turbulence

[darkoshi]

I've always known that the 1960s were a turbulent time with the Vietnam war and the Civil Rights movement going on. But I don't recall ever having heard before about the radical left-wing organization, the Weather Underground, and that they actually bombed places including the Pentagon. Reading about that, and about the Days of Rage riots, and about how Black Panther Fred Hampton was murdered by police, gives me more of a sense of just how unstable things must have felt back then.

I also find it interesting that to the best of my recall, my American History classes never mentioned the Haymarket Riot that happened in Chicago in 1886. I have much respect for the people back then who fought and struggled for labor rights and an 8-hour work day.

It also intrigued me that the leaflets from back then pictured on the Wikipedia page were written both in English and German. Even though I have German ancestry, I hadn't realized there was so much immigration from Germany to the U.S. even before the 1900s.

Comments

[randomdreams.livejournal.com]

Until the mid- to late-1800's, there were more people speaking German in Pennsylvania than speaking English. In Colorado, from our admission to the Union until anti-German sentiment in WWI, the law required that state and federal law be provided in English, German, and Spanish to anyone who requested.

The 60's were pretty horrible. The Manson Tate murders were an attempt to incite a race war, which at the time people thought was quite likely to happen. If you read about some of the big players in the militant wing of the civil rights movement, it's ... really depressing. Trumped-up charges, petty crime, betrayals, official persecution, spying, factional infighting that resulted in torture and murder.
The assassination of Medgar Evers and the botched prosecution of his murderer, the awfulness of Bobby Seale, Alex Rackley, and Fred Bennett and the whole Chicago Eight debacle, ugh. That was a horrible time, in many ways.