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Was 1968 a turning point?                                                                                    

Posted at: Apr/09/2009 : Posted by: mel

Related Category: Historical Insights,

There is a lot of good material out there on the historical events of 1968 and how critical they were to defining change in America. History is by its very nature a study of the past, so with 40+ years having gone by it is easy to see how many things changed in America and the world during that year. I was only 11 years old at the time so while my father had the evening news on, I honestly did not appreciate any of this in real time.

Social and political changes are continuous things much like the motion of large plates on our planet. Sometimes we get imperceptible amounts of movement and minor tremblers; sometimes the pressure builds to a critical point resulting in catastrophic events. I believe strongly that 1968 more closely resembles the later as opposed to the former.

Here is my summary list 1968 events:

Jan 22 – Rowan & Martin’s variety show Laugh-In debuts. This show included quite a bit of prime time satire on current events setting the stage for many shows to follow.
Jan 23 – North Korea captures the USS Pueblo. This event not only gave our foreign policy a black-eye, but forced many political concessions.
Jan 30-31 – The Tet offensive in Vietnam starts destroying the perception of U.S. military success in Southeast Asia.
Feb – Peggy Fleming wins Olympic gold in figure skating and becomes an icon for a new generation of skaters growing up in America.
Feb 1 – The Pulitzer for photo-journalism is given to Eddie Adams for his picture of a South Vietnamese Police Chief executing a Viet Cong officer.
Feb 8 – 3 die and 27 are injured when South Carolina highway patrolman shoot into a crowd of black college students protesting a segregated bowling alley (reference: Orangeburg Massacre).
Feb 8 – Independent and segregationist George Wallace announces he will enter the presidential race.
Feb 16 – The Beatles travel to India to visit the Maharishi Yogi significantly impacting all their future music.
Feb 19 – Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood debuts on PBS.
Feb 29 – The Grammy for album of the year goes to the Beatles “Sgt. Pepper’s lonely Hearts Club Band.
Mar 12 – The sitting president Lyndon Johnson wins the NH primary by a narrow margin over anti-war candidate Eugene McCarthy.
Mar 16 – Sen. Robert Kennedy announces he will run for the presidential Democratic nomination. This put the then dominate Democratic in a divided position of having 3 strong candidates.
Mar 16 – Under the command of Lt. William Calley, U.S. soldiers kill more than 300 Vietnamese civilians in what will later be call the My Lai Massacre.
Mar 25 – The Monkees airs its last original television episode.
Mar 31 – President Johnson announces he will not seek reelection. A few days earlier reporting live from Vietnam Walter Cronkite states that we are losing. President Johnson laments that if he has lost Cronkite, he has lost Middle America.
Apr 4 – The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. is killed sparking riots in cities all across the U.S.
Apr 10 – “In the Heat of the Night” wins five Oscars including best picture for its gritty portrayal of black/white social tension in the deep south. Katherine Hepburn win the best actress Oscar for her role in Guess Who’s Coming to Diner” which also explores similar issues from a different social strata. Exploring the sexual revolution “The Graduate” wins the best director Oscar. Hollywood is truely looking at and question the social challenges of the day. The ceremony was delayed two days for the funeral of Martin Luther King Jr..
Apr 11 – President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1968.
Apr 23 – An anti-war protest begins at Columbia University that will shut the school down for more than a week.
Apr 29 – Creating a sensation with its irreverence for the U.S. flag, profanity, and nudity, the Broadway musical Hair opens.
May 13 – The U.S. and North Vietnam begin peace talks in Paris. A significant amount of time was spent debating the size and shape of the table to be used for the negotiations.
May 13 – French workers join a massive student march in Paris in which over 800K people protesting police violence call for the fall of Charles de Gaulle’s government. As the iconic symbol and hero of WWII France, this protest stuns much of the world.
May 30 – The Beatles begin work on the White Album which will eventually top the charts.
Jun 5 – Senator Robert Kennedy is killed shortly after winning the California Democratic primary. This act leaves the Democratic Party in disarray going into their national convention in August.
Jul 25 – Condemning abortion and birth control, Pope John Paul VI publishes “Humanae Vilae”.
Jul 28 – The American Indian Movement is founded initiating another revolution within the U.S..
Aug 8 – Richard Nixon wins the Republican nomination for president.
Aug 11 – A week of anti-war protest, police violence, and arrests surround the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. With the incumbent president not running, and the primary front runner dead, Hubert Humphrey is nominated at the Democratic candidate for president. This is also the last truly open convention in America. All future conventions will be very carefully scripted to ensure the correct message leading to a notable lack of television air time. The networks argue the lack of newsworthiness for less coverage.
Sep 7 – The new Women’s liberation Movement protests the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City.
Oct 17 – John Carlos and Tommie Smith raise their fists in a Black Power salute during their medals ceremony at the Mexico City summer Olympics. Bob Beaman also set a world record for the long jump that would stand for over two decades. I make note of this only because sports records tend to be very fleeting making this all the more significant.
Oct 31 – President Johnson orders a halt to aerial bombing of North Vietnam.
Nov 5 – Richard Nixon wins the presidential election eliminating nearly 40 years of Democratic dominance of the white house. Shirley Chisholm of New York becomes the first black woman elected to Congress.
Nov 22 – In the Star Trek episode “Plato’s Stepchild” William Shatner and Nichelle Nichols share the first interracial kiss on U.S. television. Producer Gene Rodenberry, like many science fiction writers of the day uses his medium to explore and question social and philosophical issues.
Dec 24 – Apollo-8 orbits the moon sending back a color picture of the earth rising over the moon titled “Earthrise”. This iconic photo clearly showing the earth as a limited space and is credited by many with bringing energy and life to the environmental movement.

Please give some thought to the items I have listed. I know that some will be more meaningful to one individual than another, but taken as a group it is a pretty awe inspiring list sparking much of the change we now take for granted. I also know that there are at least a hundred events I did not list, but that merely shows how volatile 1968 really was. There will be many more pivotal years in mans history, whether in the U.S., another country, or on a global level. Change is inevitable, because that is the nature of what we do as people. The Chinese philosopher said “may you live in interesting time”. Between, violence, the loss of key political and social figures, social unrest, political change, etc., it would be hard in retrospect not to call 1968 "interesting times".

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