1968: Week 35
Posted on August 21, 2008
Filed Under Culture, Main | Leave a Comment
Weekly timeline for 1968: A year of change and tumult
August 26: Mayor Richard Daley opens the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. While the convention gets ready to nominate Hubert Humphrey for president, thousands of antiwar demonstrators take to Chicago’s streets to protest the Vietnam War. The city’s police attempt to enforce an 11 o’clock curfew. On that Monday night demonstrations are widespread, but generally peaceful.
August 26: Kay Francis dies at 63 in New York.
August 27: Anti-war organizer Tom Haden is beaten up, put in a paddy wagon and whisked off to Chicago’s Cook County Jail.
August 28: Chicago police take action against crowds of demonstrators without provocation. The police beat some marchers unconscious and send at least 100 to emergency rooms while arresting 175. Mayor Daley explains at a press conference the next day: “The policeman isn’t there to create disorder, the policeman is there to preserve disorder.” The next time the Democrats hold a convention in Chicago, in 1996, some police officers wear t-shirts proclaiming, “We kicked their father’s butt in ’68 and now it’s your turn.”
August 30: The Beatle’s record “Hey Jude,†their first record under the Apple label.
August 30: William Talman, best know as Hamilton Burger, the district attorney on the “Perry Mason†show, dies of lung cancer at age 53 in Encino, California.
September 1: Democratic nominee Hubert Humphrey kicks off his presidential campaign at New York City’s Labor Day parade.
Films about the events during and after the 1968 Chicago Convention:
“Medium Cool“(1969) Haskell Wexler filmed this combination of cinema verité/fictionall story on the streets of Chicago during the convention. Breathtaking portrayal of the events of August 1968.
“Conspiracy: The Trial of the Chicago 8“ (1987) Directed by Jeremy Kagan; originally aired on HBO. Combines dramatization of the conspiracy trial of the original Chicago 8 with footage from the convention and new interviews of the defendants.
“American Experience: Chicago 1968“ (1996)
A documentary that looks at the “police riot†at the convention.
“Chicago 10” (2007) Directed by Brett Morgen. Highly-stylized and wildly original reinacted documentary film (since no cameras were allowed in the courthouse during the trial of the Chicago anti-war protesters), chronicling the real-life events surrounding the protest at the 1968 Democratic National Convention and the charismatic protest organizers brought to trial by the city. Told through a visually-arresting animation style and a bold use of archival footage and music.
Sources:
The Whole World Was Watching: An oral history of 1968. A joint project between South Kingstown High School and Brown University’s Scholarly Technology Group
Timelines of History
Timeline 1968
Rock Timeline
Wikipedia Music Timeline
Frank Eugene Smitha’s Macrohistory and World Report
Comments
Leave a Reply