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ROLE ON CAMPUS
Gadfly Who Served Donuts

“What To Do?” As More Than Words

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I think it was a discussion in class: You know Gandhi had a nephew and there was some protest in the south of India and the nephew said to him that “I’m going to go down and observe the protest.” And Gandhi said to him, “When you see a house on fire, do you observe […]
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The generally shared perception was of a fairly apolitical quiescent student cohort not only at Williams but elsewhere. That was a reflection in the wider sense of the Eisenhower years. Spring vacation [1960] was the beginning of the Civil Rights sit-ins in the South and Eisenhower had declined to support that—he hadn’t opposed it, he […]
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“The pickets assembled before the executive mansion at 8 a.m. and formed picket lines on Pennsylvania Avenue. Under instructions from the organizers, each was attired in jacket and tie and conversation was held to a minimum, the orderly processional serving to testify to the seriousness of their purpose. The posters they carried challenged Ike’s stand […]
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I remember the chief of the capital police, at the end of this, the police chief said, “Now you all come down any time you want to and we can accommodate you.”
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We went south on spring vacation, during the two-week time. We also went down on several other occasions and we were involved in basically building. I remember Bob and I working on putting a foundation on a church that was being built. I had never done that before in my life and we were taking […]
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Bob kind of moved from one who saw himself as a teacher of young citizens to one who saw himself as a teacher of young persons. His views kind of broadened from the political and the small “r” republican to one that involved more humanity. Early on I think he took some kind of vow […]
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When they were planning a sit-in against a Marine recruiter, an ROTC recruiter. I wasn’t sure I was going and a friend kind of gave me s— for it, and so I went and sat in, and it was sort of one of those surreal things where first you sat in one place, it was […]
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