Up From the Bottom, Vol. 1, No. 1
Anti-War Movement
First issue of Up From the Bottom. a G.I. Anti-War newspaper published in San Diego by active duty service members, veterans and their dependents. This issue includes content about a boycott of Tyrrell's Jeweler; the Farm Workers' Strike in San Diego; Nixon's military pay freeze; the case of a female service member held on the Constellation; comics; a reflection by a service member on a nuclear submarine; civil disturbance training in San Mateo; Article 138; George Jackson; counseling services; CIA counter-insurgency; drug abuse; the case of Marvin Jones; the case of Raymond "Charlie" Brown; astride at the Rohr plant in Chula Vista; racism in the labor movement; boycott of Mr. Dependable's; alliance with Vietcong.
Up From the Bottom
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
September 1971
newspaper
The Guardian, April 16, 1975
New Left
The National Guardian was a radical, left newsweekly published out of New York City from 1948-1992. The paper was established by James Aronson, Cedric Belfrage, who were committed activists for the Progressive Party and Henry Wallace presidential campaign, as well as John McManus and Josiah Gitt, both liberal newspaper men, though Gitt quickly dropped out. In addition to the Progressive Party, the newspaper also held ties with American communists and the labor movement. The Cold War took a toll on the newspaper, with the decline of the Progressive Party and the rise of McCarthyism in the U.S. During the post-WWII era, the newspaper focused coverage on opposition to the Cold War and militarism, support for emerging anti-colonial struggles around the world, defense of those targeted by McCarthyism, advocacy for the black freedom movement. The newspaper continued to hold a cozy relationship with the Communist Party U.S.A., though it did break with the group over some issues, particularly support for independent political action beyond party control. The 1960s-era brought a new period of political rancor within the editorial ranks of the newspaper. In the end, the periodical changed leadership and renamed itself The Guardian. The Guardian took an increasingly Maoist line, supporting armed struggles against colonialism. During this period, the newspaper attempted to forge ties with SDS and SNCC, writing that "The duty of a radical newspaper is to build a radical movement.” "We are movement people acting as journalists," the Guardian′s staff now proudly declared. In 1970, further ideological fracture lead to the creation of a short-lived rival publication, The Liberated Guardian. In the later-1970s, a more hard-line Marxist-Leninist ideology eroded the newspaper’s reputation for investigative journalism. Readership and support for the newspaper declined through the 1980s and the paper ceased publication in 1992.
In this issue, articles cover the orphan airlift from Vietnam; the end of the U.S. war in Vietnam; Attica; Dominican protests in New York; United Farm Workers organizing in San Francisco; Joan Little; CIA red-squads; auto workers; unemployment; aerospace workers strike; San Francisco “Zebra trial”; government repression against the left; Milwaukee VA protest; the San Quinten Six; housing foreclosures; the Socialist Workers Party; economic recession; the October League; sectarian conflict on the left; Third World liberation struggles; Thieu regime in Vietnam; Soviet socialism; marketplace and letters.
Weekly Guardian Associates, Inc.
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
April 16, 1975
newspaper
Viva La Huelga (1 image)
Farm Workers Movement
An image of two Mexican-American children in Edinburg, Texas, resting on a car with a United Farm Workers bumper sticker.
Roz Payne
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. late-1960s or early-1970s
New Left Notes, vol. 1, no. 29, August 5, 1966
New Left
New Left Notes was the official newspaper published by the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). This issue includes articles about the upcoming SDS national convention in Clear Lake, Iowa; a debate over electoral politics and the National Council for a New Politics; a burglary at the Chicago headquarters of the DuBois Clubs of America; definitions of radicalism; an update from the Iowa City chapter; a discussion of the intersection of race and poverty and ERAP; a response to a previous article on the Communist Convention; SDS and ideology; “derisive terminology”; the radical tradition in America; the “crisis of Cold War ideology”; an Cleveland gathering of anti-war groups; “representative democracy” vs. “referendum democracy”; recent racial conflict on Chicago’s West Side; an upcoming Socialist Scholars Conference; grape strike; SSOC; a response to a critique of the New Left by Tom Kahn; letters to the editor.
Students for a Democratic Society
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
August 5, 1966
underground press
New Left Notes, vol. 1, no. 17, May 13, 1966
New Left
New Left Notes was the official newspaper published by the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). This issue includes articles about upcoming demonstrations against Vietnam draft tests on campuses; local updates; grape strike; National Council minutes; JOIN Community Union; MFDP summer recruiting; Southern Courier recruitment.
Students for a Democratic Society
Bruce Pech
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
May 13, 1966
underground press
White Lightning, no. 13, February 1973
New Left
Based in the Bronx, New York, and founded in 1971, White Lightning was a revolutionary community organization made up of whites and dedicated to serving the people. The group was founded by ex-addicts who had participated in Logos, a residential drug treatment program in the Bronx that used the “Therapeutic Community Model” for treating drug addiction, which emphasized “intense, confrontation group sessions.” Interestingly, drug treatment programs were one of the few places where black, white and Latino people came together, which provided a unique opportunity for radical activists. After leaders of Logos attempted to convert the organization from a treatment program into a lifelong utopian community, activists led by Gil Fagiani, who feared it was evolving into a cult, formed a break-away group called “Spirit of Logos.” The organization was influenced by the activism of the Young Lords and viewed drug addiction as the result of racism and poverty, rather than individual pathology and focused their work on unjust drug laws, the defunding of drug treatment programs, slum lords, drug pushers and addicts, organized crime, corrupt police, as well as what they saw as drug companies plundering African American, Latino poor white neighborhoods in New York City. In 1971, the group split along racial lines, with black and brown members refusing to work with white members. While the African American and Latino group soon dissolved, about a dozen white activists formed a new group and called themselves “White Lightning.” They targeted the white working-class and put out a monthly newspaper. As Fagiani explained years later, “We believed it essential to support the liberation struggles of people of color. We joined picket lines organized by the mostly Mexican American United Farm Workers Union, as well as demonstrations against the massacre at Attica State Prison and the political repression directed at the Black Panthers, Young Lords, and the American Indian Movement… White Lightning viewed the following questions as critical: How could we get working-class whites to see they had a stake in left politics? How could we convince them to look at people of color as their logical allies instead of their natural enemies?” White Lightning members also explored the histories of discrimination and class oppression faced by white ethnic groups in America as a way to build solidarity across racial lines. Like many groups in the early-1970s, White Lightning ultimately succumbed to sectarian divisions and disbanded.
This issue of White Lightning includes articles that focus on a city-wide rent hike; sports revolt; “People’s Grapevine,” which offered brief reports on other activism in the city; Lincoln Detox; abortion; housing as a human right; the war in Vietnam; socialist housing; women in prison; government attacks on working people and immigrants; comix.
Spirit of Logos
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
February 1973
underground press
Fatigue Press, no. 33, September 1971
G.I. Anti-War Movement
Fatigue Press was one of a number of underground newspapers created by G.I.’s for G.I.’s during the Vietnam War. Fatigue Press was created by soldiers at Fort Hood in Killeen, Texas, and published from 1968 to 1972. Articles in this issue address summary court martials; wage-freeze; Ft. Hood United Front policy; pollution; torture of children in jails; prostitution at Fort Hood; war bonds; poetry; the murder of George Jackson; Laos air war; lettuce boycott; Nixon's trip to China; the arrest of a staff member; U.S. control of Puerto Rico; Fort Hood United Front platform.
Fatigue Press
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
September 1971
underground press
White Lightning, undated, ca. 1971
New Left
Based in the Bronx, New York, and founded in 1971, White Lightning was a revolutionary community organization made up of whites and dedicated to serving the people. The group was founded by ex-addicts who had participated in Logos, a residential drug treatment program in the Bronx that used the “Therapeutic Community Model” for treating drug addiction, which emphasized “intense, confrontation group sessions.” Interestingly, drug treatment programs were one of the few places where black, white and Latino people came together, which provided a unique opportunity for radical activists. After leaders of Logos attempted to convert the organization from a treatment program into a lifelong utopian community, activists led by Gil Fagiani, who feared it was evolving into a cult, formed a break-away group called “Spirit of Logos.” The organization was influenced by the activism of the Young Lords and viewed drug addiction as the result of racism and poverty, rather than individual pathology and focused their work on unjust drug laws, the defunding of drug treatment programs, slum lords, drug pushers and addicts, organized crime, corrupt police, as well as what they saw as drug companies plundering African American, Latino poor white neighborhoods in New York City. In 1971, the group split along racial lines, with black and brown members refusing to work with white members. While the African American and Latino group soon dissolved, about a dozen white activists formed a new group and called themselves “White Lightning.” They targeted the white working-class and put out a monthly newspaper. As Fagiani explained years later, “We believed it essential to support the liberation struggles of people of color. We joined picket lines organized by the mostly Mexican American United Farm Workers Union, as well as demonstrations against the massacre at Attica State Prison and the political repression directed at the Black Panthers, Young Lords, and the American Indian Movement… White Lightning viewed the following questions as critical: How could we get working-class whites to see they had a stake in left politics? How could we convince them to look at people of color as their logical allies instead of their natural enemies?” White Lightning members also explored the histories of discrimination and class oppression faced by white ethnic groups in America as a way to build solidarity across racial lines. Like many groups in the early-1970s, White Lightning ultimately succumbed to sectarian divisions and disbanded.
This issue of White Lightning includes articles that focus on heroin addicts; the decision to create White Lightning newspaper; a critique of Logos; methadone; the power of the rich; the experienced of drug treatment; the political evolution of an addict; Spirit of Logos platform; comix.
Spirit of Logos
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. 1971
underground newspaper
Osawatomie, Winter 1975-76, no. 4
New Left
Newsletter of the Weather Underground summarizing the latest happenings in the underground, including articles about women and class; class struggle in New York; a short story about the Black Liberation Army; a reflection on John Brown; reparations for Vietnam; United Farm Workers elections; the impact of budget cuts in Massachusetts; Berkeley teachers strike; surplus labor; health hazards at work; book review; armed struggle and the Symbian Liberation Army; Puerto Rican independence.
Weather Underground
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Winter, 1975-76, no. 4
underground press
The Glass Onion
New Left
This April and May issue of The Glass Onion, an underground newsletter published by the New York High School Free Press, centers on events and organizational news impacting New Left activists such as the Black Power movement, the Young Lords Organization, the Free All Political Prisoners movement, Puerto Rican Nationalism, and the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee. This issue includes a particular focus on Bobby Seale’s imprisonment, the 1967 grape boycott, and Latin American revolutions.
The High School Free Press
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. 1968
underground press
Beverly Axelrod Biography
New Left
This is a brief political biography of Beverly Axelrod, who was a civil rights and social justice attorney for a variety of activists and organizations during the 1960s, including the Congress of Racial Equality, Eldridge Cleaver of the Black Panther Party, Dennis Banks of the American Indian Movement, Jerry Rubin of the Yippies, the United Farm Workers, the Chicano Movement in New Mexico, and others. Axelrod also travelled to Vietnam and helped organize the first anti-war protest that featured women and children. Her correspondence with Eldridge Cleaver formed a significant basis for his book, Soul On Ice. She was also called before the House UnAmerican Activities Committee. Later in life she formed ACE Investigations, an investigative firm that did trial preparation for civil and criminal cases. Axelrod died in 2002 of emphysema.
ACE Investigations
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
January 7, 1998
photocopy
chronology
United Farm Workers of New York Pamphlet
United Farm Workers
The United Farm Workers of America was founded in 1962 following the merger between Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee and Cesar Chavez’s National Farm Workers Association. The new union was led by Chavez and Delores Huerta. In general, the UFWA sought to raise awareness of migrant workers’ rights and utilized nonviolent strategies such as collective bargaining, strikes, and boycotts, to secure and protect farm-workers labor rights, work hours, wages and access to health care. During the late-1960s and mid-1970s, the UFWA initiated well-known boycotts against table grapes and lettuce to protest what they viewed as unfair labor contracts and unacceptable working conditions.
This document, created by the New York chapter of the UFW includes a interview with Cesar Chavez, data about seasonal farm workers, the impact of farm labor on children, poverty level wages for farm workers, and solidarity with the Vietnamese people.
United Farm Workers New York
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
early-1970s
pamphlet
"The Farmworker's Movement: A People's Fight Against Corporate Exploitation"
Farmworker's Movement
This issue of the Joint Strategy and Action Committee, Inc.'s newsletter, "Grapevine," attempts to pull together the farmworker's union "history, philosophy, tactics, program, church support."
Joint Strategy and Action Committee, Inc.
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
January 1972
newsletter
Bring Justice to America’s Fields in ’76
The United Farm Workers of America was founded in 1962 following the merger between Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee and Cesar Chavez’s National Farm Workers Association. The new union was led by Chavez and Delores Huerta. In general, the UFWA sought to raise awareness of migrant workers’ rights and utilized nonviolent strategies such as collective bargaining, strikes, and boycotts, to secure and protect farm-workers labor rights, work hours, wages and access to health care. During the late-1960s and mid-1970s, the UFWA initiated well-known boycotts against table grapes and lettuce to protest what they viewed as unfair labor contracts and unacceptable working conditions.
United Farm Workers of America
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
1976
Button
en-US
Physical Object
Juan de la Cruz Liberation Brigade
United Farm Workers Movement
Juan de la Cruz migrated to the United States under the bracero program, working at the Roberts Farm in Arvin, California. De la Cruz joined the United Farm Workers of America in 1965, advocating for living wages of workers, clean drinking water, and public health facilities. De la Cruz was killed in August 1973 during a picketing demonstration occurring between Arvin and Weedpatch, California.
United Farm Workers of America
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. 1970s
Button
Physical Object
Huelga Delano (Strike Delano)
United Farm Workers Movement
The Delano Grape Strike was organized by Cesar Chavez, Delores Huerta and the United Farm Workers of America and lasted from 1965 to 1970. The campaign incorporated nonviolent strategies such as boycotts and grassroots organizing to challenging the low pay of migrant workers by table-grape growers, namely the DiGiorgio Corporation and Schenley Industries. The Delano Strike, which received considerable national attention, ended in July 1970 with the signing of an agreement between the UFWA and the DiGiorgio Corporation.
United Farm Workers of America
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. late-1960s
Button
Physical Object
Support Farm Workers
United Farm Workers
The United Farm Workers of America was founded in 1962 following the merger between Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee and Cesar Chavez’s National Farm Workers Association. The new union was led by Chavez and Delores Huerta. In general, the UFWA sought to raise awareness of migrant workers’ rights and utilized nonviolent strategies such as collective bargaining, strikes, and boycotts, to secure and protect farm-workers labor rights, work hours, wages and access to health care. During the late-1960s and mid-1970s, the UFWA initiated well-known boycotts against table grapes and lettuce to protest what they viewed as unfair labor contracts and unacceptable working conditions.
United Farm Workers of America
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. mid-1960s
Button
Physical Object
Bank of Amerika Check
Anti-Vietnam War Movement
On February 25, 1970, radical New Left attorney, William Kunstler, gave a talk at Harder Stadium on the campus of the University of California-Santa Barbara. At the time, Kunstler was the defense attorney for the “Chicago 7,” who were charged with conspiracy to instigate a riot during the 1968 Chicago Democratic National Convention. During his speech, Kunstler noted recent local controversies, including the firing of Anthropology Professor, Bill Allen, as well as scattered violence between students and police in the student enclave of Isla Vista. During his remarks, Kunstler said, “I have never thought that breaking of windows and sporadic, picayune violence is a good tactic. But, on the other hand, I cannot bring myself to become bitter and condemn young people who engage in it.” The crowd whistled and applauded. Following the talk, as those in attendance walked toward a park in Isla Vista for a rally, police, who patrolled Isla Vista in what was termed a “saturation patrol technique,” arrested Rich Underwood, mistaking a bottle of wine he was drinking for a Molotov Cocktail. When Underwood resisted, police beat him. The arrival of more riot clad police set off clashes with students who shouted and threw rocks and bottles. Santa Barbara City College student and radio broadcaster, Malcolm Gault-Williams, explained, “Imagine being in Harder Stadium and having the lawyer of a high-profile national trial … draw connections between what has been happening nationally with what has been happening on campus. And then imagine a large part of those attendees leave the stadium and … watch as police not just arrest a student but beat the shit out of him.” Another student, John Riley, echoed that interpretation, saying, “Cops arrested this guy and set everything off. It was like throwing a match into a gasoline can, everybody just went nuts.”
That evening, the unrest spread, as student broke the windows of several real estate agencies, set police cars on fire, and then began targeting the Isla Vista Bank of America building, ultimately burning it down. UCSB Sociology Professor, Dick Flacks, recalled, “By evening I would guess hundreds of people were in the street and at some point people lit a trash dumpster and pushed it through the bank doors.” During the incident, several waves of riot-clad police were repelled by protesters. As one student recalled, “All of the sudden, all you heard out windows of the houses right next door was the Rolling Stones’ ‘Street Fighting Man.’”
It was the second consecutive night of disturbances in Isla Vista. The previous day, 150-200 people set trash cans on fire and vandalized local real estate offices, including the front window of the Isla Vista Bank of America branch, after the arrest of “Lefty” Bryant, a well‐known black student radical, and three other campus activists, Greg Wilkinson, Jim Trotter and Mick Kronman.
Students targeted Bank of America as a symbol of American capitalism. Bank of America had branches in Vietnam, helped fund the war industry and also side with California grape growers, rather than striking workers in the United Farm Workers. Becca Wilson, a student and editor of El Gaucho, explained, “It was the biggest capitalist thing around. It was a symbol of the corporations that benefited from war and were oppressing people all over world, in whose interest government was acting.” Another student, Greg Desilet, offered a slightly different interpretation, “The day afterwards a lot of it was rationalized as anti-war. The bank was seen to be in league with defense corporations providing armaments for Vietnam. That was the rationale given, but in my view it was more. It was locally centered with a lot of local anger toward police that had developed over time. People were just pissed off. They were really pissed off.” The Isla Vista Bank of America incident received national media attention, prompting Governor Ronald Reagan to declare a state of emergency and call in the National Guard, who made an estimated 300 arrests.
On April 18, 1970, unrest again hit Isla Vista, this time with tragic results. The Bank of America had established a new temporary branch and students again protested. Police arrived in armored trucks, dressed in riot gear and armed with tear gas. Radical activists over-turned cars and again began burning buildings. As Gault-Williams recounted, “The college’s student body president called on more moderate students to head down to the protest to try to calm some of the more radical students who were rioting and lighting fires. Kevin [Moran] and his roommates headed down to the scene. After helping put out a fire in a Taco Bell, Kevin ran to Bank of America, which had also been torched. While the students attempted to put out the fire, police officers moved in and began tossing tear gas into the crowds. During the confusion, police reported at the time, an officer’s rifle accidentally went off and fragments of the bullet struck and killed Kevin.” Initially, local police claimed a sniper bullet killed Moran, but ballistic tests showed that it came from an officer’s rifle. He was later exonerated. In June, 17 students, most well-known campus activist leaders, were indicted for the Isla Vista unrest, despite the fact that several had solid alibis. That same month, a third incident of unrest struck Isla Vista, prompting a harsh response from Los Angeles police. That police response attracted a rebuke from conservative writer, William F. Buckley, in the Los Angeles Times.
In his 1979 tell-all book, Deep Cover, former FBI agent, Cril Payne, claims the FBI was very active in Santa Barbara at the time and played a role in instigating the burning of the Isla Vista Bank of America building as a part of their COINTELPRO operations.
unknown
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. 1970
bank check