October 1967
A week before Stop the Draft Week, we decided to take a dry run. It wasn’t going to be spring training. We weren’t preparing for Cal football team’s opening game. We planned to stop the buses loaded with draftees headed for the Oakland induction center. We were putting our bodies on the line to shut off the pipeline feeding our brothers into the jungles of Vietnam.
We spread the word among our supporters and recruited monitors to attend a practice session at Jefferson Park, where charter buses would drop thousands of protestors off before dawn on D-Day, October 17.
That night, we held a post scrimmage review of the day’s adventures. We were winding up our discussion when Lisa asked, “Anything unusual happen today?
” Yeah, I think we have a police spy in our ranks,” Steve said. “This guy is just too much, too goody-goody, too kiss-assy. Everything is, “Yes, Sir. No, Sir. He’s always the first to volunteer. He’s always by my side. It just doesn’t feel right.”
Everybody jumped in with opinions. I respected Steve. We usually agreed on things, but I had a problem with purging people because they didn’t fit in.
“Steve, where is this guy from?”
“Walnut Creek. He’s a student in junior college.”
“Well, what do you expect? If we’re reaching out to blue-collar communities outside of Berkeley, where working-class kids don’t have deferments and are the cannon fodder for LBJ’s war, we’re going to run across people that don’t fit in.”
“This guy just gives me a bad feeling.”
We weren’t naive. We suspected we had infiltrators, but our commitment to participatory democracy and organizing trumped our concerns for security. After further discussion, I carried the day.
The day before the demonstration, I got up early to get the soundtrack ready. Running the sound truck was my specialty. was my specialty. Big, bold signs, lots of popular music and very few announcements were my style of getting the word out. Emotional, punching messages set my tone. People got pissed off listening to long-winded speeches.
I’d been driving with a suspended license since high school, but I didn’t want to take a chance on getting busted that day. I asked one of the eager-beaver new guys to be my chauffeur, the same guy Steve thought was a spy. I decided to put my money where my mouth was and take a chance.
Everywhere we were greeted with V-signs and fists pumping in the air, smiles from business types and hand-waving old ladies A few construction workers yelled “right on” while others flipped us the bird. This was Berkeley not Walnut Creek, but I felt something special was coming down. I could feel the vibes.
My driver wasn’t much on conversation, but he did ask a lot of questions. Finally, I said, “Say, man, relax. Just listen to the music.”
We’d been driving around for most of the day when I realized it was getting late and I had to pick up my hero, Don Duncan, at the airport. Don was a decorated Special Forces veteran and would be the featured speaker at our rally that night in Provo Park, next to Berkeley High School.
“Thanks for driving,” I said. “You’ve been really helpful. I have a suspended license, so I couldn’t take a chance driving, at least not in a sound truck.” His face lit up.
A few minutes later, he said, “Mike, I gotta’ hit the head. Can we stop at that gas station over there? ”
“Yeah, I don’t want you to piss your pants.”
We pulled into a parking space half a block from the station, and the newbie jumped out, running. I decided to stretch my legs and followed him. He ran right past the restroom to the nearest payphone.
I abandoned the car and headed down the block towards the safety of the campus. Suddenly, three Berkeley cop cars appeared out of nowhere. One car pulled alongside me. The cop on the passenger side rolled down his window.
“Hey, Mike.”
They all knew me by name.
“Come on over here. We need to talk to you about something.”
I knew my rights.
“I don’t have anything to talk with you about unless you have a warrant.”
The other cop jumped out of the driver’s side and headed towards me.
“Forget it.” His buddy said, “We didn’t catch him driving. It’s not worth hassling with his lawyers. We’ll have plenty of chances to nail him. He’s a loudmouth troublemaker.
I owed Steve an apology, and we had a big problem to deal with before the next day’s demonstration.