SATURDAY November 25, 1967_____ ______ ______ _____ THE FOLLOWING EVENTS PROBABLY HAPPENED IN SEPTEMBER 1967, OCTOBER 1967 , NOVEMBER 1967 or DECEMBER 1967: I mentioned to Ernie, the boresser, while yelling down the hall to him while he was in front of his room by the fire door that my favorite Sci Fi author was Isaac Asimov and he said he was his too, "Especially the robot stories". I had forgotten about the robot stories as I had gotten into his later stuff,,,, My roomie Grant gave me his brothers white IU jacket he said didnt fit him. It fit me fine. Now the red lettering is faded and I keep it unwashed. 9/67?,,, 'Bass Weejuns" were supposedly cool shoes,,, Frank, 'the Hippie' who wasnt, made me Welsh Rabbit in the lounge mini-kitchen. Thats how I learned what it was,,, Howard Cosell hated IU and knocked all our victories. He'd be on the overhead radio in the Wright Dining Hall knocking us nationally as we ate,,, My roomie said his mother told him it was good to brush ones tongue. I thought it wasnt worth the extra work. Some time later an article appeared in the paper saying so and he showed it to me. I said that there are many little useful things to do that dentists were always telling us but theres no time to do them all. This was the era when even 'flossing' was only done by a few,,, One night I was sitting back on my bed when all of a sudden I heard a noise and little bits of something went thru my room. There were little bits of white on the walls. Someone (Ernie?) had put a toothpaste tube under the door and stamped on it,,, I never stopped to think about how many non-whites there were in baseball and I said 10:1 and my roomie said for me to name ten for his every one. He was correct. (In the 1970s and 80s baseball really got white again for some reason and then shifted back),,, I mispronounced the word 'epitome' to him and he threw open the door and laughed and told me to shout it down the hall. I didnt. Funny how I recall my mistakes more often than that of others,,, for equality, he changed the nameplate on the door. The top name was smaller than the bottom one. You could see he would someday be a lawyer,,, I used to talk about maybe someday transferring to one of the Ivy League schools that wanted me if I didnt like it at IU but I kept liking it,,, ____________________________DECEMBER 1967__________:GENERAL DECEMBER: We were now all just waiting for Iu to go to the Rose Bowl to perhaps play USC with OJ Simpson for the national championship,,, In the cold I had noticed that guys on upper floors would hang food out their windows in net-bags as refrigerators were not yet allowed,,,, Frank drew a picture of Grants girlfriend off a photo but the mouth was fuzzy,,, Vietnam War was bigger and Dale, I believe, spent Xmas there,,, I got some free posters thru the mail from a BIG TEN magazine mainly because one was of Al Kaline. I hung them up. One was for Arnold Palmer and said Player: Palmer and my roomie at first thought it was of Gary Player of South Africa apartheid,,, I kept trying to learn to gargle and never could without choking. Still cant,,, Leslie told me they had just had a ceremony for a girl who got 'laveliered' which was some sort of big step,,, The Madrigals were this month but I was now worried about having enough money for the future,,, While boressing I got ahold of one guys key and was thinking of making a clay mold and getting a guy at the mall to make me a key but I changed my mind,,, my stomach continued to keep me awake with what would be an ulcer,,, ______FRIDAY DECEMBER 1, 1967... ______SATURDAY DECEMBER 2, 1967.... ______SUNDAY DECEMBER 3,1967:.... ______MONDAY DECEMBER 4, 1967: ..... ______TUESDAY DECEMBER 5, 1967: ..... _______WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 6, 1967:.... ______THURSDAY DECEMBER 7, 1967: PEARL HARBOR DAY:... ______FRIDAY DECEMBER 8, 1967:... ______SATURDAY DECEMBER 9, 1967:... ______SUNDAY DECEMBER 10, 1967: ...... MONDAY DECEMBER 11: _____ TUESDAY DECEMBER 12: ______ WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 13: ______ THURSDAY DECEMBER 14: ______ FRIDAY DECEMBER 15: To Eastland for that boress gift later mentioned? ______ SATURDAY DECEMBER 16:Right around here had to be the Xmas Boress Party where guys gave each other weird and insulting things as well as gold-painted Monon Railroad insult spikes. I still have mine. I went to the discount clothing store that was then at the end of the Eastland Plaza, picked out a huge pair of girls bloomers for it, and had my girlfriend carry it thru the line as I watched her talking to another female. I was too shy to carry it thru myself. Besides the spike I also got a t-shirt with 'I eat Chicago meat' on it. ______ SUNDAY DECEMBER 17: ______ MONDAY DECEMBER 18: ______ TUESDAY DECEMBER 19: ______ WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 20: CHRISTMAS RECESS BEGINS AFTER LAST CLASS.,,,,,.Nov 5,1999, Thursday....::: Indiana University SCHEDULE OF CLASSES at Bloomington SECOND SEMESTER. 1967-68... CALENDAR..... January 30, 1968, Tuesday,, Meetings..... Jan 31, Feb 1, Wednesday, Thursday,, Counseling ..... February 1,2,3 Thurs,Fri,Sat,, REGISTRATION..... MONDAY FEBRUARY 5,1968: CLASSES BEGIN, 730am..... SATURDAY FEB 10, 1968.. DROP AND ADD,,, FRIDAY MARCH 29,1968: Mid-Term Reports Due- 500pm..... FRIDAY APRIL 5,1968: SPRING RECESS BEGINS AFTER LAST CLASS..... MONDAY APRIL 15,1968: SPRING RECESS ENDS,730am,,,,, WEDNESDAY MAY 1,1968: FOUNDERS DAY, (930,1030,1130,1230 classes do not meet),,,,, SATURDAY MAY 25, 1968: CLASSES END 1215pm,,,,, SUNDAY MAY 26, 1968: REVIEW DAY,,,,, MONDAY MAY 27, 1968: EXAMINATIONS BEGIN, 745am,,,,, THURSDAY MAY 30, 1968: MEMORIAL DAY HOLIDAY,,,,, TUESDAY JUNE 4, 1968: EXAMINATIONS END: 515pm,,,,, MONDAY JUNE 10, 1968: COMMENCEMENT, 1000 am,,,,,,, OFFICES: JUNIOR DIVISION: MAXWELL HALL (Gargoyle bldg) DEANS: MADDEN, BUCHER, DAVIS, HERTWECK,,,,, REGISTRATION: FRESHMEN: THURSDAY FEBRUARY 1, 1968: 2:30 pm for names Jam-Kar at the old Fieldhouse with the huge dirt floor and desks all around. Freshmen came first along with half of Grad Students and Law Students, then Seniors the next morning and Juniors in the afternoon, then Sophomores on Saturday, Feb 3,1968 along with the other half of Grads and Law.... DROP AND ADD on Sat,Feb 10, 1968 for me would have been at 850am or later.... My FINAL EXAM SCHEDULE was MONDAY MAY, 27, 1968: none, TUESDAY, MAY 28, 1968: GERMAN: 1000am to noon,,, WEDNESDAY, MAY 29, 1968: ASTRONOMY: 745am to 945am, Ireally did well on it to pull me up and get that phone call,,,,, SATURDAY, JUNE 1,1968: CALCULUS: 745am to 945am. I also had a physical ed class but I dont know if we had a Final Exam.,,,,, FEES AND EXPENSES. (Remember: No college loans then): UNDERGRADUATE: In-state: $180 ( $1,260 in 1999 dollars), Out-of-State: ME!: $495 ( $3,465 in 1999 dollars). But remember: Jobs also PAID twice as much or more in those days). These are for ten or more hours.
I THINK THESE THINGS HAPPENED IN JANUARY 1968: GENERAL: ... ... UNDER CONSTRUCTION: putting in parts in random spots... . Some guy in a car brought me in the freezing cold and snow WAY out of town (So it seemed) to where there was a liquor store and the rules were so strict that I had to stand outside on the ice while he went in to buy liquor. And there was a guard right inside the door I could see. NYC was nothing like that. (I now know that it was the liquor store east of the mall but I did not know it then),,,, Grant had a great, expensive pair of Goodyear boots for the snow but I never found a pair out East,,, Bill was a short,wide highschool football lineman and he said that when he got in place he could be moved. He was correct, we couldnt move him. I went 'Arrgh' when I tried. He said, "Not Arggh, OORRGH",,,, Vietnam War kept getting worse and worse,,,, Bill wanted coke for his Southern Comfort. Cup machine in lounge ran out. He tried Root Beer and got REALLY sick,,, I got my Strat O Matic baseball cards and had them on my bed. Allen came in and wouldnt you know it but he squashed my GARY PETERS CARD!!. The year he had the best card in the league when he won the AL ERA title in 1966!!! I still have it with its creases!!,,, What would be my ulcer still woke me up in pain at night,,, Still avoided the stonies,,,,, The ABA was still a new league,,, Heavy industry still big in USA,,, In may have been in Jan 1968 when the guy who won Mr.IU and I walked across the campus and approached Swain Woods where we saw all the posters torn down for the contest (Was he Mr IU from the previous year or was it this contest he won?). In that era males hid any weight training they did. It was weird that in late 1967 I had made friends with the two guys I thought were far more 'studly' than I was and proably the two top guys with girls, even ahead of the guys in room 114. I have no idea why they both made friends with me. The Mr IU guy had a bit more muscle than the other guy and the other guy had a bit more money and breeding.,,,, Some guy upstairs wanted everyone to sign a big sheet of paper he put on his wall. So I signed, "Walt the Pollock" as thats how they spelled it then,,,, There was no ML King day in mid-Jan,,,,,, ___________________ ______________________ ____________________ JANUARY 1, 1968: THE ROSE BOWL!!! INDIANA VS SOUTHERN CAL. ___________________ RETURN TO COLLEGE, EARLY JANUARY. I dont recall how I got back but I very much believe it was via train. Probably the new Penn-Central if it started by then. I think this was the train where a conductor was saying, "There's a lower method of travel than this but I wont mention it" to a couple of other college students. Many were the times that I was in that Indy train station first fllor either waiting for a train or waiting after a train for a cab. Lonely wait each time. All those food stands now gone that I used to hang around alone and sip coffee.12-20-99,,, Many was the long busride via Greyhound to Bloomington with lots of other college guys back when the Greyhound wasnt just for the very poor as it is now,,, ___________________ THE SUPERBOWL___________________ FINAL EXAMS, LATE Jan 1968:: For his final exams, Frank did a pile of black boxes and got an 'A' and showed me them in his room with Bill T to kid me about it,,,,, 12-8-99 _______________ During Final Exams, the big guy who lived in 110 left to get married. I guess he finished his earlier. A bunch of guys gave him a 'present' by swiping furniture out of the huge central lounge of Wright Quad and piling it in a U-Haul for him and then waving to him as he took off. 12-20-99,,, _______________ After Final Exams we all went home between semesters. _______________________ I BELIEVE these things happened in FEBRUARY 1968:::: ... I RETURNED TO A GHOST TOWN FLOOR in early February 1968. Our floor was half the size of a regular one in the first place. But now many had FLUNKED out from all the partying by all the freshmen. Many wound up in the military and some in Vietnam. Others quit rather than be on critical-probation and have to work their way up. Others were taken out by parents when they saw how bad their grades were and how much it cost them. There were no student loans back then. The floor was so quiet and so empty. And people changed their rooms. For example, Frank the not-Hippie moved from the far end where there were only two rooms to in with Bill T across from me and one down. Others bounced around as well. The guy from Atlanta with the hankerchief collection whom the girls liked wound up in the navy. They posted the grades on the fire door and our floor GPA was below 2.00. One guy had a good laugh as they listed him as a great student as they had him for something like a 3.70 GPA when he actually got a 0.37!,,,,, I buckled down the second semester compared to the first. I recall being at my desk from the start studying and going for help with my Calculus,,,,, We still avoided the stony areas,,,,,Grant got a 1.6 and I got a 1.24,,,, The instrumental LOVE IS BLUE was a huge hit and I heard it constantly, perhaps since January,I should check and see when it first appeared in the charts,,,,,, ____________ _______________ ___________ _____________ REGISTRATION FOR NEW SEMESTER, "SPRING 1968":::: ________ __________ ____________ GERMAN CLASS: In Lindsey Hall, first fllor, right, right next to wide stair entrance. Grad student female taught us. Pretty cute but not beautiful. Later invited us all to a party at her place but I didnt go. I would tease the girl in front of me as we had oldtime inkwell desks and Id put her pigtail in mine,,,, Guy in that German class walked around campus wearing a CAPE with a red lining,,,, I usually left the class at the end by going,not out the front, but along the first floor to the end and then to the right in a zigzag that led to a back exit. I learned that by walking with someone else. It was closer to the way I was going and fewer people. Like a fire escape outside,,,, 12-20-99,,,, RFK was on the radio from Indianapolis one day when i was there and the TA brought her pocket radio for people to listen but non-Democrats complained so she taught us German instead,,,,,, I recall telling Grant what a liar RFK was because I was standing right near him in NYC in 1966 as he swore repeatedly he would fill out his whole term if elected and definitely would not run for president in 1968 and how he then went against his word and stabbed Eugene McCarthy in the back as well. Grant said something about how he couldnt tell what the future would bring and I said that RFK knew that when he gave his word. Grant surprised me by admitting I was right. Of course, Grant was no Liberal, either,,12-20-99,,, Was also a guy on campus who had a unicycle,,,, ASTRONOMY CLASS A202, Dr. Honeycutt. So now I think there were about half as many students left in Astro as before but I may be wrong. I know I really pulled a 'B' out of my a-- by doing so well on the Final for A201 the last semester. Hell, I couldnt flunk out after one semester or change my major when i went all the way out to Indiana JUST for the Astro Dept. If not for that it would have been much cheaper and easier to go to Penn state. I recall the first day Dr Honeycutt walked into class. He seemed so shy about it I wondered if it was the first course he ever taught. I had no idea that grad students taught courses and that he must have taught something before. I never really thought about what my German recitation TA was. But Dr. H came in the front door so shyly I thought he was going to scrape along the doorjam. And he had a big shy smile on his face. Well, Prof. Burkhead was a real nice guy so I figured we had another one here. Of course, I still sucked as a student. I was nOTHING compared to what I had been in the 1950s when I was Mister Whiz Kid. I had had virtually NO attention span since January 1959. My attention span from birth to age 9 was fantastic for anyone, especially a kid, but the constant daily fear and brutalization from 2/59 until 1964 knocked it out of me. It was totally amazing that I could still pull those tests out when I was constantly in such a swirling, fog-like state of mind that I couldnt focus on much of anything. I repeatedly did not touch my notes or books until I was cornered with a test the next day. Then I'd be so scared my attention span would finally click-in and I'd catch up with so much at once. When I did not have a test the next day I couldnt think straight at all. My mind was in a fog bouncing all over the place and constantly worrying and i would read with near-zero understanding and my mind extremely depressed and I just had to go out and walk, walk, walk as fast as I couldfor hours as i had done since 1959 at age 9. But when scared, everything quickly clicked into place for SURVIVAL although I did not leave myself enough time to actually work any problems to see where the tricks and traps and exceptions were. It was the same way in my classes. Back in Brooklyn I was the real whiz-kid in those days BEFORE being terrorized by a mentally ill teacher and her New York City hoodlums. I had hung onto every word the normal teachers had said and i blew thru everything easily. But since moving to Astoria and living in that daily Hell all I could think of in classes was survival and getting away from being surrounded by other people. That need to get away from the classroom stuck with me forever. I couldnt wait for the bell to get out and swiftly walk and walk and walk and try to calm down.,,, age 18,, early 1968,,,
I THINK these things happened in MARCH 1968:::... I was standing at my door either just before or after lunch and someone got pushed into me and my key broke off in the door and I had to wait to get it fixed,,,, I was still buying those weird monthly "MU" books about a Lost Continent I had never heard of,,, My stomach still woke me up in pain, I still worried a lot,,, This MAY have been the month I went to the dentist in a hurry. I have NO idea when it was other than it was either very late 1967 or in the first few months of 1968. I woke up once and there was blood on my pillow! I thought it had something to do with the weird pains in my stomach. But it may also have something to do with my mouth. I dont call if it was in the morning or after a nap. I then looked up a dentist in the phone book who was somewhere I recognized. He was upstairs at the WORKINGMANS building which had the big 'W' above it and where I had tried to open an account. I went there and the door opened to a STEEP staircase. I went up and there were dentists everywhere. In those days there were dentists, dentists,dentists where there are now lawyers. I went in and he just cleaned my teeth and maybe did something else. He told me I had better "give those teeth a good workout" and that he still didnt think I would have any teeth after the age of thirty! Yet I dont recall him saying that any work had to be done. (I had completely forgotten about being there until a return in the mid-90s when I looked in the door and suddenly recalled being there before but I couldnt recall his name, even with the help of the directory and I wasnt sure which office had been his.)..... The stonies were still the big bugaboos,,,, _______MARCH 12, 1968: LBJ gets 48% of vote in New Hampshire primary compared to McCarthy's 42%. Nixon gets 79%,,,,, _______MARCH 13, 1968: RFK says now assessing running aginst LBJ,,,,, _______MARCH 14,1968: RFK says wont support LBJ,,,,, _______MARCH 16: RFK announces candidacy,,,,, _______MARCH 31,1968: LBJ announces he will not seek another term!! I was in Bills room sitting on the bed by the hall-wall and the TV was to my left. We never expected it. there were a bunch of us in there and all of a sudden LBJ says he wont run again and people went "What??!! What did he say????" And we couldnt believe it. He probaly would have been renominated and had a good chance of being re-elected. (Maybe I was sitting on the end of the bed by the door),,,,, I think it was in Late March that I was in my German class at Lindley Hall and there was a big anti-war demo forming ouside. We were in the first floor classroom whose windows were just to the right going in by the wide staircase but the first floor was at the top of the stairs so they were a bit lower. They were proably there as that bldg also house ROTC which was on the top floor up the grated metal stairs that always seemed so weird to me. At the end of the class i went outside and stood at the top of the stairs. Some guy seated on the top of the very wide bannister next to me was talking and all of a sudden the biggest birdpoop imaginable hit the wide bannister right near us both and we both got splattered___________________ _____________________ ___________________________ UNKNOWN TIME: THESE THINGS COULD HAVE HAPPENED ANY TIME IN JAN/JUNE 1968: One morning I got my eggs and went to sit with some people by the windows. First thing I hear is 'Try the eggs". I sat down and they were horrendous and inedible. Like rubber. They were dehydrated or something. I dont know why. Did they run out? Was it something to do with Vietnam? I had to put my tray in the big rolling tray carrier and I saw almost noone else could eat theirs,,,,, We had wind up watches and had to set them every morning, just like many shined their shoes every night there were sort of 'traditional' times to do things,,, cabs had no ads on them to make money. Most buses did not either,,,, Vietnam was still going on and always getting worse with more and more draftees called for,,,, lots of bats would circle the Bloomington Courthouse at night,,,,, I still worried a lot and had constant insomnia,,,,, The word 'imperialism' was always heard, just like 'diversity' nowadays,,,,, 1968 was the first year that more albums were purchased than singles,,,, As shoes were American made and out of leather the thing to do was to have them re-soled and re-heeled rather than get new ones. Todays plastic sneakers did not exist yet,,12-20-99,,, We used to have CANDLELIGHT DINNERS and never could understand why as it was an all-male dorm as most of them were. It was really dark exceot for the candles and we got stake but no girls. And we had to wear ties, too. Had them in Fall 1967 as well,,,,____________________________- I THINK these things happened in APRIL 1968::::: April was the 'Monsoon Season" in Bloomington so I wouldnt be surprised if it rained 25 days that month. That was the average. ________APRIL 1,1968: This was April Fools Day so there must have been a lot of BORESSING,,,____ APRIL 2, 1968: EUGENE McCARTHY WINS THE WISCONSIN PRIMARY,,,, _______APRIL 3, 1968: LBJ meets with RFK at the White House,,,, _______APRIL 4, 1968: DR MARTIN LUTHER KING ASSASSINATED!!!. I recall the guy across the hall telling me about it and then asking my roomie what the 'negroes' would do. As if my wealthy roomie was anything like an inner-city black guy,,,, _______GENERAL APRIL 1968: Went to the cleaners on North Walnut Street with the guy in, I believe, room 109 who had money and who was good-looking and who Elsie liked. He had a car. Interestingly, I had NO idea it was there. This showed how I avoided certain area. He had a car so he was proably a sophomore. That cleaners was still there in 1994 looking the same. He had all his clothes done there, not just coats but shirts, pants etcetera. It was between the theatres of N.Walnut and 6th/7th streets and N.Walnut/10th that I knew so well yet I knew NOTHING of the streets in between. I also knew NOTHING of the streets north of 10th including a 'Roto-Lite' restaurant a half-block up,,,,, The 'radicals' were trying to get more student bulletin boards all over campus and the Administration didnt want them, especially outside. It took many years to get one in front of the Student Union outside,,,, The Peanuts comics were still going strong,as was my stomachache,,,,, Stonies still out there,,,,,
THESE MAY HAVE HAPPENED IN MAY 1968::::... My future/presemt ulcer kept me awake at night,,, still worried a lot,,, stonies still out there,,,, __________________ ___________________________ These MAY have happened in JUNE 1968:.... I needed boxes to ship my stuff back to NYC. The guy who took me to the cleaners offerred to take me to a furniture store downtown where he said the boxes were much better than the supermarkets. He even drove me down there and led me in and asked them and they trotted them right out. I guess they knew him,,,,, My gut still hurt me nightly,,, Stonies were still out there,,,, I was still the constant worrier,,,, My roomie spoke of transferring to Connecticut Wesleyan, which I had never heard of.