Fifty Years Ago Today: When the Whole World Finally Started Watching

They always say that Vietnam was the first war we saw in our living rooms as we watched the nightly TV news. I don’t recall those images as much as I should have, but I absolutely remember the night I watched the war at home—as I sat on the ’60s-splashed orange-flowered couch in the living room—when the police jumped out of the paddy wagon and began beating young people. This was happening in my hometown, only an hour from the suburb where I lived. And I was watching it with my mother—a World War II veteran. It was when the generation gap disappeared for us for a brief moment. It was the first time we agreed in months, and the last time we’d agree, for a long, long time. This was inexcusable. This was not America.

Another Golden Anniversary from the Year that Turned the World on Its End

It was fifty years ago today that the Democratic Convention in Chicago was held, finishing off a long reign of the Democratic Party that began with the great hope of John Kennedy and ended in tragedy—with major achievements undermined by an inability to end the Vietnam War. It also shattered the image of Chicago as the City that Worked, super-charged the antiwar effort, and polarized the nation.

Until the violent images appeared on television, I remember that, though the war was heavy on our minds, it was hard to get really engaged around the convention. It seemed the country’s leaders were offstage or running out of gas just when we needed them the most. The two candidates of hope were gone or fading. Bobby Kennedy had just been assassinated, and after that, Gene McCarthy seemed to have lost heart and energy.  We were left with Hubert Humphrey, the VP of a president that by this time was so reviled and exhausted he gave up and didn’t even try running for another term—and Nixon. I was too young to vote, but I knew that whatever happened, it would be my age group the next administration would be putting on the line.

Meanwhile the Vietnam War was Raging

There’s a lot of coverage that will be coming out today, talking about the specifics of what happened here in Chicago during that time, and why. There’s already been pretty heavy examination. The Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern just finished a remarkable series on “The Media Legacy of Chicago ’68,” that reminded us that this is where the phrase “The Whole World Is Watching” began. The convention was also the first instance of politicians claiming what we now call “fake news” and vilifying the media. It was the event that caused police to be trained ever after in crowd control and, significantly, it was the first time raw footage went right to broadcast: No editing, no editorializing—YOU WERE THERE. Twenty seconds of film of cops jumping out of a paddy wagon and clubs doing what they shouldn’t be doing, and more and more after that. We’d see worse soon enough at Kent State. But this was first. This got the attention of the world. This was a police state in Chicago: Vietnam on Michigan Avenue.

We Were Already Pretty Spooked

By the time of the convention, we were in the eighth month of a year that every quarter had brought us a new horror—from the Tet Offensive to two assassinations. We weren’t numb yet; your faith that regular life would—had to—prevail was still pretty strong. You felt like if you just kept your head down... you could duck until it all settled back into rationality.

I’d just graduated from high school and made a bargain with myself to get the thing I most wanted—the future promised by a college education—but from the military, the entity that was involved in what was to become the greatest tragedy of my generation. A year later, the "deal" seemed almost Faustian to my teenaged self. But at the time I was trying to make it work. My induction ceremony had taken place only a few weeks earlier.

My mother had encouraged/pushed the move (it’s what she’d done), and she wasn’t broaching any second thoughts. Both my parents were vets from “The Good War” and couldn’t really see that you couldn’t say that about this war... until we saw the paddy wagon pull up.

I remember my mother covered her mouth with her hand and held it there, long after the clip played—this woman who had weathered twenty-hour surgery shifts in field hospitals on the front and the liberation of a prison camp.  We were both stunned, both grasping for a comment that would encompass the horror of the moment. When her hand came down, she couldn’t look at me—her gaze was still fixed on the screen. There was just a deep, long sigh. I joined her. We sighed and nodded. Words wouldn’t bridge the gap, but this did.

My Coming of Age

I think it happened in that moment, quick and profound. I spent the rest of the summer winnowing the piles of what I was planning to bring to my new dorm, from clothes to record albums. I fixated on those, for some reason. I knew the Beatles had to come with me, but I was going to college, maybe I should listen to more grown-up music—maybe it was time to give up childish things.

I chose a Johnny Mathis album, one of Sinatra’s, and gave The Association Greatest Hits to my ten-year-old brother.

Nothing actually changed between my mother and me, but when we argued in the future we were both aware we knew better. We were aware that way down deep we agreed at least on this one fact—“my” war was nothing like “her” war.

Eventually, I gave up my military scholarship and took back my Association album. My brother called me an Indian-giver, and I bought him a new one. We both still have them.

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The Assassination of Bobby Kennedy: Three Strikes and the Early Hope of a Generation Is Out

This year has presented a lot of where-were-you-when moments that are impossible to keep from reflecting upon. And, if you miss one, just catch the CNN special on 1968: The Year That Changed America and you’ll be immediately transported.

Today is the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Bobby Kennedy. Unlike that of his brother, five years earlier, I don’t remember exactly where I was when I heard—but I do vividly recall the next day. I was in study hall, supposedly getting ready for what would be the last finals of high school. I was wearing a green skirt. I remember because I kept staring protectively into my lap, away from my books and the tense eyes of others, darting back and forth across the aisles of desks, anxious to commiserate. I couldn’t keep my mind focused and resented that I had to. How could we be expected to study, I screamed in my head? Or even take finals, or even be in school with all this going on? Another Kennedy dead, two months after King. This is happening here, in our country, not some remote third-word place I couldn’t picture. I was terrified. We were terrified.

It Was Supposed to Be the Best of Times…

Senior photo 1968

I was a senior and it felt good to be a high school top dog, finally. Years of tension for me and my family about being able to afford college had been wiped away a few months earlier when I hit the jackpot with a full-ride, four-year scholarship. Whew!

All the exciting senior events had been such fun, and portended early skills and success: the mini-musical I’d written for the annual Variety Show had been a hit, the Moby Dick float I’d designed for Homecoming had won the best-of-parade prize. I’d made my own dress for Prom. I was in choir and Madrigals and we preformed like mad and medaled at state contests. I ran the hot dog concessions at the football games and got an early taste of what it was like to be in charge. There were home teams to support, dances to attend, my first Hike for the Hungry. It was the last burst of childhood, the thrill of college awaited and I wanted to enjoy every minute.

…And Had Become the Worst of Times

But over it all was a pall—a growing drumbeat of dread. I received the letter informing me of my scholarship in February, a few weeks after the Tet Offensive—one step forward, two steps back. We didn’t really understand the rapidly changing details, but suddenly Vietnam was everywhere you turned. Tense, generation-gap dinner table conversations about the war and civil rights went dead silent after King was assassinated, with fear we wouldn’t be able to respect each other if the wrong thing was said out loud. Lyndon Johnson had abdicated the Presidency… Wow. At school, we talked about the racial “situation” in social studies, our choir director wrote a beautiful song, A Prayer for Peace, and we performed it at a special assembly, anxious for healing. The tension continued to crank—classmates were turning eighteen and would be eligible for the draft.

But there was new hope around peace candidates and those who could calm race relations: Gene McCarthy and especially, Bobby Kennedy.

I Admit I Chugged the Kennedy Kool-Aid

My mother was a Kennedy fool and it rubbed off on me. She read everything printed about them, often in publications that resembled movie magazines or today’s People, and relentlessly followed their exploits on television. We were surrounded by Jackie’s fashion choices and conspiracy theories about Jack’s assassination. They were fresh, tragic and irresistible. We felt proprietary and protective about them. I was already tremendously excited about this new world I was about to enter as an adult, filled with space exploration and the British Invasion. When Bobby decided to run for President I transferred this enthusiasm onto him, regardless of the fact that at seventeen, of course I couldn't vote myself. 

Our high school held a mock convention that spring. Students with acting chops took over the roles of candidates including George Wallace and Richard Nixon. McCarthy was the preferred candidate among most kids my age and supporters showed it off, parading around the upper levels of the gym with banners and chanting. But I was “loyal” and stuck it out, lonely on the main floor, with my Kennedy ’68 sign and button. I wore a one-piece, culotte outfit in turquoise, with matching tights. I was hot… and hot for the hope represented by Kennedy.

I loved the words on a poster that eventually ended up on the wall in my college dorm room: “I dream of things that never were and say why not.” Yes, I thought. Yes! Yes! That was how we’ll go forward into the world.

And then Sirhan, Sirhan turned that Yes into No. It was devastating.

 

Abraham, Martin and John... and Now Bobby

The videotape of the assassination was frighteningly close to what we’d seen before—another Kennedy, another head wound. Our memories still retained images of Lee Oswald being gunned down by Jack Ruby, the shot on the balcony in Memphis. People being murdered on TV! The Bobby blow was horrible, but it was the pattern that shook us: three assassinations, here, in the United States. Who would be next? Certainly, Ted Kennedy if he decided to run some day: Don’t Do It!  The environment was not unlike how we feel about today’s relentlessly repeating school shootings. Disturbed people could surface out of nowhere, with crazy logic, for a cause that made sense to only them. It could happen anytime, anywhere. The Democratic Convention was coming to Chicago in the summer, my city, my home. Leaders ripe for the pickings. It wasn’t a matter of if, but when, for the next one. Brace yourself.

The last 45 RPM record I ever bought was Abraham, Martin and John. It was recorded by Dion, of Runaround Sue fame—that had always been one of my favorite songs, and now so was this very different tune.

Has anybody here seen my old friend Bobby,
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up over the hill
With Abraham, Martin and John.

Take a listen here to Abraham, Martin and John. Have a tissue handy.

A Generation Bookended by Tragedy

I’ve never forgotten that June day in Study Hall. It was the week before graduation and I was about to launch out into a world that had been so enticing, and now was so terrifying. I’ve thought about it over the years and feel that third assassination was the moment that finally scoured off all feelings of childhood safety. I think we, as a generation, were gut punched at our most formative moment. After, there was a tremendous rage and energy to use all the upheaval to change to world. Yes, much of it was necessary and ultimately positive—and I participated enthusiastically—but a lot of it was born in the violence of three symbolic murders. By the time the Vietnam War finally sputtered to a pointless end, many of us were disillusioned with our inability to make enough of an impact. We moved into the Me Generation. Let’s focus on something we can control—ourselves and the lives of those we hold close. It became a time of Nixon and there were no politicians to trust as we trusted Bobby.

I feel that for those of us who came to adulthood in that fateful time there has always been a pull to return to the optimistic work of changing the world. I’ll come back to it some day, we think, when my career is set, my children on their way, when those things under my control are settled. That’s when I’ll regroup and see how I can make that difference after all. Then came 9/11 and the world is a scary place again. The assassinations and the missing World Trade Center—the violent bookends of our generation, as I see it from my armchair.

I reject the notion that we’re whiny boomers, that we blew it and we’re done. There’s no doubt we’ve upended every status quo with every decade we’ve passed through. And, there’s still a lot of world to change, and energy to do it. But there's nothing like that feeling of limitless hope and possibility, of first love. Ours was cut short, in June of 1968.

Like with any tragic figure cut off too soon, there’s been a lot of speculation over the years. If Bobby had lived and become president, would he have gotten us out of Vietnam sooner? Would he have eased the path to civil rights? Would the world have been different? Would our lives have been different?

Isn’t it pretty to think so.

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