This Is America?: The Sixties in Lawrence, Kansas

Rating:
Summary: Somewhat simplistic, but interesting account of the decade
Review: I grew up in Lawrence, Kansas in the '60s, and attended the University of Kansas during the time of the political protests, riots, violence, and police shootings that are among the most important events recounted in this book. So it's possible that I cannot really be fair to this author. His book is a decent history of the '60s in Lawrence, and the author employs an impressive array of primary research such as letters to the newspapers, letters to congressmen, and some interviews with residents.

But something is missing. The author's contentions are that that the community was polarized, that the fundamentally conservative and "cold war" attitudes of the town were opposed to the radical outlook of the university. He is no doubt correct on that, but he offers little in the way of supporting evidence, especially about the university. I was looking for more discussion of some of the radical tendencies of the university faculty and staff--things that I remember from the time.

Lawrence, even for a midwest college town, is one of the most liberal cities in the nation, and has been for some time, arguably since its founding. The author does explore some of that history, but I found his social history lacking in detail, for exammple in delineating the differences between the local businesspeople and the university faculty, who often came from other parts of the country. Perhaps some more research into the background of the KU faculty would have made the argument more convincing.

Even the central events of the book, the police shootings of 1970, are not handled with the kind of detail I would like to have seen. I wanted some detailed analysis of what really happened--was Rick Dowdell, a kid I went to junior high school with, armed when he was shot by police? Did anyone investigate this? How did the "investigation" whatever it was, compare to what we would expect to see now in such an incident?

Another point he makes is that the threat of violence and disruption of community tranquility seems to have been effective, in accomplishing, for example, the successful opening of a municipal pool in 1969, and the creation of womens' studies and womens' services at The University of Kansas in the early '70s. Both these accomplishments followed group action tending to be unlawful or even threatening violence, but that mobilized support and opposition, eventually resulting in compromise.

I would have liked to see some more social history, including for example, the community reaction to the JFK assasination and the RFK and MLK assasinations. In other words, more general observations of the decade.

Also, since I note that there was recently a reunion of '60s radicals in Lawrence, I wonder that the author was apparently not plugged into that so as to get more information.

Incidental thoughts are that the book's index is sketchy. Photos are okay, but the local paper would have had many more that perhaps could have been used. I would liked also to have seen some information on the local draft board, and the local drug scene. One of the points that the author makes is that the "Street People" who were part of the conflicts of the 1970 acute crisis were viewed as "outsiders". I recall that many were not KU students, and were in fact part of a large drug culture, but the author seems to miss this point.