BY MAREA HIMELGRIN
ST. PAUL, Minnesota - A total of $7,589 has been collected for the Helen Scheer Memorial Fund Appeal. The fund, which was organized in the Twin Cities, was launched at an April 26 meeting here that paid tribute to Scheer's life.

A deeply political person, Scheer was an active member of the Socialist Workers Party since 1944 up until a few weeks before her death from cancer at age 76 on April 11. Her life and example served as an inspiration to several generations of the communist movement.

The money contributed to the fund in her name is being used as seed money to begin a fund that will enable Pathfinder Press to transform its production techniques using the latest computer technology. Ninety-six people made contributions or pledges at the meeting and an additional nine people sent in checks after reading about the fund in the April 27 and May 18 issues of the Militant. Kitty Loepker, a steelworker from St. Louis, sent a note in with her check saying, "Hi - from St. Louis. It is my pleasure to donate to this fund as a tribute to this wonderful woman. I never had the opportunity to meet her, but I felt that I know her after reading the articles in the last two Militants about her life."

In a letter thanking those who made contributions to the fund, Mary-Alice Waters, president of Pathfinder Press and Doug Jenness, the Twin Cities organizer of the Socialist Workers Party, wrote, "Pathfinder's ability not only to provide new titles dealing with the most important questions facing class-struggle fighters today, but to also keep in print hundreds of titles produced by Pathfinder and its predecessors over a period of some 70 years - because they are needed today and will be needed tomorrow - is a powerful revolutionary legacy, worthy of the movement Helen devoted her life's energies and imagination to building."

Marea Himelgrin is a member of the United Steelworkers of America.  
 
 
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