An Offer to Teach in Africa: From Free Speech to Peace Corps

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In the spring of 1965 Uncle Sam pointed his finger at me. He wanted warm bodies to fight a colonial war in Southeast Asia the French had already lost. Being a 22-year-old male about to graduate from college, I was a prime candidate.

If drafted, I would go.

I couldn’t imagine burning my draft card, running off to Canada or joining the Texas Air National Guard. I actually believe some type of mandatory two-year national service ranging from the military to the Peace Corps would be good for young men and women and good for America.

But fighting in a war I didn’t believe in and killing people I didn’t want to kill was at the very bottom of my bucket list. And there’s more. I am allergic to taking orders and can’t stand being yelled at. I’d make a lousy soldier. I saw a court martial in my future.

Luckily, a temporary solution popped up. Peace Corps Recruiters were coming to UC Berkeley.

John Kennedy had first proposed this idealistic organization to a crowd of 5,000 students during a campaign speech at he University of Michigan on October 14, 1960. He was running four hours late and it was two in the morning but the response was overwhelming. One of his first acts as President was to create the agency.

Peace Corps service would not eliminate my military obligation but it might buy time for the Vietnam War to sort itself out. Of more importance, I felt the Peace Corps provided a unique opportunity to travel and possibly do some good. I also believed I would be serving my country.

My fiancé and I sat down and talked it out. Jo Ann was excited. We would go together as a husband and wife team. When the Peace Corps recruiters opened their booth in front of the Student Union at Berkeley, we were there to greet them, all dewy-eyed and innocent.

“Sign us up,” we urged.

Of course there were a few formalities: small things like filling out the umpteen page blue application and taking a language aptitude test, in Kurdish. We also needed letters of recommendation.

Apparently we looked good on paper. In a few weeks, the Peace Corps informed us that we had been tentatively selected to serve as teachers in Liberia, West Africa. We were thrilled. The age-old question of what you do when you graduate from school and enter the real world had been answered, or at least postponed.

Uncle Sam with his growing hunger for bodies to fight the Vietnam War would have wait.

Next Blog: My roommate tells the FBI I am running a Communist Cell Block.

48 Years Later… The 1964 Free Speech Movement at UC Berkeley

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This is the original sign I carried in the Free Speech Movement during the December 1964 police occupation of UC Berkeley and arrest of 800 students participating in the Sproul Hall Sit-in.

I’ve been rooting thorough my old Free Speech Movement files, digging for treasure. Buried between aging, yellow copies of the Daily Cal and mimeographed handouts calling for action, I found the picket sign I carried when the police invaded UC Berkeley and arrested 800 students on December 3, 1964.

There are numerous sources covering FSM and its impact including an excellent book, “The Free Speech Movement,” edited by Robert Cohen and Reginald Zelnik. FSM even has its own website, fsm@a.org. I visited the site and found pictures of aging white-haired men and women looking remarkably like me. 1964 is now ancient history.

In preparation for this series of posts I also returned to UC Berkeley. Sitting on the edge of Ludwig’s fountain under a fine mist, I stared at the steps of Sproul Hall while searching my memory for ghostly reminders of past demonstrations.

I actually found one. A long-haired African American was distributing protest arm bands. His effort would have been illegal in the fall of 1964.

A stroll down Telegraph Avenue brought me to the Café Med, one of my favorite student hangouts. I stopped for an obligatory cup of cappuccino. I wrote notes in my journal and listened in on conversations. It seemed that neither the coffee house nor my behavior had changed much.

Back on campus I visited the Free Speech Café in the Moffitt Undergraduate Library. Every seat was full so I wandered around and looked at photos. Mario Savio, who died in 1996, was there in spirit. A picture captured him in a characteristic pose, haranguing a sea of upturned faces. It was a fitting memorial.

In hindsight, the Free Speech Movement has become an important part of Berkeley’s history, honored even by an Administration that once characterized it as a Communist inspired plot. And what about my hindsight; have the years blurred or substantially modified my vision of what took place?

I tried, in writing this series on UC Berkeley’s Free Speech Movement, to be faithful to what I felt and experienced at the time. I feel now, as I did then, that it didn’t have to happen. The attitude the Administration demonstrated in the 1963 student leadership meeting I attended and described in an earlier post went beyond naïve to dangerous.

If the more radical students found ground for ‘revolution,’ it was a ground fertilized and plowed by the Administration. The desire to protect the campus from outside influence became a willingness to limit the rights of students to participate in the critical issues of the day and, in so doing, take the side of powerful elites whose vested interest was in maintaining the status quo on civil and other human rights issues.

What changed as a result of the Free Speech Movement?

Certainly the concept of in locus parentis took a major hit. Students at Berkeley and other colleges across America would have much greater freedom in the future, on both a personal and political level. We had graduated from being older teenagers needing guidance to young adults capable of and responsible for our own decisions.

While we were still a part of the future so popular with Commencement speakers, we were also a part of the now, helping to shape that future. Human rights and equality including women and gay rights, the anti-Vietnam campaign, and the environmental movement would all benefit. Berkeley students had participated in one of America’s great transformations.

The New Left considers the Free Speech Movement as an important source of origin. A similar claim might be made for the New Right, the so-called Neo Cons.

The outer fringes of liberal and conservative politics are two cats of the same color, feeding off of the same plate and necessary to each other’s success. Each functions with the tunnel vision of being right and with the belief that the ends of their particular vision justify whatever means necessary to get there. Not surprisingly, both the Left and the Right saw the unrest on the Berkeley Campus as an opportunity waiting to happen.

The message was not lost on Ronald Reagan. Following the Free Speech Movement, he would exploit the student protests at Berkeley and other California colleges as a launching pad for his career in politics. One of his first moves as Governor was to fire Clark Kerr for being too soft on the students. There is a picture from the early 70s of Reagan turning around and flipping off student protestors at a U.C. Regent’s meeting. It was a clear message of intent.

It may be somewhat instructive that his future Attorney General, Edwin Meese, was the Deputy District Attorney in Oakland at the time of the Free Speech Movement. Meese’s role had been to oversee the Sproul Hall arrests and serve as liaison with the FBI.

There is a story, which may be apocryphal, that it was Meese who persuaded Governor Pat Brown to send in the troops on the night of the Sproul Hall sit-in by claiming students were tearing up the Dean’s office. If so, it was a deliberate lie or at least an exaggeration. The worst vandalism I witnessed was my standing on the Dean’s desk in my socks so I wouldn’t scratch the surface.

My speculation is that the forces on the right, like the forces on the left, wanted a confrontation. Kerr was planning to address the sit-in the next day in an effort to persuade the students to leave the building. A peaceful solution would not have served the agenda of Meese, Knowland, Hoover, etc. Serious head bashing leading to a full-scaled riot was called for. If it took lies to bring it about, so be it.

Or am I just being paranoid?

Later, when I chaired a committee for the Free Student Union, I witnessed a similar attitude on the part of the Left. A confrontation with students getting their heads bashed was good. It would radicalize moderates and lead to further violent confrontations.

While both the Left and Right worked to subvert what happened at Berkeley for their own objectives, I believe that the Free Speech Movement was what it claimed to be: a fight for free speech, the right to assemble, and the right to participate in the critical issues of the day. It was a fight that still rings true today.

On Being Labeled a Radical… The 1964 Free Speech Movement at UC Berkeley

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The Press, Governor of California and UC Administration labeled participants in the Free Speech Movement as a small group of radical revolutionaries bent on destroying law and order. Were we?

I was curious about the background of the students who were arrested during the Sproul Hall sit-in, considering I had almost been one. A sociologist was doing a study on who was involved so I volunteered to take part.

We were given extensive questionnaires, trained and told to hit the streets. I seemed to inherit some of the more elusive, fringe types who always hang around Berkeley. Just finding them was an adventure.

When our data was analyzed, we found that a quarter or so of the participants were relatively hard core in terms of having been actively involved in the Civil Rights movement. Most of the participants resembled me: students and grad students who were somewhat on the idealistic side, angry at the Administration, in sympathy with the Civil Rights Movement, and committed to our right to participate in the political process.

Were there truly radical students on campus who saw the protests as a way to radicalize students and achieve objectives beyond retrieving the basic rights that had been taken away?

Yes. I met some when I decided to help create a Free Student Union. A union made sense to me. The student government, by its very nature, was tied closely to the Administration. A union would go beyond the temporary, nonrepresentational nature of the FSM and give us ongoing power and representation that we lacked as individuals.

I participated in two or three meetings including one I hosted at our apartment. Chaos was good, I quickly learned. Policemen dragging students down stairs and bashing an occasional head was to our advantage. It created solidarity among the ranks and radicalized the student body.

We needed to goad the Administration into further action, the more outrageous the better.

It did not reflect who I was or my goals. After sharing my opinion on what I thought about the chosen strategies, I parted ways with the Free Student Union. Apparently, most students shared my perspective. The union, to my knowledge, did not get off the ground.

The focus shifted temporarily in the spring and maybe this shift reflected a more radical strategy. We had our so-named Filthy Speech Movement. People would get up in the free speech area and see how many obscenities they could mouth in the name of free speech.

From my perspective it was inane and counterproductive, a non-issue designed to infuriate the Administration and garner media coverage.  Rather than serve a positive purpose, it degraded our efforts of the fall and was utilized by the Oakland Tribunes of the world and their allies as justification for their condemnation of the campus.

More typical was a return to what some would define as an accepted activity of college life. I was amused to read a Junior Class party announcement in the “Daily Californian” one Friday.

“Everyone is welcome at our TGIF party, especially the FSM: it will give them a chance to quench their thirst.” Dennis O’Shea, Junior Class Activities Chairman was quoted. “It promises to be the hell raiser of the year – lots of girls, a screaming rock and roll band that frequently plays for the Hell’s Angels, and 150 gallons of liquid refreshments.”

I can imagine that the Administration was praying for a return to the good old days when a ‘hell raiser’ was defined as an ocean of beer and a screaming rock and roll band.

Next Blog: Looking back at the FSM: What did we accomplish?

UC Berkeley on Strike… The 1964 Free Speech Movement

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When police occupied the UC Berkeley Campus in early December of 1964 and arrested the protestors in Sproul Hall, the University went on strike. I joined a picket line on the edge of Telegraph Avenue next to Sproul Plaza.

My bed was indeed much softer that the marble floors of Sproul Hall.

After a quick breakfast I hurried back to campus to rejoin the sit-in. I was too late.

Armed men in uniforms formed a cordon around the Administration Building where students were being dragged down the stairs and loaded into police vans. Windows had been taped over so neither protestors or media could not see what was transpiring inside.

We had an occupied campus.

The great liberal governor of California had acted to “end the anarchy and maintain law and order in California.”

Whereas Jack Kennedy had used troops to protect civil rights in the South, Pat Brown was using them to stifle civil rights in the West. Of course Brown didn’t see it that way; he was taking a courageous stand against anarchy, the anarchy I described in my last blog.

I am sure Laurel and Hardy would have seen something to laugh about. Dragging kids down stairs on their butts while their heads bounced along behind could easily have been a scene in one of the old Keystone Cop films. The Oakland police weren’t nearly as funny as the Keystone Cops, however.

As for Clark Kerr, President of the University, he felt we were getting what we deserved and argued that the FSM leaders and their followers “are now finding in their effort to escape the gentle discipline of the University, they have thrown themselves into the arms of the less understanding discipline of the community at large.”

The campus came to a grinding halt and a great deal of fence-sitting ended. Whole departments shut down in strike. Sproul Hall plaza filled with several thousand students in protest of the police presence. When the police made a flying wedge to grab a speaker system students were using, we were electrified and protected the system with our bodies.

It was the closest I have ever come to being in a riot; thousands of thinking, caring students teetered on the edge of becoming an infuriated, unthinking mob. Violence and bloodshed, egged on by police action, would have been the result. Kerr, Brown, Knowland and company would have had the anarchy they were claiming, after the fact.

A few days later we were to come close again.

Kerr, in a series of around the clock meetings with a select committee of Department Chairs, had arrived at a compromise he felt would provide for the extended freedom being demanded on campus while also diffusing the outside pressure to crack open student heads.

Sit-in participants arrested in the Sproul Hall would be left to the tender mercies of the outside legal system and not disciplined by the University. Rights to free speech and organization on campus would be restored as long as civil disobedience was not advocated.

Kerr and Robert Scalapino, Chair of the Political Science Department, presented the compromise to a hastily called all-campus meeting of 15,000 students and faculty at the Greek Theater. There was to be no discussion and no other speakers.

When Mario Savio approached the podium following the presentation, he was grabbed by police, thrown down, and dragged off the stage. Apparently he had wanted to announce a meeting in Sproul Plaza to discuss Kerr’s proposal. Once again, Berkeley teetered on the edge of a riot. We moved from silent, shocked disbelief to shouting our objections.

Mario, released from the room where he was held captive, urged us to stay calm and leave the area. We did, but Kerr’s compromise had become compromised.

A full meeting of the Academic Senate was to be held the next day and all of us waited in anticipation to hear what stand Berkeley’s faculty would take.  We knew that most faculty members deplored the presence of police on campus and the violent way they had responded to the nonviolent demonstrators. Dragging Mario off the stage had not helped the Administration’s case.

Some departments such as math, philosophy, anthropology and English were clearly on the side of FSM while others including business and engineering were in opposition.

My own department of political science was clearly divided. Some professors believed that nonviolent civil disobedience threatened the stability of government. Others recognized how critical it was for helping the powerless gain power. To them, having large blocks of disenfranchised, alienated people in America seemed to be a greater threat to democracy than civil disobedience.

The Senate met on December 8 in Wheeler Hall, ironically in the same auditorium where Peter Odegard had lectured on the meaning of democracy to my Poly Sci 1 class during my first day at Berkeley. Some 5000 of us gathered outside to wait for the results and listen to the proceedings over a loud-speaker.

To the students who had fought so hard and risked so much, and to those of us who had joined their cause, the results were close to euphoric. On a vote of 824-115 the faculty voted that all disciplinary actions prior to December 8 should be dropped, that students should have the right to organize on campus for off-campus political activity, and that the University should not regulate the content of speech or advocacy.

Two weeks later, the Regents confirmed our hard-won freedom. We had won the battle but not necessarily the war.

Next Blog: Looking back at the long-term results of the Free Speech Movement

Occupy Sproul Hall… The 1964 Free Speech Movement at Berkeley

/ Curt Mekemson / 2 Comments

 

The release of the hostage Police Car did not bring peace to the UC Berkeley Campus. Each time a solution seemed imminent, the Administration would renege or the FSM would increase its demands.

In addition to the right to organize on campus, the disciplining leaders of the Free Speech Movement became a central issue.

Demonstrations took place almost daily and were blasted in the press. I learned a great deal about media sensationalism and biased reporting.

One day I would sit in on a democratic and spirited discussion of the pros and cons of a specific action and the next day I would read in the Oakland Tribune or San Francisco Examiner that I had participated in a major insurrection of left leaning radicals who were challenging the very basis of law and order. (It was documented later that the FBI was paying a reporter to write the Examiner stories.)

Older adults in suits taking photos looked suspiciously like plain-clothes policemen or FBI agents. It was easy to become paranoid.

If we signed a petition, demonstrated, made a speech or just stood by listening, would our pictures and names end up in some mysterious Washington file that proclaimed our disloyalty to the nation? These weren’t idle thoughts. A few years earlier people’s careers had been ended and live ruined because someone had implied they were soft on communism.

J. Edgar Hoover was known for tracking Civil Rights’ leaders and maintaining extensive files on every aspect of their lives. While we weren’t up against the KGB, caution was advisable. Hoover considered Berkeley a hotbed of Communism.

We looked warily at those who didn’t look like us. One day a small dog was making his way around the edge of the daily demonstration, sniffing people.

“See that Chihuahua,” a friend whispered in my ear. I nodded yes. “It’s a police dog in disguise. Any moment it is going to unzip its front and a German Shepherd will pop out.”

The wolf in sheep’s clothing was among us. It was a light moment to counter a serious time. And we were very serious. I sometimes wondered when the celebrated fun of being a college student would kick in.

One day I was faced with a test more serious than any I had ever faced in the classroom. On December 2, 1964, FSM leaders called for a massive sit in at Sproul Hall, Berkeley’s administration building. Once again communication had broken down and the Administration was back peddling, caught between students and faculty on one side and increasing pressure from the outside on the other.

I thought about the implications of the sit-it and decided to join. I needed to act. For three months I had listened to pros and cons and watched the press blatantly misrepresent what was happening on campus. I was angry, knowing that the public had little option but to believe that a small group of radicals was preaching anarchy.

It was not wrong to utilize an edge of campus for discussing the issues of the day, or for organizations to raise funds for supporting various causes, or even to recruit students for participating in efforts to change the community.

It didn’t disrupt my education. I was free to stop and listen, to join in, or pass on. What it did do was irritate powerful, established members of the community. And for that reason, our freedoms had been curtailed.

Maybe if enough students joined together, the Administration would listen and the press would dig deeper. I told my fiancé I was going inside and then joined the thousand or so students who had made similar decisions.

It was early in the afternoon and we were in high spirits. I believed it would be hard for the Administration to claim 1000 students were a small group of rabble-rousers bent on destroying the system. And I was right. It claimed we were a large group of rabble-rousers bent on destroying the system.

Inside I was treated to a unique experience. The sit-in was well organized. Mario Savio and other FSM leaders gave us directions on what to do if the police arrived. There were clear instructions that we were not to block doorways. The normal business of the University was not to be impeded and we were not to be destructive in any way.

Floors were organized for different purposes. The basement was set aside as the Free University where graduate students were teaching a variety of classes. These included normal topics such as physics and biology and more exotic subjects such as the nature of God. One floor was set aside as a study hall and was kept quiet. Another featured entertainment – including old Laurel and Hardy films, which seemed particularly appropriate.

After administrators left, a desk in the dean’s office became a podium for speech making. I felt compelled to add my dimes worth. Each speaker took off his or her shoes so the top of the desk would not be damaged.

The real treat though was an impromptu concert by Joan Baez. I joined a small group sitting around her in the hallway and sang protest songs. The hit of the night was “We Shall Overcome.” It provided us with a sense of identification with struggles taking place in the South. I felt like I belonged and was part of something much larger than myself.

Mainly I walked around and listened, taking extensive notes on what I saw and felt. Later I would sit in the Café Med on Telegraph Avenue and write them up. They would become the basis of talks I would give back home over the Christmas break. I also turned them over to Father Baskin, an Episcopal minister who wanted to use them for a sermon at his church in Placerville.

Along about midnight the un-radical part of my nature took over. I started thinking about my comfortable bed back in the apartment. The marble floors of Sproul Hall did not suggest a good night’s sleep and it appeared the police weren’t coming, at least in the immediate future. Yawning, I left the building and headed home.

I would come back in the morning to chaos and an occupied campus.

Next Blog: Berkeley on Strike. (See below for the story about Jack Weinberg and the police car.)

In Honor of Martin Luther King

/ Curt Mekemson / 1 Comment

It is easy to forget what America was like before the Civil Rights Movement changed how African-Americans are treated in the US. I’ve touched on this subject in my articles about UC Berkeley and the Free Speech Movement. Prejudice was not a problem relegated to the South.

Today, in honor of Martin Luther King, I would like to visit the South of 1968, however. I was serving as a recruiter for the Peace Corps at that time, working through out the Southern United States. It was the year Martin Luther King was shot.

The issue of skin color had faded away when I worked as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Africa from 1965-67. My travels through the South as a recruiter brought me face to face again with the reality and tragedy of prejudice.

Supposedly, I was recruiting in the ‘New South,’ a South that had made it beyond the ugliest parts of discrimination. But one didn’t have to dig deep to find old scars or even open wounds.

A few years earlier, George Wallace was announcing his schools would not be integrated, Lester Maddox was waving his pick ax handle, students from Berkeley were participating in the Freedom Rides and young people were being murdered in Philadelphia, Mississippi for registering black voters.

One of our black recruiters had grown up in Alabama and described the experience. I was still mastering ‘Southernese’ so her statement lost a little in the translation but I report it as I heard it.

“When I was growing up,” she had reported, “I always had to step off the sidewalk and into the gutter whenever the Polish came walking along.”

“Wow,” I had replied, trying to comprehend what it would be like to have to debase yourself in such a way and at the same time wondering about the problem with the Polish that I had never heard about before.

“I never knew that there was a problem in the South with the Polish,” I observed.

“Polish,” she had replied in an irritated voice, “P, O, L, I, C, E.” Read my lips.

Properly chastised my mind made the leap. I thought back to Berkeley and remembered my feelings about police on campus. I wondered what it would be like to grow up fearing the very people who were supposed to protect you. How long it would take for those feelings to leave you… if they ever could? How could such experiences do anything other than teach you hatred?

Not long after that my wife, Jo Ann, and I were recruiting at the University of North Texas in Denton along with a black recruiter. The three of us had gone out for breakfast at a local restaurant.

I had noticed that people became quiet when we walked in. Gradually conversations resumed. I really didn’t think much about it. A family with young children was in the booth next to us. Suddenly a little four-year-old head poked up and was staring over the seat at us, all eyes.

“Mama, there is a nigger sitting with those people,” she had announced to her mother and everyone else in the restaurant in a loud, clear voice. From the ‘mouth of an innocent babe’ the prejudice of generations was repeated.

Jo Ann and I were also to learn that prejudice went both directions. One of our assignments was to recruit at Black Campuses. We had accepted readily. Why not?

When we began our recruitment efforts, we quickly realized that we were less than welcome, that there was a barely concealed resentment about our presence. No one yelled at us or threatened us, but the looks and mumbled side comments spoke volumes.

We were guilty of being white. It wasn’t who we were, what we were committed to, or what we had done; it was the color of our skin. It was a powerful lesson on the unthinking, disturbing nature of prejudice. A few weeks later the hatred it spawns would lead to one of America’s greatest tragedies.

It was in the spring of 1968 and we were recruiting at the University of West Virginia in Morgantown. It was our second visit to the campus and we felt like we were returning to see old friends. Students were excited about the Peace Corps and eager to sign up.  We had set up our booth and were well into persuading students to leave the country when the news came.

Martin Luther King had been shot and killed.

For the second time in our relatively short lives (John Kennedy’s assassination was the first), we were struck by instant grief and anguish for someone we had never known, a man who had stood as a symbol of hope that the hatred and bigotry in America could be overcome, and that it could be done without violence.

The preacher of non-violence, the Christian black man with a golden voice and stirring words had been shot down in cold blood. Another hero was dead, destroyed because he believed that he could make a difference, shot down because he had dared to dream. And we were left with the question: why?

Today, the fact that a black man can serve as President of the US, speaks to how far we have come as a nation and honors the efforts of Martin Luther King.

Still, as King would remind us if he were alive today, the struggle against prejudice is not over, and may never be. Hate crimes are a daily occurrence in our world; people continue to discriminate against others because of their religion, ethnicity, sex, economic status and color of skin.

The best way to honor Martin Luther King, and the thousands of others who have sacrificed to make this a fair and just world, is to continue the struggle.

Holding a Police Car Hostage: UC Berkeley’s 1965 Free Speech Movement

/ Curt Mekemson / 5 Comments

Jack Weinberg, creator of the statement "Never trust anyone over 30," was arrested for raising funds to support Civil Rights efforts on the UC Berkeley Campus in the fall of 1965. Students surrounded the police car and held it hostage.

In the fall of 1965, the UC Berkeley Administration declared that the Bancroft-Telegraph Free Speech area was closed and that there would be no more organization of off-campus Civil Rights demonstrations at Berkeley. Student organizers of the various community efforts reacted immediately.

These were not young adults whose biggest challenge had been to organize pre-football game rallies. Some, like Mario Savio, had walked the streets of the South registering black voters and risking their lives to do so.

In the summer of 1964 three of their colleagues had been shot dead and buried under an earthen dam near Philadelphia, Mississippi. Many had cut their political eye teeth four years earlier in the anti-HUAC demonstrations in San Francisco and had participated in numerous protests against racial discrimination throughout the Bay Area since. (HUAC was the House Un-American Activities Committee, a hold over from the McCarthy era.)

The student organizers understood the value of demonstrations, media coverage and confrontation and had become masters at community organization. They were focused in their vision to the degree they were willing to face police and be arrested for their beliefs.

The Administration wasn’t nearly as focused. Liberal in nature and genuinely caring for its students, it utilized a 50’s mentality to address a 60’s reality. Its bungling attempts to control off campus political activity combined with its inability to recognize the legitimacy and depth of student feelings would unite factions as diverse as Young Republicans for Goldwater with the Young People’s Socialist League.

It eventually led to the massive protests that painted Berkeley as the nation’s center of student activism and the New Left.

Over the next three months I would spend a great deal of time listening, observing and participating in what would become known world-wide as the Free Speech Movement (FSM). As a political science major, I was to learn much more in the streets than I did in the classroom.

What evolved was a classic no win, up-against-the-wall confrontation. The Administration would move from “all of your freedoms are removed,” to “you can have some freedom,” to “let’s see how you like cops bashing in your heads.” The Free Speech leaders would be radicalized to the point where no compromise except total victory was acceptable.

Student government and faculty solutions urging moderation and cooperation would be lost in the shuffle. Ultimately, Governor Pat Brown would send in the National Guard troops and Berkeley would take on the atmosphere of a police state.

I found myself being radicalized in the process as well although I never reached the point of moving beyond issue to ideology. It was no more in my nature to be left-wing than it had been to be right-wing. However, I would move across the dividing line into civil disobedience.

Within hours of the time that Dean Katherine Towle sent out her ultimatum to campus organizations, the brother and sister team of Art and Jackie Goldberg had pulled together activist organizations ranging in orientation from the radical to conservative and a nascent FSM was born.

Shortly thereafter the mimeographs were humming and students were buried in an avalanche of leaflets as they walked on to campus. I read mine is disbelief. The clash I had predicted at the student leader meeting a year earlier had arrived. There was no joy in being right.

In an era before social networks and cell phones, FSM organizers relied on mimeographed fliers and word of mouth to build instant support. The above flier is one I saved in my files on the Free Speech Movement.

As soon as it became apparent that the Administration had no intention of backing off from its new rules, the FSM leadership determined to challenge the University. Organizations were encouraged to set up card tables in the Sather Gate area to solicit support for off campus causes.

I had stopped by a table to pick up some literature when a pair of Deans approached and started writing down names of the folks manning the tables. Our immediate reaction was to form a line so we could have our names taken as well. The Deans refused to accommodate us. The Administration’s objective was to pick off and separate the leadership of the FSM from the general student body.

A few days later I came out of class to find a police car parked in Sproul Plaza surrounded by students. The police, with encouragement from the Administration, had arrested Jack Weinberg, a non-student organizer for CORE (Congress of Racial Equality) who had been soliciting support for his organization.

Someone had found a bullhorn and people were making speeches from the top of the police car while Jack sat inside. I situated myself on the edge of the fountain next to the Student Union and idly scratched the head of a German Short Haired Pointer named Ludwig while I listened. (Ludwig visited campus daily and played in the fountain. Later, in Berkeley-like fashion, the fountain would be named for him.)

A scanned photo of Ludwig from Berkeley's student newspaper.

Eventually I stood up and joined those on the edge of the crowd thereby becoming a part of the blockade. It was my first ever participation in civil disobedience. It was a small step. There would be plenty of time for more critical thinking if the police showed up in force.

Being only semi-radical, I did duty between classes and took breaks for eating and sleep. Eventually, after a couple of days, the FSM negotiated a deal with the Administration. Jack was booked on campus and turned loose, as was the police car. A collection was taken up to pay for minor damages the police car had sustained in the line of duty while serving as a podium.

Next Blog: The Police and National Guard occupy Berkeley’s campus

 

On the Edge of Radicalism… Berkeley’s 1965 Free Speech Movement

/ Curt Mekemson / 1 Comment

A major confrontation erupted on the UC Berkeley Campus in 1965 known worldwide as the Free Speech Movement. At stake was the right of students to be actively involved in the Civil Rights movement and other political issues of the time.

While I was playing in Puerto Vallarta, my nephew, Wayne Cox, posted the video of a Campus Cop using pepper spray on students at UC Davis. The students were involved in a nonviolent protest supporting the Occupy Wall Street movement.

It was a strong indictment of the policeman, a bully using his power of position to intimidate and physically strike out at the protestors.

Those who oppose the Occupy Movement rushed to classify the incident as a random act of a disturbed individual. It was bad PR and the video had gone viral. But the use of violence to counter protest movements has a long history in America, dating all the way back to the Revolutionary War and the Boston Massacre.

I was to experience incidents similar to Davis during student protests at UC Berkeley in the mid 60s. I’ve already written a two blogs about the roots of the protest (see below).

I returned to UC in the fall of 1965 excited about my senior year. Two of my former dorm mates, Cliff Marks and Jerry Silverfield, had agreed to share an apartment. Prices were high. Landlords had a captive student population to exploit. We ended up with a small kitchen, bathroom, living room, and one bedroom. Things were so tight in the bedroom that Cliff and I had a bunk bed. I would later wonder why this was superior to dorm life.

Jerry (on the right), Cliff and I in our small apartment.

We christened the apartment by consuming a small barrel of tequila Cliff had brought back from his summer of sharpening Spanish skills in Mexico.

While we were recovering from our well-deserved headaches the next morning, UC’s Administration moved decisively to eliminate off campus political activities from being initiated on campus.

There would be no more organization of Civil Rights demonstrations and no more money collected to support political candidates or causes. Controversial speakers would not be allowed on campus without tight administrative control.

The Bancroft-Telegraph entrance free speech area was out of business, closed down, caput. That incredible babble of voices advocating a multitude of causes would be heard no more.

The Administration’s actions were a testament to the success of the 1960s Civil Rights struggle taking place in the Bay Area. It wasn’t that the activists wanted change; the problem was they were achieving it.

Non-violent civil disobedience is a powerful tool. Base your fight on legitimate moral and political issues; use the sit-in and the picket line to make your point. When the police come, don’t fight back; go limp. If they beat you over the head, you win. Sing songs of peace and justice; put a flower in the barrel of the weapon facing you.

It is incredibly hard to fight against these tactics. People tend to get upset when they see nonviolent protestors being beaten with nightsticks in national and international media. It gives power to the powerless.

Major businesses being targeted for their discriminatory practices in the Bay Area, the Sheraton Hotel, United Airlines and Safeway, blinked. Each would alter their practices.

One business that didn’t back down was the Oakland Tribune, owned by William Knowland, a conservative Republican, former Senator from California and leader of California’s Republican Party.

As the protests in the surrounding community became more successful, the power structure being attacked struck back. Calls were made to the Regents, the President of the University system and the Chancellor at Berkeley. ‘Control your students or else’ was the ominous message.

The Regents, President and Chancellor bowed to the pressure.

Some members of the Regents and Administration undoubtedly agreed with the businesses being challenged and saw the protesters as part of an anarchic left-wing plot. Others may have believed that the students’ effectiveness would bring the powers that be down on the university. Academic freedom could be lost. Some likely felt that the activities were disruptive to the education process and out-of-place on a college campus.

One thing was immediately clear; the Administration woefully underestimated the reaction of the leaders of the various organizations and large segments of the Campus population to its dictum. Possibly the administrators believed they were dealing with a small, unpopular minority, or maybe they just needed to believe: the outside pressure was so great it didn’t matter what the students believed or how they reacted.

Next blog: I become involved in ‘civil disobedience.’

Proud to be a UC Berkeley student, I display my sweatshirt.

Sunny Puerto Vallarta

/ Curt Mekemson / 1 Comment

Beautiful sunsets are frequent in Puerto Vallarta. Throw in a palm tree and you have a post card type photo. This shot is looking south across the Bay of Bandaras toward the small village of Yalapa.

OK, I’ve been bad. Six weeks of travel before Christmas brought my blogging to a halt. I resolve to be better during 2012. In fact, other than the often-promised, rarely-achieved resolution of beating my body into shape, it is my only New Year’s resolution.

Puerto Vallarta is up first for 2012. With dire warnings of drug wars from friends and family, we spent two of our six weeks of pre-Christmas travel there. All we saw related to the wars were young soldiers armed with automatic weapons wandering through the hotel property. It was enough.

Our three-year-old grandson Cody loaded his imaginary machine gun and fired off rounds at them. It dismayed his mother and amused us.

Peggy loves Puerto Vallarta. I like it much better since the ubiquitous and obnoxious time-share salesmen have, at least temporarily, disappeared from the streets. If you want a perspective, imagine ten used car salesmen per block, each dedicated to selling you an over priced used car you are expected to share with 50 other families.

The town has been a major attraction for Americans ever since Richard Burton and Elizabeth Tailor filmed Night of the Iguana there in 1963. Taylor’s extramarital affaire with Burton guaranteed massive media coverage and the beginning of the tourist trek southward.

Puerto Vallarta makes its living off tourists. This becomes particularly obvious on days when the massive cruise ships are in town. Still, the city has its charm.

I am particularly fond of the Isla Rio Cuale and the Malecon, a downtown walkway that fronts on the ocean and is filled with sculptures. Sunsets on the Bay of Bandaras are also worthy of mention.

Shopping can be fun; a number of fine crafted items are for sale plus there are the usual Mexican crafts. The latter are found in abundance at the port and the downtown Market. Bargaining is expected. Prices are increased to account for the practice. Tourists feel they have driven a hard bargain and shop owners walk away with a profit.

Taking a river taxi to small village of Yalapa south of Puerto Vallarta provides both diversion and a small adventure. We saw blue whales and dolphins on our way there this year.

Peggy and I visit Puerto Vallarta every other year for one to two weeks. The following photos hopefully capture what we like about the city and its environs.

Puerto Vallarta has done an excellent job of placing sculptures along the Malecon, an attractive car-free walk-way that fronts the Bay of Bandaras downtown.

Another attractive downtown Puerto Vallarta site is Our Lady of Guadalupe Church of and its unique tower.

I shot this photo of pigeons in flight at a small town square.

The young Cody who fired his imaginary machine gun at the Mexican soldiers prepares to fire a very real water gun at me as I am catching a nap. Both his mother and grandmother were encouraging this reprehensible behavior.

Quaint streets and walkways make a walking tour of Gringo Gulch a must. This is where Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton lived when they were filming the Night Of the Iguana and had their notorious affaire.

Peggy and I were at a restaurant called Tapas in Gringo Gulch with our friends Tom and Beth Lovering when we found this great parody of the Marilyn Monroe photo. I was particularly taken with it because it resembled one of the holiday cards I design and draw for friends and family each year. It's featured below. I am sure you will spot the resemblance.

What can I say? Happy New Year?

There are lots of great beaches in Puerto Vallarta but be prepared to be visited by a steady stream of vendors. They come with the territory.

The Public Market next to the Rio Cuale is filled (brimming over) with small shops featuring Mexican Crafts and inexpensive local restaurants. We also found this attractive lady skeleton that Peggy is matching smiles with.

Restaurants, a museum, crafts and arts are featured on the island located in the middle of the Rio Cuale. We also found this intriguing sculpture.

Restaurants, a museum, crafts and arts are featured on the island located in the middle of the Rio Cuale. We also found this intriguing sculpture/fountain.

My friend Tom Lovering can't imagine why anyone would go to Sr. Frogs with so many good local restaurants in Puerto Vallarta but I managed to get him to pose with the frog.

Peggy took this photo of a rather attractive wood canoe on the beach. Note how it has been carved from one log.

I took this photo of Mexican crafts at the small village of Yalapa which is south of Puerto Vallarta and can only be reached by water. I love the bright colors and can't resist the small boggle-head creatures, in this case, turtles.

The Marvelous Creatures of Piedras Blancas

/ Curt Mekemson / 9 Comments

Sleep over? Each year upwards to 60,000 Elephant Seals visit the Beaches of Piedras Blancas in Central California to mate, shed and have pups. "Are they dead?" I heard a young boy ask his mother. Let's put it this way, when your body is made up of one to five thousand pounds of blubber, you don't move around much.

Pop Quiz: What creature can weigh over two tons, have a two-foot long nose, dive up to 5000 feet, spend eight to ten months of the year on the open sea, migrate upwards to twelve thousand miles, leave a track like a two-ton caterpillar, and mate with dozens of winsome females on or around Valentines Day?

If you guessed the adult male Elephant Seal, you guessed right.

These intriguing animals were all but hunted to extinction for their valuable oil in the late 1800s. Today their numbers are estimated at 170,000.

Close to 10 percent consider the beaches of Piedras Blancas on the central coast of California their home, or rookery if wish to use the technical term. A couple of dozen showed up unexpectedly in 1990. Today their population is pushing 17,000.

Peggy and I stopped by for a visit on our way home from San Diego last week. Seeing the seals in their natural habitat is an incredible experience that we highly recommend. You can learn more about these animals and the best time to visit from Friends of the Elephant Seal at www.elephantseal.org.

Cameras are a must. We took over a hundred photos during our visit. I’ve posted some of the more amusing below. I couldn’t help adding appropriate captions.

"I don't care how much you pray for a new fur coat for Christmas, I am not listening." The Elephant Seals don't mean to entertain us but watching their antics is sure to bring a smile.

 

There is always pleasure in scratching a really bad itch. Check out the two Elephant Seals below. Pure ecstasy.

"Ah, that feels good."

 

"And this feels even better!"

 

"Go that way." Ever suffer from a feeling of rejection? This certainly seems to be the case here. Although Elephant Seals are social animals that crowd together on the beach, they can also be quite territorial, especially during mating season.

 

"Mother always said to use sunblock." Using their flippers, Elephant Seals are often seen flipping sand up over their body. Peggy took this rather artistic photo. Note the seal outlined in the back. The purpose for the dirt bath is indeed to provide protection from the sun. Elephant Seals spend 8-10 months a year migrating in the cold waters of the North Pacific traveling as far north as the Aleutian Islands of Alaska. Most of their time is spent under water diving from 20 minutes to an hour and surfacing for only three minutes. No wonder the sun feels hot!

 

I caught the flipper action in this photo.

 

"My Chiropractor suggested this new back stretching exercise."

 

How could anyone resist this toothy grin?

 

"I am the king!" The size of your nose and the loudness of your roar matters in the Elephant Seal world. Big males become quite feisty during mating season as they gather harems of up to 50 females. As one might imagine, battles between two ton creatures can turn rather nasty. If your nose is big enough, up to two feet long, and your roar loud enough, other males may choose to let you have your way with out a battle, however.

 

Sleeping cheek to cheek. If that isn't a look of contentment, I've never seen one.

 

"After a hard day of sleeping, I like to lay back and put my feet up in the air."

 

If you came across these tracks without knowing who made them, you would probably vacate the premises.

 

"Did you hear the story about the Rabbi, the Priest and the Baptist Minister?"

 

"I just love the smell of fish breath." Actually, these guys fast for weeks on end while on shore. There may not be much fish breath left by the time they are ready to return to the ocean.