Charles Dreyfus

Charles Dreyfus was born May 20, 1927 in Paris, France to engineer Pierre Dreyfus and Marie Baur Dreyfus. He attended Lycée Cornot in France from 1939 to 1940. From 1940 to 1942 he went to the École Pratique d’industrie in Marseille, France. While living in France, Dreyfus traveled through Europe and Africa.

He came to the United States with his family in 1942 after the Nazis occupied France. He finished his early education at the Stuyvesant High School in New York City from 1942 to 1944. He also taught young boys French. After his graduation from high school, he enlisted with the French army and returned to France in 1944.

On his return to the United States he heard about Black Mountain through a friend. Dreyfus attended the college for the 1946 winter and spring quarters and the 1946-1947 academic year. He studied a general curriculum including history, art, philosophy and literature. While a student, he also worked in library, participated in the french club, and Dr. Miller's The World Today Club. He married fellow Black Mountain College student Fanny Hobart.

He attended the New School for Social Research in New York and later the University of California at Berkeley. In France he worked for a French automobile enterprise, an American chemical company, and lastly a textile manufacturing company which connected him to his great-grandparents who had a spinning and weaving plant in Alsace. The grandson of Captain Alfred Dreyfus of the “Dreyfus Affair,” he has been active in efforts to preserve his grandfather’s legacy.

Biography written by Mary Emma Harris for the Black Mountain College Project.

Relationships

Wife: Fellow BMC student, Fanny Hobart

Courses Taken

Winter 1945-46: Modern Novel (Merrick), Contemporary Society (Levi),Problems in Philosophy (Dehn).

Spring 1945-46: Race Problem (Miller), Modern Novel (Merrick), Growth ofModern Europe (Walcott), Problems of Philosophy III (Dehn), Work Program.

Fall 1946-47: Cultural History of the Greek World (Levi), Bookbinding(Jalowetz), Foreign Policy of the US since 1900 (Corkran), Shakespeare(Richard), World Today (Miller).

Spring 1946-47: American Civilization (Corchran), Bookbinding (Jalowetz), Introto American Labor (Neibyl?), Reading (Richard)