Archie Brown was born on March 5, 1911 in Sioux City, Iowa to Nathan and Sarah Brown, Russian Jews who immigrated to the United States in the early years of the 20th century. In search of greater economic opportunity, Nathan relocated to Oakland, California, and soon after, 13-year-old Archie hopped a freight train to join his father and older brother in gainful employment. There he hawked newspapers and was initiated into labor activism while participating in a newsboys' strike in 1928. Members of the Trade Union Education League (TUEL), the labor-organizing wing of the Communist Party, helped the newsboys advance their cause, and fostered Brown's political education. He joined the Young Communist League (YCL) the following year and soon was taking part in efforts to organize agricultural workers, many of them migrant Mexicans and Dust-Bowl refugees. Brown's talents as a persuasive and indefatigable organizer came to the fore early on. A frequent orator at rallies and meetings, Brown was arrested at a YCL event in San Pedro in 1934 and charged with disturbing the peace; he received a three-month sentence. Following his release, he joined the International Longshoremen's Association, a forerunner to the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union (ILWU), and became a moving force in organizing waterfront workers in the San Francisco Bay area. It was during this time that Brown met Esther ("Hon") Matlin at a YCL dance. By 1936 the couple were married. Theirs was an enduring union that produced four children and lasted over 50 years.

With the overthrow of the popularly elected government in Spain by fascist forces in 1936, the Communist Party began recruiting volunteers to join the International Brigades' defense of the beleaguered nation. Brown's younger brother Frank ("Bimbo") was among the initial recruits from ILWU, Local 10 to enter the fray early in 1937. Archie, by now an important Party leader and well-known labor radical in the San Francisco area, was denied a passport by the local passport agency (his claims of wanting to pursue studies in France were met with incredulity). Undeterred, he traveled to New York City and in May 1938, after three months of unsuccessful efforts to obtain a passport, stowed away on a ship bound for France, to make his way to Spain. He arrived in time to serve with the Lincoln Brigade as company commissar in the Ebro Offensive and in the final bloody retreats of the war. Following the withdrawal of the International Brigades from Spain, Brown sailed from France to New York (this time as a third-class passenger) on the S.S. Ausonia in December 1938.

For further biographical information on Archie Brown, and to review the scope and contents of his manuscript collection see, The Guide to the Archie Brown Papers, ALBA 207. This collection includes images acquired by Brown in the course of his service as a volunteer in Spain and images of Brown, and others, from before and after the Spanish Civil War.