The battle for People’s Park: round one (Episode 1 of 8)

A documentary of Bloody Thursday, May 15, 1969, in Berkeley when the University of California built a fence around a plot of land it owned which had been changed from a muddy lot to a People’s Park by members of the community. Students and other supporters of the user-developed park demonstrated on campus and Telegraph Avenue to protest the University’s actions. Police were called to disperse the demonstrators and shotguns, as well as tear gas, were used. This program was produced from tapes of the live coverage of the events of May 15 by Carol Amyx and Don Kaufman, and it is narrated by Carol Amyx. The program aired a year after the incident, as part of a series of programs on Pacifica Radio’s KPFA-FM examining what happened that day. Features speeches by the Reverend Dick York, from the Berkeley Free Church, and Dan Siegel, president of the Associated Students of UC Berkeley, as well as audio of the march as it proceeded from Sproul Plaza towards People’s Park (narrated by Denny Smithson). Tape ends with Malvina Reynolds performing “God Bless the Grass.”
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