying a script called
The FBI Story
and asks FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, “would there be any objection on your part?” Arnaz curtsies: “One can never be sure as to the type of organization that would buy this property and develop it into a series without taking into account the requirements and interests of your department.”

4.
Josephine Baker

The legendary banana-dancer was investigated on suspicion of being a commie.

5.
James Baldwin

6.
Lucille Ball

“Oh, Lucy, you got some ‘splaining to do about registering to vote as a Communist!” “Wah, Ricky, I only did it because my granddad made me!” Despite this explanation, the FBI claimed that Ball also donated to the Communist Party.

7.
Harry Belafonte

8
Lennie Bruce

9.
James Cagney

10.
Truman Capote

11.
Billy Carter

12.
Wilt Chamberlain

The file of Wilt “The Stilt” contains numerous allegations that he bet on and against his team, the Philadelphia 76ers, between 1966 and 1969, perhaps even shaving points. Indications are the FBI never launched a formal investigation, and no charges were ever brought.

13.
Charlie Chaplin

The Little Tramp spoke glowingly of communism and the Soviet Union. This, plus the progressive themes of his films and his fondness for jailbait, led the FBI to intensely surveil the silent-movie actor. They also worked with US Attorney Charles Carr to nail Chaplin for transporting a 23-year-old woman to New York for “immoral” purposes, but he beat the rap.

14.
Nat King Cole

15.
Gary Cooper

16.
Noel Coward

17.
Bing Crosby

The FBI's main interest in the crooner was for his association with mobsters, which was basically deemed social and inconsequential.

18.
E.E. Cummings

19.
Sammy Davis, Jr.

Hoover wanted info on the Candy Man's alleged mob ties, his marriage to a white woman, and his involvement with civil rights. It's hard to say which Hoover thought was worst.

20.
John Denver

The folksy singer's file contains tantalizing but mostly redacted references to La Cosa Nostra.

21.
Marlene Dietrich

The Berlin-born movie idol was rumored to be secretly aiding the Nazis, so Hoover launched an investigation that included opening her mail and tapping her phone. The Agency dug up her lesbian affairs but nothing indicating a tie to the Third Reich.

22.
Joe DiMaggio

23.
Walt Disney

The now-defunct website APBNews writes:

There has been much speculation on just what Disney's FBI file means. A 1993 book by celebrity biographer Marc Eliot claimed Disney was an informant for the bureau, and, in return, agents helped search for his biological mother.
The New York Times
confirmed some of this, though other articles condemned Eliot's book and his conclusions. Did the FBI use Disney in any active investigations? Was he feeding the bureau secrets on Hollywood subversives? These files show Disney was very close to the FBI and on at least one occasion changed movie scripts to appease the bureau. “Mr. Disney has volunteered representatives of this office complete access to the facilities of Disneyland for use in connection with official matters and for recreational purposes,” states one memo. Several heavily redacted files show the FBI was monitoring prospective Disney employees with the studio's consent.

24.
Jean Dixon

Among other things, the tabloid psychic's file reveals that from 1966 to 1968, she was a “mouthpiece for the FBI.” At her request, the agency fed her information (disinformation?) about the New Left, which she then worked into interviews and articles, claiming, for example, that the Soviet Union was behind student protests.

25.
W.E.B. Du Bois

26.
Jimmy Durante

27.
Albert Einstein

According to the FBI: “Einstein was a member, sponsor, or affiliated with thirty-four communist fronts between 1937-1954. He also served as honorary chairman for three communist organizations.”

28.
Hanns Eisler

29.
Edward “Duke” Ellington

30.
Medgar Evers

31.
Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.

32.
William Faulkner

33.
Ella Fitzgerald

34.
Ian Fleming

35.
Errol Flynn

The swashbuckling actor got on the FBI's radar for supposed communist sympathies and for two sex-related court cases one claiming that Flynn boinked two 15-year-old girls and the other charging that he pimped a woman he brought into the country from Mexico. He was found not guilty on all counts.

36.
Henry Ford

37.
Eric Fromm

38.
Clark Gable

39.
Marcus Garvey

40.
Allen Ginsberg

The Beat poet's file is over 900 pages, and that's just for starters.
In Alien Ink: The FBI's War on Freedom of Expression
, Natalie Robins writes: “Ginsberg not only has an FBI file, but a record at fifteen other agencies, including the CIA, Defense Department, the US Postal Service, the Treasury Department, and the Drug Enforcement Agency.”

41.
Woody Guthrie

42.
Ernest Hemingway

For a little while, Papa was an FBI operative, reporting on Spanish Fascists in Havana and looking for German submarines off the Cuban coast.

43.
Jimi Hendrix

44.
Abbie Hoffman

The radical's radical, Hoffman is the subject of an FBI file over 13,200 pages long.

45.
Billie Holliday

46.
Lena Horne

47.
L. Ron Hubbard

48.
Rock Hudson

49.
Howard Hughes

50.
Langston Hughes

51.
Aldous Huxley

52.
Helen Keller

There's no word on why Keller has a file, but it undoubtedly includes her effusive praise of the newly formed Soviet Union and its leader, Lenin.

53.
Gene Kelly

54.
Joseph P. Kennedy

55.
Martin Luther King, Jr.

56.
Alfred Kinsey

Kinsey's earth-shattering report
Sexual Behavior of the Human Male
upset the prudes at the FBI, as did the sexologist's acceptance of homosexuality. They kept tabs on Kinsey and his Institute for the Study of Human Sexuality, though nothing came of it.

57.
Paul Krassner

Upon receiving his FBI file, Paul Krassner discovered that the Bureau was behind a poison-pen letter sent to
Life
magazine, calling the counterculture trickster “a raving, unconfined nut.” This phrase became the title of Krassner's autobiography.

58.
Ray Kroc

59.
Veronica Lake

60.
Burt Lancaster

Manly man Burt Lancaster ignited the FBI's wrath by speaking out against the House Un-American Activities Committee and working with blacklisted movie figures. When he needed a passport to France to work on his film
Trapeze
, the State Department refused until he sent them an affidavit praising the HUAC and declaring he would rat out anyone with communist sympathies.

The file also says that Lancaster and other celebrities attended a gay party with 250 Marines. This rumor was taken so seriously that the Office of Naval Intelligence raided the mansion where the giant orgy supposedly took place.

61.
Anton LaVey

62.
John Lennon

63.
Sinclair Lewis

64.
Guy Lombardo

65.
Jack London

66.
Thomas Mann

67.
Mickey Mantle

Among other things, the FBI's file on Mantle looks at his alleged ties to professional gamblers.

68.
Bob Marley

69.
Billy Martin

70.
Dean Martin

As with the rest of the Rat Pack, the FBI watched Dino's interactions with mobsters, Teamsters, and hookers.

71.
The Marx Brothers

The Marx Brothers—Groucho, Harpo, Zeppo, and Chico are each the subject of an FBI file. A liberal, Groucho was investigated to see if he had commie affiliations, but despite his last name he was no follower of Karl. His comedy was monitored, however, because he occasionally was critical of the United States (which, according to his file, he once referred to as “the United Snakes”).

72.
Carson McCullers

73.
Marshall McLuhan

74.
Steve McQueen

75.
Arthur Miller

76.
Thelonious Monk

77.
Marilyn Monroe

In describing Monroe's file, APBNews implies the G-Men's hard-on for the archetypal blonde bombshell: “The FBI collected intelligence on all aspects of the star's life, from a telegram announcing her marriage and a report on her husband's rumored Communist Party ties to risqué quotes she gave about herself to magazines.”

78.
Georgia O'Keeffe

79.
George Orwell

80.
Jesse Owens

81.
Linus Pauling

82.
Pablo Picasso

83.
Mary Pickford

84.
Ezra Pound

85.
Elvis Presley

The King's file doesn't contain anything investigational toward him. Instead, it looks at attempts to extort him and collects letters of complaint from outraged bluenoses.

86.
Vincent Price

87.
Ayn Rand

88.
Diego Rivera

89.
Norman Rockwell

90.
Gene Roddenberry

91.
Eleanor Roosevelt

J. Edgar Hoover kept one of his notorious “secret and confidential” files on a socialist named Joseph Lash who joined the US Army. In the most explosive portion of the file, an agent reports that the Army Counterintelligence Corps, while surveilling Lash, recorded him having sex with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt in a hotel room. This tape was then reportedly played for FDR, who ordered Lash transferred to combat and angrily confronted his wife. Although Ms. Roosevelt did have affairs, 97. it's generally believed that this wasn't one of them. Given the timing, it seems likely that the sex tape, if it exists, captured Lash and his fiancée getting it on.

92.
Carl Sagan

93.
Jonas Salk

94.
Charles Schulz

95.
Tupac Shakur

96.
Frank Sinatra

The FBI kept an ten-inch thick file on Old Blue Eyes that examined his alleged communist leanings (doubtful), his supposed attempt at extortion (case dropped when the victim wouldn't cooperate), his reported draft-dodging (found to be baseless), and his friendships with Mafiosi (suspicious but never enough to prosecute). Interestingly, in 1950, the Chairman of the Board volunteered to become an FBI rat by infiltrating the Communist Party. Associate Director Clyde Tolson sniffed: “We want nothing to do with him.”

97.
Benjamin Spock

98.
John Steinbeck

Given Steinbeck's pro-labor views, it was inevitable that the FBI would compile a dossier on him, focusing on the supposed communist connections of the writer and his wives. The attention was so noticeable that Steinbeck wrote to the Attorney General: “Do you suppose you could ask Edgar's boys to stop stepping on my heels? It's getting tiresome.”

99.
Jimmy Stewart

100.
Ed Sullivan

101.
Rip Torn

102.
Spencer Tracy

103.
Lana Turner

104.
Andy Warhol

For about a decade starting in the late 1960s, the FBI investigated Pop artist Warhol for interstate transportation of obscene material (i.e., his own films). Although some of his movies were banned in some areas (such as New York), Drella was never prosecuted.

105.
John Wayne

Obviously, there was no need to monitor the Duke for communist activities. He was such a fervent anti-Red that Stalin sent a KGB assassination squad to snuff him. The most interesting thing in Wayne's file is a memo relaying reports that the actor financially supported a plot to overthrow the government of Panama.

106.
Orson Welles

107.
Mae West

108.
Tennessee Williams

109.
Frank Lloyd Wright

110.
Richard Nathaniel Wright

111.
Malcolm X

Note
: You can attempt to get these files for yourself. Some are posted at [
foia.fbi.gov
], but most will require a formal request. In your letter, mention the Freedom of Information Act, name the file(s) you're interested in, and cite the amount you're willing to pay. Send the letter to:

Record/Information Dissemination Section

Records Management Division

Federal Bureau of Investigation

Department of Justice

935 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington DC 20535-0001