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You said the U of M "was far from a hotbed of radicalism." Could you tell me a little bit more about the school?
The University of Maryland was more a southern university than a northern one. It still had a large agricultural school at the time, it had a large number of fraternities and sororities and a very active ROTC unit. With around 30,000 students at the time, political activism was the province of a small number of fringe mentalities, at least that's the way it looked to me in my first two years. In spite of what I'd learned in high school, I was not drawn to be active in my opposition to the war. I was in a bit of a haze during that time, not knowing where life was leading me and holding in a lot of fear and anger about the war and my possible call to duty through the draft. The U of M was very benign, given its proximity to D.C., and there was little in the way of acknowledgement of the war even while other universities were becoming centers of activism and opposition. The act of blocking a main highway was so incredibly out of character with all that I had seen up til then that I think it may have even magnified my response to Kent State. It was doubly inspiring to see my fellow, formerly aloof students doing civil disobedience, that I felt spurred to even more demonstrative acts.
You and I both understand the anger that was all around us as college students after Kent State. Could you tell me a little bit more about the rage you felt after you heard the news about six students being murdered by a company of the National Guard as they exercised their constitutional rights to assemble? Why did it make you feel justified in throwing rocks at them and the police?
I was beginning to see the war not only as an immoral one against a people who were trying to sort out their own destiny, but as an unfair way to sacrifice the lives of people my own age. It did not add up, to me, that there was anything important enough in SE Asia for us to be killing people and getting our own people killed. The government was drafting cannon fodder, running the war dumbly, and we had nothing to say about it all. Nixon's admission of our Cambodian involvement was a great insult to those of us who were demonstrating our disagreement with just the Viet Nam segment of the fighting. Then, to have our own troops firing on and killing students who were demonstrating no more hostily than we had been was like a declaration that we and the government were also at war. Thowing rocks and taking whatever consequences came from that seemed like a defensive move to me at the time. I felt under attack. The National Guard stood for the government that was threatening me. I was pumped up with adrenaline. There is a line for each of us beyond which we would fight. That line varies widely and changes constantly through our lives. At that time, I was pushed over that line. I was in rebellion.
You were involved at U of Md. after Cambodia. Was that before or after Kent State? You say the students took to the streets and had to be dispersed by the National Guard.
The U of M thing was the day after Kent State. I had gone to visit a friend in Chapel Hill the day after Nixon announced the Cambodian bombing and heard on the radio on the way there that the ROTC building had been torched at U of M. When I got back on the day of Kent State, I swore that I would take part in whatever demonstration of rage was happening at the University. I got there around the same time that the National Guard did and took a position on the hill above Route 1 by the university chapel. Along with a couple hundred others, we began taunting the soldiers who were attempting to clear the highway. We began lobbing rocks from the landscaping toward them and they began marching toward us with tear gas canisters loaded. Then it turned to an allout war of rocks vs gas. I saw a few soldiers get hit. We all got gassed pretty good, but kept harrassing the soldiers as they chased us through the campus. Looking back, I am amazed at my endurance that day. There was no love lost between us and the guard. Later, my friends had to hold me back as I tried to hit a hovering police helicopter with rocks. I was trundled off by my buddies to cool off.
How close was the atmosphere at U of M on that day to open rebellion?
That was it. During that day in 1970 there were thousands of students in open rebellion. Challenging government troops is an act of civil disobedience and an act of rebellion, too. It was far from storming city hall, but the administration buildings of many campuses had been seized by that time and that of U of Maryland was likewise seized and held by hundreds of us that spring, too. Rebellion is a strong belief in the wrongness of those in power. So strong that action is taken to demonstrate that belief.
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Kent State united or dissolved differences overnight. But the movement by then was fragmented and lack direction and orientation. Disillusioned I and most of the movement people of the Pre-Kent state era disappeared into the shadows. John Merz, student body Vice President became the rallying point for efective organized protest after Kent State. It was said the protest on campus effectively denied him the presidency, and probably rightly so. Even until the eve of Nixon's re-election the campus remained divided, though peaceful resistance dominated campus politics.
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I was in my first year of teaching when Kent State shut down my classes. I was Syracuse University at the time, and the 'radicals' came into class and took it over. It was a large lecture hall with several hundred students. Apparently half the campus knew they were going to push me aside. I did not.
However, at the last moment the university was closed. I made the announcement from the back of the room to 450 students while my welcoming committee was sitting on the stage.
The right-wing students demanded the scheduled exam. Most just walked out. The welcoming committee was totally deflated. I had no idea who they were and had not seen them before. Later I found out that most of the graduate students in sociology had been in the audience, since it had been advertised as an upcoming show. When I cancled the class, the committee up front looked like they had been had. They simply walked out protesting that I should not have canceled class. In reality, I supported what they were doing, so there would have been no fight or anything.
It was a hell of a way to begin a teaching career, although I had been a TA and done other teaching before that.
Following the standoff, students occupied the administration building. How it all worked out I don't remember, but I do remember the head of the City of Syracuse police force visiting the students in the administration building. It was all handled with taste.
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Alienated. For sure. Police are always grief. I was only arrested once for being in a building with 165 other students, who were discussing the Kent State and Jackson State murders. It was May 4,1970. We wern't planning to be arrested, i.e. it wasn't a sit-in. We just continued our teach-in after the building, the Student Union had been officially closed. We didn't want to be arrested; we just wanted to talk
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