By Bill Mason
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Lansing, Kan. —
To the editor:
The year 1964 was a turbulent year. Civil rights marches and demonstrations across the south and race riots in several big cities. Vietnam War protests in New York, San Francisco, Boston, Seattle and Madison, Wis. Young men publicly burning their draft cards. Henry Dee and Charles Moore, two black men hitchhiking in Meadville, Mississippi, were kidnapped, beaten and murdered by the KKK. ... The later to-be-proved-false Gulf of Tonkin Incident, bombing of North Vietnam and the U.S. military buildup continued in South Vietnam as U.S. WIAs and KIAs increased. ...President Lyndon Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law. ... Six days of race riots in Harlem. Aircraft from U. S. aircraft carriers bomb North Vietnam. ...
In the spring of 1964 I was a junior in college and ROTC in a small state college. Events of early 1964 were far away and did not affect me. Civil rights demonstrations were in the south, race riots occurred in several large cities, Vietnam and war was 10,000 miles away somewhere in Asia, and the war protests were in big cities in California and the East Coast.
Public schools in my town were integrated with no problems for the 1955-56 school year when I was a ninth grader. There were no blacks at my school that year but we played football against blacks who attended other in-town junior highs. In high school I went to classes with blacks and played football with and against blacks. In college I went to class with blacks and rooted for blacks on the college football and basketball team. But, in all those years I was not close to blacks. They were present, but in the background.
In June 1964, as a junior ROTC cadet, I went to Fort Sill for the six-week summer camp. We marched; ran; shot the pistol, rifle and machine gun ranges; threw hand grenades; did the PT tests; did map and land navigation; bivouacked; did tactical exercises, and did KP. We shared 12-man squad tents and showers and latrines with black cadets (primarily from traditional southern black colleges). I very quickly came to understand: “Hey, these blacks guys are pretty sharp dudes.” I experienced this on the second day when a black cadet formed us up and marched us a couple of miles while calling cadence. The whole cadet corps got in step and rhythm and stayed that way. Sure beat some white boy trying to call cadence. Every day they proved they were just as sharp in all aspects as any of the white cadets.
The one thing in my 71 years I can always remember was living real close to black cadets at camp when the civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James Chaney went missing in Philadelphia, Mississippi, in June of 1964. News of their missing, the searches and investigation, the discovery of their bodies, plus the finding of the bodies of Henry Dee and Charles Moore, and the arrests of the Klan members and a deputy sheriff were in the daily newspapers. These events embarrassed me and made the civil rights issues and treatment of the blacks more real and more personal. I remember and still admire the stoicism, the let’s get on with training demeanor, of the black cadets throughout those awful events.
I graduated from college and ROTC in August of 1965 and was commissioned a Second Lieutenant of Artillery. In nine months I was on the Cambodian border in the South Vietnam highlands. In my units most of the NCOs were blacks and the troops were about evenly split. Everyone worked hard, everyone did an excellent job, and everyone served their country with distinction. We received the STARS and STRIPES newspaper several times a week. Ten thousand miles away from the happenings we read about the civil right and anti- war protests and demonstrations. Since the summer of ‘64 I believed the injustices suffered by blacks and the need for change. As for the anti-war protests, basically, the troops and I were ambivalent. Hey, we are here and they are there, so what – NO BIG DEAL! Besides, pictures showed there were lots of groovy, bra-less T-shirt wearing chicks in the new mini dresses and belly button showing hip hugger pants at the protests. That’s what we were fighting for!
I came home in the summer of 1967 and decided to stay in the Army (for the next 20 years). There were anti-war and civil rights demonstrations and protests all across the country. The violence in the south directed at the civil rights movement, and violence and actions by the pro-war crowds against the peace demonstrators bothered me. Attacking and beating protestors, peeing on, throwing rocks at the protestors, setting dogs on the protestors, berating the protesters, etc. AMERICA, LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT was heard often – and the casualty and death rolls in Vietnam kept climbing: 15,000 KIA, 20,000 KIA, and VA and military hospitals were over flowing with the wounded. LBJ decided not to run for reelection in ‘68 and Nixon promised to bring the soldiers home. By 1968 Vietnam was a killing field and I believed and hoped the war protests could help force the issue and hasten our withdrawal and get the soldiers home. But, America had to save face; we had to leave with honor. Henry Kissinger wined and dined and dinked around in Paris for four more years and the KIA body count kept climbing: 25,000, 30, 000, 40,000. Finally, after 53,000-plus KIAs we got out in 1972. Did the war protests help? I like to think so.
We now have the Occupy Wall Street protests and the conservatives are spewing the same type trash they did against the 1950s and 60s civil rights and 1960s and 70s Vietnam War protests. The protesters then and now have the Constitutional right to assemble, to be heard, to present their grievances, to try to convince the public. They should not have to fear police batons or pepper spray, or suffer the vitriol of people who do not agree with their views. Let them be. They will either fail and go away, or succeed and help you agree with their discontent. Whatever they do, I seriously doubt your trashy verbal attacks will make them change or stop. After all, we have to be thankful that the original Tea Partiers did not stop after dumping the tea in the sea.
The year 1964 was a turbulent year. Civil rights marches and demonstrations across the south and race riots in several big cities. Vietnam War protests in New York, San Francisco, Boston, Seattle and Madison, Wis. Young men publicly burning their draft cards. Henry Dee and Charles Moore, two black men hitchhiking in Meadville, Mississippi, were kidnapped, beaten and murdered by the KKK. ... The later to-be-proved-false Gulf of Tonkin Incident, bombing of North Vietnam and the U.S. military buildup continued in South Vietnam as U.S. WIAs and KIAs increased. ...President Lyndon Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law. ... Six days of race riots in Harlem. Aircraft from U. S. aircraft carriers bomb North Vietnam. ...
In the spring of 1964 I was a junior in college and ROTC in a small state college. Events of early 1964 were far away and did not affect me. Civil rights demonstrations were in the south, race riots occurred in several large cities, Vietnam and war was 10,000 miles away somewhere in Asia, and the war protests were in big cities in California and the East Coast.
Public schools in my town were integrated with no problems for the 1955-56 school year when I was a ninth grader. There were no blacks at my school that year but we played football against blacks who attended other in-town junior highs. In high school I went to classes with blacks and played football with and against blacks. In college I went to class with blacks and rooted for blacks on the college football and basketball team. But, in all those years I was not close to blacks. They were present, but in the background.
In June 1964, as a junior ROTC cadet, I went to Fort Sill for the six-week summer camp. We marched; ran; shot the pistol, rifle and machine gun ranges; threw hand grenades; did the PT tests; did map and land navigation; bivouacked; did tactical exercises, and did KP. We shared 12-man squad tents and showers and latrines with black cadets (primarily from traditional southern black colleges). I very quickly came to understand: “Hey, these blacks guys are pretty sharp dudes.” I experienced this on the second day when a black cadet formed us up and marched us a couple of miles while calling cadence. The whole cadet corps got in step and rhythm and stayed that way. Sure beat some white boy trying to call cadence. Every day they proved they were just as sharp in all aspects as any of the white cadets.
The one thing in my 71 years I can always remember was living real close to black cadets at camp when the civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James Chaney went missing in Philadelphia, Mississippi, in June of 1964. News of their missing, the searches and investigation, the discovery of their bodies, plus the finding of the bodies of Henry Dee and Charles Moore, and the arrests of the Klan members and a deputy sheriff were in the daily newspapers. These events embarrassed me and made the civil rights issues and treatment of the blacks more real and more personal. I remember and still admire the stoicism, the let’s get on with training demeanor, of the black cadets throughout those awful events.
I graduated from college and ROTC in August of 1965 and was commissioned a Second Lieutenant of Artillery. In nine months I was on the Cambodian border in the South Vietnam highlands. In my units most of the NCOs were blacks and the troops were about evenly split. Everyone worked hard, everyone did an excellent job, and everyone served their country with distinction. We received the STARS and STRIPES newspaper several times a week. Ten thousand miles away from the happenings we read about the civil right and anti- war protests and demonstrations. Since the summer of ‘64 I believed the injustices suffered by blacks and the need for change. As for the anti-war protests, basically, the troops and I were ambivalent. Hey, we are here and they are there, so what – NO BIG DEAL! Besides, pictures showed there were lots of groovy, bra-less T-shirt wearing chicks in the new mini dresses and belly button showing hip hugger pants at the protests. That’s what we were fighting for!
I came home in the summer of 1967 and decided to stay in the Army (for the next 20 years). There were anti-war and civil rights demonstrations and protests all across the country. The violence in the south directed at the civil rights movement, and violence and actions by the pro-war crowds against the peace demonstrators bothered me. Attacking and beating protestors, peeing on, throwing rocks at the protestors, setting dogs on the protestors, berating the protesters, etc. AMERICA, LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT was heard often – and the casualty and death rolls in Vietnam kept climbing: 15,000 KIA, 20,000 KIA, and VA and military hospitals were over flowing with the wounded. LBJ decided not to run for reelection in ‘68 and Nixon promised to bring the soldiers home. By 1968 Vietnam was a killing field and I believed and hoped the war protests could help force the issue and hasten our withdrawal and get the soldiers home. But, America had to save face; we had to leave with honor. Henry Kissinger wined and dined and dinked around in Paris for four more years and the KIA body count kept climbing: 25,000, 30, 000, 40,000. Finally, after 53,000-plus KIAs we got out in 1972. Did the war protests help? I like to think so.
We now have the Occupy Wall Street protests and the conservatives are spewing the same type trash they did against the 1950s and 60s civil rights and 1960s and 70s Vietnam War protests. The protesters then and now have the Constitutional right to assemble, to be heard, to present their grievances, to try to convince the public. They should not have to fear police batons or pepper spray, or suffer the vitriol of people who do not agree with their views. Let them be. They will either fail and go away, or succeed and help you agree with their discontent. Whatever they do, I seriously doubt your trashy verbal attacks will make them change or stop. After all, we have to be thankful that the original Tea Partiers did not stop after dumping the tea in the sea.
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