Deep within the bowels of The Spectrum's offices -- which are themselves deep within the bowels of the Student Union -- sit a dusty collection of old UB yearbooks.
For years after World War II, they tell the familiar story of a conservative private university: glee clubs, homecoming floats and (believe it or not) a well-loved, winning football team.
An image from the '62 volume is a classic example. A guy with a crew cut sits cross-legged on the steps of the library. Pack of cigarettes by his side, pants halfway to his knees, he stares intently into a notebook. The caption reads: "Stoic in outlook and firm in notetaking, we ask for little more than guidance."
Then, in just a few years, the images change.
Open the '70 volume, and you find overturned cars. Firebombed offices. Old stone buildings marred by graffiti and broken windows.
A student crouches on the Main Street lawn while blood streams down his face. Police in riot gear stand in formation as students walk to class.
It's the story of the Norton Union clash and university strike of 1970 - three weeks of chaos at UB that tell a far different story than the idealized and watered-down version of the Sixties found in our pop culture.
On February 24, the basketball team's black athletes boycotted their game with Stony Brook University. The next night, a rumor swept the campus that the Buffalo Police had been brought in to break up a sit-in scheduled to support the athletes.
According to old issues of The Spectrum, groups of angry students marched through campus. A clash with police in Norton Union ensued and shots were fired.
During the cold winter weeks that followed, the campus became a battleground between students and police.
Students voted to strike. Forty-five faculty members who staged a sit-in at Acting President Peter Regan's office in Hayes Hall were promptly arrested. Police attacked students as they burned a flag on the Main Street lawn. Lockwood Library and the Faculty Club smoldered from Molotov cocktail explosions.
A group of students carried a flag-draped coffin across campus, proclaiming the death of the university. At the ceremony, someone held a sign: "Repent! The World is Coming to an End."
For liberals, the Sixties revolution has always had an unusual allure. Students like myself think fondly of a time when young people cared about politics and came together to fight for a cause.
And as the Iraq crisis deepens, some young liberals dream of demonstrations that could rival those of the Vietnam era. Others imagine another liberal revolution.
But it's easy to be nostalgic for that era because we've come to know it through pop culture. When a student hears 'Sixties,' they think of Volkswagen vans, tie-dyed shirts, and slogans like "Make Love Not War."
Had we actually lived on campus during the Strike of 1970, we might tell a different story.
The expressions on the faces in the old yearbook pictures do not show triumph, but anxiety, confusion and fear.
And they're not just faces of students -- they're the faces of the officers. Many young, many from Buffalo's old ethnic neighborhoods, as frightened as the students who realize that their world is coming to an end.
The Sixties revolution had many successes. But there was also an undercurrent of hate that left the country divided when the dust settled.
The editor of the '70 volume writes: "The revolution searches for a scapegoat. The kid that doesn't give a damn, who transfers out in the Heartland, rahs it up at football games and gives to his favorite charity: try him. They have their generals on the Right ... They came here from the thousands from the war, raped the books, professor's minds, battled reason, crushed dissent, dismembered faith and worshiped the gods of cash, police, order, white and pretty."
This sentiment, given by a student leader, plainly establishes the divides that strangle America today: Left vs. Right, East vs. Heartland, military vs. civilian.
As Bush's wars continue, liberals must reconcile with the darker legacies of the Sixties. If we respond with violence and hate, we will only deepen the divides.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
