The Lark: Vol 2, Issue 17, January 2023

After introductions all around, we crossed Constitution Avenue, walked past the Washington Monument toward the Lincoln Memorial. When we got near the Memorial we encountered a huge crowd already gathered in front of the Memorial steps and spreading back along both sides of the Reflecting Pool. We edged our way into the crowd to listen to the speeches that had already begun. This, of course, was before the days of the Jumbotron, so we could only perceive the assembled speakers as tiny figures gathered far away on the Lincoln Memorial steps. We could hear what was said, however, from the many loudspeakers arrayed around the crowd. We heard anti-war speeches from pediatrician and now anti-war activist Dr. Benjamin Spock, from anti-war activist David Dellinger, from author Norman Mailer, and others.  Peter, Paul, and Mary sang of the “Great Mandala” and Phil Ochs sang his repertoire of anti- war anthems.  A favorite with the crowd was “The Draft Dodger Rag”:

“Sarge, I’m only eighteen, I got a ruptured spleen

And I always carry a purse

I’ve got eyes like a bat and my feet are flat

My asthma’s getting worse….”

Around mid-afternoon, Yippie leaders Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin took the stage to exhort the crowd to march on the Pentagon – the main event of the day. The crowd began to slowly funnel onto the Memorial Bridge across the Potomac like icing squeezed from a pastry bag. After a long while, our little group reached the bridge and joined the march or rather, because of the press of the crowd, the shuffle across the river to the entrance to Arlington Cemetery on the other side.  All around us people yelled out: “Stop the War”; “Bring the Boys Home”; and “Hey, hey LBJ – How many kids have you killed today”. When we reached the end of the bridge we flanked to the left and headed toward the Pentagon.

Somehow, as we walked along, we learned, perhaps from the MOBE marshals arrayed beside the route of march, that once we reached the Pentagon, we would have two options: Go to the front of the Pentagon where an attempt to storm the entrance was planned.  Those who went that way were at high risk of being arrested; Or file to the side of the building as a part of the Yippie plan to levitate the Pentagon. The idea was to surround the whole building then direct psychic energy at the building to raise it off the ground. No real chance of arrest with the second option. Our little group opted to join with the Yippies and levitate. The last thing we wanted was for our parents, who had no idea that we were at the march, to receive a call that they needed to bail their child out of a DC jail. So, when we reached the North Pentagon parking lot, we turned right and joined a long line of levitators seated on the grass on the side of the building.

We settled in comfortably on the grass. The only discordant note was to see the machine gun emplacements on the roof of the Pentagon with barrels aimed at us.  Despite this ominous vision, we happily joined into the mellow mood and chanted along with the others “Ooooooom - Ooooooom” as we directed our thoughts to lifting the Pentagon off its foundations. Pretty soon we noticed the aroma of marijuana wafting above us. No one in our little group had yet joined the drug scene, but the ever-resourceful Kathy pulled from the knit hippie bag slung over her shoulder a fifth of scotch that we shared around, achieving our own kind of mellow.

After a time, we heard a loud commotion from the front of the Pentagon. Soon a scent of tear gas mixed overhead with the odor of marijuana. Unseen by us, protestors at the Pentagon entrance faced a phalanx of military police with bayoneted rifles. The iconic image from this confrontation is the photograph of a young woman protestor placing a flower in the rifle barrel of a young soldier.

A swarm of protesters did rush the Pentagon entrance only to be rebuffed by the military police and several hundred US Marshalls who proceeded to tackle and arrest the demonstrators.  Approximately six hundred protesters were arrested that evening, as had been predicted, and hauled off to DC jails.  Among them was Norman Mailer who later would write his memoir/novel Armies of the Night chronicling the day’s events.

On our side of the Pentagon, all was peaceful. We continued to focus all our psychic energy on trying to raise the building, but it did not move. Inside the War Machine churned on in its deadly work.

As darkness spread over the scene, the crowd of levitators began to disperse. We made our way back to the long line of buses winding around the roads stretching back to the Arlington Cemetery entrance. We found the bus to Boston and said goodbye to Debby and the Tufts contingent. A little way down the road, Paul, Kathy, and I found the Bloomington bus, climbed aboard, and fell exhausted into our seats for the long ride home.

As the bus wound its way through the streets of DC heading toward the interstate highway and before I drifted off to sleep, I reflected on the events of the day and how my outlook on things had changed. My ambivalence about the war in Vietnam had vanished. After a day amid thousands of fellow Americans committed to ending an unjust and immoral war, I had come to agree. The war needed to end now. In the years to follow, I would participate in many more protests and marches against the Vietnam War until the grit, determination, and sacrifice of the Vietnamese themselves would end the war. I also had come to regard the campus radicals at Indiana University in the new light. I resolved to no longer oppose them when we got back to Bloomington. In fact, I wondered: Was I becoming a campus radical myself?