Jan. 23, 1968: The USS Pueblo was
captured at sea
by North Korean forces. Yet, in 1968, so many other scary things happened, it became easy to look away from what was labeled, "the Pueblo Incident." For instance, the Tet Offensive began in South Vietnam a week later.
Nonetheless, as captives, the Pueblo’s 83 men endured an ordeal that
was shocking to an American public that had naively thought its Super
Power status meant such things could not happen. At the time I was in the
Navy and I had little doubt we would quickly rescue the Pueblo’s crew, even if
it meant another war. I was wrong.
Jan. 30: The
Tet Offensive began, as the shadowy Viet Cong flexed
its muscles and blurred battle lines with simultaneous assaults in many parts of South Vietnam. Even the American embassy in
Saigon was attacked.
Mar. 16: Some 500 Vietnamese villagers -- women, children and old
men (animals, too) -- were killed by American soldiers on patrol in
what came to be known as the My Lai Massacre. However, it would be another 20
months before investigative journalist Seymour Hersh would break the
horrifying story of the covered-up massacre, via the Associated Press
wire service.
Mar. 31: Facing the burgeoning antiwar-driven campaigns of Sen.
Eugene McCarthy and Sen. Robert Kennedy, President Lyndon Johnson
suddenly withdrew from the presidential race, declining to run for
reelection by saying, “I shall not seek and I will not accept the
nomination...”
Apr. 4: America’s most respected civil rights leader, Martin
Luther King, was shot and killed in Memphis, Tennessee. Riots followed in cities
coast-to-coast. The bitterness that remained after the dust settled was
scary.
In Richmond, it ended an era in which adventurous young Whites patronized some local Black clubs that featured live music. No more Sahara Club for me.
May 13: The USA and North Vietnam began a series of negotiations
to end the war in Vietnam that came to be known as the Paris Peace
Talks. Ironically, as a backdrop, France, itself, was in chaos. Workers
and students had shut down much of the country with a series of strikes.
The trains weren’t running, the airports were closed, as were schools,
etc.
May 24: On the same day my service in the Navy ended, Father
Philip Berrigan and Thomas Lewis (of Artists Concerned About Vietnam)
got six-year sentences for destroying federal property, stemming
from an incident in which duck blood was poured over draft files at
Baltimore’s Selective Service headquarters.
June 3: Artist Andy Warhol nearly died from wounds received from a
gunshot fired by Valerie Solanis. She was a sometime writer and one of
the many off-beat characters who had occasionally hung out at Warhol’s
famous studio, The Factory.
June 5: Having just won the California primary, Robert Kennedy
was assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan in Los Angeles. The hopes of millions
that the Vietnam War would end soon died that night.
It’s hard to
imagine that Richard Nixon would have been able to defeat Kennedy in the
general election. Kennedy's death meant the gravy
train being enjoyed by
big corporations supplying the war effort would continue to chug along.
June 8: James Earl Ray was arrested in London. Eventually, he was
convicted of murdering Martin Luther King. Yet, questions about that
crime and Ray's role linger today.
July 23: After watching “2001: A Space Odyssey” at the
Westhampton Theatre, I saw The Who play live on stage at the Mosque (now
the Altria Theater). The Troggs opened. Standing in the long line to get into the concert, I
was quite surprised at how many hippies there were in Richmond.
This was
in the period in which Pete Townshend and his bandmates were into smashing up their equipment to finish off
shows. The acid I took that day served me well.
Aug. 20: Soviet tanks rolled into Czechoslovakia to crush what
had been a season of renaissance. As it had been with the construction
of the Berlin Wall in 1961 and the terrifying Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, talk of World War III
being one button-push away was commonplace.
Aug. 28: In Chicago the Democratic convention that selected Vice
President Hubert Humphrey to top its ticket melted down. With tear gas
in the air and blood in the streets 178 demonstrators/bystanders were
arrested. Many were roughed up on live television. As cops clubbed
citizens in the streets, on the convention floor CBS reporters Mike Wallace and Dan Rather were
punched.
Watching the riots surrounding the Democratic convention on television, I
began wondering if those who were saying our society was coming unglued
might be right. Consequently, for the first time my political ideas
were aired out in a newspaper, when my letter to the editor about the violence in Chicago was
published by the Richmond Times-Dispatch. That experience began a love
affair with seeing my name in print.
Oct. 18: At the Summer Olympics at Mexico City, American track
stars Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised their fists during the medal
ceremony for the 200 meter race. Smith and Carlos wore black gloves (and
other symbolic accouterments) for a protest gesture that was widely
seen as a “black power” salute.
Nov. 5: Richard Nixon (depicted above) narrowly defeated Hubert
Humphrey. Although Humphrey, himself, was for peace, out of loyalty to the sitting president he
refused to denounce Johnson’s failing war policy. That mistake cost Humphrey the presidency.
Also elected that day was Shirley Chisholm from Brooklyn. She was the
first black female to serve in the House of Representatives.
Dec. 21: The first manned space mission to escape Earth’s gravity and orbit the moon began with the launching of Apollo 8.
Dec. 24: After having its way with them for 11 months, torture
and mock executions included, North Korea released all of the members of
the Pueblo’s crew but kept the ship. The U.S. Navy seemed to
blame the Pueblo’s captain, Commander Lloyd M. "Pete" Bucher, for the entire
painful fiasco. Mercifully, the Secretary of the Navy called off any
official punishment.
*
After 1968, the general public’s
perception of the antiwar movement’s
protests as being unpatriotic kaleidoscoped into something else. In June
of 1969 LIFE Magazine published “The Faces of the American Dead
in Vietnam: One Week’s Toll.” It was a ten-page story that featured
photographs and the names of 242 men who had died in the war in one
week. It was a typical week at that point of the war.
The effect was dramatic and it brought new supporters to the antiwar movement. Nonetheless, the bloody war went on.
Today, for many of my vintage, 1968 is a year remembered mostly for its
daunting series of violent explosions, in particular the assassinations. Yet, for whatever reasons, we Americans have never liked remembering the Pueblo.
-- Words and art by F.T. Rea
