MFDP Chapter 52

DON CHAPMAN

Interview 0358Don Chapman Sides 1 & 2White ; male and 0359 side 1

Quitman, Miss.FDP summer volunteer

Qs Can you tell me the time you first became involvedwith civil rights?

As Well, I first became involved at about the time of theFSM uprising there in Berkeley, and, you know, as an act-ionest. And at that time, last September, I decided at thattime that I probably would work down South on this project.And so I went towork as a volunteer - spare time, you know,a couple or three hours a week in the East Bay there for theFriends of SNCC. At that time the campus Friends of SNCCwas out of business because of the university's action, be-cause of generalized. . ..and so forth. And the idea of thiswas just to acquaint myself with the movement generally andI just kept it up and I made the decision to come so when thetime came I came, you know.

Qs When did you make that decision, was that during theFSM?

As Yeah. The emotional impact of all that. I wasn't in-volved in it to start with - I just sort of witnessed it.And then it grew, you know. And I allled^myself or becameaffiliated with a sort of a non-definitive organization thatit was. It was just a sort of a last spontaneous group ofpeople, and my own emotional set was really jelled then, Ithink. Part of that - well for about the last four or fiveyears I just supported the MLU as kind of an Intellectual -you know, I ant them money, but It was kind of an intellect-ual kind of decision that I made; it wasn't an emotionalthing. And it wasn*t based on civil rights on the racialside; it was civil rights on the legal side. It was fromtheir side - legal civil rights denied to general population,you know. And I can - since I've come down here and sinceI*ve got Involved last September I fell back to what I feltabout things that had gone on. I was oppressed last summerbut I didn't entertain any thoughts of coming down here. Imight have if I had been a little bit younger. I'm not surebecause I hadn*t gone through tMs emotional commitment thatI did at Cal during the FSM thing. I went to the Universityof Texas, oh, not too long aso when they were involved withwhat they called the John Watts case. He was a Negro boywho wanted to go to law school there and the year before Iwent there - see I was a freshman - he was turned on by theregents, I believe. The president of the university had re-signed over this. He wanted to admit him. And this wouldhave been the first integration at a university in the South.

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And this was my first real awareness when I think back, youknow? And when I was 19, 18 or so I didn't know what theheck they were trying to do. Why couldn't this guy go, youknow? Because I had already graduated from a college upNorth. And back with the experiences I had In Texas withthe police and Negroes that I witnessed there. And I waslost for years, I guess. And things like the McCarthy hear-ings and the House Un-American Activities Committee hearingin San Francisco that put me in the ACLU frame of mind, youknow. And with the FSM I made an emotional commitment anddecided to come here.

Qs How old are you now?

As 35.Qs And did you go to - were you from Texas originally?

As No, I was born in San Francisco.Qs Did you g0...?

As I went my freshman year in Texas and then I transferedback to Cal. I graduated from there. I started graduatework on a teaching credential, got married, wrjet to work,after 7 years, got divorced, this is getting up to date now.I've got a couple of kids; they're home with their mothers.And then I sort of felt I had a second chance to go back toachool and get a decent education. And I didn't really att-ain anything the first time around which is what I was doing.

Qs Well, you're a graduate student in mathematics now?

As Physics.

Qs Physics?

As I had graduated in political science before.

Qs Were you involved in the sit-ins at Sproul Hall?

As Yeah.

Qs Did you sit-in?

As Yeah. And I've only been involved in three big dealsin all - three big protests, I guess. The first one was thathouse committee hearings. And then the Palace Hotel and theFSM sit-ins and I just left there after they handed down the

"

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verdict - guilty, but I don't know what happened yet on thepenalities, if any - whether they will be appealed.

Qs Were you a member of FSM?

As Yeah, it wasn't a sort of thing that you joined. Imean you were - I'd say yes by personal commitment and otherthan that as far as I know I'd say the executive group therethat this was the only kind of commitment that you made whenyou joined it. The executive committee were sort of a hodge-podge of people from different civil rights groups around onthe campus. I guess they were sort of elite members andthese were the ones that they cited. They got a special dealin the trial - the runner of the trial, he demanded them toa separate penality agency so they could get stronger penal-ties than the court was going to allow the rest of the people

Sit What were you doing - since you're 35 now - what wereyou doing during the time that you weren't in school?

§,1 Being Mr. family man. I went to work for the governmentand I compiled maps for the Geological Survey - surveyingand mapping. And I worked there for about three years. Andthen I went to work for a private company here and doing thesame thing. And the way that I work now is that I work whenI need it for this company. And I make some extra from thisoutfit in San Francisco. We do work for civil engineers,subdividers, this sort of thing.

Qs You've been in San Francisco all the time except when you

As No, I've been living in Berkeley all this time.

Qs Bay Area - except for thetime in Texas?

As Texas and a couple of side trips - summer I went to Mex-ico a couple of years ago this summer and that's about all*

Qs What sort of a family background do you come from?

As Well, my father -my mother and father are both Repub-licans, but I can remember as a child my father?; saying thatRoosevelt was the greatest thing thfct hit this country ever,you know. And they always voted right down the line for him.Now from the time I left home and went to Texas, I neverlived at home. My father died around 1956 around there. AndI'd say that in the past I had never talked politics to him.I remember just him praising Roosevelt during the time thathe was president. I think he was generally Republican by

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tradition if he had any overt politics, it would have beenliberal just like - I wasn't too close to him. My motherfollows suit, you see. She does whatever she's told.Qs Did either of them involve themselves in political act-ivity at all?

As No. Well, my father in local San Francisco politicswas involved as an appointed civil servant this kind ofthing. He never ran for office or anything like this. Andhe worked for the City for many years there. And my motherwas never anything. She was just a mother. She approved ofanything I've ever done, you know. Like I've gone so far asto live there in North Beach during the time that it was afad to live there. She tolerated this and when I came downhere - she has her built-in prejedices - she's 73 and she'sprobably concerned with my personal safty more than anythingelse. She had to rearrange some of these personal prejudicesI'm sure becauae I'm the third child and the youngest. I'mthe only one that around - that's close enough to see. Theothers are in Hawaii and New York. And you know a decisionI would make, she would have to weigh on. She doesn't havethese strong ideas that she would just oppose me and stillmaintain a mother-son relationship. She would have to ad-just, and fun the letters I've gotten from her she has kindof adjusted, you know. She's decided apparently well he knowswhat he's doing - it must be right, that sort of thing. Thatis the way she treated my father too. It makes it easy. WhenI first told her I was coming down here she made a funny Freudian remark. She said oh, are you going down there with allthose other niggers? Identify me, too.

Qs What sort of teligious background do you come from?

As None. Me mother's an Episco^alean, I guess. She hasn'tbeen to church since she's been married maybe. My fatherwas christained, you know. And on the following day he wasconfirmed and the next day he was married. It was all arr-anged so that he could be accepted tozmy mother's family.When I was si* or seven I used to go to Sunday school sporad-ically and as long as my more rational life is concerned I'vejust been a rabid atheist.

Qs Did you ever go through any sort of experience of beingconverted to radical atheism?

As No. You mean emotionally, no. It was never built in inthe first place and I reject a lot of the premises and Ididn't have anything to reject because it wasn't there really

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very strong and in some respects I'm notreligious at all,but I take an academic interest in the 13the and 12 cent-uries. And there is sort of a religious mysticism thatwas going on. But I think it's more of a social curiosity.You know, see how people could live under these sort of verydepressed times. And equated with this, it is very similarto what we're going through now - the enlightenment and all.Like last year I took a course in painting just for kicksand one of the paintings we had to do was a self protrait.And I was trying to make a picture of me sort of symbolic-ally and it came out with all these Gothic towers and itwas very medievil looking which is what I sort of pretendedto portray. I don't know if you would call that a religiousbent or not. I think - I felt for the first time that what-ever the religious experience to someone who is religious ls3there may be kind of a emotional upheaval in it. And if thesecan be equated I felt what I would call a religious exper-ience would be noon rallies or the FSM where they announcedthe victory so to speak of getting the support of the facultyand so £orth. And everybody was all massed around there andthey were singing "We Shall Overcome 1* and it was really avery moving sort of thing, you know? I felt kind of an em-tional charge - I thought ah, thi&smust be what a religiousexperience is like to somebody who i5....

Qs Do you see a correlation between that experience andyour current involvement in civil rights?

As No, I had already made up my mind to come down here. Ofcourse, even though I was pretty set to it, it was a matterof setting the hindurances and the problems that I would runup against - like I would have to pay money for child aupport.And then I had to get up more money than the average personwho could come down and live off his parents.

Qs (inaudible)

As Oh, you mean about the decision to come here?

Qs Yeah, had you ever thought about coming to the Southbefore - before your involvement with the FSM?

As Yeah, but more out of curiosity than out of a commitmentto the movement. Prior to this experience that I was speak-ing about I had already decided to come down and I'd already

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working with the Friends of SNCC there so it was alreadypretty well set. But this was just sort of a moving thing.Maybe it was because I wanted it to be. I don't believe inany mystical experience. I just think it was a few switchesjust happened to throw it at the right time. And I believedit was right, you know. All this that was going on was rightand this doesn't happen very often, I think, to anybody. Wereally believe that what is happening is right.

Qs How long have you been divorced now?

As Three years.

Qs Did your wife act very negatively or positively?

As Oh, very positively - very pspitively enough for acapitalist. She was willing to cut the child support outfor three months . She comes from a background that behoovesyou to do what you can and there's duty to family and homecome first regardless of anything else, you know. I'm a lotloser. I would say what I owe my children - one of the rea-sons I decided to come here was having two children. Theyare both six and seven now. I could look at them and knowthat there were Negro children around and know that there isjust a world apart. They're both going on different roads.

And it's not either one of their fault, you know. And justsort of a compassion that I have as a father to my children.I could carry over very easily to a Negro child and I thinkthis was the emotional key. This was really made me see theinequities of the system more than anything else, and howwe started out on the wrong roads through no fault of hisown. They have all the complete advantage of being atheist,white, and I could do anything I want really. I'm even freeat 30 to 35, you know where I can make more material decis-ions about what to do with my life than I could when I wastwenty so all these advantages - they are choice advantagesto me but then there are certain disadvantages exist withother people. And it starts out when you're very little,but I don't want my children to have big advantages and otherchildren don't. You might just sort of say a fatherly sortof parental thing. It's hard to - I usually get nods frompeople who have children. You know, like they understand.I talked to Mrs. Divine about this and she just nodded veryquickly and understood what I was trying to say. So if youdon't have children then, you know...

Qs Is this sort of a feeling ear a sense of justice wouldyou say that's caused you to come down here?

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As You mean am I trying to achieve justice?

Qs Well, it appears that you see yourself in a positionand other people in other positions as purely by chance.What is the difference that comes to miad here? Is it onethat you want to see justice or §qual opportunity sort ofsituation?

As Yeah, it's a lot of - a lot suffer from this disadvan-tage. And, you know, I may not cause enough change for thisto come about, but I reason that we will definately not causeany change if I don't come down here. There is the chanceI might and it's worthwhile - the effort to d0.. .1 wentthrouji college in the fifties when everybody sat on theirhands and went tolthe Rose Bowl, you know. It" was a bigdeal. And I went through this feeling of this sort of des-parate beat generation life that was going on. There was arejection of this society but there was no - they didnltoffer any alternatives outside of personal kicks, you know.In the movement, I see the alternatives. I see - I'm veryoptimistic. I've always been kind of an idealist and lamoptimistic. So coming down here has made me more optimistic- maybe just because I just happened to luck into some sat-isfying relationships out here. It's like I don't see really- there may not be a real change now or even in my son's butif it's tough now, then I say let it be tough, you know, .Myfather should have done this, you know, or my grandfather.My grandfather was born in 1849 but lived in California andnever even thought of going back to the civil war or any-thing like this. California is very detached and this issomething that should have happened long ago. We shouldn'tbe bothered with this now. Part of my impatience I get tothinking that there's a lot of things to be doing that arevery important. And a lot of people could be involved withthem if they weren't hung=up, tied down like people who areliving down here - in just trying to live. I consider thingslike going to the moon important, not for all reasons butjust because for curiosity, I suppose and so forth. And yetyou think of all these thousands of people who can't parti-cipate. They're millions because they're tied down justtrying to exist - trying to eat.

Qs Would you say that you are becoming more optimistic asyou grow older or is this...?

As Yeh, and this is sort of reversal from normal train, youknow. I had the choice - I still have the choice of sayingyou can't beat the system. I can join it, you know, but

can't. let he joins the system he has to join it as

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under certain conditions unless we bring about a change.Now I come down here thinking, you know, I have a lot ofmiddle class f^rends who sell stock, work on Montgomery St.in San Frnacisco and they're sympathetic but they don'treally feel that you can really do any good - just lostdesparation. It's just there's nothing we can do; it'sjust too big and overwheming. And I'm frustrated by thisargument because I think there is something that we can dobut I donfct know how to tell them. You know I can't getthem off the dime, you know? The most I can do is embarrassthem. Of course, I was colored this way, and I come downhere and I felt that I have gained more optimistic outlook,you know?

Qs What's your own political beliefs? You mentioned thatyou were in the ACLU and you mentioned that your parentswere Republicans.

As Well, I've been a registered Democrat since I registered.I would probably -I don't consider belonging to any politicalparty being of any importance in California. I cmsider tocommitting yourself emotionally to a political party in Miss-issippi as being very important because it's working itselfinto a political party operation. And so I've taken thison since %I 've been here really. But in California I'm aregistered Democrat merely because of the convenience ofvoting in primaries, and because I've never tolerated someof the Republican candidates that they've had out there.You live in California, you know. The California politicsis sort of non-partisan. At least it has been - it was forso many years. Well, you could file on both party ticketsand so forth and in order to do political power groupsI was never poltically oriented to care much one way or theother. You know, I consider politics something that soI never took it very seriously. And the only reason I takeit seriously here is because I've com!tted myself to themovement wMch has committed itself to the Freedom DemocraticParty, you see s?? And in moving through a political situationthis isn't going to make me any morepolitical when I go backthere. But when Igo back there I'll be as apolitical asfar as parties are concerned. I wouldn't be interested injoining anything like the Young Democrats, but I will bemore radical as far as civil rights and other protest move-ments are concerned regardless of what party lable are on

in this subserviant role. And this inequity, I feel, isI canft tolerate. And like children can join the system,they all have the choice and dildren can't except

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but the political parties you mentioned, I went to a coupleof CORE meetings there in Berkeley and I decided that I didn'twant to join then because they had a communist exclusion,sort of a section in thet± constitution which seems to me tobe a political - it's determined on political grounds whetheryou join or not, you know! It*s not very free and open. Inthis movement no one has ever asked me even if I'm a com-munist, you know. Andcthat's fine. That's the way it chouldbe.

Qs ....Would you call yourself a radical now?

As A radical, yeah. Well, I called myself a radical when Ileft too.

Qs You oaasidered yourself one, but didn't call yourself one.As Considered myself, yeah -an unaffiliated radical. Idon't know if you've read much of Thomas Paine. But he'sthe kind of man that I would consider the type of radicalI would follow or affiliate myself with. I agree with hiskind of tenants and his kind of radicalism. I haven't doneenough reading in political theory to relate it to Marxismor any of these other things.

Qs Do you think your political ideas any motivationfor your coming down here?

As You mean with radicalism, oh yeah. I found somewhere inSNCC reading their literature, reading their outlook, Ifound things that are reasonable. I found that I learneda few things from the SNCC outlook and philosophy or whatthey're trying to do here. But I agreed to it intellectually.But it wasn't until I got out here that I really startedunderstanding that it could be possible - that this canhappen. And I started really believing it and this is id-ealistic. I've met an awful lot of people here and in themovement down here who are old timers and they are very dis-couraged and they hang on desparately. But I don't thinkthey've become cynics. And like I say I think I may havelucked into a situation which satisifies me. The peopleI've been working with haven't had to be led or anything,and it seems like. It seemed like I'd just plant a coupleof seeds and they would go at it. It might have somethingto do w£h the fact that they are older people, you know,and they're dealing with someone who is really their con-temporary rather than some 18 year old volunteer. That itwould be easier for them to except my suttings or seeds thatI'm trying to plant. But anyway it's been satisifying to mewhereas I can see a lot of discouraged people out over in the

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other parts of this county. But they've sort of given upand they sit around waiting to go home, you know.

Qs Had you had much previous contact with the Negroes inthe North?

As I have a few close personal friends which^is about all.I haven't traveled with groups of Negroes at all. Let's seeI have one very good friend who I would classify as close afriend I've taken one to be, you know. And that's about all;most of the other Negroes have been acquaintances but most ofthem just passing - that I've met in school or the movement.Qs Have you had much contact with the problems of the Negroas a minority group?

As From personal experience no - only abstractly. Frompassing on a bus in downtown Oakland, reading about it inthe papers. Where I went to school I never had any exper-ience. There weren't enough Negroes to go around in SanFrancisco. So I didn't know any until I got out of highschool, until I got out into the world - until I startedworking. I worked a year before I went off to college andI think the first time I was aware of inequality when wasI went to Texas. Andsort of this racial issue was up be-cause of this sweat trying to get into the university. Theyadmitted him finally but they set up an extra little cub-ical in back of the classroom and things like that. And jfcwas the break. They had a case that were staying in thisplace where I was living stole a bunch of things from sev-eral people. I believe they stole a camera and electricshaver. So we called the police and they immediately triedto pin it on this houseboy who was working there who was astudent at the local colored medical school. And they didn'teven ask any questions of the complainteHts , myself and twoother guys. They just took him in a room and started killinghim when we weren't around because he was a Negro. And itwas so obvious that they were just trying to pin it on himbecause he was colored that we just - the three or four ofus, the others were Texans by the way - withdrew all ourcomplaints and sharges and just got rid of them, you know.These other guys could accept, but I couldn't. I couldn'tsee why they were trying to pin it on him just because hewas a Negro. It was beyond my awareness of life in general.I didn't know what I was w&king into. All I did really withthis experience was put it back in the file for years Ithought about it a lot - you know, in the last couple of yearssince civil rights have come up more than the prominent issues

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that have sort of slid off on the side.

Qs Could you start talking about the experiences thatyou've had since you've been down here? When did you arrive?

As I got here the last day of June. No, I'm sorry, I gothere about the third day of June. We left the last day ofJune. And they were just letting people out of jail inJackson so I went immediately to Hattiesburg to that con-ference down there, orientation. And I had been to twoorientations there in the Bay Area - San Francisco and ajunior high school in Berkeley. Do you want me to commenton the orientation?

Qs Yeah.

As I thought that the orientations we had there in San Fran-cisco and Berkeley - those two for just afternoons - far ina way gave out more information about what was going to hap-pen and what it was like and this - fiasco. And I didn'tget anything out of the Hattiesburg orientations at all ex-cept on the last day he told me where to go. There's a gameof personal contact with people around and make a few friend-ships but they are just for a couple of days. I had the ad-vantage of meeting a couple of people I hadn't met beforelike Mrs. Gray and Mrs. Divine. And I stayed at Mrs. Gray'shouse and got very well acquainted with her. And I had alot these SNCC people who had been through the Bay Araa topreach. So I had met some of them in the crowd, not person-ally, but I knew some of them. And I felt more like I knewwhat was going on than most of the poeple I talked to there.And this sort of generalized discussion left me kind of cold.I didn't come down here to discuss why I came down here. Itwasn't really relevant, I didn't think. And we didn't <aomedown here to organize community action groups or anything likethat. They all came down here for all these weird reasons.And the same with that meeting in I didn't get much -they could have printed up a couple of leaflets and mailedthem out. I'd say I didn't really start learning anythingnew until I got out here in a project. And what I learnedwas the experience of working at it. And that has led me tothis optimistic frame of mind.

Qs What sort of activities have you been involved in here?

As Here? Canvassing, well, I work out in the country overhere and it's all very rural out there. I kind of fell intothis. They were looking for places to house us at the timeand when I was assigned into this house, I thought she lived

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In town which was actually thirty miles out of town on thjsfarm. And you wake up in the morning and you see these cornfields going all the way to Alabama - rolling, you know, it'sreal pretty country. And I was there for about two or threedays and got acquainted and met the family and a few of ttelocal neighbors within reasonable driving distance. Youknow, everyone's pretty well spread out. They're fairlygood sized farms out there. So when for one reason or an-other we had to come back and stay in town - I was out therewith Peter. We came back here and sort of bumped around hereon this floor of this hotel. People who were really left totheir own devices as to what to do - so I decided to try towork out something like that because it was pleasant and Ikind of liked the poeple around there - we'd been ther^twoor three days. And being able to go out back and forthconveniently because one of the women out there is workingand has a child in the head start program which is here intown. So I could walk up very easily and catteh a ride andmaybe stay over night with someone there. And then comeback here the next day. What this did was sort of forcethe local people out there to provide me with transportationto and around. And the will to do this was already there.They had been trying to get some kind of community meetingsgoing. The meetings were mostly just this one family, youknow. They'd gather. The families consist of uncles, cou-sins, you know, about 8 or 9 people, you knew. So all I didwas sort of force them by my presence and by my asking formeeting some of these other people. I could see that whatthey needed was more than just to sit around and talk aboutit, but what they needed was to get into some issue. It'shard to create them. You have to know an area pretty welland I could put a little bee in her bonnet and then she'dtake it from there. And the last two or three meetings havecome out pretty strong. I mean more people have come whichis really good for this sort of thing. And a sort of growthof interest with the voter registration out there. We hadthe election here just yesterday. And they all went out tothe polls and the way it turned out and my main contact outthere is supervisor of the church and he had been kind of acommunity leader but not wanting to get too deeply with civilrights. His two sons had participated in the local desegre-gation activities here in town. And he because he had a car,I sort of pinched him into it and he's gotten more deeply in-volved. Well, he offered to take people home from the pollingplace and then he would come into town and see why they werenot allowed to vote - why their names were not on the list.And everyone of them - four or five couples - wanted to comein with him. And they all did. He was extremely pleasedas the rest of the afternoon we went around canvassing tellingpeople why the others - why they couldn't vote and so forth.

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He was just happy as a clown and these people had stuck to-gether as a group and were willing to come in - they inten-ded to go down to the registrar and say, look we're out hereto vote. We're registered voters, wfcy aren't we allowed, youknow, as an untimidated group. And he was very pleased atthis and the community sort of jelled around this issue andit had jelled around things like - they decided out there togo and see the road supervisor and see that he puts in im-proved roads. The roads are all full of ruts and thingswhenever it rains. And they got up jk committee and theyhad been talking about this for months out there. They saidthat what we got to do is fix these roads. And I just sug-gested well, why don't you get up a committee, you know, andgo sse. And sb she pushed us at the last meeting, you know.They more or less drafted one man said I'll go - her father-rose. And then who do we want to take - let's take this guyand this guy, fine. So they all went last night and I haven'theard the outcome, but they wesn believing that they weregoing to be successful. And the five men of the various fanuilies out there are the leaders, you know, of the community,I think. The last thing I heard as I was driving out backthere yesterday afternoon - one of the men who was going saidthat he thought that it might be a good idea if they invitedthe road supervisor to one of our meetings. And let him an-swer questions from the community. And these are the sort ofthings white people do, you know. And I said that soundsgreat. He also suggested to my host who was driving the car,he says, should Dan go? We should take Dan to see the super-visor tonight. And he said no, he shouldn't go. This isour business - meaning me. And this is right, you know, thisis the way it all should be. And this kind of thing, youknow, seeing this kind of come up has made me feel that thiscan effect a change. If this were repeated in 80 counties inMississippi, we*d pinch them where the pinching gets hot, youknow, and I think it would work. This is maybe with optimistic- I think really that any white man's presence out therewould have, done the same thing. I don't feel I've done over-tly really that I've done anything in the way of managinganything. Like I didn't propse that. They were complainingabout the roads before I came only they just didn't know how

- the tools - that... lt's very easy for us, you know, whitemiddle classsociety to know what tools we have especially ifyou are college graduates and so forth. You have a prettygood idea of what political and social tools you can use butfarmers who may have completed the third or fourth grade,some of these men have never been to school at all - can'twrite a word. They*re every bit as intelligent as maybe acollege graduate, but they just don't know how to lay theirhands on the right tools to work the machinery of the state.

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And this is what I picture - this is my role here. It*seasy, you know. You just £ull these levers and it works.That's over simplified but this...

Qs Had you expected it to be like this? Did you expectthat the Negro would, if I could generalize, if the Negrowould be what you fowad him to be 0r....?

As** I was expecting a dragging of speaking - having to dealwith very reticent people who didn't want to get involved -you know, who were firghtened and scarred. A lot of thesepeople are firghtened. And a lot of what I felt as successout there I'm sure comes from the fact that these thingsare coincidental with the new v6ting forum out of Jacksonand the federal voting rights bill. And these things sortof fall right in. I'm sure a lot of people decided to goto the court house to register because of the federal vot-ing rights bill and the fact that the federal governmentsaid these things - you can register now, you know, rahherthan me. About the most I felt I could do, you know, istell people who haven't read the paper or haven't seen iton TV, you know, that this is possible. We ran into oneman out there who just asked Monday he decided to go reg-ister - probably because of the canvassing and because heheard his neighbors around had been registering - thingssort of snow-balled fast after a slow start. And so wewent in and he wanted to ask some questions about the form. .

We had been distributing several forms all over the place.And he had the old form - the twenty question deal. And hewas trying to figure out how he was going to answer thisconstitutional interpretation section. And nobody had toldhim; and somehow he had just missed the message on the way.And the man who was driving with me said, look we have acopy of the new form - we usually had one or two in our poc-kets - and he was ju* as pleased as could be that they hadchanged this. And he said he thought he had heard somewherethat there had been some changes but he wasn't sure what theywere and he had found that old form in an old drawer and hehad put away from some previous canvassing some months ago.And he went back down and registered on the fching, but thisidea of getting the message over really seems to be doingthe trick more than imparting any great desire for freedom.I haven't really spent much time talking about this thing.I have met people who don't know what they want - off thestreet here there is a little old lady who is 83 and shejust wanted more than anything in the world to vote and tolearn to read and write. And I told her how to fill out the

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voting form, you know. Just gave her a whole stack of themand she just copied it down darwing pictures of these let-ters. And since we started this literacy program lastweek why she's been going to that. And at 83 you don'trun into many people who - this is the kind of thing thatgives me haart when I see.... lf anything I say to myself isthat we cannot afford not to win for people like this andfor little children who expect it. And you can't say thatyou can't beat the system. It's too late to say that. Youjust got to beattit; that's all there is to it.

Qs Do you think that you've been changed at all afteryour experience down here....?As You mean in actual interests?

Qs Well, that and cultural .....your attitudes...As I havenft really felt a lot. I mean I've been really- what I'm thinking about and what I'm actually doing andworking, you know. What seeds I want to plant, what pro-jects I have under way. You know there is a certain amountof guided democracy agoing on the way I operate and I thinkthat is what's got these people going is just a little push.And when I?m not laying plans or thinking of what is a day'swork or something like this then I kind of - I'm eitherwriting a letter to two or three friends that I Isxre or I'mreading something that's not particualrily applicable butthat is an escape, you know, to sort of relax my mind. I'veread two or three books - two books on medievil history andone book on the inquisition. This is part of the mystiquethat I was involved in. And I read this thing "The Subter-raneans,, which was given to me which was sort of interestingbecause it's about San Francisco, North Beach, and all. Andthe same life that I went through sort of and it made methink a lot, you know, what ever happened to these people?And in this desparate age. And they were the same kind ofpeople that are in the movement except they lack thoughtfor the future, you know. It's funny I fell sometimes thatI've been able to step from that world into this world andI have friends who can't - who haven* t been able to make it.

Qs You've bridged the two generations then - the beat gen-eration and the . . .As Kind of, yeah, to the whatever it is generation.

Qs Whatever it is. I guess it really hasn't been namedyet.

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As And they're the same people - very similar mentality.And, ih fact, this society looks upon movement people asbeatniks. Well, when I lived there I didn't consider Iknew any beatniks whatever this was and this is sort of astrange term applied to a fiction character. There were alot of oddballs floating around. I suppose that may havebeen it. And there's a lot of oddballs floating around themovement too, but this sort of awareness that life is justnot a desparate treadmill, you know.

Qs What do you think are the differences between the peopie in the beat generation and the whatever generation?

As Relatively, they're about the same age. There mayhave been some older beats. I'm not sure; I really knowtoo many but the main difference is that there's commitmentto a cause and to a social ideal and to things outside them-selves other than personal contacts. I'm not saying thatthe older beat generation was selfish at all, but theirs wason a personal plane. It seemed to me that you were dealingwith - if you were honest or ehtical on a basis of friend-ship, with the people you knew around you then let the soc-i&y go to hell, you know. Because it isn't honest and eth-ical and it's just to be damned. And this generation atleast the committed seems to operate the same philosophyThe society can go to hell, but it can be more than damned.It can be changed and this desire to work hard enough toeffect the change is necessary to make it operate ethicallyand honestly is the big difference. And these people I cansee you know in ....book was written and people who have neverread this thing wouldn't conceive of a movement like this.It would be sort of locked off in a simple way. That is, youcan't change this thing, you know, just write your poetryman and be cool. The machine is just going on without us.We reject it.

Qs Can you explain the transition between the two? Do youthink there's a reason or perhaps a vague reason why the beatgeneration. . . . . ?

As I thihk it spawned this thing, yeah.

Qs The conditions or what?

As Yeah. The beat crowd, like the people I knew, they mightbe people a little older than I was at the time and essent-ially they had probably fought in the war and raised in the

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depression and it's just been sort of a hard life. Andrather than try to escape into this middle class mediocrityof suburbia like the average college student and the aver-age person does or even the working class now, you know.They just - they reject society very much the same as weall do, but they reject it by going into their house andwatching it through aTV screen. And this is a vicariouslife. And that the beats would reject this too only theywere older and hardened and had been bitten. People likeWalter and Peter here who is 19 - they were born - they werechildren during the war which was hard on fathers but thechild wouldn't know one way or the other whether he didn'thave butter. So it was only margarine on his bread so bigdeal. It was a fairly affluent life followed by the bigboom after the war. No big depression, you know. And thesepeople I think maybe are allowed some sort of optimism bythis set-up. They haven't been sort of consistently pushedby depression and war until they had matured, you know, butthey had.... (tape runs out)I thought of something. I think that people who were raisedor born in the 20s see and were raised in the depression andwere married at about the beginning of the war or throughthere and then had children - teenagers or 19 or 20 yearsold - having been raised in this depression, they seektranquility* you know. They seek a life that they didn'thave - mainly security and a father who works all the timeor a husband who works all the time, and children wh arewell fed and don't have to go out and sell magazines tohelp support the family. And they bounce around on thesegreen grass out there around Walnut Creek and Lafyetteand other places, you know. Now these children wb are raisedunder these conditions - they want things that they neverhad mainly a look at the world as it really is - a sort ofsense of reality and maybe a desire to get out. And I thinkthat this kind of - it's explosive, you know, theywant toget away. They reject this middle class surburban life liv-ing in these gingerbread houses out there for a little ex-citement and a little kicks. But still this doesn't reallyrelate to this optimism at all. What I think it does Is -they're wanting experiences that they have been denied asa child and the other ones wanted the security that theywere denied as a child. I don't /know whether this is go-

ing to go back and forth. And when you have this kindof desire for experience and taste for life, you know, lustfor life - If this is coupled with artistic temperment wellfor music or something like this you have some kind of cre-ative genius out of this. And coupled with the social changewhich is going on - sort of a collective group to draw upon

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to effect this change and this is this committed crowd that'sable to if anything to reject conformity because this meansgingerbread houses in Walnut Creek and they reject this be-cause that's there family, you know, - an adolesent rejec-tion. And able to reject all these ideals and establishthings that are right and take ethical positions on socialproblems because it's part of the kicks right now that justdidn't seem to be existent in the fifties. A lot of thesepeople who were going to college in the fifties were Gls.And they weren't especially looking for kicks; they had al-ready had them.

Qs There Is something I want to ask about that. This isto say that the people of the beat generation have alreadybeen hardened and therefore didn't go out into the worldand people of the present generation havenft been hardenedand are not cynics. And therfore they are going out intothe world and attempting to change the world. Now, by goingout into the world in effect they are opening themselves upto be hardened.

As That's true. A lot of them, I think, are getting hard-ened. Some of these movement people are hardened this way.I think now that I'm beyond the point of getting hardened.If I'm an idealist now, I'll probably die an idealist. Youknow, at 35 - I don't feel that I'll turn into a cynic. It'skind of late. I went through a cynical phase but I see alot of these people who I think will be quite discouraged,especially some of the more immature ones who came downhere thinkning it was going to be one thing, and it turnsout to be really kind of a complicated mess that's hard todeal with. And, you know, they just aren't up to it so theymay just go back to their - I'm not talking about the - whatI'm talking about is the type of person like the, excuse theexpression, like the Stanford coed - you know the ribbon inher hair and the straight skirt and what do they call thesethe Peter Pan collars outside the sweater. They're a fewof these floating through the movement, you know. I don'tknow how long they lasted down here, but I'm sure they'll bebombing back to Menlo Park in no time, and turn into - andmaybe get hardened by this. I remember during the FSM itwas sort of funny to see some of these UC coeds - you knowthe picture of Betty coed wearing a sorority pin on one sideand an FSM pin on the other side of their sweater, you know.And they're sort of crazy mixed revolutionaries, you know,but coming fraaths^i system. When I was an undergraduatethere I joined a fraternity and I was in the system. I didnot live in the house any longer than a semester and a halffor personal reasons. I didn't like the constant activity.

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I sort of like to withdraw and get away from.it, you know.And it operated better just living out and choosing my ownway. But it was so funny to see people who obviously werejust rooted in parts of the system. The way they dressed andthey did everytling they were told and went to football gamesand all this. And yet were committed to this FSM^thing. Igo to football games myself and enjoy them.Qs How about the Negroes in the movement? I would expectthat they would have been hardened through their experienceof just living in the South, yet they still seem very opti-mistic.

As I haven't talked to - I think Walter's optimistic

Qs Because they've been thfcough a lot and

As A lot of people here are pretty young and I can't com-municate with them too well. I don't think they have anydeep feelings about the movement one way or another and thefuture of it yet. The older men that I have met - not inthe movement but the citizens out here - they should be hard-ened. Wouldntt you say that a man of 80 would be as hard asnails and would be just as desparately attuned to this systemas possible. And I've had old people like this say thankyou for coming - thank God you've finally come, not personalltbut the movement. It has happened and that's as uncynicaland unhard as you can get. The local people have hung on totheir religion so much that this has given them an outlet.This has kept them from hardening.

Qs I wonder what the difference might be - well you mentionedearlier that with a white Northerner it kind of goes in acycle to these children who are living in easy times whereastheir parents are living in tranquility following a periodof turmoil. And that the sutdents there are trying to re-verse by trying to follow their parent's tranquility withturmoil. And yet the Negro has never had this period oftranquility. I wonder if this is perhaps sort of a beginningof a cycle on this side or perhaps or that this explains whythe Negro is optimistic when something begins to happen inspite of the fact that he's been oppressed.

As I think a lot of itese people want to gain middle classmaterials. You know, it would be kind of nice to have a toi-let inside and be able to turn the facet on and have hotwater come out - or have water come out or have a facet. Orhave a well that you didn't have to reach down in because you

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didn't have a rope. I've run into a lot of people who areafraid of this movements leading out to what we would callNorthern middle class mediocrity or what I would call this.And I'm optimistic because I don't think this is leadingthis way. This is what has given me the most heart. AndCalifornia is kind of the example of the brave new world,you know. They've got everything everybody wants out thereand I never thought about It much but it's kind of a wildplace to live. And I'm not so sure that my outlook would bethe same as somebody from Chicago or from New York, you know.I mean in the other part of the country I think they have acompletely different vlfcon of what's coming. I don't agreeat all with the Huxley concept dcf the brave new world or withthe beatnik desparate thing which is sort of like the bravenew world. I dontt think it's going to end up this way.One of the things I've seen in Mississippi which is -I havenot really been able to separate it from the racial issue downhere - is that there's a lot of kind of intelligence aboutthe way people are living other than this raci3(a turmoil, youknow - living with the environment around here. Thatmeanswhite and Negro. I mean the way they build freeways in th£state has far surpassed any California freeway I've everseen and they're kind of pretty. You toiow, they conform tothe hills and things like this. And I havent' seen anyroad or highway billboards except one or two Klan signs,youknow, which is - but the Klan has an in, you know. Butthere's not all this garrish advertising going on on thehighways. There's no sbudivis ions that I've seen like inDaly City. Like it sprawls all the way from San Franciscoto L.A. just about. And these are the things that I dis-like about California and I work for a company that engin-eered this type of thing. I've been - I remember lookingat a photograph of some real pretty hills around Clea»rLakeand the boss was looking at them too. And he sayd can't youjust see that we'll cut off all these hills and we'll fillin all these vallies just right. And there will be all theseroads that will fit just fine in there. And frac his stand-point it is just great country to deal with. I haven't seenany of that around here. There's a sort of easy going, ina way unpretentious casualness in both societies. Now Ithink what we're doing here is operating on the Negro com-munity in the Southern society and that this set of circum-stances won't necessarily lead to the inadequacies of theNorthern middle classes when these things are achieved, youknow. That is that certain values will be taken up herewill stay, will remain. I really dont 1 see any charm inhaving to cook on a wood stove, you know. This is fine if

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you have a house in the country but not to live in it allthe time. And I feel that it's my mission - our mission-is to use middle class as conveniencies to make this lifeeasier to live - to get on with more interesting thingslike painting or going to the moon or digging holes underthe sea, you know. Things like that that are really moreimportant than buying a new car every year or selling stockor making money for moneys sake. And there's this - I don'thave any real contact with the white community but apparentlythey don't value the same things that we value in California.I don't think it's going to go that way.

Qs Would say then with the exception cf the racial issue...the Southern shite....you mentioned the unpretentious

ness of tha people in Mississippi.

As Yeah, it seems to be this way. They're - a lot ofthese people seem to be very content to live in a housethat's fifty years old and it doesnt' have to look likethe guy next door, you know. In the little towns I've seenaround here... l haven't really traveled.

Qs Could you live here instead of California?

As Yeh, I could live here as a Southern white just fineexcept that it's too hot. I prefer there to be no whetherat all. You know, I was born and raised in the Bay Areaand I like it to be like that. But this - I may be allwrong, you know. I may be just not really seeing enoughof the country. There seems to be a more of a freindlinessamongst the white community - amongst themselves. Then thereexists in California. Everyone seems to be strangers outthere and they are, you know. They come from all over theplaca.

Qs Do you think that when the Negro is given the middleclass conveniences that they will come into the middle classosclety of the Southern whites or do you think that it'sgoing to more approxiamte that of the Northern white of thesuburbia and cutting up / the hills and so forth?

As I think it will be built on the Southern society be-cause it's here. You know 200 Northern saviors coming inhere isn't going to change anything. .. .it's going to be aSouthern society still. I don't see just how it's going toend up but personally I maybe this is just hopeful thinking,I don't think it's going to end up like the Northern middle

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class. I think it would be - they're going to effect achange in the white middle class down here too.Qs Well, what do you think of a group like the NAACP whichseems to be going much more toward a middle class world thanSNCC which is striving for sort of an ideal world. Do youthink the middle class they want is the Southern middle classor the Northern middle class or ?

As Well, I think it's part of - well, I'm confused really.I think what they're looking for is a materialistic middleclass society of biracial counsels and a lot of talk and aspart of the system which is - well my picutre of what'g go-ing to happen here Involves a complete breakdown of the sys-tem as it stands, see. But what's going to build is stillgoing to reflect the society's Ideals and worries. MaybeI'm thinking more of the relationship with the environmentaround, I guess, ideas - not having road signs. It's anextremely intelligent thing to have - I wouldn't have givenany Southern white the credit for that idea before I camedown here.

Qs Do you think your view of the Southern white has changedat all since you've been down here?

As I haven't - well, I lived in Texas with it on the otherside of the line. I think I could - I think I would be ca-pable of going over to the other side and living on that sideof the line. Not here in Quinton but, you know, some otherpart of the county and get along finr. I would be able tooperate over there; I wouldn*t necessarily reconcile orchange my opinions. What I've noticed is that I've gottenterrifically alienated from any white people here. I seepeople go by in cars and I wonder how am I ever going toadjust to living with these people again - you know when Igo back up North. I feel a comfortable - when we were firstdownstairs talking with you, I feel uneasy with th^t, otherguy we were talking to, you know. All the time, I've justnot trusted anybody like this. And this is maybe just sortof a survival mechanism, you know, to survive maybe, I don'tknow. But you know I see girls go by driving a car and theyare just like people I know. And I say God, is it alrightto wink at a white girl in this town? Even if you're a whitenigger, you know. It's a funny feeling being alienated likethis, but I suppose I could adjust, you know, what the hell.I'm not going to worry about it until I get back there. Ihaven't had any contact - the only contact I had was thatguy, a couple of telephone calls, hard looks, people holl-aring at me, but my opinion abstractly hasn't changed.

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Qs You know, what you say about is it allright to wink ata white girl down here even if you're white. There was aSouthern white girl who was chasing me around about sixmonths ago - chasing me - not, she wasn't - (inaudible)she was always coming around trying to get involved orget me involved. I donft know what she was trying to do.As I'd like to before I leave and I don't picture this everhappening. This is sort of an intellectual exercise of minethat I think about that I'd like to talk to someone who's aSouthern white person who isn't necessarily a racist, youknow. I have talked to people like this many times, youknow, but not with the mental set that I'm in right now.There's a - we've gotten a couple of phone calls here andI don't know how sincere anyone ever is on the phone. ButI talked to this guy who claimed that he goes to the Univer-sity of Mississippi and has shown an interest in me and theother fellow that was working here who was from Yale and hewas very impressed that he was from Yale. I say impressedthat I was from Cal, you know. I say impressed in that hewas interested in what we were doing and what kind of peoplewe were, you know, and showed an interest In the movement.He asked me at one time if he could join me - if he couldwork in some other county, you know. But he was on the phonea couple of times. We had these long conservations - thiskind of thing at least to an idealist like me, you know, hopethat you only solve half the problem in one respect - I wouldlike to see some way of getting in contact with these people.I don't see any now at all. I came down here figuring wellwhy wouldn't it be possible to just contact white people inthis state and I wouldn't even consider it feasible even ifit were - I wea?e to meet this guy and talk to him personallyI would mistrust him all the time like I do this fellow wewere talking to today. I don't even trust the FBI when theycome around here.

Qs What do you plan to do in the future? Are you goingback to school in the fall?

As Oh, yeah.

Qs Do you plan to do more work in civil rights than before?

As Yeah, I'll go back and go to work again like I did forFriends of SNCC, East Bay. I think maybe I'll be a lotmore active, I'm sure, although I will have an asset havinghad this experience. And I intend to, you know, to put my-self at the - like my movement commitment involves a lot ofthis experience if people know anything about - if peoplewill - to raise funds I*ll swallow everything I have, you

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know, all my inibitions to talk to people about it.

Qs Do you think that you'll be back down in the Southagain next summer or in the future?

As Right now I would be very hesitant about saying yes orno. It's quite possible but it would have to be in a summeror some....But then I have to go back and make another pileof money to do this, you know. Child support and things likethat. To come down here this time I would continue shildsupport and I would continue to rent a little cottage whichis near the university which is expensive and cut off all mysources of income and support myself here, you know. Sothis would be the same kind of operation next year. I wouldhave to do same thing. I can see since I've come here thatI'm looking forward to getting back to the Bay Area and get-ting back to some ofthis movement struggle that's going onthere. I feel that it's going to be some more activity onthe UC campus, I'm sure. There's bound to be more civilrights activity, you know, and this crowd - there's a hun-dred or so people down here from California in the Bay Area.And this bunch gets back to the Bay Area and get all firedup and ready to hit them and having fun - stopping trainsout there, you know. They don't much give a ©are aboutVietnam, you know, before. But I might get involved inthings like this.

Qs Let me ask just one last question. It was brought tomind by yuur mention of Vietnam. Now do you see the move-ment as a huge sociable including things like Vietnam andmore civil rights work?

As Oh*, yeah. I don't see any way we are just going to change- I donlt see the movement as just changing the domestic sit-uation in Mississippi. But Mississippi is the guiding - thefirst place we've started is all. I picture changing thewhole operation - this whole country over. It*s a typicalSNCC attitude really.

Qs How do you feel about Vietnam?

As I think it's a terrific waste of time and money. Iwouldn't blame Red China at all if they jumped into thisthing, /you know. I never quite agreed with the politicalreasons for being in there. When I was going to Californiaas an undergraduate I took Poly Sci. - the course fromScalapino who's one of the big spokesman for the policy.And I still think he's an outstanding and intelligent man,you know. I met him socially a couple of times since he

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lives only a couple of blocks away, you know, children andthe PTA. I mean he's in the PTA and things like this. YetI dontt see any validity in his - in what he has to say. Itis all right if you accept this as a starting premise - theDomino theory and all this. And if you accept that oughtnever have been out there in the first place, you know, Ithink it's all a matter of power politics and gain for theeconomic system in the United States. I tend to be a littlemore radical on an international basis than I do in a dom-estic one. This picture of the United States as being theforeigncolonial exploiter, you know, I tend to agree withthis, especially in South America and now in the far eastthere.

inaudible mutterings -tape ends