Enjoying a solo game of Chicago 68 by the Dietz Foundation. #chicago68
Daley says, “If the attorney general goes along with us I think we will expose” Rennie Davis, Tom Hayden, Jerry Rubin, the Mobe, “and we’ll also include some of McCarthy’s friends.” Johnson cautions that his attorney general, Ramsey Clark, “doesn’t see this the way you and I see it.” #chicago68 2/2
9/7/1968: In a phone call with President Johnson, Mayor Daley discusses prosecuting protesters under the new federal anti-riot law, which Johnson had signed in April. “I think we got the dope on them once and for all on conspiracy to riot,” says Daley. #chicago68 1/2
During Convention Week, 308 Americans were killed and 1,144 more were injured in the war in Vietnam. #OTD1968 #chicago68
The police department reported that 192 officers were injured, with 49 officers seeking hospital treatment. #OTD1968 #chicago68
The arrest count for Convention Week disturbances is 668. Some number of protestors had injuries, with hospitals reporting they treated 111 protestors. The on-the-street medical teams from the Medical Committee for Human Rights estimated that their medics treated over 1,000. #OTD1968 #chicago68
8/30/1968 About 5am Chicago police raid a McCarthy campaign suite on the 15th floor of the Hilton, because objects were thrown from the windows. A relatively small incident escalates as more rooms of McCarthy workers are entered and several people are hit with nightsticks. #OTD1968 #chicago68
Dick Gregory invites all the demonstrators to his house, which happens to be in the direction of the Amphitheatre. This too is turned back, at 18th Street. #OTD1968 #chicago68 2/2
8/29/1968 Senator Eugene McCarthy addresses about 5,000 gathered in Grant Park. Several attempts are made to march to the Amphitheatre. A group of delegates try to lead a march but are turned back with tear gas. #OTD1968 #chicago68 1/2
8/28/1968 When the convention adjourns for the day, 500 antiwar delegates march from the Amphitheatre to the Hilton; many join the 4,000 protesters in Grant Park. Again, protesters are allowed to stay in the park all night. #OTD1968 #chicago68
8/28/1968 Channing Phillips, who had headed the RFK campaign in the District of Columbia, becomes the first African American formally nominated for president by a major political party. He receives 67.5 votes. Hubert H. Humphrey wins the party's nomination on the first ballot. #OTD1968 #chicago68
8/28/1968 At the Amphitheatre, presidential nominations are underway. Abraham Ribicoff, in his speech nominating George McGovern, denounces "Gestapo tactics on the streets of Chicago." Mayor Daley's shouted reaction was on-camera, but off-mike. Lip-readers decode obscenities. #OTD1968 #chicago68
The melee last about seventeen minutes and is filmed by the TV crews positioned at the Hilton. It was seen by the nationwide audience watching the convention coverage, as well as by delegates watching monitors at the convention hall. #OTD1968 #chicago68
8/28/1968 Deputy Police Superintendent James Rochford orders the police to clear the streets. Demonstrators and bystanders are clubbed, beaten, maced, and arrested. Some fight back and the attack escalates. #OTD1968 #chicago68 1/2
Thousands surge onto Michigan Avenue. Coincidentally, the mule train of Ralph Abernathy's Poor People's Campaign, which has a permit to go to the Amphitheatre, is passing. At Michigan and Balbo the crowd is halted again. Only the mule train is allowed to continue. #OTD1968 #chicago68 3/3
After an hour of negotiation, the march line begins to break up. Protesters try to cross over to Michigan Avenue, but the Balbo and Congress bridges have been sealed off by National Guardsmen armed with .30 caliber machine guns and grenade launchers. #OTD1968 #chicago68 2/3
8/28/1968 At rally's end Dellinger announces a march to the Amphitheatre, while Hayden urges the crowd to move in small groups to the Loop. 6,000 join the march line, but, since it has no permit and the police refuse to allow it to use the sidewalks, the march does not move. #OTD1968 #chicago68 1/3
Police move in again. A line of MOBE marshals is formed between the police and the crowd. Police charge the marshal line. Rennie Davis is clubbed unconscious. #OTD1968 #chicago68
Then a group, including at least one undercover police officer, completes the flag lowering and raises a red or blood-splattered shirt. #OTD1968 #chicago68 2/3
8/28/1968 In the Convention at the Amphitheatre, the peace plank proposed for the Democratic party platform is voted down.
At the bandshell rally, news of defeat of the peace plank is heard on radios. A young man begins to lower the American flag flying near the bandshell. #OTD1968 #chicago68 1/3
8/28/1968 10-15,000 gather at the Grant Park bandshell for the MOBE's antiwar rally. Dellinger, Gregory, Ginsberg, Norman Mailer, Jerry Rubin, Carl Oglesby, Hayden, and many others speak. 600 police surround the rally on all sides. . #OTD1968 #chicago68
8/27/1968 At Grant Park, in front of the Hilton, where the television cameras are, 4,000 demonstrators rally to speeches by Julian Bond, Davis, and Hayden. Mary Travers and Peter Yarrow sing. The crowd is allowed to stay in Grant Park all night. #OTD1968 #chicago68
8/27/1968 In Lincoln Park, 200 clergy and lay church people, toting a 12-foot cross, join 2,000 protesters to remain in the park past curfew. Again, tear gas and club-swinging police clear the park. Many head south to the Loop and Grant Park. #OTD1968 #chicago68
8/27/1968 "Unbirthday Party for LBJ" convenes at the Chicago Coliseum. Performers & speakers include Ed Sanders, Abbie Hoffman, Jean Genet, William Burroughs, Dick Gregory, Allen Ginsberg, Phil Ochs, and Rennie Davis. 2,000 later march from the Coliseum to Grant Park. #OTD1968 #chicago68
/27/1968 About 7pm Black Panther Party Chairman Bobby Seale speaks in Lincoln Park. He urges people to defend themselves by any means necessary if attacked by the police. #OTD1968 #chicago68
This is the only march of Convention Week that gets anywhere near the Amphitheatre--it also gets very little publicity. #OTD1968 #chicago68 3/3
The police stop the march at 39th & Halstead, about half-a-mile north of the Amphitheatre. The marchers set up a picket line and remain in place until 10am the next morning. They are then ordered to disperse & 30 resisters are arrested. #OTD1968 #chicago68 2/3
8/27/1968 At 1pm in Chicago, 200 members of the American Friends Service Committee and other pacifist groups leave a near-northside church to march to the Amphitheatre. Joined by others along their route, the marchers eventually number about 1,000. #OTD1968 #chicago68 1/3
Like Sunday night, street violence ensues. But it is worse. Some area residents are pulled off their porches and clubbed. More reporters are attacked this night than at any other time during the week. #ODT1968 #chicago68