Time It Was American Stories from the Sixties

The book is a collection of 25 personal memoirs, each written for this book, covering different aspects of “ Sixties” experience.  The term “ Sixties” is broadly interpreted to include stories from the 1950s through the mid-1970s; however, these stories focus on events and experiences consistent with the “ Sixties” as historians understand that term.   Karen Manners Smith and Tim Koster created this book to make the sixties accessible and alive for today’ s college students, who know only that the period was unique and exciting, but have no real understanding of how young people’ s individual choices made it what it was. The authors felt there was a lot that today’ s students could identify with-idealism, commitment, risk, hard work, fear, hope, disappointment-if they could read the stories of people who, at their age, did important things with their own lives during a volatile historical period.

What was it like to live through the Sixties? The writers of these 27 memoirs offer the essence of life and youth in the period. In first-person narratives that range from poignant reminiscences to dramatic adventures, the writers convey what it felt like to land a helicopter in the middle of a firefight in Vietnam, to be beaten and jailed for trying to integrate restaurants in the American South, to run for cover when soldiers opened fire on a campus peace rally in Ohio. Other stories describe the writers' experiences organizing farm workers with Cesar Chavez, campaigning to elect Barry Goldwater, striking for Free Speech at Berkeley, living in a commune, joining the women's liberation movement, becoming caught up in a religious cult, or camping in the rain at Woodstock.

I. Vietnam Introduction Wayne Coe: “Blackhawk Five Four” Episodes in the life of a U.S. helicopter pilot Paul Coe: “Letters Home” A draftee writes to his family from Vietnam Leah O’Leary: “The GIs Called Us Donut Dollies” A Red Cross volunteer in Vietnam Tim Koster: “United States Blues” The Draft Lottery and an unlucky birthday Ngoc Quang Huynh: “A Life in Flight” Escaping post-war Vietnam II. Struggles for Social Justice Introduction Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons: “Mama Told Me Not to Go” Working with SNCC in Mississippi, Freedom Summer 1964 Raymond Hubbard: “Deep in the Heart” Growing up black in the Jim Crow South Sara Evans: “Not My Mother’s Path” A historian traces her journey to Women’s Liberation Toby Marotta: “Students of Stonewall” Encountering the militant Gay Liberation movement Yolanda Retter Vargas: “Sisterhood is Possible” The life of a feminist Latina lesbian. Johnny Flynn: “Something in the Wind” Spiritual renewal in the American Indian Movement. III. Pathways Introduction Tom Collins: “Hope House” Volunteer tutoring with Upward Bound, 1965-1966 John Manners: “The Peace Corps: Kenya, 1968-1972” Teaching school in Africa Jim Fadiman: “Opening the Doors of Perception” Psychedelics and research in the Sixties Steve Diamond: “Back to the Land” A search for simplicity and spiritual health Karen Smith: “The Process” Five years in a New Age religious cult IV. Conservative Currents Introduction John Werlich: Born on the Fourth of July The making of a conservative Robert Poole: Libertarian Awakening Campus conservative movements and the 1964 “Goldwater for President” campaign Ron McCoy: “It Ain’t Me Babe: Working for Richard Nixon” An insider’s view of RichardNixon’s 1968 Republican presidential campaign. Gerald Scott: “War on Drugs: A View From the Trenches” Undercover in the DEA V. Landmark Events Introduction Pat Royse: “Fire in the Streets” Reporting on the Cleveland Riots, July 1966. Tara Gordon: “Chicago ‘68” Innocence and violence at the Democratic Convention. Sheila Lennon: “Three Days of Peace and Music” Remembering the Woodstock Concert, 1969 Carole Barbato and Laura Davis “Ordinary Lives: May 4, 1970” Two students recall the shootings at Kent State VI. Speaking Out Introduction Jackie Goldberg: “Sit Down! Sit Down!” The Free Speech Movement at the University of California at Berkeley Maria and Antonia Saludado: “Standing With Cesar” Women in the United Farm Workers Movement Sam Lovejoy: “Somebody’s Got to Do It” Anti-Nuclear Activism and Civil Disobedience

Karen Manners Smith, Emporia State UniversityTim Koster, Pacific Information Resources, Inc. dba Search Systems