The Class of 67: College, Love and Social Change in the Shadow of Vietnam

By Forrrest Brandt

The Class of 67 is a historic novel; an episodic, coming-of-age story set on the Ohio State campus in the sixties. The protagonist, Jerry Roush, and his classmates live through turbulent social upheavalthe free speech movement; the struggle for civil rights, open housing, and access to the pill; the space race, and the threat of nuclear war. Jerry and his friends struggle to incorporate the changes, while dealing with their own identities, relationships, commitments, and expectations all played out on a college campus.
The reader will discover or relive what it was like to be in the epicenter of a storm of generation-splitting conflicts including the threat of the military draft and the freedom of sex, drugs and rock n roll.

What was the boomer generations reaction to mandatory military training, to girls hours and PDA (Public Display of Affection)? What did they think and feel during the Cuban missile crisis? Where were they on the day John F. Kennedy was shot? What did white suburban kids do when they discovered how rental housing worked, or racial tensions flared? How did couples obtain an abortion before Roe vs. Wade?
Growing up is never easy, but the times made it even more confusing for Jerry and his classmates as they struggled with their idealism when the world they thought they could make clashed with the one their parents sought to keep.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Aug 16, 2013
• ISBN: 9781491807057

Forrrest Brandt

Forrest Brandt attended Ohio State University in the sixties, living through the civil rights struggle, the rise of feminism, free speech, and anti-war movements. He accepted a commission in the U.S. Army in 1967 and returned to Ohio State to finish his B.S. degree in 1971. In 1976, he completed his M.Ed. at the University of Cincinnati and worked as a reading specialist for thirty years before retiring. In that same period, he wrote articles for the Dayton Daily News, various military publications, several literary reviews, and the Ohio State Alumni Magazine. Since retiring, he has worked as an English adjunct at Northern Kentucky University. In 1996, he was awarded a fellowship to the Ohio Writing Project, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. He later served three years as a member of the board of advisors for OWP. His poem, “Going Home,” was featured on NPR’s Morning Edition for Veterans’ Day, 2008. Brandt served a tour in Vietnam in 1968–69 and was activated for six months during Operation Desert Storm. He was retired from the Army as a lieutenant colonel in 1997. He lives in Cincinnati along with his wife and fellow writer, Kathleen Wade.

Book preview

THE CLASS OF

67

College, love and social change in the shadow of Vietnam

FORREST BRANDT

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© 2013 Forrest Brandt. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 8/15/2013

ISBN: 978-1-4918-0704-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4918-0703-3 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4918-0705-7 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013913974

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

This story is based on actual events. In certain cases incidents, characters and timelines have been changed for dramatic purposes. Names have been changed and certain characters may be composites, or entirely fictitious.

CONTENTS

Part I

1961

1962

1963

1964

Part II

Summer of 1964

1965

1966

1967

Dedicated to my daughter, Robin, who often wonders where her rebellious streak comes from. You are a child of the sixties, born in the midst of strife and anger, yet determined to find hope. Bless you.

This book would not be possible without the help and encouragement of my wife, Kathy, editor/reader/advisor Marilyn Russell, readers Holley Watts, Mary Pierce Brosmer, Chris Eisele, Jerry Hogan, Ken Keener, Lady Wolseley, Dr. Mary Fuller, Amy Fink, and especially the writers of Ohio Writing Project, Miami University and Women Writing for (a) Change.

Part I

1961

THE FRESHMAN

January: John F. Kennedy inaugurated thirty-fifth president of the United States, the first and only Catholic to hold that position.

February: Jerry Roush turns eighteen, applies for and receives his Selective Service (draft) Card.

March: Peace Corps created.

April: The Bay of Pigs, an invasion of Cuba by 1,600 rebels, backed and trained by the CIA, ends in disaster. JFK recommends that families plan a bomb shelter. Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin is the first man to travel into space. Russia continues to hold a wide lead in the space race.

May: Navy Commander Alan B. Shepard, Jr., blasts into space for a twenty-minute ride out of this world in the Freedom 7. Despite the cheering, the incident only adds to the proof that the United States is behind. FCC Chairman Newton Minow proclaims television is a vast wasteland. Vice President Lyndon Johnson speaks in Saigon, promising military and economic aid to Vietnam.

July: Jerry graduates from Kettering Fairmont High School, six weeks after his classmates.

August: East Germany closes the border between East and West Berlin. Khrushchev orders construction of a wall to keep East Germans from escaping into West Berlin. Adolph Eichmann goes to trial in Jerusalem is found guilty and hanged. Ray Kroc buys out the McDonald brothers and opens two hundred McDonalds in California. Johnson & Johnson introduces Tylenol. Ernest Hemmingway commits suicide. The Marvelettes’ Please Mr. Postman becomes the first number-one pop hit released on a black owned and operated label—Motown. Soul music starts gaining a foothold with hits by Sam Cooke, James Brown, Solomon Burke, and former Drifters lead signer Ben E. King, whose Stand By Me is a number-one R&B record. Elvis Presley gives his last live performance for eight years.

September: Jerry arrives on the campus of Ohio State University. On the last day of the season, Roger Maris hits his sixty-first home run, breaking Babe Ruth’s record.

October: The New York Yankees win the World Series by defeating Cincinnati in five games.

November: The Ohio State Buckeyes go 8–0–1 and end the season ranked number one by the Football Writers Association. Martin Luther King Jr. is outmaneuvered by the local sheriff of Albany, Georgia, and loses a battle in the struggle for black voting rights in that town.

December: The Packers defeat the New York Giants to win the first of their five championships in the decade.

Monday, September 26, 1961

Jerry reached for Sue’s hand as they rushed toward the Oval, the heart of the campus of The Ohio State University. The marching band greeted them, blasting out the school’s fight songs, Across the Field and Buckeye Battle Cry, as the freshmen clapped and sang along. Heading north, the band acting like a pied piper, they crossed the campus and filed into St. John Arena.

No more than settled into seats in the arena, they heard Novice G. Fawcett, the university president, boom out, Look at the person on your left. Now look at the person on your right. I will next address the student body during commencement exercises in June. By that time, two out of three of you will no longer be students at this school.

It was a storied speech at OSU, one that was heard by most students long before they arrived in Columbus. But Jerry’s outlook was positive. A strong senior year and his relationship with Sue convinced him his days of failure were in the past. He didn’t know what his major was going to be. His only reference point was the mantra of the adults of Kettering, his hometown: You’ll have to get a degree if you want a real job.

Given that vague guideline, the best he could do was imagine himself four years from now wandering off to New York or Chicago, taking a job in advertising or perhaps working as a television newsman. Somewhere along the way, he’d get the school and work thing figured out, and he’d marry Sue.

I’m ready for all of this, he whispered to Sue. She gave his hand a squeeze, smiled, and turned back to the speaker.

He was right. Kettering had prepared him for all that he would meet. He could read and write—if grammar and spelling were ignored. He could reason and argue—though he struggled with math—and no one doubted his ability to speak. He’d been a part of the third best debate team in Ohio his senior year. If college success centered on speaking up, Jerry was sure to make the grade.

But Kettering left him blind to some of life’s realities. At age eighteen, boys in America had to report to their local Selective Service Board and register for the draft. There was a huge incentive to do so in Ohio. The possession of a draft card certified to bouncers, bartenders, and store clerks that the holder was eighteen years old and therefore eligible to legally purchase and consume 3.2 percent beer.* Few, if any, males at Fairmont High School were not aware of that fact.

Likewise, few, if any, believed the card’s more sinister meaning—that they could be called into the country’s military at any time—applied to them. They were headed to college, and college exempted them. After college, they would get married, and that was another exemption. In no time, they would have kids of their own, and everyone in Kettering knew that two kids put you all but out of reach of the Selective Service Board.

The first blow to Jerry’s dreamy high school existence came to him as he finished registering for classes at the end of orientation. ROTC—rot see, the students called it—was military training, and for close to one hundred years it had been mandatory for male students at all land grant colleges to take at least two years of ROTC.

Jerry hadn’t cared when he signed up for army ROTC in July. His dad, Paul, and his uncles, Cliff, Ray, Bobby, and Bill, had served in World War II, and he certainly felt that the nation had the right to ask young men to serve. He just didn’t see why it had to be him, especially now when life was offering up the fun and excitement of college.

That was July, but now it was the first week of school, and the reality of his decision was upon him. His shoes—low quarters, the army called them—squeaked. He was sure he was getting a blister on his heel. The uniform was hot as hell, and he had to keep a sharp eye out for cadet officers who’d expect him to salute as he trudged his way toward the ROTC building on the far north edge of the campus for an hour of close-order drill.

Heat percolated up from the gravel and asphalt of the parking lot. Tar and pebbles stuck to the soles of the low quarters, causing the cadet’s shoes to sound like hob-nailed boots. Boiling under the sun’s unrelenting rays, Jerry stood in the parking lot and listened.

This is a two-count movement, barked the cadet officer, his face flushed from bellowing out commands. The command is ‘about face.’ When I say ‘about,’ you are to put your right toe six inches behind the heel of your left foot. When I give the command ‘face,’ you are to rotate one hundred and eighty degrees until …

Sweat rolled off Jerry’s face, coursing down the creases of his nose and sliding along his upper lip. I hate this shit, he whispered. Four years of marching band, the last as a bass drummer and co-leader of the drum line, Jerry had gone through close-order drill and taught it to others. It had been fun then, his choice to march in line, follow orders, and keep the beat, but this was different, and he resented being on this hot, dusty drill field. He looked at the senior cadet and sized him up. Furthermore, I know more about marching than you, numb nuts, he muttered.

About! the officer barked. Jerry’s shirt was soaking wet, and he could feel the sun baking the back of his uniform as he placed his right toe behind the heel of his left foot. Face! screamed the officer, and Jerry pivoted, bringing himself back to the position of attention, but now the sun blazed into his eyes.

Left! He readied his feet. Face! Jerry turned to his left and brought his right foot next to the left. The cadet, whose back should have been all that Jerry could see, was staring wide-eyed at him.

Your military left! screamed the officer.

Jerry stayed put while his comrade did an about face. Thank God they don’t draft college kids, he thought. I’d hate having to do this in a real army.

Right! His feet again anticipated face! and his body swung to the right.

Right! Pause. Face!

Right! Pause. Face!

About! A scuffling of toes. Face!

A crunching of gravel could be heard as a hundred and fifty freshmen spun around—some with precision, some with indecision, and some flopping about, arms circling as they struggled for balance.

Orders continued to be bellowed, and Jerry thought back to orientation when he had to make the choice. Okay, the counselor had barked into the microphone as hundreds of prospective freshmen hunkered over their IBM cards. If you’re a male, you need to pick out a time slot for ROTC classes and which branch—army, navy, or air force—you want to join. Remember, guys, if you don’t take ROTC, you will have to pick up an additional nine hours of upper-level math, science, or a foreign language. It’s your choice, but I’d just go ahead and take ROTC; it’s an easy two-hour A or B.

Choice, my ass, Jerry thought and then did another about face.

At last they were called to attention and dismissed. He made a beeline out of the parking lot and headed back to his dorm. One more year of this shit! he muttered as he stretched out his stride. Spotting a cadet officer heading his way, he promptly veered off course to avoid saluting. Yep, one more year of ROTC, and that’s it. They won’t get me back in uniform again … ever!

It hadn’t taken long, one week exactly, to convince Jerry of one goal for life: stay the hell out of the army. That night as he studied, he scribbled an expression he’d picked up from his dad and uncles: FTA! He darkened each letter for emphasis. Yeah, FTA—fuck the army!

Roommates

Jerry shared a room on the seventh floor of Park Hall, one of four eleven-story men’s dorms built on the south side of the campus in the late fifties. His roommates, Tom Eberle and Bill Miner, were from small towns in rural Ohio.

Bill looked like a walking box, a square-built farm boy trying to make the football team as a walk-on. He entertained Jerry with stories about the practices: So ol’ Ferguson comes borin’ right through my hole, and I slipped my block and got low. I’m a gonna drop Mr. All American, his voice picked up a derisive tone, "for a loss. Next thing I know he catches me with a knee upside the helmet—boom! Like to toss me ten yards down field."

A smile creased Bill’s face, revealing that the derisive tone applied only to what he thought of the fullback before the knee hit his helmet. Everything went black for a second or two. I look up, and there’s ol’ Woody starin’ down at me, a big grin on his face, an’ he says ‘Son, that man’s gonna kill you if you don’t learn to get low and hit him down around the ankles.’ Before I could get my wits about me to say anything, he chewed on that big ol’ tackle, ’bout how he better not let some freshman slip his block if he wants to see anything but the bench on Saturday. Man, he lit into him but good, and then he blows the whistle, and we line up, and damn if they don’t run that same play again. This time that big ol’ tackle put me on my kiester. They ran it ’bout fifteen times if they ran it once, till Woody decided they’d just about got it right and before they liked to killed me. I ache all over.

On their first night in the dorm, Bill came up to Jerry with the campus map and his schedule. Says here I got me a ten o’clock in H&F. H&F, what’s that stand for? Horses and Farmacy?

Jerry was sure it was a joke, but then he saw the earnest look on Bill’s face.

Horticulture and Forestry, he managed without snorting.

Bill just nodded.

Tom was as small and lean as Bill was square and stout. He was quiet and disappeared on Sundays and Wednesday nights. I go to prayer meetings on Wednesday. Sunday I’m there just about all day, and then we have Bible studies that night, so I just get a little something to eat and stay right by the church.

It was Jerry’s first acquaintance with Evangelicals. He admired Tom for his steadfastness in the midst of all the temptations the campus presented, but he was determined to allow some of those temptations to find him.

When Tom invited Jerry to join him on a Sunday, Jerry graciously declined. Tom let it go. All except once in the early hours of a Saturday when two guys from across the hall, along with Bill and Jerry, closed the bars and staggered in. Jerry lay on his bed and gripped the sides as the room began to spin.

I worry about you, Tom whispered. Are you sure your sins have been washed in the blood of Christ?

The image, sins—his sins—tumbling about in an automatic washer full of blood, just about sent him running for the john, but Jerry managed to hold on as the room continued its orbit. I’m okay, Tom, he answered, but thanks for thinking of me.

The Rules of the Game

They were on the first floor of the library. Sue kept looking at her watch. Jerry didn’t bother to wear his. He didn’t need to, but he was aware of her distracted state. At 10:20, she began to gather her books. We’d better go, she said.

They stopped in the dark hollow behind the president’s house for a few kisses, and then Sue gently pushed him away. You don’t want me to lose my two o’clocks, do you?

He didn’t, and though he would have loved to continue holding her and kissing, he grabbed her hand, and they headed back to Canfield Hall, her dorm. There they slipped off to the side of the doors and kissed a few more times, well out of the sight of the PDA—Public Display of Affection—monitors. A final goodnight kiss and an exchanged, I love you, and Sue entered the dorm, just as the lights flashed their warning.

In Loco Parentis was the Latin phrase for the rules to which all OSU students were subjected. The university believed that limiting the hours for girls would also keep the boys in check. On Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays, girls had to be in their dorm by eleven. Wednesdays and Sundays, they could take twelve o’clocks (up to seven a quarter for freshmen). Fridays and Saturdays, one o’clock became the witching hour with freshmen allowed three two o’clocks per quarter.

Convinced that the hours kept the girls chaste, the dorm monitors—grim women—went about their task as if assigned by Torquemada. They recruited helpers from the ranks of the girls themselves, Kapos armed with notebooks, who recorded the names of those who kissed too passionately or whose boyfriend’s hands seemed to roam too freely. Offenders were hauled before a court consisting of the monitor and her helpers. Punishments were meted out in the form of lost privileges.

He didn’t like the system, but Jerry knew that if the school hadn’t insisted on hours, Sue would have. When he thought about the deeper meaning of In Loco Parentis—which was almost never—it was with a sense of relief, one less thing for him to negotiate within his personal moral code. He never asked Sue what she thought.

On Wednesdays and Sundays, Jerry studied with Sue. Their Friday afternoons ended with a walk to one of the two Bergs, North Heidelberg, or South Heidelberg, for a pitcher of 3.2 beer and TGIF. Friday nights varied. On some it was another date with Sue; on others it was time to cruise the bars with his buddies from the Phi Delta Theta house.

Saturday mornings meant help hours at the Phi Delt house. Jerry hated it: up at seven thirty, run over to the house, and start to clean up after the actives. God help the pledge who woke an active from his beer-drenched sleep.

Roush, you and Huggins grab the buffer and the wax from the janitor’s closet, shouted the pledge master.

The two of them ran down the steps, grabbed the heavy mop bucket and the clumsy buffer, and attacked the dining room and rec room floors. An hour later, tired and sweating, they leaned against the basement wall. Man, this is the shits, Jerry complained.

Huggins nodded. I agree, but you don’t see any actives down here, do you? They had guys doing push-ups and running up and down the steps on the second and third floor. Looks like this is a good place to hide.

Jerry took note. The next week, he and Huggins volunteered for the floor-waxing detail.

At ten, their duties ended. Jerry hustled back to the dorm. A quick shower and shave, jumped into his best khakis, oxford cloth shirt, and sweater, and he was off to pick up Sue for the game.

Both had been to Buckeye games long before landing on campus. They knew the rituals and gladly cheered and sang the school’s songs.

TCU opened the season as Jerry and Sue sat in the stadium. Though the Bucks dominated the entire game, they could only manage one touchdown. Drive after drive ended without so much as a hint of a pass in the Ohio State strategy. The crowd grew antsy, and soon the boo-birds let Hayes know what they thought of his game plan.

Just throw the damn ball for Christ’s sake! rang out from more than one disgruntled fan.

Hayes ignored the voices, settling for a tie rather than risking victory or defeat with a pass.

The rest of the season was played out in similar fashion, but with far more satisfying results. The Buckeyes methodically mowed down their remaining opponents. Led on offense by Bob Ferguson, a bulldozer of a fullback, and Iron Mike Ingram, a pugnacious linebacker on defense, the Buckeyes were a powerful team that year. I just wish Woody would pass the ball a couple of times a game, Jerry would complain, but when the Bucks won, he’d change his tune. Why pass if you don’t have to?

English 416

If asked to guess what his first English professor would look like, Jerry would have probably described Professor McMurtry. Tall, gaunt, long black hair that fell in front of dark brooding eyes, pale skin that seemed to have missed exposure to the recent summer sun. That would have begun his depiction. Tweed jackets, dull ties, shined shoes optional, a briar pipe, pack of cigarettes, and the smell of tobacco would round out the picture. His guess would have been confirmed by reality. McMurtry’s voice registered in the baritone range, and the tone varied from cynic to hip to wise. Jerry would have guessed that too.

It was early in the third week of the quarter when McMurtry broke away from his normal rambling lecture. He paused, stared out the window, looked back at the class with a gaze that told Jerry that McMurtry was looking through and past them. His voice softened as if speaking to his muse. I met a senior last year—sorority girl, beautiful, tall blonde with clear, creamy skin—took her out to play tennis, he said. We’re walking back to my MG, and I reach out to hold her hand. She pulls away and says, ‘Sorry, that’s only for medical students.’ Seemed like a pretty narrow viewpoint to take to me, but I guess that’s the value system such women live by.

Jerry hadn’t thought about such social situations. He’d been aware of the economic differences in Kettering, but they hadn’t affected his social life that he had seen. He’d never been turned down for a date because he’d gone to Greenmont, even when he asked out the girls whose parents belonged to country clubs. Every activity, sports teams, the band, the drama and speech team, the honor society, it all seemed to be balanced by students from both sides of Far Hills Boulevard.

This, the class war McMurtry had experienced, was new. Would a sorority girl turn him down if she found out he wasn’t in pre-med or pre-law? McMurtry seemed to be saying yes.

He applied the thought to his current situation. Sue’s family lived in Oakwood, Dayton’s most prestigious neighborhood, but the Gerbers were anything but pretentious. Granted, they lived on a tree-lined street of modest but interesting houses, not the huge Tudor-Victorian-Georgian-set-back-from-the-street part of the village, but certainly not the cookie-cutter-how-do-you-tell-which-is-yours neighborhood that the Roushes called home either. They had made Jerry a part of family gatherings, remembered his birthday, gave him an 18K gold tie clip for graduation with a chain that stretched across the front of the tie. That’s to hold your honors key, Mr. Gerber had told him. Something I feel sure will happen to you.

His own parents never shared that kind of optimism, that sort of confidence, with him. Maybe McMurtry had been rejected, but Jerry felt secure with the Gerbers and with Sue.

Another day, the professor was discussing their next assignment, an exercise in descriptive writing. He’d been reading them tidbits from Lolita. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta, he quoted, his voice resonating. Listen to how Nabokov uses language to appeal to the senses. How he uses words to put you in the moment with him as he thinks about this nubile young woman, how he speaks of his yearning and lust.

He stopped and looked out the window for what seemed like minutes to his students and then turned and asked, What’s the sexiest word in the English language? Not the dirtiest or crudest—no, that’s not what I’m asking. What word do you think is the sexiest?

He waited patiently while students looked about, surprised by the question and aware they’d never given a thought to the subject before.

Breast popped into Jerry’s mind, but he was determined not to speak up. A girl close by offered touch. A boy added kiss, and then the room fell silent.

McMurtry nodded approval of both suggestions and waited some more, but when nothing emerged, he went on. His voice deepened. I think it’s ‘skin.’ Just listen to it, ‘sskkin.’ You have to let it vibrate on your tongue and lips to get the ssskkkk and then that soft nnnn sound at the end. It just sounds sexy. I think it’s the sexiest word in the English language.

Ssssskkkkiinnnn, Jerry said absently as he left Denny Hall and headed toward Commerce. It intrigued him; he could feel the vibrations as he said the word a second time. And it applies to either sex, he thought. To be the sexiest, it would have to be a word that appealed to both men and women. Skin and kiss met that criteria. So did touch, but breast?

He tried again. Ssssskkkkiinnn. There was something there, but it was breast, his longing to touch Sue’s breasts, to see them; breast refused to leave his mind. He’d had a brief glimpse of Sue’s breasts in their necking sessions, but it seemed as if they were disconnected from the rest of her, a separate entity he longed to explore.

Once, for a split second, he saw her completely naked. They were on a double date at Yankee Road Swim Club, and Ed Saunders had showed him how, if you stood in exactly the right spot, you could see women naked as they walked from the dressing room to the showers. He had no more than taken his place when Sue and Alexia walked by, unaware that he was watching.

Ssssskkkiiinnn, he said again and lost his nine o’clock to daydreaming about Sue, skin, touch, kiss, and breasts.

A Romantic Spot

Fall wound its soft, colorful way around the campus. The trees flamed in bold reds, oranges, and yellows. The air turned crisp and cool; leaves crunched beneath shoes. Now and then the smell of burning leaves or a fireplace wafted in. It was a time that begged to be enjoyed, to set aside books and take long walks around Mirror Lake, the Oval, and High Street. He especially enjoyed the late afternoons when he sat with Sue in the amphitheater behind the president’s huge Tudor house and watched the sky turn into opal shades of lavender, pink, and salmon while he held her.

Health Ed 400

One hour every Thursday to tell you what you already know, Jerry fumed as he headed toward H&F and Health Ed 400.

They sat in a circle as the teacher, short hair, gym slacks, and a short sleeve knit shirt with Ohio State Field Hockey embroidered on the left breast pocket, asked them, Who in here has ever had head lice? Come on, let’s see a show of hands.

Jerry kept his hand down. He’d gotten lice one summer when he found an old baseball cap in the park and started wearing it. His whole family cursed him repeatedly as bedding, clothes, even furniture were deloused. Strong-smelling shampoo was required each night and an hour each morning with Jean Roush going over each person’s head with a wooden stick and a pair of tweezers, nitpicking.

This was the fifth time the instructor had asked such a question of the class. Okay, show of hands, who in here has ever had ringworm? Or, Who’s ever had athlete’s foot?

Jerry fell for it the first time, raising his hand for ringworm, which was swiftly followed, as was every other question, with the explanation, Ringworm is caused by not being clean, not taking a shower or a bath and really scrubbing.

I would have thought more of you would have had lice, the instructor intoned. They’re easy to pick up, especially if you’re not careful and really scrub your hair with a good shampoo at least three times a week.

Those who had raised their hands realized they’d been zinged again. Jerry took pride in the fact that he admitted to nothing after the ringworm speech. You get more flies with sugar than vinegar, he scribbled in his notebook as the instructor droned on. She should know that.

The real test in hygiene came in the seventh week of the course. You must be in the auditorium on Thursday. No one is excused, and no one can pass the course without attending, his instructor announced two weeks in advance.

As they approached H&F that Thursday, they were besieged by an army of Health Ed instructors, each with a clipboard bearing a computer list of students. All students whose names begin with A through B, over here! barked one instructor while others called out other letters or combinations of letters.

Jerry located the teacher with the Rs and was soon checked in. An instructor stood in front of each door inside the auditorium, making sure that no one who had been checked in got out. A huge white screen stretched behind the podium, and the room hummed with excited chatter.

The head of the Health Ed Department strode to the center of the stage, adjusted the microphone, and began Settle down and get quiet. The room hushed, and she began again, This film is required viewing for every Ohio State freshman. What you will see is the live birth of a baby—not an animation, not a staged scene, but the real thing. No one will be excused until the movie is over; that’s why we have an instructor at each exit.

The house lights dimmed, and the staccato ticking of a 16 mm camera could be heard from the projection booth. A plain black and white sign announced:

Live Birth of a Human Baby

Jerry squirmed in his seat as a gurney was wheeled down a hospital corridor, the bed’s occupant giving out an occasional shriek of pain. Soon the woman was placed on an inclined bed and her feet put in stirrups. Doctors and nurses busied themselves, mopping the patient’s sweating face and constantly cooing, You’ll be just fine, you’re doing great, keep breathing deep.

Having spent so much of high school filled with curiosity about the vagina, Jerry was quick to note how uninteresting it was when plastered across a screen. The woman continued to moan and shriek.

A calmer voice was heard in the background. Push, push! That’s it. Breathe now. Push!

In seconds, Jerry felt a pain within his own groin. He winced as the birth canal began to widen and the crown of the baby’s head began to emerge. Gripping the armrest, he began to breathe for the woman, felt himself contracting his stomach muscles, hoping to speed things along. At last the child was free, the umbilical cord cut, and the baby placed on the mother’s stomach.

Jerry felt himself relax, his fingers releasing their iron grip on the armrest. The woman groaned again, there was a final spasm, and the placenta shot out of her vagina.

Aid Station

At first, his eyes had trouble focusing. I need my glasses, he heard himself say.

There was a hand holding something beneath his nose, and another hand rested on the back of his neck. Take another whiff, said a strong, female voice.

He sniffed and then jerked his head away. What was this strong smell? A second woman handed him his glasses, and the rest of the room came into focus. Three college boys sat in chairs while a squad of nurses attended to them. A nurse knelt beside each one, an ammonia capsule in her hand.

Are you feeling better? his nurse inquired.

What happened? Jerry asked as he shook his head in an attempt to bring reason to the scene.

You tell me, she said in an amused tone. We found you on the floor and had to have four boys carry you in here.

The head nurse stood in the middle of the room. Convinced that everyone in her care was now safe, she chuckled. We’ve shown that film to every student for the last ten years, and we haven’t lost a female student yet. It’s always you big, strong boys who pass out. She clapped her hands and laughed.

Homecoming, October 1961

Who was this curly-haired, slump-shouldered Bob Dylan guy shown lumbering down some wet New York ally with a girl on his arm? As he would walk along High Street, opposite the school, Jerry kept noticing the albums in the windows of Long’s Books, Student Book Exchange (SBX), and two record stores. And this woman on the album next to Dylan’s with straight, black hair hanging to the middle of her back, what was with her?

The evening of the Homecoming Concert provided some of the answers. Jerry and Sue sat in their seats at Mershon Auditorium as Harry Belafonte sang calypso. Halfway through his act, Belafonte turned the stage over. I want to introduce this young woman. Her music is magic, and I’m sure you’ll love her as much as I do … Jerry heard the name, but it didn’t click. The curtain parted, and a young woman with long, straight, jet-black hair pulled a wooden stool onto the stage, and Jerry suddenly recognized her face.

Sue leaned over and whispered, Who did he say this was?

It was the same woman he had been seeing in the record shop windows, next to the albums of that Dylan guy. Joan Baez, he whispered back.

The woman tuned her guitar, swept her hair back from her face, and then overwhelmed them. Her high, crystal-clear voice beckoned to them as she sang stories of love, courage, and justice. It was folk music, and it opened his ears to a whole new world. Caught up in the music, yearning, as Baez seemed to, for justice, true love, and racial equality, he clasped Sue’s hand. Thoughts swirled in his mind. He was back at Wittenberg University Stadium last October and hearing John F. Kennedy’s campaign speech—that confident voice the president used when speaking to American youth, a siren song compelling them to somehow push the country forward, to put service before self.

Just as it had a year previous, the message clicked. The music and the emotion Baez brought to it touched him; America could be better, and he could be an agent for the change that would bring it about. Jerry was sure Sue would agree. Maybe this was his calling and the beginning of an answer as to what to do with his life.

November 18–20, 1961

The Buckeyes traveled to Ann Arbor and pummeled Michigan 50 to 20 to end the season undefeated and ranked first in the nation. That Sunday night, the faculty council voted against accepting the Rose Bowl invitation. All over the campus, signs appeared as students vented their anger against the faculty. Didn’t they understand the importance of football?

A stream of students scurried past the Union on their way to High Street. Catching a glimpse of the students as he walked back to his dorm, he headed toward the action. The marching band had formed on High Street, clad in their gray wool jackets. More and more students poured into the intersection at Fifteenth, the campus gateway. Traffic was halted. Buses were trapped and could only sit by the curb, their interior lights glowing in the twilight. Fraternity boys dragged trashcans, cardboard boxes, and wooden pallets into the intersection. The pyre was a good five feet tall when someone applied his Zippo. The flames reached higher and higher as other students dragged tree branches and discarded cardboard boxes from behind the bars, stores, and hamburger joints that lined High Street and added these to the inferno. Sirens screamed as both police and firemen attempted to respond, but the sheer number of the students—easily five thousand—made their efforts all but wasted. Photographers from the Columbus newspapers shinnied up street light poles and aimed cameras at the crowd.

Don’t let them get a shot of your face! someone shouted. Administration will identify students from the photos and throw you out!

Some ducked their heads inside the collars of their jackets, pulled knit caps over their brows, or donned ski masks. Some turned grocery bags into masks, but most didn’t care as they beamed and waved toward the cameramen.

Would administration dare expel so many students? Few thought so or even cared. The drum section started their cadence, and the band quickly fell into formation. The school’s fight songs blared into the evening air. Let’s march on the state capitol! someone shouted, and the band began to lead the way.

Jerry found it a grand spectacle. He sang, cheered, and marched happily along, confident that this would change official minds.

Capitol Square, the epicenter of the city, was two and half miles from the campus, but youthful enthusiasm willed them on their way. Cars pulled out of the way and allowed the waves of students to wash around them. A few arrogant drivers refused to pull over. They honked their horns and waved angry fists at the crowd. Jerry saw four boys walk over the top of one protesting car, the car’s roof buckling and popping back into place as they stepped over it.

This will get out of hand, he said to himself, but then the band began to play Across the Field again, and he let go of his fear.

Townspeople stood on the porches of their row houses and apartment buildings and cheered with the sense that anything that went against the wishes of police, the city, and the university was something they could get behind. Young men poured out of Columbus’s Near North neighborhood and joined in, letting their long simmering feud with the rich snob, college kids pass by the way.

An enterprising bus driver, the first one trapped by the demonstration, opened his doors and invited marchers in. The bus was filled so full the sides seemed to bulge. Still more students stood on the bumpers and in the open doorways. The bus crept along with the protestors; at least this driver would be able to get back to the barn before the night ended.

The parade kept moving, the police deciding that the only solution was to let the march continue to the edge of Capitol Square. There they formed a barricade of emergency vehicles along with firemen armed with water hoses. All along the route, they turned cars away from High Street, forcing them onto side streets and allowing the mob to pass.

The band reached the barricade and stopped marching, and the crowd spilled around them chanting, Bucks to the Rose Bowl, faculty to the toilet bowl! Their voices directed at the Capitol Building, the seat of Ohio’s government.

Pushing the crowd back, a phalanx of policemen set up a ladder. The chief climbed the steps and pulled out his bullhorn. This is an illegal assembly! the chief bellowed. I am ordering you to cease and desist!

The crowd let out long boos, and someone shouted, We want the Rose Bowl!

Another voice let loose, Yeah, get the governor out here. He knows what to do!

If you do not break up this march, I will have no choice but to read you the riot act! the chief responded.

Riot act was one of Jerry’s father’s favorite phrases. He could hear that familiar deep voice, I’m going to read you the riot act, before launching into a long dissertation on the occasion of one of Jerry’s many screw ups, but until this moment, he’d had no idea that it was more than just a figure of speech. Now he understood. Still it didn’t occur to him that what he was doing was wrong or that it represented anything more than a minor inconvenience to the rest of the city. If the university’s faculty wouldn’t be reasonable, then they had to expect riots.

The chief and the mob glared at each other. The firemen manning the hoses looked about nervously, waiting for the order to open the hydrants and turn loose the force of water.

The governor, Jim Rhodes, had been a one-quarter wonder at OSU, flunking out and then emerging decades later as an Ohio State alum in his campaign hype. The football-crazy kids counted on him to right matters, but Rhodes refused to be drawn into the conflict.

At last, defeat became obvious to even the most determined. The band turned around and led the way back to campus. Like most of his fellow marchers, Jerry remained convinced that somehow the message would get through and that someone higher than the faculty council would intercede.

The Lecture

The chimes rang out the hour, and in room 105 of Orton Hall the students could hear gears and chains clank into action, the whole classroom vibrating as each of the eight hours was announced. Professor Howard, dressed in a rumpled gray suit and carrying his notes in a worn black valise, mounted the podium and turned toward the class. He ran a huge hand through his thick, coarse, gray hair, sighed, and then spoke. I don’t want to know how many of you were out there last night.

His voice rumbled with anger, lightning flashed in his sad eyes, and his spirit pushed students back in their chairs. He bent his back, grasped the sides of the lectern, scanned the classroom, and began punching out key words. "Starting a fire, hanging faculty members in effigy. My God, you would have thought it was Kristallnacht in Munich! The student body should be ashamed."

He paused, looked at the empty desktop, and then stepped forward. "In September, the city of Columbus told you that you couldn’t hear Harold Aptheker speak because he was a Communist. Never mind freedom of speech; never mind your right to a peaceful assembly; never mind the university’s mission to investigate all ideas; never mind your constitutional guarantees; never mind the fact that the city doesn’t even own the university. They said no, and most of you let it go. The faculty stood up and reminded the president of this university that he, not the mayor of Columbus, not the governor of Ohio, he, the university president, was in charge of the school. The faculty demanded your rights to free speech be honored; otherwise that speech would have never taken place. You would have gladly let a handful of small-town politicians and narrow-minded bigots like Dr. Pavey keep you from hearing a challenging lecture."

He stopped, rubbed his hands across his face, and then bored in. "This week, the administration is going to pass a rule that will keep you from dropping any course after two weeks. That’s a rule that affects each and every one of you from now until you graduate, and yet only a handful of you will say anything to oppose it. But let the faculty tell you that it is pointless to go out to California and play a team you’ve already beaten, and you take to the streets, disrupt traffic, destroy public property, and act as if you’ve been denied life itself.

I’m sick for this university. Go on down to the Student Union and grab another donut. I’m so angry I can’t say anything rational to you about Western civilization.

The class sat silent, stunned into shame. Most stared at their notebooks, ballpoints and pencils at the ready, waiting for word on the reign of Caesar. Dr. Howard glared at them in silence. Jerry felt his face burn. At least he could say to himself that he had gone to the Aptheker lecture. That fact absolved him, didn’t it?

Dr. Howard, eyes still burning with rage, stood slump-shouldered behind his desk. He shushed the students out the door as if his hands were a broom. Go on, get out, he said wearily. That’s all for today.

The students, Jerry included, picked up their notebooks and slipped quietly out of the room, leaving the wise old man to simmer in his thoughts.

The words burned in Jerry’s ears as he walked across campus. Last night, he hadn’t given his participation much thought. He saw the protest mounting; he had his homework done; he wanted to see the Bucks in the Rose Bowl; and he marched.

Now, because of Dr. Howard, he saw the consequences. He saw the pointlessness of the whole protest. He thought back to the students who had marched over the roof of the car and understood how easy it would have been for the march to blow up into something ugly. How could he reconcile his love for football with this?

1962

A YEAR OF CHANGES

January: Fidel Castro excommunicated by Pope John XXIII. The United States tries to help the Saigon regime by spraying foliage with pesticide, soon to be named Agent Orange, to reveal the whereabouts of Vietcong guerrillas. Jackie Robinson becomes the first black elected to Baseball Hall of Fame. Bishop Burke of Buffalo Catholic Dioceses declares Chubby Checker’s Twist is impure and bans it from all Catholic schools.

February: Jerry finds out he has mononucleosis.

March: The top ranked basketball Buckeyes, led by Jerry Lucas and John Havlicek, finish second in the NCAA tournament, losing the championship game to the University of Cincinnati for the second year in a row. Sue changes the relationship,

April: Under Secretary of State George W. Ball predicts that the war against the Communists in South Vietnam will be a long, slow, arduous struggle.

June: According to Searle Pharmaceutical Inc., 1.2 million American women are now using their birth control pill. Jerry begins working at Delco Products, a division of General Motors.

July: Actress Marilyn Monroe is found dead, apparently from an overdose of sleeping pills. An anti-apartheid leader in South Africa, Nelson Mandela, is found, arrested, and charged with incitement to rebellion.

September: Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring becomes a bestseller.

October: James Meredith, an air force veteran, becomes the first black to register at the University of Mississippi. Federal marshals must escort him to the registrar’s office. Riots ensue. Pope John XXIII convenes Vatican II, the first ecumenical council in ninety-two years. The Cuban Missile Crisis begins. Kennedy tells the public, Within the past week, unmistakable evidence has established the fact that a series offensive missile sites is now in preparation on that imprisoned island. Khrushchev and Kennedy bring a new term into being: brinksmanship. Khrushchev sends a note to Kennedy, and the two reach an agreement. The crisis ends.

Oct 29: Many in the world are happy to be alive.

November: Fifty U.S. helicopters carry Saigon troops on an operation against what has been regarded as a Communist sanctuary.

December: Cuba exchanges 1,113 participants in the Bay of Pigs invasion for $53 million worth of food. Jerry meets Julie, younger sister of a high school classmate.

The Holidays, 1961

Late Wednesday afternoon, finals completed, he rode home with old friends from grade school and Fairmont, Jim and Jack Mueller. The three chatted away the two-hour ride, organizing basketball games at Grassen’s barn, Michigan Rummy tournaments with their Greenmont buddies, and recounting dormitory tales of shaving cream pranks and youthful stupidity.

They pulled into the Roush driveway around six. A dark green four-door ’55 Chevy sat in the driveway. Jerry grabbed his suitcase and laundry bag from the trunk and hurried into the house. Whose car is that in the driveway? he asked without bothering to acknowledge his parents or Beth, his younger sister.

All depends, answered his father. For the time being, it’s yours. In the meantime, your mom hates it when you take her set of wheels, and Beth will be driving in another year and a half, so …

His mom hugged him. Come on, she said. I made your favorites, pork chops and home fries. Let’s eat before everything gets cold.

We ran into John Sharp at the shopping center, his dad mentioned at dinner. He wants you to call him when you get into town. He’s got a Christmas tree business and could use some help.

John Sharp, always Mister Sharp to Jerry, was the grade school and junior high band director for Kettering schools. The family first came to know him when Eve tootled a clarinet in the all-township band. Paul and Jean became active in the band boosters, and the relationship deepened. By fifth grade, Jerry was playing drums for him. Jerry called and in minutes returned to the dinner table. He wants me to start tomorrow.

The first significant snow of the season fell that first night. For two weeks, he would work long hours, nailing stands to the bottoms of trees, shaking them free of snow, holding them up for customer inspection, tying them to the roofs of cars, and collecting money. His hands became sticky with sap, his jacket smelled like one of those tree-shaped cardboard car deodorant pads, but he made enough money to cover Christmas gifts, pay his fraternity bills, and take Sue out most nights.

His grades arrived two days before Christmas. He had opened the letter with his grades with a mixture of excitement, hope, and anxiety. Western Civilization B, English C, History of the Theatre B, Phys Ed B (did only football players get an A in that damn class?), Algebra C, ROTC B. He’d made it! In fact, he’d more than made it. A 2.6 when a number of his fellow students would have already flunked out. He tore into the house, computer printout in his hand, and placed it on the kitchen counter where his parents would spot it as soon as they came home.

It was the best Christmas he could remember in the last eight years. He was close to being eligible for Hell Week with the Phi Delts. His parents didn’t nag him about school once, not even to suggest that with a bit more effort … For the second year in a row, it was a Christmas season in which tension seemed absent from the Roush household, the second Christmas with good grades and Sue. He basked in the joy of both situations.

He had felt confident throughout finals. Though he didn’t know it then, English and college algebra were designed to rid Ohio State of the students it didn’t want but had to accept. Almost half the freshman class would receive Ds or Fs in both subjects. As he entered the tests, Jerry carried a C in the first and a B in the later.

Friday, January 5, 1962

He showered, shaved, splashed English Leather on his face, slipped into a pair of khaki trousers, his favorite Gant oxford cloth shirt, and then topped it all off with a navy blue V-neck sweater and his pledge pin. From the back entrance of Park Hall he headed across the expanse of the parking lot, straight toward Canfield Hall and Sue, ignoring the looming black clouds filling the western sky beyond the campus.

He rang her room and then took a seat on a couch and waited. Behind him, two senior coeds talked, and he began eavesdropping. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’m not pinned. I’m not even dating anyone seriously, and Mom and Dad are insisting that I come home after graduation, said the first.

I know just what you mean. ‘Nice girls don’t go out and live on their own,’ the second said, her voice pinched as she imitated her mother. What am I going to do, living at home in Mansfield? Who am I going to meet there?

Jerry had chuckled to himself at that. His older sister, Eva, had been forced to live at home after graduating from Ohio State until she finally found her backbone, took a job in Cincinnati, and moved in 1959. Jean Roush had refused to help her move as much as a skirt and then stood at the doorway, bawling as the van, Eva, and Eva’s possessions left the house.

Jerry, who was to inherit the bigger bedroom, had been only too happy to make up the difference—carting out boxes, lugging furniture, and piling clothes in the family station wagon before following his sister to her new home. He’d never understood why Eva hadn’t moved out long before. He couldn’t wait for the opportunity to get his own place or move in with Sue—married of course.

He wondered why these