'Then we moved on past the dream'
(Continued from page 2)
Banshees were loose in the Emerald City. Sirens screamed from all directions, and students were running up the street from the direction of the Justice Department. "What's happening?"
I touched the arm of a girl.
"Too much," she said, "Too much."
I found a ride. A Volkswagen bus with two boys and two girls from Florida stopped, and they took me to Haynes Point where the buses were waiting.
On the way we passed by the area blocked off by the police. There were thousands of them, dressed in those strange riot helmets and high boots. Tear gas rolled out from inside an open area. Spotlights lit it all, and two ambulances passed us, joining four others along the street. From behind the buildings came screams. The group at the Justice Department was 5,000 strong, protesting the conviction of Bobby Seale, a black defendant at the Chicago conspiracy trial sentenced to four years for contempt of court.
A GROUP OF students came running from a dark alley. They held their mouths and noses, stumbling and lurching. A bleeding boy fell, and a girl helped him up. He shook off her hand. The bus moved on, and I didn't see what was behind them in the alley.
The gas entered the bus. It was just enough to make us gasp and cough and one of the girls was crying. We were ordered on by the police, past the piles of broken glass, through the sounds of black anger and bank alarms. Now and then you could see the conflict in the spaces between the buildings; marchers being knocked down, clubs falling, gas-masked police dodging thrown bottles. It was a play in which all were actors. A play in which it was hard to hate or like anyone. But who threw the ignorant armies against each other? Who wrote the play?
Near eight we got to Hayne's Point where hundreds of buses
KU station facilities old
(Continued from page 11)
(Continued from page 11) it. That was the first week of school," Kissel added.
Frank Baker, KUOK adviser,
agreed, "We're stuck down there
until there's room somewhere
else. Nothing is being done.
It just stays the same year after
year."
Francis H. Heller, dean of faculties, said there is no better location available.
"The space assessment committee reviewed the plight of KUOK but at the present time only very marginal places are available. There would be no improvement as far as fire or safety is concerned." Heller said.
The KUOK staff has its own engineer who has made many improvements, Cooper said. He has built shelves, installed flooring and repaired equipment.
When asked if improvements would be made in the area if a new location could not be found, Heller said the committee would face that question when the situation arose.
Without a place to go and without money for improvements, the "continual chess game of space" goes on. Students involved with KUOK can only joke about the rats, hide in the bushes out back and receive parking tickets at 5.55 p.m.
"We try to do the best we can with what we have—or don't have." Cooper said. "I think we do a very good job."
Nov.19 1969 KANSAN 13
were parked in circles. They were off in the distance, and a policeman wouldn't let us drive into the bus area. "Keep going, you've caused enough trouble."
THEY LET ME out up the street and I ran back, waited for the cop to turn, then ran past him. "Hey, where you going?" He raised his club and began to chase me, but a car entered the road and he returned to guard it. I ran toward the buses.
Hundreds of the marchers could not find their buses. I could not find mine. They wandered blindly, having lost their way. The police on cycles roared through, shining their spotlights on the students. They had the radios and communication to help the students leave Washington. But instead they hindered that exit, almost as if they wanted us to stay to complete the play. It was coitus without climax. Chicago was climax.
Gas crept across the Potomac in huge clouds and covered some of us. For a half hour I sat under a tree and tried to get it out of my body while dark shapes ran by. A Student Mobe first-aid marshal ran up and gave me eyedrops and a cloth to cover my nose and mouth. He ran on to the next person.
Finally near ten the Kansans found each other and our bus. At midnight we left the Emerald City.
Some had gone because they wanted to find a cause. But all had gone, I think, because they no longer believed the television myth. For once, they had gone to see for themselves—to bring reality home.
On the bus going west I looked around at the faces. The sun was up, and one by one, they were waking. Some had gone to Washington to say they had gone. Some had gone because they believed strongly in the cause.
Somehow life and reality have moved to the television screen, leaving behind a last will and testament, to be fought over by the living dead, who retire during prime time to their darkened living rooms and gather around the lighted box. The box that has made the myth of the mass culture into a reality . . . turning all America into a hamburger stand with no exit.
The bus returned the way it had come, back through Pennsylvania and West Virginia, through Appalachia, back through Ohio and Indiana, back through all the cities that looked alike; the computerized replicas of Middletown; back through areas of remaining wilderness, and then back through time it seemed.
A STUDENT WHOSE beard spiraled out like fire played an
old American song from another time when revolution was honorable, when he might have marched with the drum and the flag. Then he played "When Johnny Comes Marching Home." One at a time the people began to join in the song, sadly, softly. A girl across the aisle stared off into another world, her eyes blank and somehow emptier than the entire Emerald City now was. Behind me someone began another song, "All we are saying," she sang, "is give Peace a chance."
An Invitation from: JAYHAWKER TOWERS APARTMENTS
1603 West 15th St.
(adjacent to campus)
To investigate the new, unique incentive rental plan now in effect.
This incentive rental plan offers numerous price ranges for married couples, graduate students or undergraduates. The plan is designed to provide a two-bedroom furnished or unfurnished apartment at prices competitive with one-bedroom or two-bedroom apartments, yet offer much more in space and quality, convenient location and services.
Visit the office at 1603 W. 15th, or call 843-4993 to get complete information. Inspection is welcomed.
BURGER HUT GRAND OPENING Wednesday & Thursday
J
TELEVISION SET DRAWING Enter as often as you like Drawing will be Thursday night
SPECIAL ON ALL SANDWICHES Buy one-get second Free
A CLOWN FOR THE KIDS 11:30 a.m.-8:00 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday Free candy and gas balloons
Burger Hut is locally owned and managed 1/2 block west of 23rd and Naismith