Hot Summer nights

(1966 Peace Fast)

 

It was a hot evening in June. Then again, evenings are always hot in June in Nashville, Tennessee. The three of us were sitting at an outside table nursing our second draft beer. I believe we were drinking Bock. No, we weren't singing, "bring Bock my bonny to me."

 

We were planning a protest against the Vietnam war. We agreed we would hold a Peace Fast starting July 4 at the War Memorial Auditorium.

 

I was working with the Southern Student Organizing Committee (SSOC). 

 

SSOC was primarily a group of Southern students who focused on Civil Rights, anti-Vietnam war, labor rights, and other progressive issues. 

 

SSOC did not sponsor this protest, but they were very supportive. Two of the fasters were on their staff, and the rest of us were all members of SSOC and committed to social justice. We used the SSOC mimeograph machine to print flyers we passed out at the City Bus station in front of the War Memorial.

 

The fasters included two ladies and six men. We were Sherri Meyers, Dee Slawson, Jody Palmour, Ed Hamlett, Tom Foley, Paul Fahle, Bill Gregory, and I.

 

Some supporters gave up a night's sleep and guarded us while we slept. Their sacrifice touched me. They included David Kotelchuck, Allen Austin, and Bill Meyers.

 

Other friends would stop by and urge us to continue our fast. Archie Alan, George Slawson, Dave Benson, and many others were always supportive. Even a sympathetic physician stopped by to make sure we were doing OK.

 

Passersby would stop and talk to us about the war. Some argued, but many would listen. The unofficial pastor to the civil rights movement, Will Campbell, brought his guitar and sang antiwar songs, including "Universal Soldier."

 

I know we changed some minds about the war and even recruited a few people to our cause. Each of us spoke passionately from our heart about our opposition to the war.

 

We fasters had thrown caution to the wind, demonstrating and camping out on the hard concrete floor of the War Memorial on those hot July nights.

 

However, on that sweltering June night at the tavern, we weren't thinking about what would happen to us. Hell, I think we knew what would happen; we would all be thrown into a police van and taken to the city jail.

 

It was, after all, 1966 in Nashville, Tennessee, with a peace fast on the War Memorial. Duh!

 

On the evening of July 7, there was lightning and thunder in the distance. Storms were approaching.

 

They sent some young kids to provoke us into a fight. One hollered, "you damn commie hippies."

 

Police arrived demanding that we leave, and in unison, we said we were staying. We were all arrested, along with some of our friends and supporters.

 

Someone, not one of the fasters, managed to get away and called others to come to our aid.

 

When our friends arrived at the jail, they too were arrested for the serious crime of inquiring why we were arrested.

 

Twenty-one of us were arrested that evening on charges of loitering.

 

We spent a couple of hours locked up before we were all released.

 

We never went to trial. After a volunteer attorney for the ACLU threatened lawsuits against the city, they dropped all charges. 

 

But I digress. 

 

After we finished our beers, I ambled back to the apartment where I was staying on that sultry June night. Affectionately known as the Catacombs, it was a large old Victorian house on West 18th Street, near Music Row. The house had been converted into apartments, as was the original carriage house.

 

Many vagabonds and poets had lived at one time or another in the Catacombs—people on their way up and all too often people on their way down.

 

My apartment (cockroaches included at no extra cost) was right off the back porch. As I walked up the back stairs, I heard Joan Baez music flowing from one of the carriage house apartments. It'd been a long day; I was tired but hadn't had an opportunity to listen to music in several weeks. I turned and walked towards the music. Cautiously I knocked on the door, and a young lady answered. I asked, "may I come in and listen to the music?"

 

Surprisingly she said yes. 

 

She was with a young man, and they were drinking beer. She offered me one, and I graciously accepted.

 

I don't remember her name.

 

Next, she put on Theodore Bikel's  "From Bondage to Freedom.” It was Songs of many lands, of tyrants and slaves, of free men and liberty. 

 

Was I in Red heaven or what?

 

As it turned out, I knew her ex-husband, who was sometimes peripherally involved in SSOC. Go figure.

 

She asked me if I was familiar with a particular artist. I wasn't. She put on the LP, and I was blown away. It was Len Chandler's "To be a Man." Such revolutionary fervor but also such tenderness. After she played the other side, I felt revived and ready to fight the good fight.

 

It was after midnight, and they had things to do. A couple of my comrades in arms were also coming over for breakfast at Eight AM. 

 

So, I thanked the young couple and said good night.

 

A couple of years later, I attended a Len Chandler performance at a coffee house run by the Presbyterian Church in Nashville. He played there a second time with the release of his second LP, "The Lovin' People," in 1968, and I also saw that show. 

 

Len was an outstanding songwriter and singer. He told the story of what inspired him to write each song. He was very active in the  Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). 

 

Years later, I would dub a copy of the record and give it to my nineteen-year-old daughter and fourteen-year-old son. I still get emotional when I listen to it and remember the night I asked if I could listen to the music.

 

In the fifty-five years that have passed since those blistering nights, many things have changed. Unfortunately, too many things haven't.

 

Authoritative harassment has all too often become bullets.

 

Democratic opportunity has become a significant obstacle.

 

Hatred and Intolerance have become institutionalized.

 

Wars have become endless.

 

Catastrophic weather events have become the new normal.

 

And so it goes. 

 

This memory is dedicated with love to Delilah Slawson June 16, 1936 - June 24, 2015, and George Slawson August 31, 1931- February 1, 2014, and all those associated with SSOC who are no longer with us.