I have no memory of the nighttime trip out of Alabama save for watching the lights of Montgomery receding in the distance.  I felt both relief and foreboding and kept thinking, ‘They’re still back there.’  I never could sleep and only started to relax in the late morning as we drove through the Carolinas.  Jim was taking a course to the northeast that eventually brought us into Virginia, where he had an aunt and uncle.  We stopped there for a light dinner and watched on the Huntley-Brinkley report for any news from Montgomery.  We were guessing that they wouldn’t mention anything.  Instead, they showed film clips of a huge police riot, with men on horseback clubbing demonstrators and several people lying bloody on the ground.  The clips were blurry and too short to be able to identify anyone from our group, although Jim thought he recognized Pam Clemson.  Everyone was despondent and wanted to return. It was Jim’s uncle who pointed out that we wouldn’t arrive until sometime late on Wednesday and that we couldn’t undo what was already done.  He also believed that by now the Alabama authorities would most likely stop us on the way in, and we’d never be able to rejoin the Juniata group.  So we resumed our trip home, arriving on campus after midnight.   My diary for the day (written on Wednesday) was hardly illuminating (Figure V-1):

“Drove all day.  Highly uncomfortable, four in a Volkswagen.  Ate supper at Jim Lehman’s uncle’s house in Virginia.  Got on campus around 1:00 in the morning.  Exhausted.”

Wednesday night, I brought things up to date (Figure V-2):

            “Slept through all classes…Went to bed early…Snowed about 14 inches…”

So the dreary, annual, March slush snow I felt coming way back on Saturday during the send-off rally finally arrived.  It fit with my mood.  News was filtering back that Don Hope had gotten injured and that Pam Clemson had been hauled off to jail.  On Thursday, I finally went to classes, although I skipped my early afternoon Epochs recitation section.  (I’m guessing because Elmer Maas was still in Alabama.)  I was studying that night in my second floor room in Sherwood dorm when John Garrett finally arrived:

“John Garrett finally came in around 10:30 [PM].  He was really tired out.  He was wearing a white riot [sic] helmet.  He wasn’t hit too bad…”

It’s unfortunate that I didn’t write down any of John’s long monologue of what had happened on Tuesday and Wednesday.  I listened on into the early morning hours of Friday the 19^th.  John didn’t take off the hard hat until he fell into bed.  (Figure V-2.)

I don’t mention it in the diary, but the whole contingent had returned except Pam Clemson.  The very next day, Don Hope was back at the podium lecturing in his 10 AM Introduction to Literary Forms class.  I managed to stagger in on time.  John Garrett was still sound asleep in his room.  Don had a large patch on the back of his head and seemed a little dazed.  Instead of picking up the thread where he left off a week earlier, he pulled out a book and started reading (Figure V-3):

            “Mr. Hope broke down in class while reading a poem called ‘Discipline’ by a restoration poet.”

In case English Literature wasn’t your major, Discipline was written by George Herbert.  Don’s voice was faltering from the start, and by the time he got to the fourth verse:

Though I fall, I weep:

Though I halt in pace,

             Yet I creep

To the throne of grace.

he totally broke down.  The class was silent.  He managed to compose himself and continue.  At the end of the last lines:

Though man frailties hath,

                 Thou art God:

Throw away thy wrath.

the class held its breath for what seemed to be forever and then gave him a standing ovation.  Don was stunned by the response, tried to smile, then said softly that class was dismissed and left the room.

March 19^th also saw the publication of “Volume LXL, No. 19” of The Juniatian, an event that unfortunately for me elevated the day to one that would “live in infamy.”  Well, at least for a little while.  Although I had slept through all my classes on Wednesday, I was awake long enough to take a call on the hall payphone from someone from the campus paper.  (Why they just didn’t walk over to the dorm is a mystery.  It wasn’t as if I was rooming in Altoona.)    I was still totally wound up from what had happened, and I had no idea the fate of those who stayed, other than what could be gleaned from the evening TV news.  Everything came out in a torrent of words that would’ve made Neal Cassidy proud.  Of course, only the most over-the-top ejaculations got written down, and, of course, they made great copy even though they made me sound like an idiot.  So I’m wandering through Totem Inn, pick up the paper, and am greeted with the following (Figure V-4; note that my copy of the paper does not include the center section containing page 3):
                                                Twenty-One Join In Protest Action
                                                     “Every white person in Montgomery
                                                     would have killed us, with no questions
                                                     on their part,” summarized Chuck Lytle.
I remember thinking, ‘Ouch, that sounds really bad.  It sounded okay when I said it.  Did I actually say that?  Yeah, I actually said it.  Shit.’

[As an aside, this statement was so astonishing, Earl Kaylor quoted it in his 1977 centennial history of the college, Truth Sets Free, which later led to a blatant case of bushwacking by the college.  I received a pre-publication announcement from the college sometime in 1976 excitedly noting that I was mentioned in the book and that I really owed it to myself to buy a copy and that there was a discount if I sent in my payment now and wouldn’t family and friends enjoy reading about you from their very own copies???  At that late remove, I had no idea what epoch-defining thing I had done, said, or wrote that would deserve mention in the official, centennial history of the college.  The book was kind of expensive.  Could I afford it?  The letter lay open on the kitchen table for some time, calling to me like Bali Ha’i.  It was soon payday.  Who was I to deny the judgment of the ages?  I couldn’t write the check fast enough, and then I had to wait months until the book finally arrived in the mail.  I went right to the index, found my name, and with trembling fingers found page 347.  I guess I should’ve expected it.  But that God-awful quote had long receded from memory.  To my great misfortune, there it was for all past and future generations of graduates to see:  that same hideous quote that it took me months…years…to live down while on campus.  How could Earl Kaylor do this to me?  Wasn’t I one of his ace students?  Was it that good for copy?  Why didn’t he quote Elmer or Don Hope or somebody articulate?  I slammed shut the book and tossed in on a shelf.  It took a long, long time before I could steel myself to pick it up again and read the whole thing.]

Another front-page article in the same edition reported on a second group of students and faculty who traveled to Washington, DC for a protest action at the White House on the day after we left for
Alabama.  According to the report, the group consisted of fifty-one students and seven faculty.  The editorial page was devoted to opinions on what was happening both nationally and on campus.  “Pro” opinions were written by Gary Rowe and Mike Marzio.  There was also a lengthy piece by sophomore history major Brian Smith in which he tried to make a case against universal suffrage and urged the retention of literacy tests, which at the time were being effectively used throughout the South to deny voting rights to Blacks.  Brian’s opinion most probably made up the majority view on campus.  Later generations used to the left slant of most colleges and universities today might find it surprising that not that long ago, college campuses were very conservative.  And remember, this was Juniata, where skipping too many convocations would get you tossed out of school.  More on this campus mood a little later.

In an accidental indictment of the college in general, the regular feature From The Editor’s Desk began with

“For perhaps the first time in history, students from Juniata have joined a movement of national significance…”

The editorial was careful not to take sides and only pledged to

“…allow a statement of definite [sic] positions on both sides.” 

Front page column inches and equivocating editorials in the campus paper were the least of the administration’s worries.  Luckily, the fact that Juniatians were involved in the demonstrations lasted only one night on the national news, and anything appearing in The Juniatian could always be dismissed as campus hyperbole.  But the national print media were another story.  The demonstrations were picked up by all the wire services, and coverage extended from the local Huntingdon paper to the New York Times.  Don Hope’s injury and his academic affiliation were featured in every single story (Figure V-5).

Luckily, the accompanying photos were fairly grainy and didn’t show anybody from campus, at least for sure.  But fame being what it is, participants, family, friends, even the administration started parsing through the pictures looking for somebody, anybody, from campus.  Figure V-6 from the New York Times is a typical example.  Even at this late remove, I couldn’t help an Elvis-type sighting.

My days writing in the little red book were winding down.  There’s a gap starting March 26^th that continues through April 3^rd.  I picked it up again, but gave up for good after logging the events of Monday, April 12^th.  There are a number of entries worth mentioning, and one in particular worth adding as a figure.  The latter has to do with my feelings after refusing to participate in a “report to the campus” by the entire civil rights contingent in Oller Hall the night of Monday, March 22^nd (Figure V-5):

            “Could kick myself for not going to Civil Rights Alabama Report in Oller tonight..”

When I first heard this was being planned, I was strongly against it, feeling it would have too great a potential for self-congratulatory or self-aggrandizing posturing.  The whole idea made me very uncomfortable.  Plus, my reasons for going south were personal, and I didn’t relish the idea of sharing what I felt would be poorly articulated thoughts.   John Garrett tried mightily to change my mind.  The day before, I told him that I didn’t participate in all of that to have people clap for me.  He realized he wasn’t making any headway and finally let it go.  During my extensive interview with Sylvia Kurtz, I had not re-read this particular page of the diary, and that is how I remembered things.

Much later when I was preparing everything for the reunion, I read this particular entry and remembered that I had walked behind Oller Hall the night of the event and was amazed to hear a loud and very long ovation.  I stopped until it died down, then continued on to my dorm room in Sherwood and wrote this entry.  So the admonition of A.J. Liebling to the editor of the New Yorker quoted at the beginning of Chapter Three rings true:  I later remembered myself as being strong to my convictions to the end.  This page shows that I regretted my hard-headed attitude even while the event was taking place.  Deep down inside, I wanted some of that applause, too.  As the Bible says, ‘Pride go-eth before a fall.’

Then, just as things seemed to be calming down, on Wednesday, March 24^th the administration’s worst nightmare came true.  The latest edition of Life Magazine hit the stands, complete with pictures of senior Harriet Richardson, freshman coed Pam Clemson, and the then-poet-in-residence Galway Kinnell. The pictures, taken by the famous civil rights photographer Charles Moore, were clear, sharp, full-frame, and VERY dramatic.  Everyone involved rushed down to Uptown Cut-Rate and bought them out.  I actually had to write home and get my parents to buy a copy at Shipe’s Corner Tobacco Store on Market Street in Sunbury.  I even mentioned it in my diary:

            “Harriet Richardson, Kinnell, Pam Clemson, & Rev. Witt are in Life Mag…”

The picture that sent the administration into apoplexy took up ¾ of a page and showed Harriet holding a handkerchief against the side of Galway’s head. (I could not get a complementary copyright clearance to add the famous picture to the narrative.  You have to get Charles Moore’s book “Powerful Days,” which includes this and many other pictures of the Juniata contingent.)  There was blood all over his shirtfront.  Moore didn’t win a Pulitzer for taking baby pictures:  the picture explodes with emotion and drama.  But what emotion?  This wasn’t just good versus evil, justice versus persecution.  Mixed into it was Bogart-Bacall, Tracey-Hepburn; hell, it was Gary Grant versus Eva Marie Saint without any dialogue!  Moore was so good, you didn’t NEED any dialogue:  it was written all over their faces.  But what sent the administration screaming down to the seventh level, foaming at the mouth all the way, WAS their faces:  Harriet was a negro for God’s sake, and Galway was white!

Far be it for the administration to assume anything but the worst.  For them, Moore’s photograph was the Godmother of PR disasters.  Now, they’d have to explain more than just all this civil rights stuff; they’d have to explain how they’d let this happen on campus.  Well, maybe it could be all put down to the passion of the moment.  Maybe it all happened down there.  Maybe nothing ever happened, on campus or off.  On campus, nothing was officially said.  The students in the know smiled.  The rest just didn’t get it, and any overtones of racial impropriety were lost in the general outrage at student civil rights activism occurring in old Jacob Brumbaugh’s “right little, tight little school”.