Chicago 1968
As we near another presidential nominating convention, I am reminded of the events of 48 years ago. History does not repeat itself, but it does often go in spirals. And to quote George Santayana, those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them.
Like 2016, 1968 was a year of unrest. We were in the middle of a lengthy war that was not going well, racial tensions were running high with protests in the streets, and we were choosing our next leaders. The Democratic Party was meeting in Chicago that summer, and after one idealistic candidate, Eugene McCarthy, had successfully challenged the status quo, Lyndon Johnson announced he would not run again. The spring was marked with tragedies; Martin Luther King had been assassinated, and then the probable nominee, Robert Kennedy, was gunned down just after winning the California primary. The Republican candidate, Tricky Dick Nixon, was promising "Law and Order", trying for the racist vote among southern rednecks. Sound familiar?
I was beginning my sophomore year at university, and had returned to South Bend a week or so before classes resumed. I was photo editor of the campus weekly news magazine (a small version of Newsweek or Time magazine) as well as a director of the Student-Faculty Film Society, which at the time was rated the best collegiate film organization in the US. David Kahn, another Film Society director, called me as soon as I hit campus. He had been approached by Haskell Wexler, the cinematographer for some major films including The Night of the Iguana, and Dave asked me if I wanted to go to Chicago to shoot some documentary footage for Wexler. Haskell had come to Chicago to get footage for a semi-documentary that would be his first feature film as a director, and he needed people with some experience shooting location footage during the Convention that was starting.
David, Fran Maier, and I drove the 90 miles to Chicago and met with Wexler. He explained that he wanted cinema verite` shots of crowds, demonstrations, and such. Jerry Rubin, Abbie Hoffman and others had been planning protests, and Mayor Richard J. Daley had assured the nation that he would keep order, no matter what it took.
The first night, we met at Wexler's hotel suite at the Blackstone next door to the Hilton and he gave each of us a 16mm Arriflex with a 400 foot magazine, enough film for about 12 minutes. To get the documentary feeling, we were shooting Tri-X black & white film pushed to ASA 800, giving a grainy look. He said to shoot whatever interested us, not interviews like newsmen were doing, but scenes that he might cut into the film to add ambience. We were paid $50 per magazine, and told when we used one up we could come back for a second one.
Dave went down by the Convention Center, Fran went up to Lincoln Park where the hippies camped, and I took Grant Park where demonstrations were scheduled. The first night was pretty rowdy as the night went on, and that was my first glimpse of Chicago's finest in their riot gear, carrying clubs. They forced the protesters back to Lincoln Park with a few arrests, but nothing like what was to come the next nights.
The second night, we were warned to bring wet towels as a defense against tear gas. There had been a little of it used the night before, down by the convention center. I was in Grant Park again, by the bandshell, where I found a good perch in a tree where I could film down onto the crowds. Amid chants of "Dump the Hump" (vice president Hubert Humphrey, the party's eventual nominee) and antiwar chants. The protesters moved through Grant Park towards the Conrad Hilton hotel, headquarters for most of the delegates. They were met by a wall of Chicago's finest, and they were in no mood to give ground; they started advancing toward the youth, and some stones and bottles were thrown which mostly just hit the ground in front of them.
Then they charged, clubs swinging. The crowd tried to back up, but it was really difficult in the back with thousands still coming south. The chants turned to shouts and screams; I was trying to film what I could, and soon the first clouds of teargas started drifting my way. I realized the damn stuff rises, and being up in a tree was not a good place to be. I dropped the Arriflex getting out of the tree, and just turned it on as I joined the crowd trying to get back towards Lincoln Park. There were k**s with blood streaming down their faces, holding arms and bruised legs, and people were getting arrested and hauled off to a waiting line of Black Maria paddy wagons. (side note - we changed the name of the film society to Black Maria in honor of the events of that week.)
I got back to the Blackstone by using State Street to avoid the police and crowds, and turned in my magazine. I was done for that night.
The third night was even worse; the later investigation called it a police riot. I got some footage, but I was disgusted with the entire affair. I wound up going to Old Town, to get high and get laid. I had a couple of hundred bucks tucked into my shoe thanks to Haskell so I was ready to celebrate! I was walking along north Wells and asked a doorman outside a club where I might crash for the night; Dave, Fran and I had been staying at a YMCA flophouse for $3.00 a night and I was sick of it. The doorman looked up and down the street, spotted a chick he knew and asked her if I could stay with her. She looked me over, shrugged and said OK. We walked down the sidewalk until a new Pontiac Bonneville stopped and a black guy hollered at her; he knew her and offered us a ride. She got in the front seat, I got in the back seat with a little black dude and his girl, Kitty. We started driving around Old Town, passing pills, joints and a jug of wine around. Pretty soon we were going the wrong way down one-way streets, scr****g the sides of the Pontiac on parked cars, and running stop signs; turned out the car was stolen. She suggested we ditch the car and all go to her place where I walked into the bathroom to take a piss and found the little black dude screwing Kitty on the floor. I said excuse me and started to back out and he said no, stick around, she'll need more so when he was done she grabbed me and blew me while I tickled her little tits and twat, his goo running out; I knew better than to stick my dick into her!
The night kind of degenerated from there. I do recall all of us going to a nearby park at 4:00 AM and playing on the playground equipment, stoned out of our minds, and waking up naked in bed with the with the girl who originally invited me holding my cock. I couldn't really recall what we did but she seem pleased enough to fix me breakfast and gave me her phone number if I was ever in town again; sadly I lost it somewhere...
Humphrey was nominated, and went on to lose to Richard Milhouse Nixon that fall. Wexler did use some of our footage in his film Medium Cool; we had the world premiere at the university Film Society the following year, complete with searchlights in the sky, limousines and red carpet for the stars which included the actor Rip Torn.
The lesson I learned was that democracy is not easy; power structures do not yield willingly, and are ready to use force to keep their status quo. It was my introduction to politics in the real world, something I've been involved with ever since. I don't mind disagreeing with opponents, but apathy will get me pissed off; people suffered and died to give you the vote, and if you are too lazy to use it intelligently, shame on you. Democracy means we get what we deserve for government.
Like 2016, 1968 was a year of unrest. We were in the middle of a lengthy war that was not going well, racial tensions were running high with protests in the streets, and we were choosing our next leaders. The Democratic Party was meeting in Chicago that summer, and after one idealistic candidate, Eugene McCarthy, had successfully challenged the status quo, Lyndon Johnson announced he would not run again. The spring was marked with tragedies; Martin Luther King had been assassinated, and then the probable nominee, Robert Kennedy, was gunned down just after winning the California primary. The Republican candidate, Tricky Dick Nixon, was promising "Law and Order", trying for the racist vote among southern rednecks. Sound familiar?
I was beginning my sophomore year at university, and had returned to South Bend a week or so before classes resumed. I was photo editor of the campus weekly news magazine (a small version of Newsweek or Time magazine) as well as a director of the Student-Faculty Film Society, which at the time was rated the best collegiate film organization in the US. David Kahn, another Film Society director, called me as soon as I hit campus. He had been approached by Haskell Wexler, the cinematographer for some major films including The Night of the Iguana, and Dave asked me if I wanted to go to Chicago to shoot some documentary footage for Wexler. Haskell had come to Chicago to get footage for a semi-documentary that would be his first feature film as a director, and he needed people with some experience shooting location footage during the Convention that was starting.
David, Fran Maier, and I drove the 90 miles to Chicago and met with Wexler. He explained that he wanted cinema verite` shots of crowds, demonstrations, and such. Jerry Rubin, Abbie Hoffman and others had been planning protests, and Mayor Richard J. Daley had assured the nation that he would keep order, no matter what it took.
The first night, we met at Wexler's hotel suite at the Blackstone next door to the Hilton and he gave each of us a 16mm Arriflex with a 400 foot magazine, enough film for about 12 minutes. To get the documentary feeling, we were shooting Tri-X black & white film pushed to ASA 800, giving a grainy look. He said to shoot whatever interested us, not interviews like newsmen were doing, but scenes that he might cut into the film to add ambience. We were paid $50 per magazine, and told when we used one up we could come back for a second one.
Dave went down by the Convention Center, Fran went up to Lincoln Park where the hippies camped, and I took Grant Park where demonstrations were scheduled. The first night was pretty rowdy as the night went on, and that was my first glimpse of Chicago's finest in their riot gear, carrying clubs. They forced the protesters back to Lincoln Park with a few arrests, but nothing like what was to come the next nights.
The second night, we were warned to bring wet towels as a defense against tear gas. There had been a little of it used the night before, down by the convention center. I was in Grant Park again, by the bandshell, where I found a good perch in a tree where I could film down onto the crowds. Amid chants of "Dump the Hump" (vice president Hubert Humphrey, the party's eventual nominee) and antiwar chants. The protesters moved through Grant Park towards the Conrad Hilton hotel, headquarters for most of the delegates. They were met by a wall of Chicago's finest, and they were in no mood to give ground; they started advancing toward the youth, and some stones and bottles were thrown which mostly just hit the ground in front of them.
Then they charged, clubs swinging. The crowd tried to back up, but it was really difficult in the back with thousands still coming south. The chants turned to shouts and screams; I was trying to film what I could, and soon the first clouds of teargas started drifting my way. I realized the damn stuff rises, and being up in a tree was not a good place to be. I dropped the Arriflex getting out of the tree, and just turned it on as I joined the crowd trying to get back towards Lincoln Park. There were k**s with blood streaming down their faces, holding arms and bruised legs, and people were getting arrested and hauled off to a waiting line of Black Maria paddy wagons. (side note - we changed the name of the film society to Black Maria in honor of the events of that week.)
I got back to the Blackstone by using State Street to avoid the police and crowds, and turned in my magazine. I was done for that night.
The third night was even worse; the later investigation called it a police riot. I got some footage, but I was disgusted with the entire affair. I wound up going to Old Town, to get high and get laid. I had a couple of hundred bucks tucked into my shoe thanks to Haskell so I was ready to celebrate! I was walking along north Wells and asked a doorman outside a club where I might crash for the night; Dave, Fran and I had been staying at a YMCA flophouse for $3.00 a night and I was sick of it. The doorman looked up and down the street, spotted a chick he knew and asked her if I could stay with her. She looked me over, shrugged and said OK. We walked down the sidewalk until a new Pontiac Bonneville stopped and a black guy hollered at her; he knew her and offered us a ride. She got in the front seat, I got in the back seat with a little black dude and his girl, Kitty. We started driving around Old Town, passing pills, joints and a jug of wine around. Pretty soon we were going the wrong way down one-way streets, scr****g the sides of the Pontiac on parked cars, and running stop signs; turned out the car was stolen. She suggested we ditch the car and all go to her place where I walked into the bathroom to take a piss and found the little black dude screwing Kitty on the floor. I said excuse me and started to back out and he said no, stick around, she'll need more so when he was done she grabbed me and blew me while I tickled her little tits and twat, his goo running out; I knew better than to stick my dick into her!
The night kind of degenerated from there. I do recall all of us going to a nearby park at 4:00 AM and playing on the playground equipment, stoned out of our minds, and waking up naked in bed with the with the girl who originally invited me holding my cock. I couldn't really recall what we did but she seem pleased enough to fix me breakfast and gave me her phone number if I was ever in town again; sadly I lost it somewhere...
Humphrey was nominated, and went on to lose to Richard Milhouse Nixon that fall. Wexler did use some of our footage in his film Medium Cool; we had the world premiere at the university Film Society the following year, complete with searchlights in the sky, limousines and red carpet for the stars which included the actor Rip Torn.
The lesson I learned was that democracy is not easy; power structures do not yield willingly, and are ready to use force to keep their status quo. It was my introduction to politics in the real world, something I've been involved with ever since. I don't mind disagreeing with opponents, but apathy will get me pissed off; people suffered and died to give you the vote, and if you are too lazy to use it intelligently, shame on you. Democracy means we get what we deserve for government.
8 years ago
Speaking of HHH, perhaps you remember this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUnHZAUR6hE