October 18, 1967… the day I caught my first whiff of tear gas. Hard to believe that my alma mater has become such a hot bed of apathy these days. I’m given to understand that a few years ago students organized to protest Halliburton recruitment on campus. The AP article just underscores my point. College kids these days, I swear…. It’s not like the old days when we went to class barefoot through the snow, up hill both ways, police with billy clubs slamming down across our bent and battered shoulders, atmosphere poisoned with chemical crowd dispersants, eyes blackened by rubber bullets… yup, those were the days.
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2 Comments
Ah, yes. And those were the weekends.
Nice to see that someone else marks the Dow anniversary; 43 years ago. Also my first whiff of tear gas; I remember being so glad I wore my glasses that day, instead of my contacts. Saw the commotion from the windows of the thirteenth floor of Van Hise in a Scandinavian Studies class, came down to check it out, and was drawn toward the center of the action, while others were running away; saw the beatings, was cleared back by police toward the building with the carillon; stood paralyzed in the street as a cop asked me to step back, someone grabbed me and pulled me safely up onto the curb, in compliance with his request, since I was frozen. Turned out to be a classmate from my college alma mater, it was my first semester as a graduate student at the UW. Many political distractions followed in the next two years, including the Black Student Strike, and a memorable march up State Street to the Capitol, nervously looking up at the top of buildings for snipers, and with the whole crown shouting “on strike, shut it down” and emphatically meaning it; wasn’t just outside agitators, as claimed, but many disenchanted Wisconsinites.