<Begin Segment 44>

RS: So, we're finally in Kansas.

AI Yes, yes. [Laughs] Well, maybe we'll just start the beginnings of your time in Kansas. When you first got there, was this just right at the end of summer and about to begin the fall, the beginning of the year, the school year?

RS: Yeah, yeah. It was probably sometime in July, because school starts early there. It starts in the middle of August. So we had to get situated and find a house and all of that, which we didn't have any difficulty. But it was really hot. It was the hottest time of the year. I had no idea it was gonna be that miserably hot. And as I said, we found out, when we were in Seattle on that trip is when Bea found out she was pregnant. And so she was showing, and Mark, our son, was born just a few months after we got there.

AI: Well, so then when you started at Kansas, did you have a heavy course-load of teaching right away, or how did that work?

RS: Yeah, it was, well it was a full load, which for everyone was two classes. But we had more contact hours and more people, so it was eighteen hours a week. Most people had eighteen hours a week, for three courses. We only had two. Which was a nice perk, because we only had to administrate two classes worth of students so that it was significant. So it was almost like having two faculties. We had one that taught Monday-Wednesday-Fridays, and one that taught Tuesday-Thursdays. But, what I didn't realize was that they were hiring so many people and there were six of us that were hired that year. And the previous year there were three people. So there were nine of us that were fresh out of graduate school. And, which was fifty percent of the faculty. There were eighteen on the faculty altogether. So we had a tremendous impact. And we were all crazy. We all had these really radical ideas about curriculum and, because we were closer to the students than we were to the average faculty. And, so everything we wanted to do was really, appeared to be radical to the faculty that had been here already, but we had the numbers and so we were able to change the curriculum. But they were very, they were very sort of reckless times, because the kind of parties we were having, and the drugs, and we were partaking in all of that with students, because we felt closer to them.

And then that first year was the most tumultuous year, probably, in the history of campuses all over the country. And Kansas really sort of proved its metal by being right there on the map. And that's where the first time that I really was involved in some serious protesting, and it was during the Cambodian Invasion. And faculty were asked to sort of restrain themselves from participating, 'cause they didn't know what the students were gonna do, but we just defied them and went out and protested right in front of the chancellor's office and everything. And then shortly after that, the city just sort of busted wide open and the student union was set on fire and burned down. And the ROTC building, bombs were set off, and faculty were asked to sleep in the doorways of every building on campus to protect it against fire bombing and to throw bombs back out if they were to be thrown in. I mean, it was just insane times.

And then there was the whole thing going on between the City of Lawrence and vigilantes versus the hippies that were raising hell. And then there were -- the African American community. There was a young boy named Rick Dowdell that was shot by the Lawrence police, and shot in the back of the head. And so that created a whole series of protests and riots. And then during these riots, when they were burning cars and turning them upside down, a white kid was killed by the vigilantes. And so that created this tension on top of tension. And things sort of built to this head. I remember when the black community decided that they were going to have an open carriage funeral march down the middle of Massachusetts Street, which is downtown, on the day that the city was having their outdoor sale. And all the merchants were putting their goods out on the street. And so the city said, "No, you cannot do this." And so they compromised by having it a block over and they marched down parallel to downtown then crossed downtown right at this critical intersection and went to their church. And they had a horse-drawn carriage and all the African Americans in their dashikis and, you know. And the reason I remember that is because I marched with them and I had a Super 8 movie camera and I shot the whole march. And then I completely forgot I had done that until a few years ago I discovered that footage and what a rich piece of history that is. So, I haven't done it yet, but I'm gonna donate it to the museum that keeps things like that. But it was really interesting crossing Massachusetts, seeing all these white people with clothes off of rack -- and all of a sudden turn around and look you hear the clop, clop of these horses and this coffin, this young boy, Rick Dowdell and all these African Americans, and mostly people of color walking with this carriage, pretty dramatic moment.

But that's, and then Lawrence went under a curfew and the national guard came and it was right at a time that we were having our big national sculpture conference. And we had all these people coming into Lawrence to do this conference. And I remember breaking curfew because I had to pick Ron Gasowski up, my friend that was flying in from Arizona. And I picked him up and came in, paid the toll at the toll booth and there was a big tank right there and this young eighteen-year-old with a rifle standing there in front of my car and shaking, he was so scared. And I rolled down the window. And he said, "I'm standing here to inform you that you are violating curfew in the City of Lawrence and that you will travel at your own, safe-," you know, "in disregard of your own safety." And I said, "Well, fine." So we drove all the way through. We were able to make it to my house. But all the parties had to be like for the entire night, which we gladly accommodated. So the whole week of this conference was under curfew. But those, all of that happened the first year, and really, ironically, it really made us feel better about being in Kansas, that this was not a place that we thought it was going to be. And again, I think that had a lot to do with sort of shaping and completing that shift, from right to left. And...

<End Segment 44> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.