The Year 1969 Memoirs, Richard M. Nixon Becomes President

 1969 Memoirs and Antidotal Material 

Ages 17 and 18

January 1969

I regret not keeping a daily journal for 1969  as I did in 1968. I think I stopped because it was laborious, and I didn’t think I had all that much of interest to write about until I fell in love. I was a Senior in high school and working almost 30 hours a week, so it did not leave me much time to record my thoughts.  The main reason I think was that once I met John Cunningham and he consumed my entire life I was too afraid to write about my true feelings 

I was in my senior year of Rancho Alamitos a school of around 2,000 students. After returning to school after Christmas Vacation, I quit Home Silk Shop primarily because I couldn’t stand Mr. Roman’s constant yelling and screaming at us stock boys. We were working our asses off, but it was never good enough for him. He made me so nervous with his glaring dissatisfied looks that I had enough and quit the second week in January. I had worked there for about two months since November. Besides, it was really hard to get to work on Harbor Boulevard without a car and sometimes I had to hitchhike.

My first semester of my Senior year ended as Nixon was sworn in as President. Even with all his faults I hated to see LBJ leave. He  was president for most of my teenage years and he and Lady Bird seemed so much a part of America’s life.  .

  January was kind of a transitional month for me because I stopped hanging around Larry Jaeger and Bob Belcher. They did something I thought was so totally stupid by shooting each other that I decided it was best not to hang around them. Bob Belcher had broken a window in his father’s truck and to keep from getting in trouble, he shot the window out with a rifle. He then claimed that while up Silverado canyon a stray bullet had shattered the window. But that’s not why I stopped hanging around with them. Bob, to make it look good, talked jaeger into shooting him in the arm! Which Jaeger did! The day after it happened it was all over school that Bob had gotten shot but only, he, Jaeger and I knew the truth. Jaeger couldn’t keep the incident to himself and had to tell someone. Me.

During the month, the number one songs on KHJ’s radio station were Young-Holts Unlimited “Soulful Strut.,” Tommy James and the Shondell’s “Crimson and Clover,” Sly and the Family Stone’s “Every Day People,” and the Turtles’ “You Showed Me,” which was the only number one song I liked.

In 1968 I had stayed home every Wednesday night to listen to KHJ in my bedroom and I kept a record of all the top 30 songs for that week charting them as they went up and down. I was not as ambitious in 1969 but did pick up a copy of KHJ’s listing when I could. KHJ printed a list of it’s “Boss 30 Records in Southern California” everything Wednesday and as music was an integral part of my life listening to songs on the radio and then buying records either as 45 records of Albums. I had a clock radio that woke me up every morning that was set om KHJ Los Angeles Station.

On January 1^st the top 10 songs had actually been released in November and December of 1968. The number one song was Young-Holt Unlimited’s Soulful Strut that was number one the week before and ha been playing for 5 weeks. Next came Elvis Presley’s “If I can Dream “ that had been out for 7 weeks. “The Worst That Could Happen” by the Brooklyn Bridge  had been out for 4 weeks. “I’m Gonna Make You Love Me” by Diana Ross and the Supremes had dropped  but it had been out for 5 weeks already. The next three songs, Tommy James’ “Crimson and Clover”, Fun & Games’ “The Grooviest Girl in the World’ and the Door’s “Touch Me” had just entered the top ten. Next was the Royal Guardmen’s “Baby Let’s Wait.” The Fifth Dimensions’ “California Soul” entered the top ten for the first time jumping 10 points. Marvin Gaye’s’ “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” was on it’s way out rounding out as number 10 but it had been playing for 7 weeks.  A song that soon would become really popular especially with me was The Foundation’s Build Me Up Buttercup that debuted at number 30 on the chart. By next week that song shout up to the 16^th position.

The only new songs entering the Top Ten  were Jay and the American’s “This Magic Moment, Sly and the Family Stone’s “Everyday People”,  Tammy Wynette’s “Stand By Your Man”, and the Turtle’s “You Showed Me” which  jumped from the 26^th position to number 9.  Songs that had left the top ten were  “Baby Let’s Wait”, “I Heard It Through the Grapevine”, “If I can Dream”, and “Worst That Could Happen”.

I received a letter from Mrs. Laura Sullivan that was dated January 9. She wrote, “Dr. Junior, Leonard and I received your Christmas card and picture. We do thank you. Tech or ay other college will be glad to enroll such a dine looking young man. Looking forward to your graduation. Your grandparents  enjoyed  their visit. Also the plane ride. Tressa said that is the only way to go.  We are sure having some cold weather. Well have some more  thank you  note s to write sp won’t get on politics. Tell all the folks, Leonard & I said hello. Hope this is a good yea for all, also hope we don’t get hail this year. Your friends Mr. & Mrs L.W Sullivan.

I remember buying the last issue of the Saturday Evening Post Magazine. On 10 January 1969 after 147 years, the last issue was published.  Mom always bought the Post, Life Magazine, and Reader’s Digest when ever she went grocery shopping, so we always had them around the house. Mom also had the Sears’ Catalogue delivered to the house, and I especially looked forward to it, mainly to look at models of the men’s underwear section.

By January 15^th “Build Me Up Buttercup  had jumped to the 6^th position in KHJ’s Top Ten. Two other songs joined the top ten  Booker T & the MG’s “Hang ‘em High” and  the Bee Gee’s “I Started a Joke.”  Songs that left were  The Grooviest Girl in the World, Soulful Strut, and I’m Gonna Make You Love me.”

The day before Dad’s 44^th birthday it began raining in Southern California for nearly a month, off and on. Heavy rains caused massive landslides in Southern California along with flooding the streets. The news said that nearly 100 people died from the storms, with 91 of them being from mudslides crashing into homes in the night. Mt. Baldy received more than 50 inches in a nine-day period beginning on January 18. By January 26, the Federal Emergency Management Association (FEMA) had declared much of Southern California a federal disaster area. They said it was the worst storm to hit Southern California since 1938.

Dad’s 44^th birthday was on Saturday 19 January 1969, but we didn’t do anything special and the next day on January 20 Richard Milhous Nixon was sworn in as the 37th President of the United States of America.

            I had quit the Fabric Store by the middle of January and toward the end of January, Dad asked if I wanted to make some money by working at his company, H & L Distributors, for about a week. Our neighbor Tom Horan was the manager of H & L  which was a beer distributor for Coors Beer. They were doing some construction where their main gate was down and I was hired to stay up all night, sitting in my car and watching the gate to make sure people weren’t trespassing. Tom told me not to try to stop people but just call the police if I saw anything suspicious.

I worked there for a week just staying up all night listening to the car radio and once in a while getting out to look around the yard with a flashlight. It was kind of spooky being there all by myself, but I was paid $50 for the week.

On January 22^nd two new songs joined KHJ’s Top Ten. They were Dorsey Burnette’s “the Greatest Love” and Sir Douglas Quartet’s “Mendocino”.  Stand By Your Man and This Magic Moment dropped out.

I know that Jerry Smith and I went to Disneyland towards the end of the month and the place was almost deserted because it was raining. Disneyland will not close for bad weather but there were so few people there that we were able to go on most of the rides. We had on plastic poncho, but we still got pretty wet. But at 17 it was still loads of fun being at a nearly empty park. I received a letter from Grandma Johnson that was post marked the 25. Along with her letter was one she sent from Aunt Alice Lippard dated  Jan 21.

 “Hi Jr. Was glad to get your newsy  letter & you talked to the Huskys  & got  the news. You didn’t  mention  Johnny and Buddy  and McCoy  back in Lubbock. He may  be at the lake by the time we get  down  there. Guess little ole Ronny [McCoy]  thought any kind of a home  beat what he had. He just  didn’t  have a nigger  chance . I still feel sorry for him. Has the rain let up? . We haven’t had a drop of rain all winter & it sure is dry. Its cold.  Been freezing  all day. Wilburn went down to the pasture and killed 6 quail. . the dog sits them  & he shoots  them. Glad you and Charline  can go to the show. Yes  she should get out more. She has held up so far better than a lot would have but that is all yesterday. And we have little James to love. Wish I could see him. I know  he is getting sweeter all the time. Is his hair  growing  & dark. I’m glad Minnie  Lee  has a job. There is another one  I feel sorry  for.  JW  & Polly  had to go to Canyon  tonight  to take Kay  to a ballgame . Glad Donna and Terry  can come over . Don’t seem possible they will soon be married a year. Wouldn’t been quite so bad if she hadn’t taken Charline’s drawers [panties]  We have laughed  a lot about that. 

 Guess we are hurrying time  but will be seeing  you when you get back.  You might even decide to go to summer school so you can get through sooner.  I’m sending  Alice’s letter  if her and Barbra  can loose weight  there's hope  for June, Charline  & Donna.. Write me again when you find the time but do make them good grades. Love  you from Grandparents.”

“Alamogordo, NM  Jan 21, 1969  Dear Bro. & Sis. We have escaped the flu  so far. Spencer  & I  stay in pretty goods as not take it. Sure hope you all are well.    We have worked out in the yard the past 2 days sure looking good hope to set out some rose bushes when they come in. I keep Shannon while Barbara works. She sure  sweet. They are just fine working every day. Wanda, Harvey & boys are fine also working every day, The boys are sure doing good in school. Talked to Charlie, Betty  Lori & Jerry last Sunday They are fine said it sure was cold up there. Want to see Ted and Pauline before long. They are fine. Jim  and Barbara  wants to know when will you go back down to the lake. Has June lost any weight. I have gone to 144 lbs sure feel better. Barbara sure have lost weight and what club did she join? I had better close and get to bed. Spencer is already asleep. I half to go wash in the a.m. and then will help iron  so answer real soon. Tell all hi for me . All our love  Spencer and Alice.27 

27 January 1969  Monday  

Up With America Assembly was held this week promoted by Steve Clark the Student Body President. Orange County was very conservative and it was reflected in the politics of most of the kids at Rancho. At the flag raising ceremony a Marine honor guard attended the ceremony. During 3rd Period intercom system played the Gettysburg Address. All week there are going be 3rd period interruptions by snippets of speeches from President Roosevelt and Kennedy and also from Martin Luther King. On Wednesday they want everyone to wear something red, white or blue for Patriotic day. Theres an assembly on Thursday and on Friday we are having Vietnam Day and we are suppose to donate magazines and books and even soap to send to service men over there.  I am not going to attend any of the events as I am against the war and Vice Principal  Mangan  said we want to give patriotism a push back against the riots.

The biggest disaster to hit Southern California besides the rain storms, on the afternoon of Wednesday January 29, a Union Oil Company platform stationed six miles off the coast of Santa Barbara  suffered a blowout. For eleven days, oil workers struggled to cap the rupture and during that time, 200,000 gallons of crude oil bubbled to the surface and was spread into a 800 square mile slick by winds and swells. Incoming tides brought the thick tar to California beaches.

On the radio, three songs enter KHJ’s top ten. They were Creedence Clearwater’s “Proud Mary’, Diana Ross’ “I’m Living In Shame,” and Tyrone Davis’ Can I Change My Mind”. Build Me Up Buttercup dropped from number 3 last week and started to slide.  The songs that left the Top Ten were The Greatest Love, Touch Me,  and I started a Joke.

On January 30, the Beatles give their last public performance, on the roof of their Apple Records and so ended an era.

February 1969

In Southern California it rained and rained for most of the month. Another big storm hit us and killed 18 people over several days.

The songs that were number one on KHJ during the month was Sir Douglas Quintets “Mendocino” Smokey Robinson and the Miracles “Baby, Baby Don’t Cry,” The Classic IV’s “Traces” and  1910 Fruit Gum Company’s “Indian Giver.”  In the news Jim Morrison of the Doors arrested for exposing himself in a concert.

I received a letter dated 3 February 1969 Monday from my cousin Kay Johnson. In it she mentioned Ronnie McCoy, the boy I once knew when I was back in Texas in 1964. Grandma Johnson always kept up with him whenever she was down at the lake as Ronnie kind adopted her as a grandma. She had mentioned that he had run off and joined the army.

Kay also mentioned her brother John Johnson and my nephew  James who was born last December. I had written to Kay that Charline and Dad were fussing and she was considering moving away to Denver for a new start.

Kay wrote, “Dear Jr. How are you and everyone else? Has it stopped raining yet? Boy that must really be  a mess out there. Worse than West Texas sand storms I bet. We’re fine. I’ve had a bad cold but I’m just about over it now. Hey, you mentioned writing to Wayland. You’re not turning Baptist, are you? Ha! Not really. I hear it’s a real good school. Boy, I bet that all night party will be really cool. We can’t do anything like that back here. The schools and our parents won’t let us. I can’t believe about Ronnie McCoy. He’s not that old, is he? I thought he was about my age. Oh well. I’m glad the Huskys are all fine. I haven’t seen any of them since this summer. John and Ginger are fine. Did I tell you that Ginger’s dad, Paul Carlisle had a heart attack last week? He’s pretty bad off. I think Ginger was going down but he’s as Falcon, Texas and she couldn’t take off work to go that far away.  I bet James is really cute. Why don’t you take some pictures of him and send them to me. He’ll probably be grown before I ever see him. So, Charline is serious about moving? I’m like you. I think she’d like it in Denver. That’s a real nice town.  “You Showed Me” by the Turtles was no. 1 last week. Now it’s” Build Me Buttercup.”  I really like that song. I’ve seem Planet of the Apes and Barbarella. Planet of the Apes was good, but I didn’t like Barbarella. It was just plain dumb. Well, I’ve got to else and start studying. Write soon. Love ya. Kay.

In  1977 Mom was sent a newspaper clipping regarding Ronnie McCoy. Evidently he had murdered his 2^nd wife and had abandoned his baby girl. He was sentenced to prison in New Mexico to 2 to 10 years  for voluntary manslaughter.

By Wednesday February 5^th, a huge oil slick off the coast of Santa Barbara, California had reached the beaches and killed thousands of sea birds and marine animals. The Character actress Thelma Ritter died from having suffered a heart attack. I always liked the roles she played.

Three songs entered KHJ’s top ten on this date. They were Paul Anka’s Goodnight My Love, Joe South’s Games People Play, and Spirit’s I Got A line on You.”  Songs that left were Every Day People,  Build Me Up Buttercup, and Crimson and Clover.

            Also, on this day the news reported that the census department stated that the United States population had reached 200 million people.

            I was writing letters a lot to family and friends back in Texas. I was writing Pam Husky who was a sophomore in high school in Lubbock. I think she had a somewhat crush on me, but I never thought of her as anything more than a friend and a younger sister of Buddy Husky who I had an unrealized crush on.

She sent me a letter dated 7 February  Friday in which she mentioned that I had written that I went to Disneyland and told her a little bit about the shooting incident with Larry Jaeger and Bob Belcher.

She wrote, “Howdy Pard, how ya’ll like my paper? Neat huh? Judy and Johnny came up one weekend to visit and the next we went to see them.  How is Donna and everyone? I bet you thought you would never hear from me. Well, I have me a little time but am bit busy lately. I’ve been doing some horseback riding. Are you looking forward to this summer? With all that skiing and swimming. Thanks for the words to Mrs. Robinson or whatever. How did you enjoy Disneyland? I bet it was fun. School is doing pretty good but could be better. I’m playing tennis now in P.E. Boy do they work you out. But I like it. The last movie I saw was the Horse in the Gray Flannel Suit. I haven’t had time to go. Besides most of the movies are suggested for mature audiences and mother won’t let me go to those.  I haven’t been doing much, just studying, watching TV and horseback riding. There isn’t that much else to do, and I haven’t anything to do. What have you been doing? Did you ever get the problem with the car window worked out? Are the guys that did it still playing like nothing happened? I think you should have told because it is for their own good. It wouldn’t be being a squealer. There hasn’t been anything to happen here quiet that wild. We had a jail break which we’re never had before. It was exciting because they were armed and in Lubbock. You’re right about Christmas being lonesome. Mother had the flu at Christmas. That made things really bad. Then daddy got it. I’ve been lucky. Well, I guess that’s all. Write when can. Adios when. Pard Pam.”

It was reported in the news that by February 7 it had rained for 14 days out of the last 25 causing mudslides and some homes in Los Angeles County being evacuated. Here in Garden Grove, it was pretty miserable attending school in the rain as that Rancho was built so that classes opened to outside hallways that often were flooded and boards had to be laid down for students to cross. P.E. was mainly held in the gym playing basketball or wrestling both which I hated. I remember Coach Starr yelling at boys wrestling to “grab him by the balls.” I was embarrassed but it was a different time.

            During much of February I skipped classes when ever it rained and stayed home as much as I went. On 12 February two new songs enter KHJ’s top ten. They were The First Edition’s But You Know I Love You and Classic IV’s “Traces.” “You Showed Me” dropped out and Hang Em High left the top 30 all together as did “Build Me Up Buttercup”.  

Grandma Johnson sent me a letter dated 17 February Monday after I had written her. She wrote, “Dear Jr. How are you. We are well but Pauline has the flu. Been pretty sick still is bed. But think she will be ok. She’s better. Granddad and I went to Lubbock yesterday to get a boat pump he left there to have fixed. Kinda of getting things rounded ups so we’ll be ready to take off for the lake when it warms up. Had on inch of rain. Cloudy and foggy today. Then we went to church this morning. Oh yes, we went by to see the Huskys yesterday. Of course, they were all gone but Pam. She seem glad to see us. Buddy had gone to a wedding. Mr. and Mrs. Husky were out paying bills and buying groceries. The house hadn’t been cleaned since you and Judy cleaned it. He was fixing the old house to rent. Someone wanted to rent it. Buddy  keeps his horse out at Boyd’s. They lost the black cow that someone shot her. Mack living in his trailer house somewhere there in Lubbock. Ronny is in the army. He quit school so guess he is better off. Judy and Jonny are okay. His mother and Daddy are getting a divorce. Just likes teaching. Guess he will teach there another year.  Glad you make honor roll an working even part time helps out. Hope Mrs. Williams is still improving. I know June don’t feel like holding down a job. Bet Donna and Terry will stay with their clothes next time till they get dry. How low can people get to steal clothes out of a dryer. How is little James. Just get sick to see him. Bring him back next summer when you come. Guess Kay writes you about her boyfriend. I never have seen him. They go to the show Sat. nights. There’s nothing of news. Love you from grandparents.”

My Aunt Pauline’s mother Laura Sullivan  with her husband Leonard lived about a quarter mile from Grandma Johnson’s farm house and was probably their nearest neighbor. Donna and I, when I was out on the farm would often walked down to see Mrs. Sullivan as she had usually books and magazines in her home which Grandma Johnson never did. She was a sweet woman and took an interest in us and we enjoyed her company which I think made Grandma Johnson jealous. Once when I said I thought Mrs. Sullivan was a smart woman Grandma retorted that she wasn’t smart enough not to leave the Church of Christ and join the Baptists.

On the 19^th  four songs entered the top ten on KHJ’s list. They were  The Zombie’s “Time of the Season”, Dione Warrick’s “This Girl Is In Love With You, 3 Dog Night’s “Try a Little Tenderness” and 1910 Fruit gum Co.’s Indian Giver.: The four songs that left were  Can I Change My Mind,  Mendocino,  I’m Living in Shame,  But You Know I Love You.

On February 21st for 5 days Rain pelted Orange County making it hard to go to school but I mostly ditched classes. The Saddleback Mountains' canyons hill slides were devastating to homes up there. along with washed out roads and bridges. 5 people died when a mud slide crashed into a fire station in the canyon. 21 inches of rain fell during that period breaking records and basically wiping out communities in Modjeska and Silverado canyons

            Mrs. Sullivan wrote me a letter dated February 24^th in which she wrote, “Dear Jr. Just checking to see if you are using motorboats yet. Seems like the weatherman mentions more rain for California every day. We have received a little over an inch but the most fog I ever saw. Everything each morning, fog thick and heavy fog too. We would like to get more rain. Kay probably writes you that John is taking a course in drawing plans of buildings etc. Anyway, something that is needed in the job he has now. He is very interested in it besides means more pay. Kay is taking home economics and she really likes it. She prepared all the meals while Pauline was in bed with the flu. Leonard has been in the house 2 weeks with flu. He gets out today for the first time. Went to the mail box. So, you are an uncle now. How nice. If you try to make it that way,  you can be of help to each other. You take an interest in him now then he will be interested in you years from now. No person is an island unto themselves. We need others, especially friends. Brenda went to Austin last Thursday to Future Teachers Assoc. Meeting. There were 13 from Olton that went. They caught a chartered bus at Lubbock for Littlefield, Amherst, Sudan, Muleshoe, and Olton members. When they got to Austin Brenda called Dorothy her aunt. Dorothy, George, and Hugh came to the motel and took Brenda and 3 of her friends all over Austin. Then Friday evening they took them out to a fish fry. It sure made the trip more enjoyable. They had their meeting in the coliseum. Brenda sent me a card of the motel for my card collection. A boy came along while she was writing. He asked whom she was writing. She said her grandmother. He didn’t believe her. He said if you are writing your grandmother, you won’t mind if I write too. She said no go right ahead and he did and signed his name. I told Brenda if she ever met the young man again to tell him thanks for writing enjoyed hearing for him. Well, I am for our President. Hope he knows what he is doing. Going to Europe and all those insults. Junior, do you have any idea why there is so much disturbance and unrest among college students? I can’t understand why adults are so disrespectful. At the last Baptist Convention there was so much talking and laughing and visiting in the back among preachers mind you. Not paying any attention to the speaker. Well, how did I get off on that we were discussing the President. Ha!  If congress will help maybe Mr. Nixon can be a good president. He must be pretty smart. Of course, things don’t go just right he will get the blame whether he is to blame or not. I talked to your grandmother last week. Skeet called me and wanted me to tell Tressa that Skeet’s brother Lester died of a heart attack. Tress and Wilburn enjoyed their fishing trip to Falcon Lake. She said they are going to their cabin next week. Now there is  a couple that is always doing something. We’ll have taken up enough of your time. Won’t be long now until you will be through with public school and on to higher leaning. Give our regards to all the folks- Mr. and Mrs. Sullivan”

Dorothy is my Aunt Pauline’s full sister. Their father Charlie Allen abandoned Laura around 1928 and she remarried Leonard Sullivan. Ottice Marvel Sullivan was their daughter and was Mom’s best friend growing up I Hart Camp.

26 February 1969 Wednesday

Three songs broke into KHJ’s top ten and they were New Colony Six’s Things I’d Like to Say,  Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrill’s Good Lovin’ Ain’t Easy to Come By and the Road’s She’s Not There.  Songs that left were Games People Play, Proud Mary,  and Baby Baby Don’t Cry

On the last day of the month Rancho’s Varsity Basketball team which had been the Garden Grove League’s runner up was eliminated from the CIF 3-Al playoffs when they lost to Nogales 77-73 in La Puente.  There was no joy at Rancho among many but as I could not give a fig about sports it did not affect me any except to hear about the lost all day long in the hall ways going to an from my locker.

MARCH 1969

March  started out as most previous Marches in Southern California. The weather at times was dreary and on other days quite bright. I was in my last semester of my Senior Year and was drifting along. The month news was mainly about John Lennon marrying Yoko Ono and staging their first “bed-in” for peace. The Beatles were breaking up and after 88 weeks of record sales, their album. Sgt Pepper finally dropped off the charts.

            Other musical news was that Jim Morrison of the Doors was arrested for exposing himself and Simon and Garfunkel’s Mrs. Robinson was the Record of the Year at the Grammy Awards. Judy Collin’s Both Sides Now won as Best Folk Song of the Year. On KHJ’s radio station the Zombie’s Time of the Season, Tommy Roe’s “Dizzy” and the Fifth Dimensions’ “Aquarius” were the number one songs for the month.

            The KHJ top ten list for March 5 included 5 new songs. They were The Box Tops “Sweet Cream Ladies, Forward March, Tommy Roe’s “Dizzy” the Fifth Dimension’s Aquarius/ Let The Sunshine In”  that jumped from number 21 last week to number 8 today.  The Arbor’s “The Letter”  made the rest of the new songs. One’s that left were  “Try A Little Tenderness,” “Traces”,  “Goodnight My Love”, and “I Got a Line on You”

            In politics Richard Nixon who was sworn in as President in January had forced liberal Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas to resign so he could replace him by a more conservative justice. That was super scandalous, but I didn’t care too much about that. However, when Nixon also claimed that he would end the Vietnam war in 1970 I was excited about that as I would soon have to be registered for the draft and carry around a draft card at all times.

In March 1969 I was a senior in high school in sunny Southern California. At that time, my main worry was having to registered for the draft in April when I turned 18. All that was about to change when in late March 1969 I fell in love, with a boy.

I remember that one early morning my AM radio alarm clock clicked on to rouse me for school. As I lay there, deciding whether to deal with the bulge between my legs or to get up, I heard the strangely haunting melody of a new song: “When the moon is in the Seventh House and Jupiter aligns with Mars Then peace will guide the planets and love will steer the stars This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius- the Age of Aquarius!”

 I immediately sat up and jumped out of bed dancing. The 5th Dimension’s clarion call was a euphony as well as an epiphany to me. The stars were aligning which would usher in love, peace, and happiness. And my happiness was soon to be a boy named John Cunningham.

I must admit that I fell in love with John Cunningham in late March as hard as anyone could fall in love. I still don't know how to write about this topic, and I have tried in various stages of my life.

 I know have a desperate need to be loved and to be perfect. It’s part of my compulsive behavior syndrome and it embarrasses me  slightly that someone reading this will discover that I am not a perfect human being and thus will not love me anymore. But to be honest with myself and to my strange concept of historical accuracy I have to say that I spent the Spring, Summer and Fall of my 18th year totally and completely infatuated, consumed, and involved with John Cunningham. I won’t rationalize away this homosexual attachment to John Cunningham by platitudes of male bonding, adolescent puppy love, idol worship or any other excuse for my relationship with John Cunningham. I was simply in love with him. It’s that simple.

Those that have gone through this experience can understand what I felt but imagine most heterosexuals cannot fathom it and there is no use to trying to explain it. How do you explain the color red? How do you explain the color red to a color-blind person? Either you know and recognize it when you see it, or you don't.

John Cunningham age 18

John Cunningham age 17

How do I explain John Cunningham? First let me make it perfectly clear that John did not have the same feelings towards me, and we never had a physical relationship. To be frank I desired that bonding but I knew that to express it would totally destroy the shaky foundation that our friendship was based on so I had to learn to suffer the fact that if I was to have John as a friend, I could never have him as a lover. And I am not sure that I even wanted that as sex was still a mystery something you did in secret.

Anyhow that was the crux of my relationship with John for two years. I was demanding. I was jealous. I was controlling. I was all consumed by the physical need I had to be with him. I physically ached till I thought my heart would break whenever we fought. Even when we were on good terms after I went home, after I had stayed as long as I possibly could and sometimes was even asked to go home, I would lie in bed and ache for John. My chest felt it was being squeezed and my throat would lump with choked back tears. I really truly loved John Cunningham and would had gladly laid down my life for his.

Now I truly believe I was self-destructing over John Cunningham and he was taken out of my life because my future had better things for me.  Still no one has ever meant as much to me even into my old age.

            On March 12^th four new songs were added to KHJ’s top ten.  They were Glen Campbell’s “Galveston”  Blood Sweat and Tears’ You Made Me So Very Happy, David Ruffin’s My Whole World Ended”,  and Thee Prophets’ Playgirl.  Songs that left were New Colony Six’s Things I’d Like to Say, Indian Giver, This Girl Is In Love With You, Time of the Seasons.

            At school on Friday March 14^th, Rancho Alamitos’ school newspaper called “La Voz Del Vaqueros Vol. XII No 10”  featured an article on John Cunningham and Gail Foltz before I hardly was aware he existed. The school newspaper wrote, “ Experiences ranging from tramping through the snow to talking to Senator Allan Cranston were shared  recently by Gail Foltz and John Cunningham, two of Rancho’s outstanding seniors.

            Gail and John were chosen as Rancho’s representatives to attend “A Presidential Classroom  for Young Americans” recently held in Washington D.C. Their home for the week was the Washington Hilton Hotel. Three students shared a room and the ringing of the telephones at 6:30 a.m. told them it was the time to rise and shine each day.

“Everything down to the smallest detail was taken care of for us, enthusiastically stated  Gail. The entire staff is to be admired for what they are doing for today’s youth I learned a lot more than I could have in a civics class because I was experiencing  it first hand and actually saw  the government process in action. No attempt was made to influence our opinions or present the government  as something it is not. I think all the students respected the honesty and openness on the part of those contributing to the program.”

            John stated that this program more than anything else solidified in his mind the concepts and values of the educational process, that “education is doing and getting involved as well as reading from a book and this is a major void in our educational system today, This concept could be applied in our public school system. The concept requires responsibility on the part if the student which was very evident during the week and proved beyond a doubt the value of more student responsibility. It’s such a tragedy that the methods of teaching are unique to this program and can’t be applied to our present system of education.”

They watched Congress at work, visited the Pentagon, Marine Memorial, Kennedy gravesites, Arlington Cemetery, Senate and House office  buildings Capito, The White House, Bureau of Printing and engraving, The F.B. I. and the Smithsonian Institute.

John felt he week long program was “excellent: and that they did the best in the time that they had. He felt it was too bad  that such a limited number of students could participate in such a worthwhile program.

            The same school edition had an article written by Dave Osterman, who I had known since grade school, called “Vaquero Brain Children Win Award Certificates’ also mentioned John. The article was about 16 students who qualified as first round winners in the Bank of America’s achievement Awards Program for 1969. The sixteen students had achieved certificates of Achievement and had a chance to win $1000 in cash.  I was not among them as I barely was scraping by  but knew most of them one way or another. The awards covered all high school courses offered from  Math to Home Economics.

Winners were Karen Acosta for Home Economics, Marlene Allen in in business, Warren Araki in Math & Science, Jim Carne in Lab Science, Troy Clemmons in Horticulture, John Cunningham in Social Science, Susan Dahlin in Music, Gail Foltz in Liberal Arts, Bill Genervo  in Vocational Arts, John Harris in Art, Karen Kellogg  in Foreign Language, Keith Mercer in Math, Edith Nielsen in Fine Arts, Bob Stewart  in Industrial Arts, Linda Tyler  in Drama, David Wickert in English,  

Grandma Johnson wrote Mom a letter dated March 17 in which she was kind of rambling as I think she just needed to write us.  

“Guess the Irish are whooping it up in Shamrock. [Mom was born in Shamrock, Texas] Haven’t heard from Clee. [Grandma’s younger sister Clee Petty] Hope they are all well. We are ok. Kind of tired . We went to the lake  [Lake Stamford] Friday Evening  and come back Sunday. Enjoyed the trip & went to the R.E.A [Railway Express Agency in Stamford]  Express barbeque and I never seen so many people and as much to eat. Was plenty of water in the Lake and everything just like we left it. Come in and found all this mess had taken place. Poor Bug nobody will ever know how it happened.  Some of the clan was married up here at Stamford.  Then the Rock and Roll Bunch went to Hart Camp to celebrate in the old school gym. I guess it was pretty wild. They fixed dinner today at the Baptist Church for all. I sent money but didn’t go. My its cold. Got down to 28 last night. Guess all the fruit went as it was in full bloom and no rain yet. They didn’t have all their cotton out around Haskell.  Husky’s old house is about to fall in. There still feuding over the lot. We went to church last night . Our meeting will begin next Sunday. Then we will go back to the Lake. Seen in the paper where Ginger’s brother Nelson’s girl getting married when schools out. [Ginger was the ex-wife of my cousin John Johnson] Don’t know when  [whether] she’s coming up or not. I did hear from John. Said Carla [ John’s wife who had lupus] was holding her own & he was working his self to death. So much to do building a big  mall there now. Write when you get back from your trip. Love Mom and daddy.

            The KHJ Survey came out on Wednesday March 19^th with “Dizzy” still number one and I hated the song. In fact I hated most “bubble gum” music. I mostly listened to folk music like Judy Collin’s “Some Day Soon”, psychedelic rock, and popular groups like the Beatles, the Turtles, 3 Dog Night, the Doors, and the Beach Boys.

I really liked the 5^th Dimension’s “Aquarius” which was now in the number 2 spot. It really appealed to me as if it was the dawning of a new age. However again four new songs moved into the Top Ten spots. They were  Shango’s “Day After Day”, Elvis Presley’s “Memories”, Neil Diamond’s “Brother Love’s Traveling Salvation Show”,  and Jerry Butler’s “Only the Strong Survive.”  Day After Day was a song about California slipping into the ocean to a calypso beat.

            Mom and Dad’s 23^rd anniversary was on a Thursday, the 20^th which was also the first day of Spring. They had taken off from work and went on a trip to Northern California for a vacation.

            Charline was living at home with her baby James and Donna and her husband Terry Pierce lived at 11782 Sage Street in Apartment 2 but came to the house on a regular basis. Donna was working but not Terry.

I had a hard time dealing with the changes Terry was making of  Donna’s appearance. He had her cut her hair short, dyed blond, wearing short skirts, and long white go-go boots which was never my quiet sister’s style. I never cared much for Terry at all and I know he did not care for me; perhaps because he recognized in me something about himself. Years later, after they divorced,  Donna said Terry often would dress up in women’s clothes but whether he was Gay or just a transvestite I never learned. He only married Donna to avoid the draft and then deserted her.

            In March 1969, as not quite an 18-year-old boy, I had no vocabulary for how I felt about the sexual attraction I had towards males and especially John Cunningham the subject of my sudden infatuation in the middle of the month. I knew I loved John from the moment I saw him  but I also knew that men did not love other men in the intimate romantic way that I felt. If they did, they were queers and queers were loathsome sissies. However I also knew above all else that my love for John was not loathsome. Yet  still I felt that what I felt for this boy was somewhat shameful and had to be kept a secret. It had to remain a secret love.

Immediately I was possessed with the desire to find out who this objection of my affection was. Today I would be called a stalker. Back then, I was a lovesick puppy sniffing out all the hallways of Rancho hoping to cross paths with him so he might notice me. I couldn’t even explain why I was compelled to get to know him because I certainly wasn’t a queer. Still, there was this something, a something that had no name but it felt so sublime. I as yet had no vocabulary by which to label these feelings I had for this boy perhaps because I was too afraid.

I now had a secret that I could never tell anyone else about, ever. I was in love with a boy. It was my greatest pride and my deepest shame. I didn’t know much of what was going on in the world in 1969, but I knew this; that being called queer was the very worse epithet that could be hurled at you, well that and being called a “sissy”..

So here I was in love with a boy named John Cunningham, and I could not tell a single solitary soul. I knew that if I had any chance at becoming close to John Cunningham, to being his friend, I would have to hide from the world what my soul wanted to shout out loud. My life was a cliché. It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.

I did not record the date I fell in love with John Cunningham but it must have been during the week of March 17^th  while Mom and Dad left for their anniversary to take a trip up in Coastal California I think around Santa Barbara and Solvang.

This event of first laying eyes on John Cunningham was so prominent in my life that I wrote about it over the years several times trying to remember the nuances of it. The most detail account was written when I was 34 years old, married to a woman, in the closet, and had just recently reconnected with John who I hadn’t had contact with for over 13 years. This is what I wrote to remind me of my love for him.

“It sees strangely odd not to be eighteen years old and in school. However, the reality of the matter is that I am thirty-four years old and tired of life without hope. Hope which has fled like sparkles on the water as the dark clouds of reality obliterates, the brilliant, blinding  light of lost illusions.

I labor now at a sterile, unimaginative office, where production is measured in the amount of paper which can be crossed filed, checked, and dated.  Reams upon reams of paper falsely giving value to gluttonous speculation. All for what, do I sit comatose, nine hours a day. For another piece of paper for which I can acquire more pieces of paper to exchange for goods  and services which I have determined are necessary for subsistence in this modern world.  Papers with obscure inking, stacked capriciously, carelessly, scattered rows upon rows, on  imitation wooden desks, which here and there, are covered by more paper and papers smiling, framed in glass and metal.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. I was not going to let it be this way. I was going to create, and let my creative genius make a name for myself. I was not meant to be a paper mover. At least I thought I was not supposed to be one. I had stories to tell, poems to write, and canvases to bring together the brilliant hues of my life, all in a panoply of cosmic wonder. Somehow it has not happened. Here I am, catatonic in a clouded, sunless world,

Many times I am amazed at the world around me. People seem happy. I am told by my church that God is in His Heaven, Reagan is in the White House, and all is right with the world. But not My world. My leaded, clouded, dismal world. Once my world was full of lights, adventures, colors, magic, and glory. That is all gone now. Gone as was a different time, a different age. So long ago. I fondly look back to a time when it was the Age of Aquarius and I smile.

Lying a sleep in my room, the clock radio clicked on.  7:14 am.. Another school day. Should I get up and go to school  or stay in bed where it is warm and friendly. Mom and Dad have already gone to work.

While making the most important decision of the day a strangely haunting melodious sound emitted from the little square  General Electric clock radio which was precariously close to the edge of my chest of drawers. It was an unfamiliar tune. Its tempo slowly pulsating and a crescendo rings into the strains of  “When the moon is in the Seventh House And Jupiter Aligns with Mars  Then Peace will guide the planets And Love will rule the stars! This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius Age of Aquarius! Aquarius!”

This  song immediately pierced the inner regions of my psyche and I was up, dancing and singing, “Let the Sunshine in! The Sunshine in!”

I was awake! I was alive! I was revived! I had a new joy in my life ! A reason  to get out of bed and go to school. I was going to go to school for no other reason than it was the Age of Aquarius, And I knew it was true because the radio said so,

Still singing Aquarius, I fumbled into the blue bathroom at the end of the hall across from my bedroom, covered my face with foam from the mentholated  shaving cream can and dragged a safety razor over the bottom half of my face. Looking into the mirror, I saw that today I did not draw blood. A good sign.

Pulling open the glass door of the shower door open, I stripped off my boxer shorts and jumped into the shower, baptizing me in a steady stream of hot hard water brought all the way from the Colorado River so I could wash the sleep from my body.

Oh God! Its fifteen to eight! I got to get my ass in gear Frantically searching for a clean pair of underwear in the bottom of the chest of drawers, next came the herculean task of finding a match pair of socks  that matched reasonably well  or at least did not smell too badly. Good I got a clean  shirt in the closet. It’s the one with the small tear above the pleat where Jerry Smith pulled off the “fruit loop”. Oh well! I will wear my corduroy jacket for most of the time anyway. Are these slacks too wrinkled? No. Good enough. Got to get going  Where is my other wing tip shoe? . Must be under the bed. No time to search for it now. My hush puppies will have to do, Great Looking Good!  No time to eat. I’ll have to grab a bite during second period’s Senior Break.

Outside the overcast spring sky kept the dew on the lawn. Cutting across the yellow crabgrass yard, I can feel my soft leather hush puppies becoming soaked. No time to worry about that now. Got to get to school before they lock me out. Thank God I live just down the street from my school.

Oh God! There’s Vivian the crosswalk lady. “Hi Vivian! I’m late for school Catch you later” I say as I smile the more sincerely insincere smile I can muster. Oh great , she is hurt. Now I am going to feel guilty all day because I didn’t stop to find out how her arthritis is acting up.

Sailing through the chain link prison fencing, the school buzzer sounds for the start of another school day. However, this day is going to be different . I just know it is.

Scurrying off to my first period, which is my School Service Art Class, there Mr. Wendt  gives me this feign look of surprise at my presence. “Ah Mr. Williams. So good of you to make it to class this week.” Titters from some of my classmates annoy me, as I slide into my seat and give the tall goateed instructor a weak smile of contrition.  So began what I hoped would not have been another tedious and monotonous day at school. But Hey! this is the Age of Aquarius. The radio said so.

As I looked around the classroom, Mr. Wendt routinely read off the school announcements and took attendance. I knew I was in enemy territory as I had no friends in this group. The only reason I’m here at all is because they needed someone with talent to make the rest of them look good.

When first period was over  the rest of the day flowed into second period Biology,  then third Period Study Hall  and finally forth period Physical Education class where we were in training it seemed for a Vietnam boot camp. Finally it’s lunch and I had managed to sleep walk through my progressive education which was almost over for the rest of the day.

Since I live so close to school, I get the “privileged” lunch pass so I can go home to eat. Lately however I have been leaving with Jerry Smith, Fred Townsend, and Steve Ryder and cutting out. We would cruise down to the beach  where they would drink their lunches. Kirin Beer  being the in alcoholic beverage at the moment. I did  not drink however which made me the perfect chauffeur . From these excursion, we all came back to Rancho in time for fifth period.

However today I had lunch at school a so did most of my school chums. Sitting on the two-foot-high brick that surrounds the school’s quad area was a way for us to look and act like “too cool seniors.”  I sensed we really did not fool anyone but perhaps ourselves Telling the same lame jokes, bitching about the same teachers, and anticipating  the same dreary weekend, I tried to homogenize  into the group  but always, and constantly, I was aware of my separateness from the male camaraderie  that the others seemed to share so carelessly.  Oh sure I had my share of school friends mostly from grade school  but still, there was this barrier, this wall  me and them. I am not sure who first erected it or why it was there but I always was aware of it.

At last the school buzzer sounds, signaling the end of lunch period. Off to the lockers en masse the collective student body charges, wherein the confines were gorged  beyond functional limits were brown paper covered textbooks, yellowing gyms shoes, pencil stubs empty roller ball pens, stale candy, apple cores, Pee Chee folders, notebooks, and anything else we thought we had to have shoved into our personal lockers.

I never used my own locker which seemed inaccessible as it was in the middle of an enclosed corridor and was on a bottom row. How gauche to have to stoop  like a freshman  to use a school locker. Besides the aesthetics of the matter, there was a practical consideration, that of being the threat of being trampled from students above you and being crushed beneath an avalanche of school supplies from upper lockers. Personally, I always thought the administration should have had the decency to put out signs stating “Danger Look for Falling Books.”

A part from this, I must confess that I suppose the real reason I never used my own locker was that I could never memorize the combination. I am sure it was even too difficult for normal mathematical intelligence  which I was far from as I am sure my Geometry teacher Mr Hugget who I had for sixth Period would affirm. I was somewhat below parr in the department.

So, I came to a happy arrangement  with my good school friend and buddy, Jerry Smith to use his locker which was ideally situated for all my classes and was away from the maddening crowd. Jerry never minded my use of his locker  as I believe that it was due to the fact that there was some unwritten, unspoken prestige connected with how many people shared one’s locker. And since Jerry had me as a resident occupant and may others as temporary repository guests, I suppose he was high up there in the ranks of “groovy guys on campus.”  Not that Jerry cared much for that sort of thing as he was a “laid back” good natured fellow.  He just lucked out and had a good locker location and was willing to share his good fortune, in direct violation of school policy  regarding “sharing secret combinations.”  

Jerry’s locker was I the middle of an outside corridor hall, midway between each end of the school. His combination flowed like numerology created it in heave, Seven left, 12 right, and three left.

Grabbing my Pee Chee folder from the locker which contained English theme booklet, I was able to stay the tide of windbreaker jackets and notebooks teetering from Jerry’s locker and managed to safely slam the opening shut before a plethora of contents  ruptured forth.

Off to fifth period  English with Mrs. Appy. Happy Appy as I secretly called her because she was a doll although she tried to project this image of a cranky no-nonsense pedagogue. This semester I had English composition with her.  Not only was she a great teacher, but through the façade I knew she genuinely liked me even when she was annoyed with me. “I don’t care how much you know until I know how much you care” goes the saying.

Mrs. Appy liked me despite the fact that in my Freshman year my grammar was so atrocious  that it caused her to shout, pull her hair, and sometimes throw chalk at the black board. I never took offense because she did that towards most of her students.  Even with the theatrics I knew she knew that I had something deep inside me, germinating, which perhaps someday, with nurturing and love, would blossom like an American Beauty. She made me feel that way, even though I certainly did not feel like I had any potential. Mrs. Appy however made sure that any potential she could see in me was not nipped in the bud.

So here I am in fifth period composition, setting at my cramped hard plastic desk across from oh so perfect Edith Nielsen. Sweet and sanguine Edith Nielsen.  Why are you still smiling? Nobody is taking your picture.

 Oh why did I sign up for this elective with all these snobs? Well at least Mrs. Appy likes my stories and reads them out loud in the class more than the others.

With sparkling eyes, white short curly hair, rosy cheeks, and a voice like Helen Hayes, petite Mrs. Appy is standing at the front of the class trying to make sense out of poetic meters. Iambic. Trochaic. Dactylic. I can’t hear the difference even with her rap tap tapping on the black board.

This junk is so boring. I wish I could take a nap. I should have ditched and gone home. This desk with its concaved hard plastic seat is just murder on my butt.  Squirming in my chair, I propped my elbow on the deck to support my head as I doodle on the line sheet paper in my notebook on which I should be taking notes. Who cares?

The sun came out at that moment, illuminating the classroom and the warmth of its rays began to fill the class room. It was so warm that drowsily I began watching the sunlight filter through the elevated windows which were perched high up upon the pale painted cinder block wall. A beam of sunlight streamed down, and I watched as little dust fairies swirled and danced  light upon shadows in the sunbeam.  

Mrs. Appy slapped the blackboard with her long rubber tipped wooden pointer. Tap- tap -tap.  She struck the black board to emphasize the rhythm of the Iambic meter. It did no good. I still could not hear the difference, thus I went back into a half state of consciousness, induced by having eaten a large lunch.

Oh Shit! She’s ready to call on someone  to come up to the board. I slouched lower in my seat, hoping that Barry Wendall, sitting in front of me, would obliterate me from her view. It worked. Some other unhappy soul was called upon to be mortified. Edith however looked disappointed that she was not called upon, even with her hand raised. I went back to doodling.

At I sat there, with the afternoon sun, lighting up the corners of fifth period English composition,  something incomprehensible, inexplicable , and totally incongruent  with any other experience  I previously had, occurred while I was carelessly and indifferently looking up and down the rows of other half attentive students .

There between Darryl Perry and Linda Tyler, who I had never forgiven for saying I looked like a frog, the sunbeam rested on a classmate whom for some unknown reason, my attention had been captured.

 Like in the song “More Today Then Yesterday”  that typified by infatuation with John Cunningham, “I didn’t know what day it was” only that I fell in love with John. It must have been however during the last school week of March 24th through the 28th.

 I remember I was sitting at my desk in my Fifth Period English Composition Class after lunch. My teacher, Mrs. Helen Appy who I liked, droned on and on about iambic and trochaic poetry meters. She kept tapping the blackboard with a wooden pointer, trying to teach us the rhythm of the verse. I sat bored, as wooden as her chalk board pointer, watching the analog clock above the black board, as it ticked along in its own cadence. I was so bored.

I slouched in my seat but looked up behind me towards the high window slits where I noticed then that a sunbeam had burst into the room. I was fascinated with how its brilliance illuminated dust fairies, swirling around within it. They were blissfully unaware of the poetic meter conformity that white haired Mrs. Appy was dutifully trying to rap-a-tap into us, her dullards.

I let my eyes follow the beam down, down, down — until it rested on a single boy.  The golden glow of the sun beam highlighted his face, which unlike mine was looking dutifully and attentively at Mrs. Appy. To say I was entranced would hardly describe the feeling that welled up in me; my heart suddenly felt like it was exploding. The most beautiful god-like creature I had even seen was sitting there in my classroom, resting his chin on his erect fist.

 I do not know  how long I was frozen  in time there staring at the chiseled features  of this boy. However it was long enough for the Linda Tyler,  the girl  who sat near me, to snicker and giggle. My gaze must have betrayed me. Immediately my face burn hot in embarrassment and I quickly looked away. But No matter. I had seen the most striking youth and all this time he had been in my fifth period English class and I didn’t even know his name. That would change.

One such remembrance I wrote about how I tried to get John Cunningham to notice me. “After that vernal day I knew I had a purpose and mission in life. And that was to make John Cunningham my friend. Oh, it was easy to find out his name, but it was not going to be easy to get him to be my friend, No not just a friend but best friends.  How do you go about entering the personal life of someone who does not even know you even exist. How does one become instant friends, depended upon one another and secure in the knowledge  of a close bond of friendship.

 Oh for a casual relationship, one could introduce one self and make idle conversation if you were socially adept which I was not. To my dismay, by innocuous investigation, I learned that John Cunningham  and I were from very different social stratum  and high school class standing.  This was no small obstacle to overcome but my determination as a 17 year old was set to learn all I could about John from old class annuals in the school  library and talking with my friends who had gone out for sports with him.

John had been on the Senior Varsity team I learned, and to my great relief  he had not achieved any great distinction in sports. He was not a jock. Had he been, he would have been completely unapproachable to anyone except those in the circles of a school clique called “soches” from the term for "social" or  “society”. They were mostly simply middle-class kids from families where their folks were professionals but to someone coming from a lower working class family like me, they were like from a different planet. The “soches” ruled the school and dominated the social life  of all the “top” people on campus.

I was not in the least athletic or sports minded. In fact, I abominated sports in general and Physical Education in particular from which I was always getting a doctor’s note to be excused from P.E. which meant I was often in the locker cage handing out towels to my naked classmates. I didn’t mind except I knew some of them called me queer behind my back.

So if John was into sports this was going to be an obstacle right away but thank goodness he was not. Something in his demeanor indicated that he was probably not a jock nor was he that popular although I discovered that he was in the top echelon of academics and over achievers  at Rancho. I found out that he had been chosen along with Gail Foltz over all other seniors  to represent our school at some sort of National Achievement Award and was given a trip to Washington D.C  to attend a symposium of other equally gifted  students from across the nation.  This honor ranked him as one of the highest scholars at Rancho while I was ranked in the lower third, primarily from ditching school so much. In fact, my school counselor told me that I wouldn’t be able to achieve much in college and that I should just joined the military right out of school.

No Matter. I was consumed with a passion that somehow and someway, John Cunningham and I would become best friends.

After sizing up the situation , my next strategy was to be wherever John was. Proximity  I figured might be the right element for him to gain an awareness of me. I stalked carefully  every corridor, carefully concealing myself in the throng of short skirts and corduroy slacked students hurrying to classes.  Eventually it took me less than a week  to discover all of John’s hidden spots and secret routes which he took within the labyrinth of hallways that made up our Southern California school.

Although I tried to be as blasé as possible, it was my stealth in tracking his movements that caused me to find him in the school library every lunch hour, sitting alone, studiously reading. So the last week of March I started hanging out in the library, sitting at the same table as John, acting like I was studying but in reality I was peeking up to gaze upon John’s perfect features.

Sitting across a blond oak table upon wooden chairs, I spread my notebook out to convey a studious posture. Today was the day. The day of destiny. I had mustered up all my nerve and pronounced to myself that this would be the day. The glorious fateful day that I would speak to this posture perfect boy  known as John Cunningham

How strange that he should be just three feet across the table from me, contently absorbing the content of the book he was perusing  For nearly a week during the last week of March  I had been sitting across this blond oaken table  and for that week he had not noticed that I had been peering  over the brim of my illustrated Medieval History tome, studying  the outline of his angularly lean face. He had perfect bone structure with a model’s  strong chin and high cheek bones. His sharp Roman nose was dusted with a light pigmentation of freckled that flowed out onto his cheeks. His dark brunette hair, almost black in certain light, he kept regulated short unlike my sideburns which were constantly violating school standards by creeping below the bottom of my ears. His boyish haircut perfectly framed his lightly tanned complexion.  His mouth was totally aristocratic with silent type lips which seem sensual  in their austerity.

But truly , the window to his soul was his dark brown eyes framed by masculine lashes and trim eyebrow ridges.

All this masculine beauty  crowned perfectly his well proportioned , firm young body, nattily dressed in dark blue trousers, and tucked into his belt, a short sleeve sports shirt.

Day after day, lunch period after lunch period, I sat absorbing the presence of this magnificently hewn boy. I had no answers to why my infatuation with this boy caused me to be drawn to him  to the point of obsession. Perhaps John was everything I wanted to be. Perhaps he possessed everything I held to be of real value. Perhaps I was simply in love. Whatever I felt John possessed, it drew me like an invisible fetter  and held me completely spell bound.

These past days of sitting  across from John, watching him, secretly observing him, voyeuristically spying on his every inflection were days of intense excitement and complete exhilaration.  Each school day now was looked upon with eager anticipation, knowing that I would be sitting across from John in the school library. Somehow on those days I seemed more alive.

By March 26^th, the song “Aquarius” was number one in Southern California and four songs moved into KHJ’s top ten. They were Edwin Star’s “Twenty-Five Miles”,  Betty Everett’s “There Will Come a Time”, The Peppermint Rainbow’s “Will You Be Staying After Sunday”, and The Checkmates’ “Love Is All We have to Give.”  Moving out were “Day After Day,  Memories”,  “My Whole World Ended and Playgirl”.

A new song debuted at number 23 position called “More Today Than Yesterday” by the Spiral Staircase which after falling in love with John Cunningham became my main song for how I was feeling towards him.

Friday March 28 was the day I was finally going to approach John.

“Yes, I am going to speak  to him. What can I say that won’t make me seem like a nerd, a dork, a queer?

 My pulse is racing. My heart is doing the Indy 500. My knuckles are white from clenching my oversized Illustrated Medieval History. God! my hands are so sweaty. Putting the book down I wipe them on my brown corduroy  trousers, and I I begin to speak.

“Uhm” I say. Oh no he’s leaving! Hurry hurry  hurry! Say something, anything, stupid! “Uh… hey.” Sheer terror grips me as he stops. He looks up, like a deer at a pond momentarily  distracted by a sound.

Shit! My face has gone white drained of color. I can feel all the blood actually draining out of me as if someone  had lifted some flood gates. The pit of my stomach suddenly turned to stone. As if an eternity passed, he suddenly  is aware that someone had spoke to him. It was me. I spoke to him.

“Aren’t’ you in Mrs. Appy’s English Class,” I said without my tongue mangling my words.  A strange thought passed over his face. I am panic stricken, filled with anguish and despair  I want the earth to open up and swallow me whole.

Then he answered, “Yeah I am. Aren’t you?”

So it began. He had spoken to me. My soul was redeemed and for the following lunch periods when we came back from Easter Vacation we began our friendship in earnest.

On that fateful Friday March 28 it was announced  in the news that the former United States President General Dwight D. Eisenhower died after a long illness in the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Washington, D.C. It was about all that was in the news at the end of the month and all anyone would talk about.

My Grandma Williams’ birthday was on Monday, March 31^st but the family celebrated it on Sunday the 30^th. At their house I heard then that Grandma and Grandpa were selling all their properties in Los Angeles County and were retiring to Yucaipa.  

Monday was also the beginning of Easter Vacation with no school for a week and no John Cunningham.

April 1969

James & Me on Dale Street

April 1969 began with the nation still mourning the death of former President Dwight D. Eisenhower on March 28th. His death signaled the close of one era, the 1940’s and Fifties and truly the beginning of another.

The baby boomers, born after World War Two, were now pre-teens, teens, and co-eds by the millions and they were exploding onto the social scene and dominating it by the sheer weight of their numbers.

At the start of April 1969, I was still in high school, a senior with a dark secret. I was in love with a boy, which while terrifying was also exhilarating. It was my secret love; a love, as Lord Alfred Douglas had written, that dared not speak its name. But as another poet, Bob Dylan, had said to my generation, "the times they are a changing." 

Wednesday April 2^nd was Buddy Husky’s 20th Birthday and while I had a new infatuation, I still fondly thought of him and how John Cunningham had taken his place as an object of desire in my heart. No longer did I want to go to Texas Tech  after I Graduate and live with the Huskys to be near Buddy.

There was a primary election for mayor of Los Angeles the first week in April where Mayor Sam Yorty will be challenged by the first major black candidate Tom Bradley in May.

It rained off and on during Easter Vacation so it was too cold to do much of anything. I sent Buddy Husky a birthday card but mainly pined over missing being with John Cunningham during the school break.

Jerry Smith and I went to the show and saw Steve McQueen in Bullitt at the Westminster Edward’s Cinema West Theater which was the only time we did something together during the break.

Aquarius was still number 1 on KHJ’s Top ten songs and More Today than Yesterday jumped from debuting last week at 23 to number 10 this week. Other songs that ended the top Ten were Frank Sinatra’s “My Way”   The Venture’s “Hawaii 5-0”. Songs that left the top ten were  Galveston,  Brother Love’s Traveling Salvation Show and There’ll Come a Time.

6 April 1969 Sunday

It certainly didn’t feel like Easter this year although Mom cooked a ham. The rain stopped this morning and it cleared by the time we ate dinner. The winds stopped Donna and Terry came over of course. It was my nephews first Easter and he could only eat the food Charline mashed up for him. Mom made a pecan pie.

In the news there was an Anti-War march and demonstration held in MacArthur Park, one of seven in major cities.-The biggest marches were in Chicago and New York. They are the first big Vietnam Wa rallies since Nixon took office

7 April 1969 Monday

I talked mom into letting me take her to work in the morning so I could have the car for school. I could have walked to but I wanted the car so I could give John  Cunningham a ride home after school. I learned that John walked home down Orangewood to his house behind the Orange County Plaza which was about a mile and a half.

            At noon I told him I had mom’s car if he wanted a ride home. He said maybe tomorrow because his mom was picking him and his  younger brother James up.

8 April 1969 Tuesday

After school I gave John Cunningham a ride home but first we stopped at the McDonalds on Katella and Dale to get a drink and French fries. He lives off of Gilbert Street behind the Orange County Plaza at 11691 Capri Street.

In the news yesterday the Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution guarantees a man’s right to keep obscene films and books in his home and struck down laws prohibiting private possession of obscene material

9 April 1969 Wednesday

 Jerry smith, Fred Townsend and I decided to go to the show, and we went to the Harbor Drive-In in Santa Ana to see “Three in the Attic” which was rated R. Movie rating system had just been implemented and any movie with nudity was rated R.

The first movie I had ever seen that had nudity in it was Rosemary’s Baby. Mia Farrow pulls off a sweater and shows her tits and I nearly died! I was so embarrassed! I went to the Gem Theater in downtown Garden Grove with my friend Barry Wendall. I was embarrassed because I felt like everyone was looking at me and pointing fingers at me saying you dirty, dirty boy. I had no idea that Mia Farrow was going to show her tits. But back at the Harbor Drive-In cars were lined up out  to the street. Theater security was walking up and down the line looking for cars full of teenagers then asking for some I.D. showing that they were 18 years old. Since we had no adult with us, we were stopped and questioned. Fred Townsend was 18 already but Jerry Smith and I weren’t going to be 18 until the next day, the 10th. We were embarrassed and humiliated and mad when the guy made us pull out of the line we had been waiting in and leave the drive-in theater. We bitched and we moaned and thought how stupid it was but there was nothing we could do. Tomorrow when we turn 18, I guess overnight we will mature into young adults. What a laugh. Well, we wanted to prove that we could pass for 18 so we wanted to go specifically to a dirty theater to see if we could get in. In 1969 the only “art” theater that we knew of was on Beach Blvd north of Manchester and the Riverside Freeway. “Art” was a euphemism for porno in 1969 so we braced our nerve and drove to Buena Park. Fred Townsend and Jerry Smith bought some Kirin Japanese Beer to fortify their courage as we tried to get into an “adult movie house.”  However, when we went up to the ticket window to our horror, we saw sitting behind the glass booth was a little old white-haired lady with chubby cheeks. Our lust was almost lost. I couldn’t believe it. I was ready to call the whole thing off because after all who could buy a ticket to a smutty, filthy, stag movie from some body’s grandmother? However, Jerry Smith, the horny cynic he was, rationed “Hey she doesn’t care who buys a ticket or why is she the ticket taker? She probably owns the theater!” So, with that logic we sallied forth huddled together to prove we have the stuff to get into an adult movie. Entering the lobby, we were assailed by the smell old spice cologne. The theater was dark, filled with a smoky haze, and with each step our gym shoes seemed to get stuck on something on the sticky floor. The place had only about ten men in there, along with we three, so we found a place far from anyone else. We stumbled in during the ending of the first movie. It was some kind of black and white burlesque movie because the only thing about the film I could really make out was these Amazon looking women dressed in skimpy sequin outfits which only covered their snatches. Their big bosoms had falsies pasted on from which tassels dangled. I should have known I was Gay back then because I don’t remember the women, but I sure remember the costumes. The movie was filmed in black and white and of the poorest quality I had ever seen. We only saw 15 minutes of that film, so we waited in anticipation for the next movie. During the intermission, Fred Townsend went to the concession stand for popcorn which when we tried it, we nearly puked. It was stale and tasted rancid and was probably days old. I bet we were the only ones ever to buy popcorn in that place. The next film wasn’t even in English! It was a Japanese flick, filmed in black and white with English subtitles written in white so most of the time couldn’t be read. We sat through the entire film because after all we paid $3 each for an Art House experience but mostly because Fred and Jerry were hoping to see more tits and ass. They hoped in vain. It was the most boring mind numbing tedious, monotonous Japanese film in which the only part I could remember after leaving the theater was a scene of this Japanese man running down a dark alley chased by a hoard of pigs. This chase scene went over for about fifteen minute. He finally broke down the door of this building, ran into the men’s room and fell into a urinal while the pigs rutted and snorted around him while the credits rolled. This was it!? Incredible! We were robbed! We should have known something was wrong when we were the only ones in the theater after the intermission. We should of saved our money and bought a Playboy. So much for my first encounter with smut in the movies.

•           April 9 – The Harvard University Administration Building is seized by close to 300 students, mostly members of the Students for a Democratic Society. Before the takeover ends, 45 will be injured and 184 arrested.

 

10 April 1969 Thursday

I turned 18 years old with no fanfare. I attended school I know because I had to write a short story for class.  I wrote as the heading “E. Hugh Williams Jr. Composition Period 5 Thurs. April 10, 1951”

            The Story I called GOAT RIDING TIME was extremely racist but It was about a brief memory of being back in Texas. “Have You ever ridden a goat? If you haven’t let me tell you it s something you’ll never forget.  William Johnson and his are a colored family that worked for my Granddad. Ever so often Granddad goes over to William ‘s place to see how they’re getting along. Well one tome back in ’59 I went with Granddad over to William’s  just for the ride. There our people were, a whooping and a hollering so, that I couldn’t make cotton seeds out of what was going on. I soon understood the laughter when I saw the colored boys holding a goat (boy did he look mean!)  while one of the other boys tried to mount him. I couldn’t help but laugh along with the people as that old goat  bucked and kicked that poor howling boy who was desperately trying to hang on. After the boy was finally thrown, we all got together and sliced a mess of huge watermelons that were cool from having lain under the house all day. They were the ripest , the juiciest old melons I ever had. I was feeling good until I heard granddad volunteer me to ride . Did that melon turn sour all of a sudden. I told Granddad that I didn’t want to ride no goat in front of all these coloreds, but he just grinned and before I knew it, four black hands had me up there on that cussed goat. “Granddad!” was all I had the chance to holler before that animal decided to rear up on his front hooves and to send his back side and me jerking up into the air.  Grasping and clutching at every bit of hair and flesh  that I could hold on to that mean goat when it went into a spin with me bouncing off  and on his backbone. Finally, he did a back flip as that he had his belly to the sun and me for his target as he stomped bac to earth. Bruised I picked myself up and brushed the dirt off my face. I was more mad than hurt, mad at those black faces  a gawking and a laughing at me, Yes they were having a gay time and Granddad was just as bad, over there grinning his fool head off. I was so humiliated. I sulked all the way to Granddad’s pickup . Boy was I mad. Mad at least for an eight year old.” 

I wrote this primarily as an assignment but it was loosely based on a memory I had when I went back to Texas with my parents.  William Johnson was a real person. He was African American and his family had worked at one time in some capacity for Grandpa Johnson. I remember as a kid that Mom sent a large box of clothes we had out grown to the Johnsons once. I was on the farm once when Mrs. Johnson came over to visit with Grandma. She had brought some of her kids with her but she didn’t allow them into Grandma’s house. I grew up with this warped view of black people as I tried to identify with my Southern heritage before I abandoned the racist aspects as an adult.

11 April 1969 Friday

 The annual Carnival was held at the Rancho Alamitos “fair grounds”  with booths and concessions sponsored by various  Rancho Clubs. There was a dance afterwards with two bands and a light show.

12 April 1969 Saturday - 

Simon & Garfunkel releases "Boxer"

 14 April 1969 Monday

My dear cousin Jr. I assume that if you haven’t died from shock getting this letter from me and if California hasn’t slid into the ocean yet and since I haven’t heard different that you are well and good. I guess you’ve been wondering if I broke my hand or something since, I haven’t wrote in ages. Well, it’s a long story and I wish I could find a cute card like you did to tell you about it. How long did you get out for Easter? I got out from the 3rd till the 14th. Wow 12 whole days. That’s pretty good for Olton. Usually, we don’t even get that long for Christmas. It’s been just like summer out there most of the week. Everyone’s running around barefooted and in shorts. I guess y’all do that year-round out there, but we can’t out here because of the snow. Ha! What have you been doing? Mother says to live it up while I can cause this summer, I was gonna have to hoe. I dread that. Maybe I can get out of it. How did you do on those SAT and ACT tests? You asked my opinion about who you should stay with when you go to college. Well, I think Texas tech is a better school than South Plains, but I also think it would hurt grandma’s feelings if you didn’t stay with them. Maybe you could work something out like staying with the Huskys during the week and coming out to the farm on weekends. But that’s probably wouldn’t work either because you probably want to plan stuff with the Huskys when you have more time on the weekends. I guess it’s really whatever you want to do. Are you coming out here right after you graduate. I wish you’d write me sometime and let me in on some of your plans. With that closing thought I’ll end this letter. Be good. Love Kay PS I only have 6 weeks of school. Yea.

 41st Academy Awards - It was the first Academy Awards ceremony broadcast worldwide. There was no host. The ceremony is remembered by many critics and fans alike as the year 2001: A Space Odyssey was not nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture, and that Once Upon a Time in the West did not receive any nominations. Oliver! became the first - and so far, only - G-rated film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture. Ironically, the following year would see the only X-rated film to win Best Picture, Midnight Cowboy. As the special effects director and designer for 2001: A Space Odyssey, Stanley Kubrick was the recipient of the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects this year. It was the only Oscar he would ever win. Cliff Robertson won best actor for Charly over Peter O’Toole Katharine Hepburn of- The Lion in Winter and  Barbra Streisand for Funny Girl tied for Best Actress.

16 April 1969 Wednesday

We had a school assembly today.

Additional Material 

A pissed off conservative parent wrote a latter to the Editor of the Anaheim Bulletin complaining about it

 17 April 1969 Thursday

Shortly after my 18th birthday, I drove down to the Selective Service Board in Santa Ana, California and registered for the draft. I had no choice; it was the law. Checking off the boxes on the medical forms, I froze in my tracks when I read this question: “Do you have any homosexual tendencies?” I was in love with a boy. Did that count? 

By 1969 the United States’ involvement in the war in Southeast Asia was at its peak. Three and a half million men were serving in uniform, and about a third of those were conscripts. 

The 1968 Tet Offensive had forced Lyndon Baines Johnson not to seek a second term as President of the United States. Meanwhile, Americans, who had been told the war was nearly won, realized that they had been deceived by the military. General Westmoreland, to calm an anxious nation, called for 300,000 additional troops to turn back the Viet Cong’s Liberation Front and to secure Saigon. 

In Physical Education class, the boys at my high school were being trained for boot camp as much as they were being trained for basketball camp. When we ran laps, we carried other boys on our backs. We sweated to strenuous calisthenics, including jumping jacks, pushups, set ups, pull ups, and throw ups. The coaches thought they were doing us a favor. They knew where many of us would be heading, since they saw few divinity students, sons of politicians, and even college-bound material among us middle class Southern California seniors. 

Of course, it also never even occurred to them that there might be sissies or queers in our gung-ho group. Yep, a Vietnam rice paddy was the future for most of the Class of ‘69 at Rancho Alamitos. Even my Senior year counselor, more or less, told me that I should just up and enlist so that I could pick the branch of the armed services I wanted rather than wait to be drafted. He looked at my grades and laughed when I asked about college. Damn him.

 The draft was a big deal in 1969. During the 1968 presidential election, Richard Milhous Nixon had campaigned on a promise to end the draft. Well, the last conscripted men reported for duty in Vietnam in June 1973, which was of little consequence to me my senior year. 

Now I had been opposed to the Vietnam War for most of my high school days, which put me at odds with my World War II navy veteran dad. Ever since my older sister had started dating navy guys, I was a pacifist. My sister’s dates often brought their lonely buddies to my dad’s home for supper and sometimes for a place to sleep. My dad being a navy guy never turned anyone away, so we were kind of the USO for my street. I could not stand the thought of these handsome young men being shipped off to war. 

I am also sure that my ardent opposition to the war came from the fact that frequently some of these young sailors were assigned to my full-size bed when the living room’s pull-out couch was full. Young men in navy skivvies. Oh, the sacrifices I made for the war effort, having to share my teenage bed with 19-year-old seamen! 

However, by April 1969 I was not infatuated with lonely sailor boys, but in love with John Cunningham. Nevertheless, there was no way was I going to check off that I had homosexual tendencies on the selective service official government form. Besides, I wasn’t a homosexual. I was just in love with John, and we would never have sex.  Hell, John didn’t even know that I loved him, so why should I tell the draft board? 

Ultimately, I didn’t. Later, I would learn from others that even if I would have checked the box stating I had homosexual tendencies, the draft board would have demanded proof before considering me for a 4-F deferment. I had no clue at the time that many straight men who wanted to avoid the draft were claiming to be gay! 

The radical anti-war magazine Realist at the time told draft dodgers that the best way out of the draft was to be a “hoaxusexual.” A movie made in 1969 called The Gay Deceivers documented this phenomenon, detailing the exploits of two straight guys who had to pretend to be homosexuals to avoid the draft. 

After turning in my paper work I was issued my draft card, which gave me a temporary student deferment because I was still in high school. The card came with a warning that I had to have it on my person at all times, subject to legal penalties. Congress, in 1965, had made it a crime to “knowingly destroy” or “knowingly mutilate” the selective service card. In 1968 the Supreme Court upheld the conviction of a draft card burner who had been sentenced to six years in prison. I was even informed that any police officer could stop me at any time and ask to see my draft card; so, the paper card became a constant reminder that my body was not my own.

•           Apr 17th - Sirhan is convicted of assassinating Sen Robert F Kennedy

 

18 April 1969 Friday

I received a Birthday Card sent to me from Buddy Husky- I am sorry I waited so long to send you this card. I have been intending to write you for a long time. I suppose you feel a lot older. The weather out here sure has been nice lately. I am riding in the Tech rodeo this week. I have taken up riding saddle bronco horses. I am sure looking forward to you coming back. We can really make a lot of rodeos when you come. Arnold.

John Cunningham made plans to go to the movies and his mom Ruth Cunningham made us take John's brother Steve. That was kind of a pain as I wanted to be alone at the drive-in with just John. We went to the Orange Drive In off of Chapman and saw Cliff Robertson's Charly and Sidney Poitiers For Love of Ivy. 

 21 April 1969 Monday

I joined the LUV [Let Us Vote] Club because John Cunningham was a member. After registering for the draft, I began to attend a Let Us Vote (LUV) Club, a meeting of politically minded students at Rancho who thought that 18-year-olds should be allowed to vote. The opinion was that if we were old enough to die for our country, we should be allowed to vote for those who sent us off to war. Even though I thought the LUV Club views were “right on,” I actually joined because John Cunningham was a member.

            The club was started back in March and was opened to any Junior or Senior  at Rancho.  L.U.V. stood for the cause of eighteen-year-olds obtaining the right to vote. Orville Nelson the senior advisor  introduced the program but a committee formed by Doug Nassif, Dave Osterman, Hope Friedman, Diane Rutscke, and Carol Wenz  organized the meeting place and time for the weekly meetings

23 April 1969 Wednesday-

Sirhan Sirhan was  sentenced to death for killing Bobby Kennedy

25 April 1969 Friday

I asked John Cunningham if he wanted to go to the movies with me and he said yes. He wanted to see The Planet of the Apes but John doesn’t have his license yet, so I drove. We went to the Fox Theater on Lincoln in Anaheim and the movie was fantastic.

Afterwards we went cruising on the freeway because we didn’t want to head home but I got lost on the Riverside Freeway. Somehow, we ended out near Chino, and we didn’t get back home till after midnight. But I didn’t care. John is a good friend.

This was my first date with John Cunningham. I was so scared to ask him out even though by this time I had already gotten to be friends with him by taking him home instead of his mother picking him up. I was really nervous and embarrassed about getting lost because I so wanted to impress John, but he didn’t seem to mind at all, and I think it was kind of an adventure for him to be out on his own.

28 April 1969 Monday

At one of the weekly meetings of the LUV Club  I asked to see John’s draft card to compare it to mine. When he flippantly mentioned that he hadn’t registered yet, I nearly flipped out. His birthday was last January and here it was near the end of April, and he still hadn’t registered! The law said that one had to register within two weeks of one’s 18th birthday, and John had gone almost 12 weeks. I convinced John that he had to register before he got into serious trouble.

29 April 1969 Tuesday

 I drove John Cunningham in the blue 1963 Ford Galaxy down to Santa Ana to go to the Draft Board. As I waited for him to fill out his paperwork, I listened to Spiral Staircase’s “I Love You More Today than Yesterday” on the car radio. I wondered how he felt about the question “Do you have homosexual tendencies?” I was afraid I knew the answer. No.

30 April 1969 Wednesday

I turned in my essay into Mrs. Appy in my composition class on the subject of faith.

            I was still using E. Hugh Williams on my assignments and when my paper was returned Mrs. Appy gave me an A- on it. She wrote in the comments “Good because it doesn’t vacillate-not particularly new-that you try to answer by belief or faith neither of which can be answered by science. However, you state that well. Good read aloud.”

This is what I had written. “There is only one certainty in life and that is death. All else are beliefs and absolutes established in the human mind. Man has built up a scientific bubble to shield himself in; to account for the unknowns of death. All Mankind falls into the category of either bubble; man who believes in life and man who believes in death. Both are supported by faith and faith is a creation of the human mind.

            I happen to be a man who believed in the bubble of death. I have no doubt at all that there is a God and that there is an afterlife. I am more sure if this than I am of the sun rising each morning or that the sky will be blue when I wake. So many of this day say that God is only chimerical, a creation  of the human mind. I say the human mind is a creation of God.

All people who believe in a God are my brothers. This includes agnostics, hedonists, and the like. Atheists and nihilists  are just fallen brothers that have slipped into the bubble of life. These people must  be the most infelicitous  sort, living day to day with no goal or purpose. Is science their Golden Calf?

The are no absolutes but those men make; therefore , science is just a creation of the mind to fill the need of people who cannot believe in something they cannot prove with calculus and a slide ruler. These people may make definitions of ideas like hope, charity, love, faith, and death. Why must they define the undefinable? The must have substances to have a belief, like so much matter and energy. Can you measure love with a slide ruler. They undoubtably  must not believe there is love for they cannot classify and analyze it like so many molecules. Love is real;, you can feel its presence. God is real, you can feel His presence. Your soul is real , you can feel its presence.

What does it matter if we believe life came about by unknown chemistry umpteen billon years ago? So you gain all man’s science pr mundane beliefs and you have crated a very worldly existence here; what have you gained when You’re dead and have lost your soul?

I believe this life is a preparation for the next and nothing is built on faith alone and I hope my faith is durable.”

Looking back on this quickly written essay I can see that a lot of it was in response to John Cunningham who said he was an atheist. I deluded myself into believing that I was trying to bring John to God rather than to me.

Additional Material

A group of students from Rancho requested the "virtual elimination of dress code rules" at the Garden Grove Unified School District meeting  "the action stemmed from the recent suspension of Santiago High honor student Michael Pickers who refused to trim  his sideburns." 

 May 1969

 2 May 1969 Friday

As John and I became closer friends we began to argue and discuss politics, philosophy, and theology. His family talked of these things while my family did not, and I was drawn to the intellectual exercise of having to defend my positions which really weren’t my positions as much as they were my family traditions. 

John and I argued over and over about the existence of God. John claimed to be an atheist because I think he thought that was kind of cool and he had no religious upbringing at all. He was raised to be a moral person but a religious one. We debated whether God was so powerful that he could create a rock he could not lift which is a theological trap. Saying yes or no was denying an omnipotent Supreme being. John would ask me “where is God?” and I would answer everywhere. 

From these continuing debates my theology was becoming dominantly protestant. I believed in a God who was love but without a body passion or parts. God was enormous enough to fill the universe but small enough to fill my heart. This had been drummed into me that God is a Spirit, so I had fashioned a God that as Moses had said without body passion or parts. 

Church of Christ Theology was even vaguer on the concept of the Trinity. I never was taught what was Christ other than the son of God. It seemed ironic to belong to a Church named for Christ and yet not really understand his divine nature. 

We did not believe in the Nicene Trinity of three Gods in one. That I knew. There was only one God, God the Father who I was taught to associate with the God of the Old Testament. There for reason dictated that Jesus Christ could not be a God too. Catholics I think see God in a state akin to physical change- solid, liquid, Gas, Father Son, and Holy Ghost. Mormons I would come to find out just believed that there are lots of Gods and Jesus being just one of thousands. But that was not how I was raised to believe, and I simply wanted to convince John of the existence of God while he almost convinced me that there was not. However, I was in love with John, and I knew that love was somehow connect to the love that flowed from a divine source.

My favorite song in May was ''Good morning star shine, the earth says hello. You twinkle up above us. We twinkle below.” As this hippie anthem climbed the Hit Parade Charts, the space craft Apollo 10 transmitted the first color pictures of Earth from space on May 10. These iconic images had such a profound effect on the youth movement that they became a catalyst for the first Earth Day events of 1970.

 On the same day as the famous color picture of the earth was being transmitted to earth, the popular 60s singing group The Turtles was  snorting cocaine off Abraham Lincoln’s desk in the White House, before singing “Happy Together” at Trish Nixon’s Young Republican Ball. Mark Volman fell  off the stage 5 times,

In South East Asia, U.S. troop begin an attack on Hill 937 that would be known after as “Hamburger Hill” for the many ground up and mutilated corpses. During the ten-day battle, 450 tons of bombs and 69 tons of napalm were dropped by the 101st Airborne Division, and five infantry battalions — about 1,800 men — hammered the Viet Cong. After the position was secured at the loss of 56 American soldiers and 421 others wounded, Hamburger Hill was abandoned on June 5 to the disbelief of a war-weary America. Hamburger Hill thus became symbolic of America’s lack of a military strategy for winning the war, and its loss was the breaking point for many Americans. 

As American soldiers were slaughtering the Viet Cong in the jungles and rice paddies of South East Asia, the Monty Python comedy troupe formed in the United Kingdom on May 11. Their work would exemplify the absurdities of the status quo. One of the six founding members of the Pythons was Graham Chapman, an active homosexual. 

On May 15, Associate Justice Abe Fortas resigned — or perhaps was forced to resign — from the United States Supreme Court due to information kept in a file on him by J. Edgar Hoover, the all-powerful cross-dressing director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Abe Fortas had only joined the court in October 1965 but was a key player in several sex-related rulings in the mid-1960s. 

In 1967 he was one of three dissenting justices in an early Supreme Court gay rights case. The case involved a Canadian “homosexual” named Boutilier who was being expelled from the United States on the grounds that, under U.S. immigration law, homosexual aliens were deportable because they were “afflicted with a psychopathic personality.” In oral arguments, Fortas aggressively questioned the government lawyer on whether homosexuality was intrinsically psychopathological. He stated that the Public Health Service had advised Congress that not all homosexuals were psychopaths. However, the Court’s majority ruled against the gay Canadian, and he was sent packing. At the time, Fortas told another justice that the reason for his dissension was that “ordinarily a homo is a psycho, but many are not.” The court’s decision infamously allowed Congress to continue to define homosexuality as a psychopathology. Two months after the Court announced its ruling in the Boutilier Case, J. Edgar Hoover sent some FBI agents to visit with Justice Fortas. The agents said they had a dossier on Fortas consisting of information given to them from “an active and aggressive homosexual” who had been an informant of the Washington Field Office. They told Fortas  that this informer had “over the years” provided a great deal of reliable information and claimed now that he had sex with Fortas on several occasions prior to Fortas becoming a Justice of the United States Supreme Court. There were more allegations, but Fortas maintained he had never committed homosexual acts at any time. Still, the justice expressed great appreciation for having been provided with these facts and asked that “his thanks be extended” to J. Edgar for having handled the matter discreetly. Of course, the whole point of the FBI visit was for Hoover to intimidate the associate justice; to remind Fortas of who was really in charge. In 1968, J. Edgar Hoover had another team of FBI agents from the Washington Field Office pay a visit to Fortas. This time they informed him of Hoover’s ‘concern’ that Fortas had been seen at a homosexual bar. Sometime after President Richard M. Nixon was elected, J. Edgar Hoover showed the President the file he had gathered on Fortas, which included allegations Fortas had once been involved in a sexual relationship with a teenage boy. Calls were made to Fortas and after only serving three and a half years, he resigned from the Supreme Court. His resignation allowed Tricky Dick to appoint a conservative successor which, in effect, delivered a history-changing “coup de grace” to the liberal Supreme Court that had ended the political doctrine of “separate but equal.”

While I was involving myself  into the life of John Cunningham and even going over to his house to help him pull weeds on May 18 Apollo 10 with astronauts Tom Stafford, Gene Cernan, and John Young was launched as a full dress-rehearsal for the Moon landing in July.  Two days later on May 20 National Guard helicopters sprayed skin-stinging powder on anti-war protesters in California as the guard was sent to Berkeley .

16 May 1969  Friday

I am members of the SPOT Club, Society of Political Oriented Teenagers, that I joined last year with Ernie Vaio as leader. It was the only real club I joined as it radical and we would discuss psychedelic music and anti- draft  and other issues. One of the issues that the club had ben pushing is a change in the school's dress code of no long hair below the tops of your ears and no sideburns below the ear. I don't know how many time I let my sideburns creep down to far and I'd get a notice. Girls would have to kneel and if their skirt didn't go below their knees they were sent home to change. The club wanted rules changed that girls could wear pants to school instead of skirts and dresses and boys could wear their shirts untucked into their trouser and we could wear sandals without socks. A court case decided that 75 percent of the dress codes of Orange County are illegal so next year dress codes for the Garden Grove Unified School District may be abolished. Too late for us but the Junior class will love what we were had been promoting.

John and I went to the movies again and saw Candy and Fraulein Docktor which were both rated R because of the nudity. We went to the Huntington Edwards Theater on Beach Blvd and Ellis. Candy had all these stars in it like Marlon Brando and Ringo Starr but was really kind of stupid and I am not sure what it meant. All I know when kids at school found out that I had gone to see it they thought I was kind of cool. Fraulein Doktor was a German spy movie with some lesbian sex in it.

23 May 1969 Friday

Goody two shoes Edith Nielsen won $1000 in a scholarship from the Bank of America's 1969 Achievement Awards program. She also, last February, got a Good Citizenship Award from the Orange County DAR.  All that is in the school newspaper is news about Gary Hall's swimming competition and Jocks Dennis Regan and Steve Jackson 

25 May 1969 Sunday

On 25 May Seven kids ranging from 9 to 13 were arrested Sunday by Garden Grove Police after they went on a $5000 vandalism spree at Rancho They damaged the kitchen and cafeteria and used fire extinguishers to spray the floors and walls of a fire hose was brought to flood the gymnasium floor, centered on cafeteria and snack bar area,  girl’s locker room and gymnasium  It was the 5^th consecutive week of break-ins  culprits stole small number of ice cream bars and hot dogs Smashed a window to get into the cafeteria threw eggs against walls and ceilings  Food in refrigerators strewed on the floor scaled back to $2500 

The Academy Award for Best Picture of the Year went to Midnight Cowboy — the only Academy Award-winning film ever rated X (although it has since been re-rated as R). Midnight Cowboy takes place in pre-Stonewall New York City, where Andy Warhol and his infamous Factory’s influence were at their height. Homosexuality was “inching its way out of the shadows,” but as the movie showed, it was still a source of deep shame. The movie’s main character, Joe Buck, is a young Texan who dreams of making a living in New York City as a gigolo. So, he catches a Greyhound to the Big Apple where by chance he meets a seedy, shady character named Ratzo with whom he develops his only intimate relationship. At one-point Ratzo, ridiculing Buck’s macho cowboy act, says to him, “That’s faggot stuff.” Buck hollers back, “John Wayne! Are you tryin’ to tell me he’s a fag?” This odd couple learns to survive in a condemned building by caring for each other in the only way they know how — much like Jack and Ennis’ ill-fated relationship. However, unlike the Brokebackers, Ratzo and Buck regard homosexuals with contempt and fear. In the end both cowboys, Ennis, and Buck, lose the one person they care the most about because of society’s disregard. But hey, this was the Sixties and homosexuals, who basically had a “non-existent status” in American society, could hardly expect to fare any better. Ironically, Midnight Cowboy had a song in its soundtrack called “He Quit Me,” echoing the sentiments of Ennis Del Mar’s famous wish. The same day that Midnight Cowboy was  released with its X rating, making it dead in the water for any Utah screening, Salt Lake City was about to experience an example of the Youth Rebellion which was challenging authority all over the United States.

When we came back to school on Monday the 26th it was all anyone talked about was the vandalism and how the Cafeteria and snack bar was closed for the week. I wasn't affected as I usually left campus with Jerry Smith and Fred Townsend. I was a short week as that Friday was Memorial Day. In the news John Lennon who married Yoko Ono conduct their "Bed-In" at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel in Montreal, Quebec from May 26  to June 2 being innterviewed by the press. Meanwhile, John Lennon and Yoko Ono recorded “Give Peace a Chance” on May 31 in Montreal, Canada. Give Peace a Chance was recorded during the famous bed-in for peace by John Lennon. The song, the first single recorded solo by a Beatle, was released under the name Plastic Ono Band, on June 1st.

30 May 1969 Friday

Today was Memorial Day and Jerry Smith ad I went to Huntington Beach in the afternoon to lay out. It was hard to find parking spot which was about a half mile from the beach as all the closer parking spaces were full.

On May 31st Stevie Wonder released "My Cherie Amore" which along with Jr. Walker's What Does It Take became by love song that summer for John Cunningham.

 June 1969

June was busting out all over in 1969. It was a magical time for me because I graduated in on Friday the 13th. I never took that date to be inauspicious. Rather, I felt that it was a day for new beginnings. My high school days had never been particularly kind to me, as I suspect they weren’t for most gay kids. This was especially true in the 60s, when nonconformity would get you taunted by your peers and suspended by the authorities. We had dress standards and hair standards and jockstrap inspections.

When I came from school I generally watched Dark Shadows a vampire soap opera at 4 on Chanel 7. 

 On June 3rd my moms 40th birthday the last episode of Star Trek aired on NBC. It was one of my favorite shows and didn't understand why it was canceled

4 June 1969 Wednesday

KHJ’s Boss countdown had The Friends of Distinction’s Grazing in the Grass as the number 1 song for the week. Followed by Ray Steven’s Gitarzan, Elvis Presley’s In the Ghetto, Buchanan Brother’s Medicine Man, The Dog Night’s One, Oliver’s Good Morning Starshine, Bettye Swan’s Don’t Touch me, Henry Mancini’s Theme form Romero and Juliet, Clarence Clearwater’s Bad Moon rising, and Dusty Springfields. Windmills of Your mind.”

5 June 1969 Thursday

In the news a Santa Ana police man was shot and killed while question some black men

Additional Material

The men involved in the shooting were members of the Black Panthers and the young man who shot the officer was found 6 weeks later in Hollywood at the Actor Donald Sutherlands home

On June 8  President Richard Nixon and South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu met at Midway Island and Nixon announced that 25,000 U.S. troops would be withdrawn by September. as anti-war sentiment grew. June 9th was my sister Charline's 22nd birthday living at home with James. I remember she and John's brother Andy Cunningham who was home on leave went on a date to Movieland Wax Museum in Buena Park with John and me but I can't remember the day. Nothing came of it.

 11 June 1969 Wednesday

The week I was finishing high school on June 11^th the top 10 songs on KHJ were Love Theme From Romero ad Juliet, Grazing In the Grass, Good Morning Starshine, Gitarzan, The Rascals’ See, In the Ghetto,  Jr. walker and the All Starr’s What Does It Take to Win Your Love for Me, Roy Clark’s When I was Young, and Medicine Man.  I spent my last week in high school signing Year Books ditching classes and just hanging out mostly. Caps and Gowns were ordered but all I really wanted was to be with John.

13 June 1969 Friday

 I graduated from Rancho Alamitos High School where I went from September 1965 to June 1969.  The Graduation ceremony took place from 4:30 to 7:30 and it was a pretty day for a  Friday the 13th.

Before the ceremonies, at the house on Dale Street, Dad had to take plenty of pictures of me in my Cap and Gown. I hated standing out in the front yard posing for pictures, but Dad was so proud of me that I had to let him. I think it was one of the few times in my life that I was doing something that made my dad proud of. He even got down on his knees and buffed up my shoes to make sure they were shiny. Seeing him do that for me made me so uncomfortable, but I guess it was his way of showing me how proud he was.

Dad took a bunch of pictures of me in my cap and gown which were all green while the girls were all gold. That was our school colors. I thought the whole rigmarole of going to graduation was ridiculous as I hated high school, but it meant so much for Mom and dad.

I would have rather not gone to my graduation because of all the fuss, but my middle-class family would have none of that. The grandparents, the aunts and uncles, were all there to see me, the first boy in the family to ever graduate from high school. They were so proud but I knew I had graduated by the skin of my teeth and only because I didn’t know what else to do. It was expected that we kids at least graduate from high school.

After all the pictures were taken, I left and drove over to Capri Street to pick up John Cunningham as we went to the graduation ceremony together because we had to be there before the parents and guests to be instructed of the protocols.

Grandma and Grandpa Williams, Aunt Minnie, and Aunt Bonnie and Bill Fagen all came to see me Graduate along with Mom and Dad. My sisters didn’t bother and I didn’t blame them. Donna was married to Terry Pierce who didn’t want to come and my sister Charline stayed home with my nephew James who was only about 7 months old at the time. I suppose my younger cousin Larry was there but I don’t remember.

We  seniors had to line up somewhat in Alphabetical order, so I was in line with Barry Wendell and Ross Weishaar while John Cunningham was one of the first in front so we were not together for most of the time.  Graduation was long ceremony with us standing outside in the warmth of the June sun, and since my last name starts with a W, my family and I had a long wait before my diploma was conferred..

We were so bored standing in line waiting for all the speeches to end until it was our turn to go up and receive our diplomas.  I think Warren Asaki was the valedictorian. While jostling around in our green and gold caps and gowns before the ceremony, we seniors were told to write our names on slips of papers to be handed to Tracy Strong, the principal, when it was our turn to walk up the aisle between all the parents who were sitting out in the open quad area of campus. He then would solemnly pronounce our names and smile and shake our hands while the vice principal and counselors sorted through the diplomas to hand out.

The jocks and the jokers of my senior class all goofed around of course while standing in line, saying how cool it would be if someone wrote “Mickey Mouse” or “Ima Fink,” or something just as inane on their name slips. However I was the only one with nerve enough to do it. I guess it was just getting my last lick in at the establishment, as I was the only student out of the 300 or more graduates who didn’t write my correct name.

So, when it was my turn to step up to be handed  my diploma Tracy Strong read “Edgar Beauregard Williams” instead of “Edgar Hugh Williams Jr.” to the bewilderment of my relatives. All my friends just cracked up because they knew how much I loved the South while in high school and had to defend it constantly from all my “Yankee” friends. My year book had been filled with kids writing “The South Shall Rise Again” and other such epithets.  The kids who actually knew me thought it was funny that the principal read something weird because we all knew that he didn’t know us from Adam. It was my last chance at rebellion against a system that did nothing for me but humiliate and put me down for 4 long years for being different.

At the time I didn’t care because I knew Principal Strong didn’t know me. But I was now free, and in a small way this was my rebellion against the restraints of societal expectations. I was done with being the world’s best little boy at least for a while.

However, all my folks didn't know what was going on, and Grandma Williams kind of scolded me later but I think she actually thought it was funny too. My family simply thought a mistake had been made.

After the Class of '69 was matriculated we shook hands, the girls all cried and hugged each other, and for the first time I realized that I might not ever see some of these kids ever again, but for some that would be too soon.

Well, I was now the first grandson to graduate from high school something that Grandpa Williams or Dad or any of my other uncles ever did. In fact, Minnie and Bonnie were the only ones in that family to have graduated from high school in Downey.

After the graduation ceremony the family and I all went back to the house were Mom had a special cake. I received a lot of money from friend and family for graduating and John even received a $50 scholarship from the Bank of America for his academic achievements. Mom and Dad gave me their old ’63 Ford Galaxy as a graduation present.

John Francis Cunningham

I didn’t stay long at the house because I wanted to take off and be with John Cunningham with whom I was going to spend “Grad Night”. Our Senior Class elected to spend Grad Night at Disneyland, which would be locked down all night but John and I didn't want to do that because it seemed so predictable, and we were free now and didn’t want to spend time locked up with so many of the shit heads from High School who we finally got away from. I don’t know if John really felt that way, but I did.

            I really didn’t want to go to Grad Night with my Senior class as that I had no real connection with my classmates. John Cunningham said he also didn’t want to be locked up all night either, so we had made our own plans for Grad Night.

 I didn’t really care that John did not feel about me the way I felt about him. It just felt great that he wanted to spend Graduation Night with me. To outsiders it might have appeared that we were on a date, but I tried to maintain the illusion that we were just buddies out for pizza and a movie.

When John graduated, he still hadn’t gotten his driver’s license but only his learners permit. However, he drove that night anyways taking his Karma Ghia which was given to him by his grandpa who had just recently passed away. We had told his mother a big lie that it was okay for him to drive as long as he was with another licensed driver like me,  but really that was only partly true because you also had to be 25 years old or older.

 We first went to the show at the Huntington Beach Edward's Theater on Main Street in Huntington Beach and saw "Goodbye Columbus". It was supposed to be as good as “the Graduate”, but it didn’t even come close to it but it was pretty good but mainly I enjoyed it because I was with John in a darken theater.  

After the movie let out we drove back to Stanton and we went to Pepe's Pizza Parlor on Beach and Katella around 10:30. After eating some Pizza and talking about plans for the Summer we then just went driving around and ended up at the Huntington Beach Pier. The Huntington Beach Pier extended a quarter of a mile out in to the ocean and we walked along the pavement, stopping occasionally to watch the waves shine against the moon light and we talked about our futures. We walked slowly, stopping at points to see the stars and the lights reflected on the waves. The moon was a sliver and the stars glittered.

We eventually walked out to the little cafe at the end and watched the moon sparkle on the water surrounded by the smells of salt water and fish. It was a warm summer night and it felt good being at the ocean. I was never sure how John felt about me leaning into him as close as I dared.

However I let John talk and I listened. He never spoke about us because there wasn’t any “us” for him. But I was bound and determined that there would be an us for a while. As John and I were together staring at the waning crescent moon, I asked him if he wanted to go camping like on the Kern’s River up north this summer and he said he did.

We stayed there on the pier for several hours as we talked about life and philosophy and politics and religion. I was happy; happy to be with John and happy that he was happy to be with me. It was one of the most romantic nights of my life.   I didn’t want the night to ever end but it did.

After taking John home I didn’t get home myself until 2 o'clock in the morning, and it seemed like the day would never end when I finally fell asleep at 3 reliving my experiences with John. I could not have had a better “grad night” then being alone with John sitting on a worn wooden bench on the barnacled pier, listening to the waves break upon the shore and seeing the moon spill its enchantment across the velvety fluid waters in motion.

It was over all too soon and again I ended up in my room alone and missing John’s company feeling that my heart would break from wanting to be with him.

Mom had a letter from Grandma Johnson dated June 13^th. "Well tonight the big night. How I wish I could be there to see Jr. graduate. Did he get the watch I sent when I sent the money, you didn’t say. Did John Warren sent him anything  Glad Laura sent him five dollars. I knew he will get a lot of loot. Write me what all he got. How is James . I just can’t feature him walking  but they grow up so fast. Hope Donna and Terry had a nice visit with his brother. Don’t guess R.L. and Jerry  going to come to see us. I’ve quit looking and Mr Williams ‘ finally retired but plant had to shut down. We had a shower of rain last night & electric storm. Hope JW hasn’t had any of the hail and storms they had on the plains. We will go up the 4^th to see John and Ginger and Chris and Craig. We seen then last summer. There’s nothing of news . the little mockingbirds are having a concert this morning. Wish you could see my flowers and Wilburn’s garden tomatoes. Getting red and of the okra I planted just for Jr.”

The rest of the month was kind of spent anti-climatic after school was over. I was not working and spent as much time as I could over at Capri Street to be with John and I am sure I became a nuisance.

I remember when on Sunday June the 15th sitting and watch the premier of "Hee Haw" with Roy Clark & Buck Owens which eventually became a staple for Mom and Dad to watch. I thought it was incredibly corny which I suppose it was meant to be. As little James grew up he loved watching the dancing animated pigs at the beginning of the show. I just remember the song “Gloom despair an Agony on me.”

June 18–22 – The National Convention of the Students for a Democratic Society was  held in Chicago. The Weatherman faction seized control of the SDS National Office. Thereafter, any activity run from the National Office or bearing the name of SDS was Weatherman-controlled. The Weatherman group was named for the Bob Dylan song you don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.

On June 18^th the top ten songs on KHJ was still Love Theme from Romeo and Juliet, what Does It Take to Win Your Love for Me, Good Morning Starshine, Yesterday When I was Young, Tom Jones’ Love Me Tonight, “See”, Jerry Smith’s Truck Stop, Blood Sweat and Tear’s Spinning Wheels, The Isley Brother’s I Turn You on, and The Shondells’ Crystal Blue Persuasion.

On  20 June 1969 the Friday after graduation John Cunningham finally got his driver’s license. I went with him to the drivers course and waited until be passed. He had gotten all his driving practice from going places with me while fooling his mom.

The Summer of 1969 began on June 21 and to me it seemed endless. I was 18 free from high school, in love with John Cunningham and with the thrill of great expectations. That only real fly in the ointment was that dad insisted that I go to work at H &L Distributors in Buena Park.

Dad insisted that I go to work at H & L Distributors to earn some money helping truck drivers unload their beer trucks. Tom Horan was the manager of the Company and Dad had worked there for several years. What H. & L. distributed was Coors Beer to East L.A. and I was hired as a swamper,  someone who rode along with the route driver and unloaded the beer. It was very hard work, but the money was good. I was making $3.00 an hour. But I hated it. Hated it beyond words. Hated being known as Ed's boy, hated the continual stench of sour beer, hated the long trips into L.A. riding with old fart truck drivers and unloading the never-ending supply of cases of beer. 

At the plant, the main warehouse at the end of Dale Street was refrigerated, and it was cold inside and hot out in the summer sun. I didn’t work every day as I recalled just as the needed me. Dad and I had more fights over me working at the Coor's plant more than anything else that Summer and Dad and I had our share of doosies. The only clear memories I have of working at H.& L. is stacking cases of beer on pallets to be picked up by a forklift and loaded onto the trucks. I remember so clearly the song "My Cherie Amour" By Stevie Wonder constantly on my mind to relieve the sheer boredom of the job. Also, the song "What does it Take to Win Your Love for Me" by Jr. Walker and the All Stars use to tear me up for obvious reasons. I use to cry every time I heard that song as it was my lament over why John didn't love me.

On June 23 Conservative Warren E. Burger was sworn in as Chief Justice of the United States by retiring liberal Chief Justice Earl Warren.

June 25^th was my sister Donna's 20th birthday and she was married to Terry John Pierce. My favorite song of the summer reached number one on KHJ’s top ten on this date. It was What Does It Take to win your love for me” because it epitomized my feelings for John Cunningham who was indifferent to my intense love for him.  Next in order were Good Morning Starshine, Love Me Tonight, Yesterday When I was young, Crystal Blue Persuasion, Love Them from Romeo and Juliet, The Joy, Jeffrey Group’s My Pledge of Love, Stevie Wonder’s My Cherie Amour, I Turn You On, and Andy Kim’s Baby I Love You.

Other songs I liked and were played constantly on the radio was The Winston’s Color Him Father,  Zager & Evans’ "In the Year 2525", and Vikki Carr's With Pen in Hand.”

 The last weekend in June, the 28 through the 30th John Cunningham and made the first of our many excursions. We went on a camping trip to Kern River. How we loaded a tent, cooking utensils, a stove, lantern, sleeping bags food and clothes and us all in John's Karma Ghia I'LL never know. We drove way up a logging road and camped besides a stream thinking we were miles from civilization when in the middle of the night we heard mooing as cows came through our camp. We had camped in the middle of a cow pasture. Oh well.

 We only spent one night up there along the Kern River because John said his car was acting up and thought we better get back home.  Actually I think it was that I had snuggled up next to him during the night. Little did I know clear across the continent New York Street kids were in rebellion, one that would effect my entire adult life. On the early morning of June 28 the Stonewall riots in New York City marked the start of the modern gay rights movement in the U.S.

The times were a-changing even if I was not aware that they were. In the June 1969 issue of the Advocate, editor Dick Michaels prophesied: “L.A.’s homosexuals could be a very potent economic and political force IF UNITED. The time has come for a new leadership to rise from the wreckage of the past.”

In that same issue future gay historian Jim Kepner wrote: “A new kind of homosexual movement is shaping up bypassing the corpses … Homosexuals are beginning to move freely and surely in their own milieu — and accept their sexuality.”

July 1969

My summer began with graduation from High School on Friday June 13th and ended with the first day of Classes at Cypress Junior College in September but in the meanwhile I was enjoying and ruminating about life during the summer of 1969.

I had already taken my ACT and SAT tests and my scores were good enough to get into Junior College and I hadn't made up my mind yet about going to Golden West or to a brand new Campus in Cypress.  John kept procrastinating taking his tests and I didn't want to make a decision where to apply until John had. I did completely abandon leaving California to attend Texas Tech in Lubbock. John was in California so I was staying in California.

 On July 1, 1969, while I was sulking because I felt I was not spending enough time alone with John Cunningham, something big was going on in Washington, DC: The deputy director of the Pentagon, Dr. Donald MacArthur, was called before a congressional subcommittee hearing on chemical and biological warfare. Here he explained that currently all biological agents were naturally occurring, and thus known by scientists throughout the world. However, he also claimed that within the next five to ten years, “it would probably be possible to make a new infective microorganism which could differ in certain important aspects from any known disease-causing organisms.” He noted, however, that this new microorganism might be uncontrollable since it would attack the “immunological and therapeutic processes” that kept humans free of infectious disease.

Pressing on, Dr. MacArthur then told the subcommittee that a research program to create such a new microorganism would take about five years at a cost of $10 million — since molecular biology was a relatively new science and there were few competent scientists in the field. He suggested that if Congress funded the program it be run through the National Academy of Sciences — National Research Council and under the control of the Department of Defense. Dr. MacArthur warned the subcommittee that biological warfare was a “highly controversial issue” and “there are many who believe such research should not be undertaken lest it lead to yet another method of massive killing of large populations.” The biological agent discussed at this Congressional hearing was later called a “retrovirus.” The agency that was to create this retrovirus was later hidden in President Nixon’s National Cancer Act of 1971. As part of this national effort, in October 1971, the Army’s Fort Detrick, Maryland biological warfare facility was converted into a cancer research center, eventually becoming the Frederick Cancer Research and Development Center, an internationally recognized center for cancer and AIDS research.

 2 July 1969 Wednesday

On the following day, the New York City police were summoned for the third time to quell an aggressive crowd of nearly 500 protestors chanting Gay Pride slogans and marching down Christopher Street in Greenwich Village. According to one eyewitness, the police, armed with nightsticks, seemed “bent on massive retaliation.” The Village Voice newspaper reported, “The cops who had been caught off guard and were on the defensive before, had taken the offensive and massive retaliation was their goal. Some seemed quite ready to depopulate Christopher Street the moment anyone would give them permission to upholster their guns.” Reports from the Village also stated that “7th Avenue from Christopher Street to West 10th looked like a battlefield in Vietnam. Young people, many of them queens, were lying on the sidewalk, bleeding from the head, face, mouth, and even the eyes.” By this time “Black Panthers, Yippies, Crazies, and young toughs from street gangs all over the city and some from New Jersey” outnumbered the “queens” and were using the Gay Power movement to loot and cause mayhem in the Village.

By July 2^nd Crystal Blue Persuasion was KHJ’s number one dong followed  by My Cherie Amour, What Does Iy Tale, Baby I Love You, Jackie DeShannon’s Put A Little Love In Your Heart, I Turned you on, Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline, Mike Nesmith a former Monkee member’s Listen to the Band, and Color Him Father.

 4th of July 1969 Friday

 The family had the fourth of July in the back yard with Donna and Terry coming over to BBQ hamburgers. Mom made potato salad as well. It was in the mid 80's but a heat wave was scorching Texas. Grandma and Grandpa Williams came over with Minnie and Bonnie and Bill. My cousin Larry was doing things with his friends.

On the Fourth of July about 40 of these New York gays boarded a Homophile Youth Movement chartered bus to go to Philadelphia for the Eastern Regional Conference of Homophile Organizations. ERCHO was holding its 5th anniversary of a homosexual picketing demonstration in front of Independence Hall. The event was called the Annual Reminder. When the youth and the leaders of the homophile organizations came together at Philadelphia they immediately clashed. The New York contingent brought with them a new militant self-respect that the old guard could not tolerate.

When Frank Kameny, founder of the Mattachine Society of Washington, D.C., and organizer of the Annual Reminder, saw two New York lesbians holding hands, he slapped their hands shouting, “You can’t do that! You can’t do that!” The New York folks were freaked by Kameny’s actions. To ERCHO’s dismay they broke with the older group and wrote on their own picket signs “Equality for Homosexuals” and “Smash Sexual Fascism.” Many of the youth then began walking hand-in-hand as couples and the Annual Reminder disbanded, never to be formed again. “The new young militants stared at the older homophile organizers across a wide generation gap.” Back in New York City, leaders of a homophile organization called the Mattachine Society of New York organized the first “Homosexual Liberation Meeting” on July 9. The meeting was made up of a committee which demanded a Gay Power demonstration to protest police harassment. However, dissension broke out immediately over whether the movement should align itself with all oppressed minorities or just work for law reformation for homosexuals. The Mattachine Society policy was only to be involved with issues related to homosexual liberation, and it would not budge.

6-12 July 1969 Sunday - Saturday

The second week in July I flew back to Texas with Charline and James. He was just a little baby only 8 months old. James will never know how much I loved him. I use to take him everywhere with me. When John and I went to the Huntington Library in August later that Summer I took James along with me. I use to ride him on the handlebars of my ten-speed bicycle. Anyways back in Texas it was so hot that James was just miserable the whole time. Besides, I don’t think Grandma and Grandpa Johnson were not up to having a baby around the house, so we called our trip short, and we returned to California. at the end of the week I really don't remember a thing in the world about that trip. I vaguely remember James crawling around on the floor getting into Grandma's things but that is all. I was glad to be back in California and to be with John Cunningham again.

On July 8 The very first U.S. troop withdrawals from Vietnam were made. My Cherie Amour became the number 1 song n KHJ on July 9 followed by Crystal Blue Persuasion, What Does It Take, Baby I Love You, Sweet Caroline, Put A Little Love in Your Heart, Color Him Father, Listen to the Band, The Rhondels I’ve Been Hurt, and In the Year 2525.

16 July 1969 Wednesday

I was still working at H & L Distributing hating every minute of it and was fighting with dad as I wanted to go work with John Cunningham delivering Pizzas. Dad said that the Ford wouldn't last if I did and said he wouldn't work on it if it broke down. 

KHJ’s My Cherie Amour, Crystal Blue Persuasion, Color Him Father, In the Year 2525, Put A Little Love in Your Heart, Kenny Roger’s Ruby Don’t Take Your Love to Town, I’ve Been Hurt, Sweet Caroline, Baby I Love You and What Does It Take. Apollo 11 with astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins lifted off toward the first landing on the Moon.

 18 July 1969 Friday 

Ted Kennedy drove off a bridge on his way home from a party on Chappaquiddick Island, Massachusetts. Mary Jo Kopechne, a former campaign aide to his brother Robert Kennedy, died in the early morning hours of July 19 in the submerged car.

 20 July 1969 Sunday

I went over to John Cunningham's home to visit with him. I hadn't seen him for the past ten days. I wanted to tell him all about my trip to Texas, but he seemed vaguely annoyed. I guess he is  tired from that Pizza Man job. It has him working from 6:00 at night to way into the morning. I'm trying to talk him into quitting it because it is making him irritable. I left after a short while and went home to watch the Astronauts land on the moon. Everybody was in the front room-eyes glued to the television set as ARMSTRONG stepped out on to the moon. Unbelievable is the only word to describe it.

21 July 1969 Monday-

I had to go to work at 9:00 and worked until 4:30 at H.&L. Distributors. That evening I went over to John's to see if he still wanted to go to Disneyland. He did and so did his younger brother James. I was a little put out because I didn't expect that James was going too. At John's house we got into an argument over the Ted Kennedy- Kopeckne incident and it made me mad and irritable all the time at Disneyland. The Cups and Saucers were the only fun as we were spinning faster than anyone.

22 July 1969 Tuesday

In the afternoon drove over to visit with John. He seems indifferent to me. I guess I'm starting to get on his nerves. I shouldn't be coming over so often. I accidently, later in the day, ran into John and James at the Liquor Store where James works. James inadvertently asked me to go with them to the show; not knowing John had not ask me and did not want me along. John's attitude made me mad, so I agreed to go with them, and we saw ''LION IN WINTER" at the Fox theater on Euclid. It was an excellent movie. On the way home from the show, John and I had a terrible fight over his not inviting me over to his house for a midnight discussion as we almost always do after we go somewhere.

23 July 1969 Wednesday-

Brooded all morning long about the fight last night. In the afternoon I decided to put a rear speaker in my car. After a while, I  called John up to apologize but he didn't want to talk for he was still angry at me. In the late afternoon I went and had prescription sunglasses made. They cost me $40. This evening I went to the Los Alamitos Race Track with Fred Townsend and Jerry Smith. I didn’t like it that much. I can't figure out what is wrong with John.

The top ten songs on KHJ’s hit list were “In the Year 2525”, “Ruby Don’t Take Your Love to Town”, “Put A Little Love in Your Heart”, “My Cherie Amour”, “Crystal Blue Persuasion”, “Color Him Father”, Jerry Butler’s “Moody Woman”, the Box Tops’ “Soul Deep”, The Guess Who’s “Laughing” and  Ray Steven’s “Along Came Jones”, “

24 July 1969 Thursday-

I went to Huntington Beach with Jerry Smith and Fred Townsend. That night I went with Jerry to see “Peter Pan" and "Swiss Family Robinson" at the Harbor Drive- In. In the news the Apollo 11 astronauts return from the Moon landing.

 25 July 1969 Friday-

 In the morning I mowed the backyard and cleaned it up. Later in the afternoon I got enough nerve and went over to John's with some pamphlets to help him on his A.C.T. test tomorrow. He took them but wouldn’t talk to me. He is still angry. In the news President Richard Nixon created the Nixon Doctrine, that said the United States now expects its Asian allies to take care of their own military defense.  Ted Kennedy plead guilty to leaving scene of an accident nearly a week after the Chappaquiddick car accident that killed Mary Jo Kopechne.

26 July 1969-Saturday

I Went back over to John's to see how he did on his test. He says he doesn't think he did very well because he didn't finish all the questions. It probably doesn’t matter though, John is so smart he probably did very well. He still is mad at me when I go over to his house. He won’t hardly tolerate me and goes in to his room to read while I'm stuck talking to James and his mom.

27 July 1969- Sunday

Went to Standard Brand Paints today and bought some acrylic paints to finish a picture I started a long time ago. Donna and Terry came over for a while today and she helped me paint some.

28 July 1969 Monday

Finished my painting and brought it over to John's for a present. He liked it very much and it broke the ice. We became friends again. That night we took his German Sheppard dog named Schulz for a walk up to Gilbert School and we talked for long while.

Additional Note That later part of July was the first real fight John, and I had the first of many before we went our separate ways. John offered me something that my own family couldn't give me which was Intellectual stimulation. The only intellectual companionship I had was with Donna and when she married and moved away from home that was gone.

30 July 1969 Wednesday

My mom’s best friend, while I was growing up, was Jean Horan who lived across the street from us on Dale Street. Jean’s daughter Carol had married John Griggs 

The top ten songs on KHJ Radio were “Ruby Don’t Take Your Love to Town”, Johnny Cash’s “A Boy Named Sue”, “Soul Deep”, “Laughing”,” In the Year 2525”, “Along Came Jones”, Bob Dylan’s “Lay Lady Lay”, Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Green River”, the Rolling Stone’s “Honky Tonk Women”, and “Crystal Blue Persuasion.”

In the news President Richard Nixon went to South Vietnam and met with President Nguyen Van Thieu and military commanders.

31 July 1969  Thursday

Tom and Jean Horan's son-in-law John Greggs died of an overdose on their Hippy commune somewhere out by Hemet. John and Carol were very heavy into the hippy movement and lived in huge canvass teepees “in harmony with nature”. Carol had just  given birth to a baby boy only a few days before John's death. They named the boy who was born “au natural delivered” by his father was named "FULL BUCK MOON".

As I remember it John died eating mushrooms that were poison. Years later I heard how he may have been murdered by the drug dealers he was heavily involved with. He and Timothy Leary were in some sort of partnership too and Carol and John had an "art" gallery in Laguna Beach, I think was called the "Mystic Gallery" or something like that from which they sold LSD.. It was all very psychedelic.

August

2 August 1969-Saturday

 I got up at 7 to get ready to go to San Diego with John Cunningham. I got dressed and was over at John's by 8 O'clock. He sure looked tired. In San Clemente I had to stop and put water in my car. It over heats whenever I get on the Freeway now. In Oceanside we took a tour of Mission San Luis Rey guided by a Franciscan Monk. I took some pictures of it. John and I were both impressed. We arrived in San Diego at 11 O'clock and the first thing we went to be the Presidio Park. We visited a few Museums there and saw some historical landmarks. Later we went to Balboa Park and to all the museums there. We were getting hot and tired, so we left at 4:30 to go home. Arrived home around 7 and at my house some relatives were over for a Barbeque.

The relatives where Dad's aunt and Uncle Buelah and Uncle Ed Danforth

4 August 1969 Monday

I tried to start the car and it wouldn't work. Dad and I put all new points and spark plugs in it and it started but there was water in the engine. We are going to have to tear it apart.

5 August 1969  Tuesday

Jerry Smith, John Cunningham, and I went to the Huntington Beach in the afternoon. We used Jerry's Volkswagen. It's nice at the beach not really too hot. That night John picked me up and we walked his dog Schulz and talked. We walked over to Gilbert School then up to the Donut Shop at the end of the Orange County Plaza. John is a good friend.

6 August 1969 Wednesday

Worked on the car mainly taking it apart. Dad says it blew a head gasket and the engine is full of water. Laid in the backyard some to tan a bit this morning.

The top ten songs on KHJ radio are “A Boy Named Sue”, “Green River”, “Honky Tonk Women”, “Laughing”, “Lay Lady Lay”, Charles Randolph Grean Sound’s “Quintin Theme”, “Ruby Don’t Take Your Love to Town”, “Soul Deep”, The Archie’s “Sugar, Sugar”, and Tony Joe White’s “Poke Salad Annie”.

7 August 1969 Thursday

Read and cleaned house today plus worked on the car some. Hot day. Summer vacation is getting shorter. I called John but he said he was going to show with his kid brother Steve.

I had to control my obsession to be with John Cunningham as I knew that he liked his alone time and that being to needy would drive him away. Once when his parents went away to Las Vegas for the weekend, I disconnected my distributor cap telling John my car wouldn't start I slept at his house. I wanted to share the bed with him but he had me sleep on the floor next to him

8 August 1969 Friday

I liked James Cunningham's cassette tape recorded so much that I bought one today for $33 at the Radio Shack. John drove me over since my car is out of commission.

9 August 1969  Saturday

Got up early to help Dad put the car back together. We got it running around 11 o'clock and then I went over to Donna and Terry's with my new tape recorder to tape some records of mine  because our stereo is on the blink. I came home at 4 o’clock to go over to Milton and Marie's for a Mexican Dinner. the whole clan was there including Uncle Ed and Beulah from Texas.

Additional Material On August 9 – Members of Charles Manson family murdered Sharon Tate, who was 8 months pregnant, and her friends. coffee heiress Abigail Folger, Wojciech Frykowski, and Hollywood hairstylist Jay Sebring at Roman Polanski's home in Los Angeles, California. Also killed was Steven Parent, who was leaving from a visit to the Polanski’s' caretaker.

10 August 1969 Sunday

The family went over to Frank and Barb's for Gwen's baby shower and for dinner. I visited John and we drove around Santa Ana then down to the Huntington Pier to be doing something. It’s very hot and humid. In the evening I went over to Frank and Barb's to have supper. I didn't stay long.

Additional Material- On August 10, The Manson Family killed Leno and Rosemary LA Bianca.  In August of 1969 I remember so clearly hearing about the Sharon Tate Murder. I woke up one morning and read in the newspaper in two-inch headlines Four Slain in Laurel Canyon. That was all that was in the news. But I was so involved in my own life I gave it very little thought until a day later another headline proclaimed the LA Bianca Murders.

After that panic was in the air. When Sharon Tate and her friends were murdered even though it was gruesome and brutal it did not hit home. The lives and exploits of the rich of Hollywood was as removed from me as what goes on in Russia. However, the La Bianca murders were different. They were like us. Normal every day middle class people murdered in their homes by the same killers of the Sharon Tate.

We usually never locked our doors at night only when away but now doors were locked at night. The newspapers reported now  an increase of the buying of guns and Hippies were no longer thought of as harmless flower children but drug crazed killers.

Anyways the focal point of that summer was John Cunningham. Many years have come and gone since the Summer of 1969, and I know much of what I remember is distorted through years of savoring certain memories and the burying of others in the graveyard of bitter pain. I look back and I just remember the good times and how John made me feel alive. Made me feel feelings I never thought I had. Made think thoughts I never knew I had. So, I will continue to hold on to the sweet ghosts of two young men out to experience the world. 

The World was an open cornucopia of experiences for us to revel in. It felt good to be young. It felt good to be in love. The weight of the draft, anxieties of entering college, and the lack of control I had over my own destiny because of my youth now does not even enter in to the picture when I think of that time, but I know in reality they were fears I had. It was not all blue skies and warm sandy beaches. But I like to listen to "What does It Take" by the All Stars close my eyes and drift back to a more innocent time. A time of blue skies and white clouds and John Cunningham.

 11 August 1969 Monday-

Went to the beach at San Clemente with John. It was very hot, so we didn't stay long. Left at 1:30 and took the Coast Hwy home. At home I found that I was quite sunburned on my stomach.

I don't remember if this was the time I almost drowned caught in a Rip Tide. I went into the water and suddenly huge waves were crashing over me plummeting below the surface. I was struggling to come in but the tide kept pulling me out with successive waves pounding me when ever I bobbed to the surface with barely enough time to catch my breath. It was surreal seeing John and others lying on the beach while I thought I was drowning. I never made a sound as I didn't want to make a scene. Finally I was exhausted and went limp and when I did my feet touch sand and my will to struggle revived once I was grounded and I struggled to the shore. I found John and collapsed on the beach towel next to him with every muscle in my body on fire. I never said a word that I had almost drowned.

Another time at the beach, tar blobs had gathered from the oil spill in Santa Barbara and John and I inadvertently got some on our feet. We found the men's changing room and I remember scraping the tar off of John's feet. In the changing rooms was one of the few places I ever saw John undressed but I was too shy to do more than glance at his body.

 My life was a whirlwind of activity that summer of 1969 and it really amazes me that I could even find this much time to record brief snatches of my life. The Summer of 1969 as I remember it was one of bright blue skies with great big billowy clouds. A hundred trips to the beaches of Huntington, Newport, San Clemente and excursions to San Juan Capistrano, San Luis Reyes, and San Diego. Hot sweating bodies lying on the white California beaches listening to Easy to Be Hard by the Three Dog Nights, In the Year 2525, and Love One Another- "You can make the Mountains Sing or make the Angels Cry."  

It was a summer of casual family get-togethers with Milton and Marie Williams at their home in Walnut and the long drive through the Brea Canyon to get there. Bonnie and Bill Fagen were still an intrinsic part of the family, and I will always remember the good times with Bonnie and my cousin Larry. Bill another story. I could always take or leave him. They lived in Buena Park off the Valley View and 91 Freeway as I remember. Grandpa Williams had not yet gone into decline and he and Grandma and Minnie all lived off of Woodruff in Norwalk. I had my car, and I could go over and see them without Mom and Dad.

 13 August 1969 Wednesday

Honky Tonk Women, Green River, Sugar Sugar, Polk Salad Annie, Lay Lady Lay, # Dog’s Night easy to Be Hard, A Boy Named Sue, Grassroots’ I’d Wait a Millin Years, Laughing, Soul deep.

About this time John and I received our admission to  Cypress Jr College. I convinced him to attend Cypress rather than Santa Ana or Golden West as Cypress was bring new and had just opened it's main buildings. Since we were beginning a new chapter in our lives we wanted something brand new.  Besides I helped him fill out all the application forms that he had procrastinated with. Attending college was the only way we could get a deferment from the draft. 

 August 15–18 – Friday-Monday

The Woodstock Festival is held in upstate New York, featuring some of the top rock musicians of the era. On August 17 a Category 5 Hurricane named Camille, the most powerful tropical cyclonic system l in history, hits the Mississippi coast, killing 248 people and causing US $1.5 billion in damage (1969 dollars).

As this was an East Coast event there was not much notice of it in Southern California and I don't remember it at all until 1970 when it became a cultural event.

 20 August 1969 Wednesday

Sugar Sugar, Easy to be Hard, I’d Wait A Million Years, Motherlode’s When I Die, Honky Tonk Women, Green River, Gladys Knights and the Pips The Nitty Gritty, The Youngblood’s’ Get Together Plk Salad Annie, Tom Jones I’ll Never Fall in Love Again.

 27 August 1969 Wednesday

Sugar, Sugar, easy To Be Hard, Get Together, When I Die, I’d Wit A Million Years, Green River, The Nitty Gritty, I’ll Never Fall in Love Again, Honky Tonk Women, The Rondels’s What Kind of Fool Do You Think I am.

28 August 1969 Thursday  

I registered for College at Cypress Jr. College. It was a horrible experience because they did it by alphabetical order so by the time, I registered there were few classes still opened and I had large gaps in my schedule. Registration was a horrendous process standing in very long lines and then getting up to the window only to find out the classes you wanted were already closed and you had to go to the end of the line and start over. Because John Cunningham was a C, he registered last Monday and got every class he wanted. I was at the tail end and had to take the 2nd half of United States History first because all the A sections were filled.

 

SEPTEMBER

2 September 1969 Tuesday

In the news Ho Chi Minh, leader of North Vietnam died.

3 September 1969 Wednesday

Easy to Be Hard, Sugar Sugar, Get Together, Oliver’s Jean, The Dell’s Oh What  night, When I Die, What Kind of Fool Do You Think I am, The Lettermen’s Hurt So Bad, The Clique’s Sugar on Sunday, The Union Gap’s This Girl is a Woman Now.

5 September 1969 Friday– 

In the news Lieutenant William Calley is charged with 6 counts of premeditated murder, for the deaths of 109 Vietnamese civilians in My Lai.

 10-12  September 1969 -Wednesday-Friday

I started college on September 10th, 1969 a Wednesday at Cypress Jr. College assigned to the Bernstein House because my Major was Humanities. The first three days of School, September 10 through the 12^th, were “Social Orientation Week. Most of the new buildings were completed but the new swimming poll was  stopped by a Plumbing strike It was to be an Olympic size  pool with two diving platforms. The pool was to be built adjacent to the Edison House and new gym.  In the center of the campus was a 120 foot campanile. It was built to go up  through the Piazza level. The college bookstore was in one of the temporary module  C-31. 

The teachers I had my Fall Term 1969 were:   Mr. Reeves for Western Civilization 4A Monday and Wednesday from  10:00-10:50 at the Library Auditorium room 216 3 credits.  Mrs. Yamada for English 1A Rhetoric  Monday- Wednesday- Friday from 12:00-12:50 Room C11 in the annex 3 Credits  In Mrs. Yamada class I learned what Rhetoric is and how to write a composition correctly.  Mr. Reeves again for Western Civilization 4A and Seminar Mondays 1:00-1:50 at the library room 203 0 credits.  Mrs. Melom for Guidance Wednesday and Friday 1:00-1:50 in the Bernstein Fine Arts Building 225 1 credit Mr. McLeod for US History 7B Monday Wednesday Friday  2:00-2:50 in Room B13 of the annex 3 Credit  Mrs. Fouste for Social Anthropology Monday Wednesday and Friday  3:00-3:05 in Room B11 3 credits. I took Volleyball for my PE class that we were required to take on Tuesday and Thursday. All in all, I took 15 credit hours. I had to take 12 to be considered a full-time student to keep my draft deferment.

 All freshmen have to take Guidance 

My college career started official on 10 September 1969 a Wednesday because Tuesday was Admissions Day a California State Holiday. Cypress College so beautiful to me and brand new. For some I am sure it seemed like a barren waste because there was no landscaping in the new section that had just opened. There was no grass, no landscaping, no trees then just dirt and dust. In the Spring Semester Olive Trees were planted and a green wet seeded toilet paper substance was sprayed all over the top soil to provide grass. 

The interim part of campus of course were landscaped where I suppose the grassy knoll area was the focal point of campus in 1969. It was later destroyed when new Men’s locker rooms were built in 1971. The knoll was where the vending machines and a small lunch dispensed food and refreshments to the student body. 

However additionally all the new permanent buildings had their own little common eating area and eventually the central or common area of student activities drifted away to each of the respective buildings. 

The new section of campus consisted of the Fine Arts Building, The Gym and Showers and Locker Room, The Library, the Piazza, and the Vo-Tech Building stood apart from the rest of the interim buildings on the old part of the campus. Everything smelled of freshly poured concrete, new carpeting, and fresh paint. The new buildings were permeated with these smells. I imagine it was the newness of place that entranced me and attracted me to the place. I was to be the first class of the new Campus.

Cypress Jr. College under President Daniel Walker initiated in the fall of 1969, with the completion of the first permanent buildings, the “house system”. Students were assigned to a “house” depending on their major. The Fine Arts building was named for Leonard Bernstein the conductor and known as the Bernstein House. The Vocational-technical building was named for Thomas Edison, the inventor and was known as the Edison House. The library was temporarily housing the Business School and that House was called the Carnegie House after Andrew Carnegie, the  businessman. By the time I left Cypress the Business School building was finished and the Carnegie House was located just southeast of the Bernstein House. All of these buildings were connected by a piazza walkway that was above street level and in the center of the Piazza was the Campanile.

All of the Humanity majors at that time were assigned to the Bernstein House. All traditional students and science majors were assigned to the Edison House, and Business Students and all others were assigned to the Carnegie House. 

Since I was a history major, I was assigned to the Bernstein House along John Cunningham who was a Political Science Major and with other Social Science majors, Theater Majors, and Fine Art Majors. However, most of my classes were held in the interim section across campus from the Bernstein House. But I still spent most of my time between classes in the permanent buildings primarily the Bernstein House and the Library. My association with the Bernstein House was inspired because it broaden my perspectives as I met other likeminded people in the liberal arts.

In my personal life I was still totally wrapped up with John Cunningham. No one else matter in my life, not my family or my other school friends, no one. Jerry Smith went off to Golden West Jr. College and Larry Jaeger did not enroll in college at all and was soon drafted into the army and sent to Viet Nam. So, of all my old school friends from Rancho Alamitos, only John was really still part of my life and I had engineered that. I helped him fill out his ACT application. I talked him into enrolling at Cypress College. I wanted him to be close to me.

In 1969 5,000 students were enrolled at Cypress but I bet less than 2000 students were on campus at any given time back then. My classes were all small except for Western Civ which met in a lecture hall by the library. Most of my classes had no more than 15 or 20 students far smaller than high school. In my Western Civ Seminar class there were only eight students! I don’t think I could have had such personal attention even at a private college. Did I mention that in 1969 all community colleges had no tuition as part of California’s Master Plan for Education? Public Education was free in California even college until 1971. I only had to pay some student association fees like ten bucks and of course I had to buy my text books.

Cypress College is basically built with in a looped parkway with a street also dissecting it down the middle beneath the Piazza. Since most of the classes were still located on the western half of campus in the interim buildings parking on the east side was virtually empty. John Cunningham almost always parked his Karma Ghia in the Fine Arts Parking Lot because hardly any one parked there. I could always find a parking space next to his. That was how small the campus was in the fall of 1969.

John and I didn’t have any classes together in the fall semester because by the time I registered all of his classes were closed. But we would always meet for lunch, and I would go find him in the library and sit with him there. I spent much of my first semester in the college library because I had such long gaps, often and hour or two between classes. I really got to know the library inside and out. 

On nice days John and I would sit outside by the duck pond and quiz each other on vocabulary words we were learning or had found in the dictionary. We wanted to expand our vocabulary and tried to stump each other with words like phantasmagoric and lexicon. For me it was just a wonderful time to be sitting and interacting with someone I loved in the only way that was possible in 1969.

Easy to Be Hard, Jean, Oh What A Night, Hurt So Bad, Sugar, Sugar, Get Together, What Kind of Fool Do You Think I am, This Girl Is a Woman Now,  Bobby Sherman’s Little Woman, Nilsson’s Everybody’s Talking were the top 10 on KHJ

Additional Material

 Cypress College is a community college located in Cypress, California. Opened on September 12, 1966 the campus was designed by architect Frank Lawyer of the Austin, Texas-based firm Caudill Rowlett Scott. It features several futuristic looking buildings set around a central lake. The Cypress College campanile is an architectural feature with a long history. Campaniles were originally built as detached bell towers in Italy. The Leaning Tower of Pisa is a campanile. Today, a campanile is a freestanding tower that can found on many college and university campuses. We invite you take a walk around our campus to appreciate the many views of the campanile. Then stop by the Student Center and companion Bookstore buildings wrapped around the base of the Cypress College campanile. The college is noteworthy in that it has never completely abandoned the style of buildings it was initially created with. The school's new library, which opened on January 30, 2006, still bears heavy resemblance to the school's original buildings, though the use of concrete is de-emphasized in favor of glass. Daniel Walker was college president from 1966-1970

Cypress College operates with a decentralized approach of separate academic "divisions," allowing the benefits of both a small and large college campus. Each of the campus' instructional buildings was designed with a commons area where students with similar majors could meet and study. A House system is planned for Cypress Junior College, California, for an expected enrollment of 12,000. This idea of a residence hall where students live, and work together may be organized around a major field (science, engineering, arts) or for a deliberate interdisciplinary mix. Usually, a House plan brings living and learning together to complement each other, but a commuter college like Cypress must organize its Houses without benefit of dormitory life. The plan is intended, in these days of large enrollment, to minimize the impersonality of a "punch card" campus and the sense of alienation that exacerbates current student revolt. 

Each House will be in a major building (vocational technical, fine arts, library, business, humanities, sciences, physical education), near the entrance for easy access and prevention of interference with classes. It will be a complete student center and, depending on size and interest, will include food services, lounges, library reference and browsing material, seminar rooms, study areas, possibly audio-tutorial systems, a House manager, student government offices, space for leisure-time activities (music, sports), bookstore, and barbershop. House spirit and pride will be achieved by participation in House government, social and cultural activities, vocational and personal counseling, and the chance to enjoy diverse opportunities. A few disadvantages are anticipated, but it is felt they will be solved without great difficulty. (HH)

12 September 1969 Friday

My first day at Cypress began at 10:00 a.m. with History of  Western Civilization 4 A taught by Thomas Reeve. We met in the great lecture hall across from the library. The Lecture Hall was filled my first day and this horn rimmed bespeckled mid 30's man came to the lectern and announced that he was Mr. Reeve, what his office hours were and what he expected out of his students. We were given an assignment to read over 100 pages of material by September 17 with the first test  to be given on October 3rd. I thought I was going to die because he sounded so hard, but I had no choice. I had to take his class as part of my history major and since I had such a difficult time registering, I just didn’t want to alter my schedule.  In Mrs. Yamada class at noon I felt really stupid because I didn’t even know what Rhetoric meant.

15 September 1969 Monday

More than half of the class had dropped Mr. Reeve’s Western Civilization class and he eased up on our reading assignment and postponed our first test until October 8. I sighed with relief.  I was not aware that this was one of the oldest ploys in the trade to reduce class size and weed out the non-serious students by announcing an ardent and over whelming class load and then when the class size let up on the assignments. I was a novice, however. I did not know these things. We were not taught these things in our “College Prep” classes at Rancho High. Neither were we taught was “Blue Book” was.

 17 September 1969 Wednesday

John and I had no classes together but we would met at the Knoll on the quad during lunch to visit and we would do things like quiz each other on learning new vocabulary. There were hardly any people going to Cypress that John and I could usually park next to each in the Bernstein House Parking Lot.

Hurt So Bad, Oh What A night, Little Woman, Easy to Be Hard, What Kind of Fool Do You Think I am, Jean, Electric Indian’s Keem-O-Sabe, This Girl is a Woman Now, Rascals’ Carry Me Back, Sugar Sugar were in the Top Ten of KHJ

 18 September 1969

The first issue of the school paper the Hoofbeat Vo.4 Issue 1 was published September 18 1969  On the front page was picture of the debacle that was registration. A caption said, “Long, Long Lines-Many Cypress students, who weren’t lucky enough to make it for pre-registration, found themselves waiting in long lines under the blazing California sun. The long lines lasted until the last day of registration September 11 and continued through the days following while students made changes in their schedules.

 A following article  called Administrators Get registration blame told of how horrible it was to register. Cypress Junior College like other colleges in the chain of higher education, must bi-annually proceed through the process f registration and counseling. In a growing  college like ours, there are many changes that must be made, new programs  that must be undertaken; problems rise and must be solved in the development period of educational registration. This is very understandable, yet detrimental, when even educational administrators plan a remote system of registration that fails to provide the students with appropriate classes and instructors in order for them to qualify for schools of higher learning.

 Students begin to ask questions for they wish to know why there is such a shortage of classes in subject areas  such as psychology, biology, geology, and political science while there are still courses open in the more developed fields of chemistry and physics.

When asked about this, assistant dean of instruction Carl Ehmann and registrar Al Root imply said; “we slipped up in our planning.”  That doesn’t really solve the problem for students who needs particular credits for his ultimate goal in his chosen field.

What happened to the pre-registration program that was started last spring to determine and evaluate the course that would be in demand?  Why did they not make more of those requested course available to the returning students? A study  of student needs and class evaluation delayed the printing of class listings until mid-summer.

Then July and August have passed; September has finally roiled around with it final registration. This finds the students fighting to obtain classes that were by popular request, supposed to have been expanded.

The unfortunate thing is that the administration had a goof solid foundation in their projected future program last spring, but no where along the way the lines of communication have certainly been fouled up.

This breakdown in planning this shortage of :demand; classes leaves a chaotic and perplexed student body  seeking a higher education in a school with a shortage of desired courses and instructors.

  There were 23  new faculty hires for 1969.  Lawrence Canova  psychology,  Eric Gruver Philosophy  Ry Hass physical education and health, and Willaim Sedano  for speech.

 Additional Material

Tiny Tim & Miss Vicky announced their engagement at the New Jersey State fair. She was 17 and he was in his 40's

19 September 1969 Friday

Today Cypress’ name was changed form Cypress Junior College to just "Cypress College"  as part of statewide  trend towards eliminating the junior college label. Cypress opened in 1966  as a Junior college with no permanent buildings but now an enrollment of 5,101 in day and night programs a 25 percent increase over last year.

20 September 1969 Saturday 

The very last Warner Bros. cartoon of the original theatrical Looney Tunes series was released called "Injun Trouble" and the made up Archies group from the comic strip had a number 1 hit with Sugar Sugar. 

24 September 1969 Wednesday

Oh What A night, Little Woman, Keem O Sabe, This Girl Is A Woman Now, Jerry Butler’s What’s the Use of Breaking Up, Hurt So Bad, Carry Me Back, Marvin Gaye’s That’s the Way Love Is, Elvis Presley’s Suspicious Minds, What Kind of Fool Do You Think I am on the Top Ten of KHJ

 25 September 1969 Thursday

The school’s newspaper the Hoofbeat  had over it’s banner the word Junior Crossed out from the name Cypress Junior College. The Board of Trustee’s decision last week to change Cypress’ name dropping the word Junior will involve many changes around campus. New sweaters will have to e knitted for the cheerleaders, new signs designed by the architects, and even Orange County department of roads will have to change their street signs. The change will take a while

 26 September 1969 Friday

I got the results back from our Guidance aptitudes and career interest test. I was so embarrassed. My highest scores were as a minister or an interior designer. In Mrs. Mellom’s Guidance Class we had to take a Vocation Aptitude Test to see where our abilities and interests lay. I don’t think those tests were accurate at all because categories such as history and art in the teaching professions weren’t listed at all. I tied on two aptitudes which were my highest interests according to the test. I could be either a minister or an interior decorator. I was so embarrassed by the results because especially back in 1969, interior decorator screamed queer. To tell me that I would make a great interior decorator was basically saying, “Yes you are queer and now we all know it.” Nowhere on the test did it suggest that I could become a commercial artist and just because I was a religious kid, I was supposed to become a minister? My church didn’t even have ministers! Well for obvious reasons I paid no attention at all to that test.

 An expenditure of $2500 for seeding and surface sprinkling of the area surround the new building was approved by the Board of Trustees last week.  Some kind of ground cover was needed immediately to keep down the dirt and dust problems on campus Permanent landscaping around the new buildings was also approved.

October 1969

October began hot and hazy. John Cunningham and I were on good terms, and I began to further ingratiate myself to him by helping him with his assignments. He didn’t seem interested in school at all and talked about dropping out of college, but I was so afraid that if he let his grades drop, he would lose his student deferment and would be drafted. The law stated that a guy had to be a full-time student with a 3.0 grade point average to maintain a deferment. So I began writing term papers for him because I felt that they were really just busy work and as smart as John was, he shouldn’t have to be bothered with mundane tasks. He was very glad to have me do them, and I enjoyed the research, so I didn’t mind. He was doubly glad when he received A’s on the papers, I was doing for him. There wasn’t anything I wouldn’t have done for John if it made his life a little better or a little easier. 

In high school he was at the top of his class, and I was at the bottom of mine so in a lot of ways I was slowly building up the self-esteem that high school had shattered. In October John Cunningham was asked to speak at a homecoming assembly at Rancho to address the senior class what College life was like after high school. I went with him set him and for the first time I actually saw John as fallible. He was not prepared for his talk, and he smirked and bragged about how much free weight he could press. I couldn’t believe it. He totally was there talking about weight lifting and how good he had gotten at it instead of all the opportunities that college life offered.

 It was about this time that like an epiphany came to me that if I was getting A’s on John’s assignments and I was getting A’s in my class work that I must be at least as bright as John Cunningham. That truly was a revelation to me but also a disappointment because for six months John seemed like a god on earth in beauty and brains.

1 October 1969 Wednesday

Little Woman, Keem-O-Sabe, SuspiciousFF Minds, What’s the Use oof Breaking Up, Sly  & The Family Stone’s Hot Fun In the Summertime, Carry Me back, That’s the Way Love Is, the Cuff Link’s Tracy, Four Seasons Oh What A night, This Girl is  a woman Now in the Top Ten on KHJ

 3 October 1969 Friday

John Cunningham and I went to the show tonight and saw “If” at the Brookhurst theater on Ball and Brookhurst. The  Tickets were $1.75. The second feature was "Festival" a documentary of the Newport Folk Festival which had Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Peter Mary and Mary and Donovan in it.  "If" was tremendous about Malcolm McDowell rebellion at British boys school. First time I saw male butts in a shower scene. 

 

6 October 1969 Monday

Mr. Reeve announced that we had to bring a Blue Book for our first exam next week. I was frantic. Was this another textbook for the class that by some clumsy oversight I had neglected to buy? I was too embarrassed by my ignorance to raise my hand in the crowded lecture Hall to ask what was a blue book. So, I timidly asked this blue jean cladded  girl next to me, “What’s a blue book?” She looked at me with a dumb founded expression as if I had asked “What school is this?” She however told me that a blue book was an examination theme booklet in which to write an essay and she I could get them at the bookstore for a nickel. So much for college preparedness.

 

8 October 1969 Wednesday

I took my first college examine today in Mr. Reeve’s class and it was a disaster. I studied and read my material but being in college for the first time I really don’t know what to study for. Mr. Reeve even announced that his tests were so hard that he graded on a curve and 80 percent was considered an A! I only got a C. which stood for crushed because that is how I feel. Anxious that they were right that I’m not able to cut college. If I flunk out or worse get kicked out, then I will probably be on the first boat to Viet Nam.

Suspicious Minds, Hot Fun In the Summer Time, The Temptations’ I Can’t Get Next to You, Little Woman, Flying Machine Smile A Little Smile For Me, Lou Christie’s I’m Gonna Make You Mine, Keem O Sabe, 5^th Dimension’s Wedding Bell Blues,  What’s the Use of Breaking Up

Cypress College had a dog named Cyp as a mascot who had strayed on campus in 1968 and soon was adopted by the student body which raised money to feed and care for him “Find a quiet out of the way spot on campus with a person sitting alone, obviously struggling with a personal problem and sitting next to him staring out at the same direction he is, will be a mangy gray dog unobtrusively lending moral support.

 

9 October 1969 Thursday

The Hoofbeat came out today.  There's going to be national protest next Wednesday against the war. The United States National Guard is called in to control demonstrations involving the radical Weathermen, in connection with the "Chicago Eight" Trial. 

 10 October 1969 Friday

Dedication ceremonies for the new $6 million Cypress Junior College  held as part of the states bicentennial. Cypress College to Mark Growth in Dedication Friday  LA Times 9 Oct 69 Library Complex – The Cypress College library , a four story building, includes the library itself on two floors, one floor to handle storage and offices and another for lectures and class rooms “Cypress- Once the land was farms and pastures with dairy cattle roaming on it. Three years ago it became the site of the Cypress College and contained temporary , movable classrooms and administrative offices. Today that same 107 acres is a modern complex of educational buildings highlighted by a 120-foot missile like campanile.

Friday these buildings will be formally dedicated at 2 p.m. Visitors to the campus will be able to tour the new gymnasium and locker rooms, the Fine Arts Building, a fourstory  library  and the Vocational-Technical Building. Final Campus Layout. As the Campus is completed it will include  men’s gymnasium in 1972 and the existing gym will then be used exclusively by the women; a Community Service Center and a Humanities Building in 1976; an Administration Building in 1974 and the second Vocational Technical Building in 1975.  Approximately 17,000 students will attend Cypress in 1976. The enrollment now 5,146.

The Fine Arts Building is set away from the other units. It is a three-story 64,843 square foot structure and houses the music, art, English, and the theater arts departments. A recital room located on the third floor is to be used by the Theater Arts and music classes. There are numerous workshops and classrooms throughout the building.

Repair, Body Shops- The Vocational-Technical Building contains body and repair shops fpr automobiles, a welding shop, and lounge. The second floor holds the journalism and photography departments, the stewardesses-hostess classes and the refrigeration-air conditioning space class.

            Dr. Daniel Walker, college president, said the new photographic facilities are the most complete of any junior college. There are two studios, a large darkroom for classes, a photo display area, individual darkrooms and a workroom.  

            A 50 meter pool, originally schedules or completion in time for Friday’s dedication had been delayed indefinitely because of the recent plumber’s strike

            On campus is a 17,000-square foot Pomd but it is not used for swimming. The pond serves primarily for landscaping but is also used as a source of water for lawns and shrubs on campus.

The library now occupies the third and fourth floors of the new Library Buildng, with the first floor  being used  for storage and offices. A 150-seat lecture room is located on the second floor along with classrooms. The library is connected to the gymnasium and the Vocational-Technical building by a 20,104 square -foot piazza.

Unusual House Plan- Students from stewardesses-hostess classes who will serve as hostesses for the dedication, will also explain to visitors the unusual house plan in effect on Cypress campus.

            Last spring, students of the college, which was built three years ago out of temporary, moveable  buildings selected names for the first houses- Edison House for the Vocational-Technical Building; Carnegie House for the Library and Bernstein House of the Fine Arts building.

The basic idea of the House Plan, an innovation insofar as a two-year college is concerned, is that the auxiliary services of the college are decentralized and spread around the campus. Instead of the typical giant college complex with one student center, one counseling building, one library, one cafeteria, etc., the concept at Cypress developed over the past two years has these services in each of the buildings. When students registered they were assigned to a house or selected a specific house on the basis of their expressed major field.

Vocational-Technical students were assigned to the Edison House, business students to the Carnegie House; fine arts students to the Bernstein House and all all others were assigned to one of the three houses until the buildings in the other major fields are completed.

 Large Balcony area- The Edison House includes a portion of the two floors in the building  with a large balcony area overlooking the ground floor. Edison House includes lobby space, browsing area, a snack bar with dinning space on the first floor along with representative photomurals of the vocational-technical areas, and spaces for trophies and exhibits of various kinds.

The formal dedication ceremonies on Friday will be held in the gymnasium. Dr. John W. Dunn, chancellor and superintendent of the Peralta Junior College District will be the keynote speaker. Dr. Dunn is the immediate past president of the California Junior College Assn. The Cypress College concert choir, under the direction of Thomas Coleman will perform at the ceremonies.

Rep. Richard T. Hanna {D-Huntington Beach} will present a Flag that has flown over the Capitol in Washington D.C. and Assemblyman Kenneth Cory [D-Garden Grove} will present a state flag that has been raised over the Capitol in Sacramento.

The dedication ceremonies are scheduled to coincide with the City of Cypress’ celebration of California’s 200th birthday. The ceremony on campus will be followed by a fiesta and carnival at Los Alamitos Race Track.

 On Saturday , mayors of Orange County cities will join federal, state and county officials for a VIP breakfast. At 10 a.m. a parade will form at the junior college site and march to the race course. Scheduled to ride in the parade are Lt. Gov. Ed Reineck and former governors Edmund G {Pat} Brown, Goodwin Kight and Earl Warren. A carnival and other special entertainment will begin at noon ad conclude on Sunday. 

12 October 1969 Sunday

The LA Times printed a picture of the building in which I had my History of Western Civ Class with Mr. Reeves. The caption said “A New Wrinkle- Wood-Textured concrete façade of library at Cypress College looms over students walking beneath. Students above are standing on patio of the Library’s fourth floor. Campus buildings were dedicated in ceremonies Friday.

 

15 October 1969 Wednesday

The National War Moratorium was held today organized by The Cypress Student Mobilization Committee from 10 to 2. .

. Mr. Reeve said that he couldn’t officially say we could cut his class to attend but he also said that he wouldn’t take attendance today if we failed to go to class. Rallies are being held nationwide for the stopping of the war in Viet Nam which has been dragging on for 5 years. Nixon ran on a peace platform in 1968 with the promise to bring peace with honor but he hasn’t kept any of his campaign promises.  Support at Cypress was small, and I heard most of the big rallies were held at Cal-State Fullerton and Long Beach. I went to the knoll where a group of students performed what they called “Guerilla Theater.” Students dressed as soldiers acted out a scene with other students dressed as Vietnamese peasants and at the end a figure came out with a death mask on and kills the soldiers and the peasants. When he took his death mask off the student was wearing another mask of President Nixon. A loud speaker system was used by those who wanted to voice their opinion of why we should get out of Viet Nam. Others read war poems and sang anti-war songs. There was also an open casket laid out on the lawn. It was great. Nothing like this in high school. Too bad John Cunningham went to class instead of joining me.

However later that night he and I went back to Cypress to hear Ray Bradbury be a guest speaker at the Artist Lecture Series held in the lecture hall at 8. The talked about the Space Age  being a Creative Challenged. The place was packed and we barely found seat together way in the back. 

Hot Fun In the Summer Time, I Can’t Get Next to You, Smile A little Smile for Me, I’m Gonna Make You mine, Suspicious  Minds, Wedding Bell Blues, R.B. Greaves’ Take a Letter Maria, Shondell’s Ball of Fire, Little Woman,  The Guess Who’s Undun, Top Ten on KHJ

 16 October 1969 Thursday

I heard some guy tried to set himself on fire to protest the war. He wasn't an enrolled student and after he was stopped he was taken for mental evaluation. People seemed excited that the "miracle" New York Mets won the World Series.  John Cunningham is into baseball but not me although last summer he and I had a bet who would win the National League West title. I picked the Atlanta Braves only because they were a Southern team and they won.

17 October 1969 Friday

Fashion Square Theaters on Imperial and Idaho in La Habra, I went to the show where they have four small screens and saw "If" again by myself.

 22 October 1969 Wednesday

Today is Grandpa Williams 67th Birthday.  

Take a Letter Maria, Wedding Bell Blues, Peggy Lee’s Is that All There Is, Smith’s Baby It’s You, Hot Fun In the Summertime, The Beatles’ Something/Come Together Top Hits on KHJ

 29 October 1969 Wednesday

In the news Supreme Court orders end to all school desegregation "at once"

Something/Come Together, Undun, Ball of Fire, Take A Letter Maria, Wedding Bell Blues, Andy Kim’s So Good together, Friend’s of Distinction’s Going In Circles, Steve Wonder's Yester-me Yester You, Yesterday,  Glen Campbell Try A little Kindness, Clarence Clearwater’s Fortunate Son/Down On the Corner Top Songs on KHJ

31 October 1969 Friday

By the end of October John began to tire of me again and my obsessive need to be around him. I bought myself my first cassette tape recorder and was amazed that I could tape songs right off the radio instead of going out and buying them. Songs that were meaningful to me then were “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes”, “Hot Fun in the Summer Time”, “Is That All There Is”, and Green-Eyed Lady”.  Sweet Judy Blues eyes really spoke to our crumbling relationship. “It’s getting to the point that I’m no fun anymore I am sorry. Don’t let the past remind us of what we aren’t now. I am lonely.”  

 November

1 November 1969 Saturday

The temperature was 87 today and I am upset that John is mad at me. Jerry Smith and I went to the show to get out and he said he really likes Golden West but I am glad I chose Cypress instead.  We went to the Cinedome 21 and saw 2001 Space Odyssey.  It was really good visually but I didn't get much of what was going on especially the ending. 

3 November 1969 Monday

Mr. Reeve gave us his 2nd examination which covered all of history to the fall of Rome. It had multiple choices, true or false, fill in the blanks, map questions as well as two essays worth half of the total score. I answered the best I could and answered everything but am apprehensive because I thought I did well on the first  test, and I hadn’t.

In the news President Richard M. Nixon addressed the nation on television and radio, asking the "silent majority" to join him in solidarity with the Vietnam War effort, and to support his policies. Vice President Spiro T. Agnew denounced the President's critics as 'an effete corps of impudent snobs' and 'nattering nabobs of negativism'.

5 November 1969 Wednesday

A cool 75 degrees today. I went to Western Civilization in the Lecture Hall and Mr. Reeve passed out our corrected  tests and handing me mine he said to me, “Little bit better than the first one, huh,” and he smiled at me and that was all. I opened my test booklet to see my score and I had 99 points! I was flabbergasted. Then Mr. Reeve after handing back all the tests said that 80 percent was still an A, but he had a student in class who had gotten 100 per cent a perfect paper. He said that in his 7 years of teaching Western Civilization no student had ever gotten a perfect score on his tests and to save his ego and reputation for having difficult tests he gave that student a 99 percent because of placing the capital of Assyria on the wrong side of the Euphrates River on the map question. He wouldn’t tell the class who the student was, but I knew it was me! After class Mr. Reeve came up to me and talked to me and said don’t worry about your grade because you know you got a 100 percent.

I never did as well on any of his other tests, but Mr. reeve gave me an A in Western Civilization and more so gave me the confidence to know that I could do college work and even excel at it. In other classes I took from him I do believe he inflated my grade just because he knew I had the potential. We also became friends after that, and Mr. reeve always bragged about his 99 percent student in his classes after that.

Something/ Come Together, Going In Circles, Yester-me, ,  Take A Letter Maria, Wedding Bell Blues, Undun, Fortunate Son/Down on the Corner,  Blood Sweat and Tears’ And When I dies,  Crosby Still’s and Nash, Suite: Judy Blue Eyes, So Good together Top Hits on KHJ. Like Neil Diamond’s Holly Holy, Peter Paul and Mary’s Leaving On A Jet Plane,  Diana Ross’ Some Day We Will be Together, Stem’s Na, Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye

6 November 1969 Thursday

Looking around the campus you ca see a new green in the form of grass. It is a fibrous material sprayed on the ground mulch composed of paper fiber, green dye and wild grass sees.  The main purpose of putting down this is to keep the dust down and try to cultivate the grass ideally

9 November 1969  Sunday

In the news a bunch of Indians seized Alcatraz Island inspiring a wave of renewed Indian pride and government reform. The weather is really cooling off. It was only 70 today. I have a paper due tomorrow in my Rhetoric class. 

10 November 1969 Monday

The term seems to be going faster now that I have the hang of it. I haven't really done much except go to classes and hang around John when he lets me. I haven't net any other kids here yet. I suppose I am in the library too much between my long breaks between classes.

11 November 1969  Tuesday

Today was Veteran's Day so I didn't have to go to Volleyball. However John Cunningham and I went to controversial Art exhibit in the Bernstein House that some found pornographic because they had some paintings of nude figures. President Walker was pushed by critics to censor the exhibit but instead had the faculty vote on keeping the controversial art or taking them down. 

12 November 1969 Wednesday

It was really warm today which is unusual for this time of year. It was 86 degrees out. Hot one day and cold the next.

“Something/ Come Together”, “Fortunate Son/Down On the Corner”, “And When I Die”, “Going In Circles”, “Yester-me yester-you, Yesterday”, “Leaving On A Jet Plane”, “Undun”, “Take A Letter Maria”, “Wedding Bell Blues”, “Someday We’ll Be Together” are top songs on KHJ

14 November 1969 Friday

I went to all my classes. Mrs. Fouste is having us read the NAKED APE. In the news NASA launched Apollo 12 with Astronauts Pete Conrad, Richard Gordon, and Alan Bean as the second manned mission to the Moon.

15 November 1969  Saturday

In the News a half a million protestors against the Vietnam War staged a peaceful demonstration in Washington, including a symbolic "March Against Death". Janis Joplin, was accused of vulgar and & indecent language in Tampa, Florida

It rained off and on today but mostly in the evening and supposed to rain some more tomorrow.  Since Andy Cunningham has been home John doesn't want to do much with me. 

19 November 1969 Wednesday

Yesterday High Santa Ana winds  some around 50 miles an hour made it miserable. Today its just windyin the news Apollo 12 astronauts Charles Conrad and Alan Bean landed at Oceanus Procellarum ("Ocean of Storms"), becoming the third and fourth humans to walk on the Moon.

KHJ’s top Ten were “Something”, “Some Day We’’ Be Together”, “And when I Die”, “Leaving Ona Jet Plane”, “Yester-me, Yester-you, Yesterday”, “Fortunate Son/Down on the Corner”, “Going In Circles”, “Kiss Him Goodbye”, The Originals’ “Baby I’m For Real”,  and Suite: Judy Blue Eyes

21 November 1969 Friday

The rains came in late November John and I had a terrific fight because I was spending too much time at his home on Capri Street and John wouldn’t see me or have anything to do with me. I was heartbroken. The only real memory I have of November is driving around at night on the freeways in the rain to be by myself and out of the house. On many of these nights the rained poured and I would drive aimlessly, directionless. I just had to be by myself so I could cry and think. I was in a terrible depression and the song that played on the radio over and over was Suspicious Minds by Elvis Presley. Other times in the rain I went to the near empty Knotts Berry Farm Ghost Town in the rain. One could wander around and be melancholy like a ghost.

The news was a shocker as the United States Senate voted down President Nixon’s Supreme Court nominee Clement Haynsworth, the first such rejection since 1930.  He was nominated to replace Abe Fortas who was forced to resign.

22 November 1969 Saturday

Six years ago President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas.

23 November 1969 Sunday

There was a bright Full Moon tight. Kind of amazing knowing that there men on the moon not just the "Man in the Moon" 

24 November 1969 Monday

More yjam 2 inches of rain has fallen in the past few days

The Apollo 12 spacecraft splashed down safely in the Pacific Ocean, ending the second manned mission to the Moon.

26 November 1969 Wednesday

It was windy today but there's a four day weekend starting tomorrow with Thanksgiving. 

“Some Day We’ll Be Together”, “Leaving On A Jet Plane”, “Come Together”, “And When I Die”, “Kiss Him Goodbye”, “Baby I’m For Real”,  “Fortunate Son/Down on the Corner” “Yester-Me, Yester-you, Yesterday”,  “Going In Circles”, and Tommy Roe’s “Jam Up and Jelly Tight”,

The songs I really like that are being played now are 3 Dog Night’s “Eli’s Coming” and Ferrante & Teicher’s “Midnight Cowboy.”

27 November 1969 Thursday Thanksgiving

School is out for the next two days. Mom fixed a big Turkey dinner and Donna and Terry came over. Bonnie and Bill went over to Grandma's instead because Grandpa had a cold and didn't want to go out.  The weather was really nice in the mid 80's.  James is almost a year old now and is really getting big. 

December

1 December 1969 Monday

My baby nephew James turned 1 year old today. John Cunningham came to me and said he needed some help on a term paper in his political science which he didn’t do over the Thanksgiving break. So I wrote a paper for him, and he was so glad that it broke the ice between us again. He must have missed me because we started hanging around again, having our long discussions about the meaning of life and philosophy. I even began spending my evenings again on Capri Street where John and I would go for long walks with his German Shepherd Schulz. We’d walk to Gilbert Elementary and then down to Mr. Donut at the Orange County Plaza. I didn’t care what we talked about as long as we were together. We became in separatable again.

In the News the first draft lottery in the United States was held since World War II.  The days of the year, represented by the numbers from 1 to 366 (including Leap Year Day), were written on slips of paper and the slips were placed in plastic capsules. The capsules were mixed in a shoebox and then dumped into a deep glass jar. Capsules were drawn from the jar one at a time.

The first day number drawn was 257  which was September 14, so all registrants with that birthday were assigned lottery number 1. Men of draft age, those born between 1944 and 1950, whose birthday fell on the corresponding day of the year would all be drafted at the same time. Only the first 195 birthdates drawn in the 1969 lottery were called to serve. The last date called was September 24.

2 December 1969 Tuesday

I have been watching Dark shadows again lately when I get home from school. I didn’t use to like it but now I do.

3 December 1969 Wednesday

Someday, Leaving On A Jet Plane, Baby I’m For Real, Come Together, Kiss Him Goodbye, When I Die, Jam Up and Jelly Tight, Dusty Springfield’s A Brand New Me, Mel & Tim Back Field In Motion, Down On the Corner are the top songs on KHJ

4 December 1969 Thursday

John Cunningham and I decided to go the show and went to the Huntington Beach Cinema and saw the Sterile Cuckkoo featuring Liza Minelli and Wendall Burton. Minelli is Judy Garland’s daughter.  I really loved this show about two kids going off to college or the first time and falling in love. I really identified with Pookie and Wendell Burton reminds me of John’s bother Andy Cunningham.

In the news Black Panther Party members Fred Hampton and Mark Clark are shot dead in their sleep during a raid by 14 Chicago police officers.

 6 December 1969 Saturday

I went to the show by myself to see Krakatoa East of Java at the Cinemaland Theater on Harbor Blvd. I couldn’t get anyone to go with me so I went to a matinee by myself . the second feature was Ring Bright Water.

10 December 1969 Wednesday

Some Day, Baby I’m For Real, Leaving On A Jet Plane, Kiss Him Good by,  Jam Up and Jelly Tight, BJ Thomas’s Raindrops Keep Fallin On My Head, Eli’S Coming,  Come Together,  Gladys Knight's Friendship Train, and Billy Joe Royal Cherry Hill Park, are the top songs on KHJ

12 December 1969 Friday

 There was a discussion about the Vietnam War at the Knoll today from 10 and until 2 and I skipped classes to attend. It was a Free Forum to debate the Pro and Cons of withdrawing from Vietnam.  A guy from the National Liberation Alliance and the editor of the Hoofbeat with some others facilitated the forum

15 December 1969 Monday

Because of dense fog there was a major car crash pile up involing 150 cars and the highway patrol said turned the freeway for a mile into a "junkyard." 

17 December 1969 Wednesday

Some Day, Raindrops, Jam Up, Leaving On A Jet Plane,  Baby I’m For Real,  Kiss Him Goodbye,  Eli’s Coming,  Cherry Hill Park, Midnight Cowboy, Shocking Blue’s Venus top songs on KHJ

18 Dec 1969 Thursday

Stayed home and watched TV with Mom and Dad. Carol Burnetts Christmas special came on at 8 and she had Big Crosby as her guest. Afterwards at nine tonight I watched the Bob Hope Christmas special tonight also with Mom and Dad. I still like Bon Hope although he’s not as funny as he used to be- I like the song "War is Over! If You Want It, Happy Christmas from John & Yoko"

19  December 1969 Friday

I received a Christmas Card from Pamela Husky. She gave me the nick name “Freddy” so that is how she addressed me. She called herself “Winnie”

“Dear Freddy Sorry haven’t written , It seems the whole year  I’ve beet plain lazy. My grades have been  showing it too. Well how are you? How is college? Hope it isn’t too rough. What have you planned to major in?  Oh guess what! Buddy ‘s getting married to Joanne Peyton. The wedding is January. You should receive your invitation sometime this month. I hope you can work something out and maybe get to come down. Boy, I sure have been bored this year. Wish you were here. School is so confusing. We’re always having something to complain about. Like now we can’t go into the halls before school or we get a demerit. To me that is immature. It seems that it isn’t the teenagers they’re having trouble with, it’s the parents. Oh before I forget, write me and tell me what you need and want for Christmas. God Bless You. Be Good Love  Winnie.”

 22 December 1969 Monday

Cypress shut down for Christmas Vacation and I am out of school for the rest of the year. Jerry Smith called and wanted to go to the show so we went to see Barbra Streisand in “Funny Girl” playing in New Port Beach. I liked it but Jerry who really likes musicals really liked it.

23 December 1969 Tuesday

John Cunningham and I went to the show and saw “I am Curious Yellow” at the Stanton Theater at 11300 Beach Boulevard. It was rated X and very controversial because of the Supreme Courts’ decision that it was not obscene and they allow it to be shown even if it is pornographic. If Jackie Onassis can go see it I figured we ought to also. It was mostly boring, talking about Swedish politics while people screwed and this one chick gave her boyfriend a blow job. Surprised they had a clip of Martin Luther King in it when he visited Sweden. Roger Ebert the film critic called the film "a dog and anti-erotic". I agree however it was thrilling seeing it with John in the dark and hoping it cause him to be excited..

Additional Material 

The film was the 12th most popular film in the United States and Canada in 1969 and the highest-grossing foreign-language film in the United States and Canada of all-time. It was number one at the US box office for two weeks in November 1969.

 24 December Wednesday

I read in in the paper the police raided the Stanton Plaza  for showing I am Curious {Yellow). Armed with a search warrant the cops confiscated six reels of film. I guess yesterday while John and I were at the Stanton Theater, the police raided the Balboa Theater in Newport Beach. Some newly appointed judge named by Governor Reagan ordered the film seized as obscene. No one was arrested  but the theater will be charged with exhibiting obscene material .

I went with the family over to Grandma and Grandpa Williams for Christmas Eve. Even Wallace and Mattie Lee was there out from Texas. Only Frances Ann and Eddy came with their two kids. They were 2nd cousins to James. Others there were Bonnie and Bill with Larry, Milton and Marie with Stephanie and Gregory and it was Aunt Minnie's 40th birthday. Grandpa had fixed his Texas Chili and Grandma made a lot of pies. Charline and I didn't stay long andI drove her and James back to the house. Donna and Terry never showed up. Probably fighting.

Raindrops, Jam Up and Jelly Tight, Some Day, Led Zeplin’s Whole Lot of Love,  Eli’s Coming,  Venus, Theme from Midnight Cowboy,  Cherry Hill Park, Kiss Him Good bye, Baby I’m, For Real are the hit songs on KHJ

25 December 1969 Thursday

Mom fixed a ham for dinner after James opened all his presents. Donna and Terry came over but didn't stay long. It was announced that there is supposedly a 24 hour Cease Fire in Vietnam for Christmas.

26 December 1969 Friday

John Cunningham and I went to the show and saw Viva Max with Peter Ustinov in it. He played a Mexican general who invaded  Texas too reclaim the Alamo. In the news President Nixon landed in El Toro  then went to his  Western White House in San Clemente.

31 December 1969 Wednesday

I ended the turbulent year 1969 by going to the show on New Year Eve with John Cunningham and his older brother Andy. We went to the Newport Edward Cinema and saw Katherine Hepburn in “The Madwoman of Chaillot.” I was hoping it would be as wonderful as Lion in Winter, but it wasn’t. However, I was happy to end the 1960’s and ring in the 1970’s with John even if I had to share him with his brother. Earlier when I had talked to Jerry Smith, he was really sad to see the Sixties go because he said they really were the decade in which he came to age.  So ends a decade and I wonder what the 70's will bring. Peace I hope

•           The Madwoman of Chaillot is a 1969 American satirical comedy-drama film made by Commonwealth United Entertainment and distributed by Warner Bros.-Seven Arts. It was directed by Bryan Forbes. The film stars Katharine Hepburn with Paul Henreid, Oskar Homolka, Yul Brynner, Richard Chamberlain, Edith Evans, Donald Pleasence, John Gavin, Margaret Leighton, Charles Boyer, and  Danny Kaye. The story is of a modern society endangered by power and greed and the rebellion of the "little people" against corrupt and soulless authority.

KHJ’s Raindrops, Jam Up and Jelly Tight, Whole Lot of Love, Venus, Cherry Hill Park, Some Day We’ll Be Together, Eli’s Coming, Midnight Cowboy,  Bobby Sherman’s La, La, La If I Had You, Rick Nelson She Belongs to you.

The growth of Orange County during the 1960's saw the population double from 700,000 in 1960 to 1,400,000 at the end of the decade. My home city of Garden Grove when from 84,000 to 122,000. Huntington Beach exploded from 11,000 to 105,000. I went from being 8 years old to 18 years old.  We were a young county with the median age being only 26 years.

            Music was an extremely important part of my life in 1969 as that many of the songs reflected my unrequited love for John Cunningham. In 1969 there wasn’t as many venues for hearing music. Primarily we listened to it on the radio either at home or in our vehicles. There were a few dance shows on TV like American bandstand but to keep the music that meant so much to us we had to buy either the albums or the 45 Records. However in 1969 a personal cassette player came on the market that allowed us to tape songs right off the radio.

            From KHJ’s Wednesday tabulations those were the songs most often played  over the course of the year and were heard the most frequently. There were only four songs that were on the charts for 11 weeks, almost three months. They were Jr. Walker and the All Star’s “What Does It Take to Win Your Love For Me”, The Archies “Sugar, Sugar”, Creedence Clearwater’s “Down On the Corner” and the Beatles’ “Come Together.”  I hated Sugar, Sugar and was upset that it was listed as the number one song for all of 1969.

            Five songs were played for 10 weeks. They were “Crystal Blue Persuasion”, “Green River”, “Easy to Be Hard”, Na, Na Na, hey, Hey, Kiss Him Goodbye”, and “Some Day We’ll be Together.”

For 9 weeks KHJ played “Jam Up and Jelly Tight”,  “Aquarius/Let The Sunshine In”, “Good Morning Starshine”, “Love Me Tonight”, “Theme from Romeo and Juliet”, “Put A little Love In Your Heart” “Soul Deep”, “Jean” “What Kind Of Fool Do You Think I Am”, “Every Body’s Talking”, “This Girl Is a Woman Now,” “Oh What A Night”, “Carry Me Back,” “What’s The Use of Breaking Up”, “Little Woman”, “I’m Gonna Make You Mine”, “Suspicious Minds”, “Baby I’m For Real”, “Leaving On a Jet Plane”, “Take A Letter Maria”, “Wedding bell Blues”, and “Hot Fun In the Summer Time.”

These were the songs that were on KHJ’s charts for 8 weeks; “Crimson and Clover”, “Dizzy”, “You Made Me so Very Happy,” “Hair”, “Grazing In the Grass”, The Rascal’s “See”, “Baby I Love You”, the Winston’s “Color Him Father”, “In the Year 2525”, “Ruby Don’t Take Your Love to Town,” “Laughing”, Motherlode’s “When I Die”, “Get Together,” “Hurt So Bad”,  “Tracy”, “Baby, It’s You,” “Ball of Fire”, “Cherry Hill Park”, “And When I Die”, “A Brand New Me”,  Stevie Wonder’s

“Yester-me, Yester-You, Yesterday”, Neil Diamond’s “Holly Holy”, “Undun”, and “Smile A Little Smile For Me.”

            Songs that were popular with me but did not last but 7 Weeks were Stevie Wonder’s “My Cherie Amour,” Spiral Staircase;’s More today than Yesterday, and Johnny Cash’s “A Boy Named Sue” only last 6 weeks and Mary Hopskin’s “Goodbye"  for 5 weeks