‘Standin’ in a Hard Rain’ is the fast paced, personal, ‘boots-on-the-ground, ‘ front line account of major events by a dedicated radical in the 1960’s (and beyond) who found himself at the table with the planners and out in the street, running from the cops. It tells the story of how and why an ordinary suburban kid became a committed radical who was with the Freedom Riders in the Deep South, the Strike of ’68 at S.F. State University (the longest, most violent student strike in American History) the Draft Resistance with David Harris and Joan Baez, the Grape Strike with Caesar Chavez, Angela Davis, Eldridge Cleaver and the Panthers. I faced a bayonet at my own throat from the National Guard at Berkeley’s People’s Park. Standin’ in a Hard Rain traces the difficult transition after this revolutionary period of a generation trying to do something productive with our lives in a country in which we felt alienated. It ends with me burning my draft card at the age of 73.
Inhoudsopgave
Foreword by David Swanson
i Acknowledgments
iii An Introduction that Fits the Mood
Introduction: The War at Home
Section I: Before I Knew What I Knew
Chapter 1: Jew Boy
Chapter 2: Bikinis and Molotov Cocktails, Fresno, California, 1960
Chapter 3: Becoming a Certified Regular Guy
Chapter 4: 1963-The Murder of Hope
Section II: There’s Something Happenin’ Here
Chapter 5: 1964-What I Did on My Summer Vacation
Chapter 6: A Southern Girl and the End of the Civil War
Section III: My Own Road
Chapter 7: Off to College, 1964
Chapter 8: Radical Politics Enters My Life
Chapter 9: 1965-1966-Coming Home, Frank Verges, and the Revlon Girl
Chapter 10: The Beginning of Bigger Things
Chapter 11: Love and Unsettling Revelations
Section IV: The Hard Rain Begins To Fall
Chapter 12: San Francisco and Big Trouble
Chapter 13: Radical Theatre and the Student Strike at San Francisco State
Chapter 14: Billy Clubs, Not Books
Chapter 15: I Make a Circle
Section V: Que Viva La Huelga! Que Viva La Revolucion!
Chapter 16: 1969-El Teatro Campesino
Chapter 17: Breaking In
Chapter 18: Back to School and Into the World
Chapter 19: The Jew Boy Con Los Chicanos in France
Chapter 20: Coming Home … Again
Chapter 21: Parting More Sorrow than Sweet
Section VI: Coloring in the Full Picture
Chapter 22: The Fresno Draft Resistance Movement
Chapter 23: 1969-The Battle of People’s Park, Berkeley, CA
Chapter 24: Security Detail and the Brass Workers’ Strike, 1969
Chapter 25: Not Sex-Sex and the Revolution
Chapter 26: About Drugs and Revolution, for the Record
Chapter 27: Some Other Encounters
Chapter 28: More Front-Line Tales and ‘Your Friendly Movers’
Chapter 29: 1969-Woodstock and the Politics of Love
Chapter 30: Becoming the People We Were Warned Against
Chapter 31: 1970-A Purge at the University, A Little Extra Attention
Section VII: Breakdowns
Chapter 32: Caught in the Crossfire
Chapter 33: 1970-Progressive Theatres Reflect the Times
Chapter 34: Days Of Rage: The Cambodian Invasion and After
Chapter 35: 1971-Going to Court, Fresno County Jail
Section VIII: Times Changin’
Chapter 36: 1971-Say ‘Uncle’ Sam! and the Unraveling Times
Chapter 37: Smokin’ with ‘A Few Good Men’
Chapter 38: Angela Davis and a Few Other Things
Chapter 39: David Harris, the Vets Against the War, and ‘The Building’
Chapter 40: Riding Off Into the Sunset
Section IX: The Rustic Interlude and Beyond
Chapter 41: Political Theatre Where You Can
Chapter 42: Unexpected Challenges
Section X: You’re Never Through When You Think You Are
Chapter 43: ‘Seize the Time’
Chapter 44: Ghetto Time and More Trouble
Chapter 45: Under My Own Stars: Some Late Revelations
Chapter 46: Off to Do My Thing, Somewhere
Chapter 47: Afterward and Now
Chapter 48: Back In the Saddle Again…
Coda: After a Hard Rain…
Over de auteur
I was born in Washington D.C. and grew up in Fresno, California. Beginning life as ‘red diaper’ baby in a pro-labor Jewish household. My parents refused to cross picket lines. At age eight, I played in my communist uncle’s back yard with Carl Bernstein. From my college days on, I seemed to be in the right place at the right time to be on the front lines of some of the major events of the 1960’s. Student strikes, draft resistance, the Grape strike in California. I even helped get Eldridge Cleaver out of the country away from the FBI. I worked in important radical theatre companies for progressive change. This put me in front of the crowd but it also increased the surveillance on my activities. I was not afraid to be one of the people our parents warned us against. I was followed and informed on. My phone was tapped. I was shot at and I did some time in jail. The last time I saw my FBI file it was as thick as a small city phone book. After a career as a professional theatre designer and professor, my wife Toni and I own and run a small bookstore north of San Francisco. We use the space for workshops and public events. I talk politics with my customers all day. Visit my website at http://Joel Eis.com
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