1968: A Primer for Understanding Baby Boomers

1968* (* a primer for understanding baby boomers)

Rick Robinson

Headline Books Terra Alta, WV

1968* (* a primer for understanding baby boomers)

by Rick Robinson copyright ©2024 Rick Robinson All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any other form or for any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any information storage system, without written permission from Headline Books, Inc. To order additional copies of this book or for book publishing information, or to contact the author: Headline Books, Inc. P.O. Box 52 Terra Alta, WV 26764 www.HeadlineBooks.com mybook@headlinebooks.com ISBN 13: 9781958914342 Library of Congress Control Number: 2023952012

P R I N T E D I N T H E U N I T E D S TAT E S O F A M E R I C A

Dedicated to Joshua, Zachary, and MacKenzie— and any children of baby boomers struggling to figure out why their parents are the way they are.

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Content Introduction....................................................................................... 7 January – 1968................................................................................. 11 February – 1968............................................................................... 25 March – 1968................................................................................... 40 April – 1968...................................................................................... 51 May – 1968....................................................................................... 62 June – 1968....................................................................................... 72 July – 1968........................................................................................ 81 August – 1968.................................................................................. 91 September – 1968.......................................................................... 104 October – 1968.............................................................................. 115 November – 1968.......................................................................... 128 December – 1968........................................................................... 137 Lessons Learned from 1968......................................................... 146 Acknowledgments......................................................................... 158 Additional Books by Rick Robinson........................................... 160

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Introduction I’ve always been obsessed with 1968.

I have read more books detailing, watched more documentaries about, and listened to more music made in 1968 than any other year of my existence here on Earth.

It was truly a defining year for America.

It has become a defining year for me, as well. The vibe of 1968 – good and bad – is part of my very being.

Nightly body counts from a war (uh, conflict) half a world away filled the news and nightly dinner discussions. Thanks to the Tet Offensive and the May Offensive, 1968 was Vietnam’s deadliest year. Robert Kennedy and the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. were shot down for their beliefs. Racial strife and political discord poured violence into the streets. The Beatles owned the airwaves with “Hey Jude.” Elvis Presley and Richard Nixon made big comebacks. Kentucky Derby winner Dancer’s Image had a drug problem, and O.J. Simpson won the Heisman Trophy.

It wasn’t only America feeling pain in 1968. Riots and unrest in Europe shook order in the world.

Near where I grew up, a now-demolished Internal Revenue Service Center was new. Northern Kentucky University did not exist. Just over 1.2 million passengers were flying out of Greater Cincinnati Airport (compared to over 7 million in 2022). The homebuilding industry was a whopping $20 million regional industry. Clay Wade Bailey was a reporter, not a bridge. A phone 7

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call from Newport to Florence was assessed a “long-distance” toll charge. Half of the people in Kenton County lived in Covington, whose population at the time was nearly three times larger than the population of all Boone County.

Best of times? Worst of times? A little of both?

As I write the introduction to this book, America faces political and civil unrest possibly not seen since 1968. Factions on the left and right all believe the country is going to Hell in a handbasket. When voices from either side have approached me with their doomsday democracy scenarios, I have found myself cautioning: “Well, it ain’t 1968.”

This book arose as I began to question my bold declaration.

In 1968, I was ten years old. While my memories of certain events are quite vivid, they would not fill a chapter – let alone a book.

I remember walking home from vacation Bible school at Bromley Christian Church with my cousin Cindy to watch Robert Kennedy’s funeral procession on Grandma Luella’s black and white Zenith console. I can also envision friends of my older sisters and cousins gathered around that same television set watching the draft lottery – the number being an indicator of their chances of ending up in Vietnam.

I clearly recall my dad, Bucky Robinson, explaining to me why he could not take me to see a movie one weekend for fear of unrest resulting from the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I can tell you about a Reds ball game we attended at Crosley Field in the summer, fall days on the back deck of the Ludlow Vets chugging a cyclamate-sweetened Fresca, while Mom and Dad relaxed with a beer, and a spring fishing trip with my cousins Jim and Dave to Franzen’s Pay Lake in Villa Hills.

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Past those events, everything else is a bit fuzzy. Truthfully, my obsession with 1968 revolves around images others have embedded in my brain. At ten years old, I wasn’t paying attention to the riots at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

Vietnam was a place where the boys from Bromley were afraid of being sent. In 1968, my humor did not go beyond Archie and Jughead, and my political worldview was being set by Gotham City’s Police Commissioner Gordon and his often-cowled campaign contributor, Bruce Wayne.

As I thought through my bold “it ain’t ’68” declaration, my intellectual curiosity got the best of me. Was 1968 so bad to deserve comparison to today’s turmoil?

I grew up in Ludlow and Bromley (the Twin Cities, as we call them). What really happened in 1968 in the confines of my small world and beyond the floodwall guarding it?

Was my home region responding in the same manner as every other small American town? Did Northern Kentucky mirror the nation? Or did we, as a community, ignore it? I decided to read a year’s worth of newspapers to find out. I compared what I read in The Kentucky Post and the Times-Star to national publications.

I found secondary sources, like oral histories, to supplement my investigation.

I also looked at LIFE, Time, and Sports Illustrated. The covers of those publications help define the times for me. Movies and music help me pinpoint a place in time. So, I’ve included them, as well.

I suspect what I discovered would be similar in many communities across the country.

For anyone seeking to understand the baby boomers, the newspaper research was eye-opening. “Woke” and “politically correct” are modern terms. They are not words used to describe

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print journalism in 1968. Headlines referred to “guys” and “gals.”

There was a section in the newspaper for women providing recipes and other sage marriage advice. The enemy in Vietnam was called “Charlie,” “Reds,” and “Commies.” When a local person was mentioned in a story (including minors), the article generally included the person’s street address. Stories about our African-American community were nearly nonexistent. Context of the times mattered.

Also of interest at the time was the frequency of oneparagraph news stories explaining things like how a chimney was damaged in a local fire or how one man calling another man a bad name at a bar resulted in a $25 fine.

Along with extensive reading — did you know in 1968, a new Ford pickup truck cost $1899? — I also interviewed people from Northern Kentucky recalling their lives in 1968. This is their story as much as mine. I am deeply appreciative of those contributing about how this important year impacted their lives.

Special thanks to my friends at LINK for agreeing to publish excerpts of these chapters in their print and digital editions. Also, a very special shout-out to my publisher, Cathy Teets of Headline Books, for humoring me in writing what became an obsession.

Finally, please note this is not a college thesis, nor am I a journalist. I did not footnote articles nor source check interviews I conducted. Unless otherwise noted, all news articles are from The Kentucky Post and Times-Star, and all photographs are compliments of the Kenton County Library. Where appropriate, secondary sources are referenced.

While I did not footnote chapters, I did keep copies of articles and publications I consulted. If you are interested in the research, email me at neverleavefish@gmail.com or meet me at

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the Covington Branch Kenton County Library, and I’ll show you how to run the newspaper archives viewer.

Peace, love and 1968, Rick Robinson On a plane somewhere over America August 24, 2022

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January – 1968 “There is something about the new dateline— January 1, 1968 – that grabs everybody emotionally, economically, and spiritually.”

—The Kentucky Post and Times-Star, New Year’s Day, 1968

Eye-Catching Local Headline: Nunn Calls for Action on Our 4-Year College On the covers of LIFE Magazine: January 5 – Katherine Hepburn – The Comeback of Kate January 12 – Faye Dunaway – BONNIE – Fashion’s New Darling January 19 – a human heart – The Corridors of the Heart January 26 – diet pills – Exclusive Report – Dangerous Diet Pills On the covers of Sports Illustrated: January 8 – Packers and Raiders – How They Won January 15 – Turia Mau – The Swimsuit Issue January 22 – Jerry Kramer carrying Vince Lombardi on his shoulder – The Super Champion January 29 – Lew Alcindor (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) and Elvin Hayes– Big EEEE over Big Lew: Houston Upsets UCLA On the covers of Time Magazine: January 5 – President Lyndon Johnson as King Lear – Man of the Year

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January 12 – New York’s Chancellor Samuel R. Gould – Rise of Public Universities January 19 – Conductor Zubin Mehta – The Baton is Passed to Youth January 26 – Penn Central’s Stuart Saunders – Railroads of the Future #1 on WSAI: “Hello, Goodbye” by the Beatles #1 on WCIN: “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” by Gladys Knight and the Pips #1 on WCXL: “For Lovin You” by Bill Anderson Popular at local cinemas: To Sir, With Love On Television: Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In debuted Happy Birthday: Actor Cuba Gooding, Jr. (January 2), rapper LL Cool J (January 14), singer/songwriter Sarah McLachlan (January 28) In Memoriam: swimmer and surfer Duke Kahanamoku (age 77)

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The news stories of 1968 offer a telling glimpse into the makeup of Boone, Campbell, and Kenton counties, and a review of those articles published in January set an appropriate stage for exploring the region’s collective psyche. In January 1968, politics, civil rights, and Vietnam drove the news in Northern Kentucky.

State and Local Politics At the time, local and state governments in Kentucky looked quite different than they do today.

Currently, the Kentucky General Assembly meets every year. In 1968, the State House of Representatives and State Senate met only in even-numbered years. The balance of party power in Frankfort was also quite different then, as well.

Democrats controlled both chambers of the state legislature with commanding majorities. To some extent, the balance of power in the General Assembly did not matter. The governor in Kentucky wielded a great deal of control over the legislature and used it by setting the daily agenda.

Interestingly, the governor and lieutenant governor ran independent of each other instead of, as they do today, as a ticket.

Additionally, a governor could not serve successive terms. When Kentuckians had gone to the polls to vote for governor in 1967, they elected Louie Nunn (R) to become the first Republican chief executive in over two decades. Nunn defeated Henry Ward (D) to win the office. However, the voters also elected Democrat Wendell Ford (D) to be Nunn’s lieutenant governor.

Ford would be a thorn in Nunn’s side throughout his entire term in office.

Louie Broady Nunn was born in Park, Kentucky, a small community located on the border between Metcalf and Louie Nunn taking the oath of office.

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Barren counties. His father was a farmer, and the family operated a general store. Nunn spent his formative years attending classes in a one-room schoolhouse. After high school graduation, Nunn earned a bachelor’s degree from Bowling Green Business College (now known as Western Kentucky University). Nunn enlisted in the Army during World War II, where he quickly rose to the rank of corporal, but a childhood back injury caused him to be medically discharged two years later. Following his time in the service, he earned a law degree from the University of Louisville.

Louie Nunn’s political career began in 1953 when he won election as Barren County Judge Executive. While he served just one term in office, Nunn became a political force to be reckoned with in the Commonwealth. He ran statewide campaigns for other candidates and bided his time before running for governor.

Nunn’s first campaign for governor was a 1963 losing effort against Ned Breathitt (D).

Louie Nunn was exploring the ugly bounds of populism long before today’s politicians. In the 1967 victorious primary campaign, Nunn referred to his opponent, Jefferson County Judge Executive Marlow Cook (R), as a liberal New Yorker and Cook’s supporters as his “Jewish backers.” In the general election, he blasted a civil rights executive order on public accommodations.

The New Republic said Nunn’s losing effort was ““the first outright segregationist campaign in Kentucky.””

Former State Representative Ken Harper (R) remembered Nunn’s 1967 general election campaign for governor. “Art Schmidt (R) and I got a promise from Louie to back a four-year state college in Northern Kentucky,” Harper recalled. “And when Louie made a promise, it was etched in stone.”

Louie Nunn barely beat Henry Ward in 1967 with only 51.2% of the statewide vote. Despite registration favoring the Democrats, Northern Kentucky outpaced Nunn’s state margins and gave him 54% of the vote. Nunn’s pledge to support a fouryear college in Northern Kentucky was key to his local support.

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At the new session of the General Assembly, as opposed to today, there were fewer Northern Kentucky legislators wandering the halls of the state capitol in Frankfort. The Northern Kentucky Caucus was made up of Carl Bamberger (R), Ken Harper (R), John Isler (D), Phillip King (D), Leo Lawson (R), Carl Mershon (D), and James Murphy (D) from the State House of Representatives.

Tom Harris (D), Don Johnson (R), and Clyde Middleton (R) were the region’s state senators.

Having been in office less than a month, Governor Nunn used the start of the new year to issue a dire warning to citizens about the future financial well-being of the Commonwealth.

Governor Ned Breathitt left office with a substantial deficit in the state treasury, and Nunn wanted to let everyone know it was a major problem he had inherited. “The decisions that are made in my office and in the General Assembly will determine how far and how fast Kentucky will progress in the years ahead,” Nunn declared.

Days later, when the legislature formally convened, Governor Nunn failed to submit a budget proposal, drawing sharp criticism from both Speaker of the House Julian Carroll (D) and Lieutenant Governor Wendell Ford for not offering solutions for the shortfall. Northern Kentucky legislators (Republican and Democrat) were more forgiving.

Campbell County Rep. Art Schmidt said Nunn “… got to the point, and it was gloomy to look at.” Kenton County Rep. Ken Harper called the speech a “… sound and deliberate approach to the problems we face.” And Kenton County Rep. Phil King (D) said Nunn “… evidently intends to work with the legislative branch on a bi-partisan basis and this is encouraging.”

Later in the month, when Nunn did present a budget, it included raising the sales tax from three percent to five percent, eventually earning Nunn the nickname of “Nickel Louie,” a moniker that would haunt him 20 years later in a bid for another term at Kentucky’s top office.

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Along with budgetary issues, the state legislature in 1968 was faced with other critical issues of the day: Sunday alcohol sales and requiring candidates for office to report the names of people and corporations donating to their campaigns. Some issues proposed in January 1968 are still being debated today.

Legislation on gun control, abortion, a state lottery, gaming, and teacher salaries all grabbed headlines.

This was the session of the Kentucky General Assembly where support for establishing Northern Kentucky University came together. In mid-January, the Kentucky Council on Higher Education recommended the new institution be established as soon as practical.Although support for the college had been a campaign promise from Governor Nunn, his initial response was more than a bit cold. “[T]he prospects for the college certainly would well be to the actions of the entire Legislature in meeting their obligations to education in general,” said Nunn.

Not mentioned in the press were Nunn’s behind the scene efforts to pressure support for what would eventually become Northern Kentucky University.

Locally, officials in the various counties were planning for their new year. In Kenton County, Judge Executive James Dressman (D) looked forward to opening the new county golf course in Independence. Boone County’s Bruce Ferguson (D) was facing a “big boom year.” And Judge Executive A.J. Jolly (D) was worried about Campbell County’s budget. All three counties were concerned about infrastructure projects. Roads, parks, bridges, and sewers were on the minds of all county officials.

Finally, joined by the merger of Summit Hills Heights and St. Pius Heights, the newly formed town of Edgewood, Kentucky, met in January 1968 to organize its government.

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Civil Rights You could not tell it from most of the local stories, but a national campaign for President of the United States of America was slowly centering around Vietnam and civil rights. In January, George Wallace, the former governor of Alabama – who had declared five years earlier in his state inaugural address, “Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever” – visited Kentucky in support of his bid for president. “Our purpose is to hurt both political parties,” Wallace told a meeting of the Kentucky Press Association.

Other stories, while not directly mentioning the presidential election, certainly had strong ties to the civil rights movement.

With a backdrop of unrest and civil disobedience occurring across the nation in 1967, Kenton County Rep. Philip King introduced a very strong riot control proposal in the Kentucky House of Representatives. The bill would have given mayors and county judge executives extraordinary powers whenever they saw a clear and present danger of a riot in their respective jurisdiction. In addition to giving powers to disburse potential rioters, it also allowed the authorities to call upon citizens to aid and assist in putting down riots. Citizens would be relieved of any legal civil or criminal liability in answering the call.

It is hard to imagine this legislation calling for the legalization of lawless vigilante mobs was not driven by racial animosity and/ or fear of anti-war protests and mounting civil unrest.

On the other hand, a bill to eliminate several state-recognized holidays reflected the evolving nature of racial relations in the Commonwealth. Prior to the passage of this particular legislation, Kentucky still celebrated Confederate Memorial Day and Robert E. Lee’s birthday. The law eliminated those holidays and, thanks to a committee amendment, added the birthday of Abraham Lincoln to the calendar. While voting to eliminate Civil War holidays from the state calendar hardly seems like a courageous vote by today’s standards, it marks a historic move to 19

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racial reconciliation for its time. Remarkably, as this chapter was being written, legislation was pending in the Kentucky House of Representatives to remove Robert E. Lee Day (Jan. 19) and Confederate Memorial Day and Jefferson Davis Day (both on June 3) from a list of public statutory state holidays.

Also in January, a man from Lexington became the first African American to be sworn in as a Kentucky state trooper.

Following the commencement of troopers in the state capitol rotunda, twenty-five-year-old Air Force veteran Millard West said he had no idea he was the first, “… otherwise I probably would have never applied.”

Finally, a racial dust-up involving a Kentucky politician during a White House visit made national news. As reported by the Kentucky Post and Times-Star’s Washington bureau, Katherine Peden had been invited by First Lady “Lady Bird” Johnson to be one of three speakers at the inaugural “Women Doers” luncheon.

Peden, a pioneering woman in politics and business, was the first female to serve as Commissioner of Kentucky’s Department of Commerce and later in the year would announce her candidacy for Kentucky’s open seat in the United States Senate. She was to speak about “What Citizens Can Do to Help Ensure Safe Streets.”

In her comments, Peden offered she may be the only female member of President Johnson’s Civil Disorders Commission, a panel charged with examining the causes of urban riots having occurred in the mid-sixties. In February of 1968, the 462-page report would become a best seller and reached a conclusion, “Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal.”

Also in attendance at the White House luncheon was African American actress and singer Eartha Kitt, who, while not a programmed speaker, interrupted Peden’s speech to offer her thoughts on why riots have broken out across America.

Kitt confronted Peden and the First Lady with her view of the situation involving minority youth in America.

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“You send the best of this country off to be shot and maimed,” said Eartha Kitt. “They rebel in the street. They will take pot and they will get high. They don’t want to go to school because they’re going to be snatched off from their mothers to be shot in Vietnam.” As to Peden’s speech, Kitt offered, “Miss Peden may have walked in the gutters, but I have lived in them.”

According to reports, First Lady “Lady Bird” Johnson was left in tears, and Katherine Peden called the actions of Eartha Kitt a national disgrace.

It was the reporting of the incident that would raise the eyebrows of today’s reader. Media response to Kitt’s comments were swift and harsh. Compared to the pedestrian style of writing in other stories of the month, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star reporting about the Kitt/Peden confrontation was quite colorful, giving readers the mistaken impression Kitt was some sort of “mad woman.” As many national leaders were saying much the same at the time, it is certainly fair to ask if the stories on Eartha Kitt had been the same for a white male.

Vietnam The January local stories regarding Vietnam set the stage for the region’s conflicting emotions on the topic. In January, there were only a few local stories on the overall conflict in Southeast Asia. For the national perspective, readers had to go to the Cincinnati section of the paper to follow troop movements and efforts to negotiate a peace accord. Local stories for Northern Kentuckians were either “human interest” or sad obituaries.

Midway through the month, a new section began appearing on the editorial page of The Kentucky Post and Times-Star – “Our Boys in Vietnam” – keeping readers abreast of the activities of local soldiers from Northern Kentucky sent overseas.

The human-interest stories focused on soldiers and their experiences at home and overseas. For instance, one story reported on the efforts of Air Force Staff Sergeant Bill Gaither 21

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from Ludlow, who was running a toy drive for an orphanage near where he was stationed in Phan Rang, Vietnam. Gaither and a few of his fellow airmen had volunteered to rebuild an orphanage two years earlier.

After the construction was complete, Gaither decided to have a Christmas party for the orphans.

“I was put in charge of the Air Force Staff Sergeant Bill Gaither. party. I wrote to friends asking them to gather up toys to give to the kids. Well, pretty soon, I had 3000 or 4000 gifts,” said Gaither. UNICEF helped him distribute the toys to children across Vietnam.

Following his stint in Vietnam, Gaither would become a world-renowned wildlife artist and sculptor.

Another story (“Wounds in Vietnam Jungle Lead to Medal, Pretty Bride) described how Sergeant Warren G. Carpenter had been seriously wounded near Da Nang, Vietnam, and met his bride while he was back in Northern Kentucky convalescing. The story of the marriage between Carpenter and high-school senior Charlene Beil led the story. However, the article also tells how Sergeant Carpenter won the Bronze Star.

“Carpenter was in a search-and-destroy operation moving through the dense Viet Cong-infested jungle when he was fired upon.

He opened fire with his automatic rifle on the VC. With bullets flying, he darted from spot to spot, directing fire on the enemy.

Disregarding his own safety, he moved through the dense hostile fire to the casualties, administered first aid, 22

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and helped them to a clearing for helicopter cleanup.

It was while he was carting a wounded buddy to a waiting helicopter that the VC grenade exploded near him, fragments tearing into his body.”

The reports of soldiers being wounded or killed stand in stark contrast to the well-crafted, human-interest stories.

Geneva Hallou, the mother of slain Marine Sergeant Monty Lyon of Beaver Lick, had been waiting for over a month for her son’s body to be returned from Quang Tri. The wait was agonizing for the family. Shortly before Sergeant Lyon died, he sent his mother a letter.

Start watching the papers again, Mom. We’re landing tomorrow at the DMZ, which is the line that separates North and South Vietnam. There will be a lot of news this time because we’re going to catch hell. Don’t start worrying because we’re all ready for it, Mom, and proud to go.

Stories of other young Northern Kentuckians who lost their lives added to the region’s grief. A 20-year-old Lance Corporal from Elsmere named Paul H. Webb was killed by a mortar in Da Nang. Another young man of the same age, Navy medic Jeffrey Scott Aker of Taylor Mill, was killed near Quang Tri. Aker had been a freshman at Eastern Kentucky University when Naval reserve orders called him to active duty. His mother reflected the mood of many parents with children in the military. “I’d rather have him the way he is,” she said, “than for him to be a draft card burner.”

A Simon Kenton classmate of Akers, Marine Lance Corporal Thomas Rick Retschulte was killed a few days later. The Kentucky Post and Times-Star called the deaths of the two Simon Kenton classmates who were killed days apart “War’s Grim Toll” and wrote, “Service to their country made men of the youngsters, 23

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and they died like men in the line of duty.”

In the first month of 1968, one particular news story and its editorial comment defined how many in Northern Kentucky felt about Vietnam.

Earlier in the war, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star began following a few local draftees, documenting their training and experience in Vietnam. A reporter even embedded in their training. On January 5, 1968, one of those draftees, Army Private First Class Carl Fryman from Covington, took a piece of shrapnel from a mortar in his right hip during an ambush that killed sixteen and wounded fifty-six. Fryman was described in the article as a timid and religious soldier who had trouble with the thought of killing the enemy as a job.

Fryman still resides in Northern Kentucky, and he vividly remembers the day he was wounded. He was about nine men back in the line when the attack started. He went to his knees and attempted to secure his poncho. It was monsoon season, and he did not want to lose his poncho in what he thought was a mere skirmish. “There was an odd sense in the air something was up,” he recalled. “Someone behind me in the line was shot, and intensity picked up. We had walked into an ambush and were surrounded.”

Fryman lay next to some wood slightly above the ground.

Shrapnel snuck through the small space and hit him in the hip.

“My leg went numb, and I had pain in my kidney,” Fryman said.

“I wasn’t sure where I was hit.”

The battle raged throughout the night. “We took massive casualties,” Fryman remembers. When reinforcements finally arrived, he was down to his last eight rounds. Fryman has committed to memory the sight of the first helicopter cutting through the morning fog in the valley to evacuate the wounded and recover the bodies of the dead.

The newspaper’s take on Fryman’s story is important because it explains how many in Northern Kentucky felt about Vietnam. In 24

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January 1968, Kentucky had eighty-two conscientious objectors, including boxer Muhammad Ali (whom the local papers still referred to as Cassius M. Clay). An editorial regarding Fryman compared him to Sergeant Alvin York, the pacifist turned hero in World War II. It praised Fryman’s “Red Badge of Courage.”

The important thing about Pvt. Fryman is that, despite his alleged timidity, his pacifism, his religious scruples, and his puritanism, he completed his training, made PFC, and went out in the eelgrass and faced Charlie in mortal combat. ...

He didn’t run to Canada or Sweden. He didn’t burn his draft card.

Carl Fryman never read the stories in The Kentucky Post and Times-Star until after he came back from Vietnam near the end of 1968. Today, he calls the coverage “a bit overblown” and refers to himself as “a poor comparison to Sergeant York.”

Still, by contrasting the injury to Carl Fryman against the actions of those protesting and actively avoiding the draft, the editorial reflects the conflicting points of view in America at the time. Yet, despite growing anti-war sentiment nationally, support for the war was clear in the region’s newspaper.

Moved by such support, Terry Carnes (pictured front right), his brother Tom Carnes, and friends David Wietholter and Harry Campbell enlisted under the Army’s “Buddy System.” Carnes’ father was Terry Carnes (pictured front right), and career Air Force. While Terry his brother Tom Carnes, along with Carnes was born in Covington, friends David Wietholter and Harry Campbell of Covington being inducted he never really had the into the Army.

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opportunity to live in Northern Kentucky until his father retired.

He was hoping to follow in his father’s footsteps in the Air Force, when his draft notice arrived. Like many young men of the day, he, his brother Tom (now deceased), Wietholter, and Campbell enlisted together under a system allowing them to attend basic training together.

Following basic training, Carnes spent time at Ft. Benning and then Germany. He was deployed to Vietnam as a courier for the First Cavalry in January 1970. Carnes never expected raising his right hand near the end of January 1968 would lead to a career in the Army. He left the military following his tour in Vietnam but rejoined and eventually retired a Sergeant First Class. Carnes clearly remembers the day his induction photo was taken. In retrospect, he never really thought much at the time about being deployed to Vietnam. His father had served in Korea, and his older brother had served in Vietnam. So he and his brother “were a family used to being deployed.”

About the time the Carnes brothers and their buddies enlisted, the impact of one headline from the Cincinnati Post would change everything to come for the remainder of 1968: VIET REDS STORM INTO 7 TOWNS, HIT BASES The Tet Offensive had started.

Additional chapter credits:

Carnes, Terry, telephone interview with Rick Robinson, 18 January 2023.

Fryman, Carl, telephone interview with Rick Robinson, 31 August 2023.

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February – 1968 “It seems now more certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate.”

—Walter Cronkite – February 27, 1968 “If I’ve lost Cronkite, I’ve lost Middle America.”

—President Lyndon Johnson

Eye-Catching Local Headline: The Ladies, Bless Them, Will Have Questions For Our Forum On the covers of LIFE Magazine: February 2 – Aleksei Kosygin – A Private Interview with Premier Kosygin February 9 – Captured VC guerillas – Suicide Raid on the Embassy February 16 – North Vietnamese soldiers – The Enemy Lets Me Take His Picture February 23 – Peggy Fleming – Olympic Charmer On the covers of Sports Illustrated: February 5 – Olympic skiers Billy Kidd and Jimmy Heuga – The Olympics February 12 – Bobby Hull – Hockey’s Immortals February 19 – Peggy Fleming – Olympic Champion February 26 – Curtis Turner – King of the Wild Road

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On the covers of Time Magazine: February 19 – Hanoi’s General Giap – Days of Death in Viet Nam February 16 – John Kenneth Galbraith – The All-Purpose Critic February 23 – Soviet Admiral Gorshkov – Russia’s Navy, A New Challenge at Sea #1 on WSAI: Green Tambourine by the Lemon Pipers #1 on WCIN: I Wish It Would Rain by the Temptations #1 on WCXL: Skip a Rope by Henson Cargill Popular at local cinemas: Bonnie and Clyde On Television: Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood debuted on PBS. Happy Birthday: Lisa Marie Presley (February 1), actor Gary Coleman (February 8), actor Josh Brolin (February 12), actress Molly Ringwald (February 18), and comedian Mitch Hedberg (February 24) In Memoriam: blues artist Marion Walter Jacobs a.k.a. “Little Walter” (age 37)

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At the end of the nineteenth century, publisher Edward Willis Scripps created a media empire by founding forty-five small, inexpensive newspapers across America. Each edition of a Scripps newspaper was four pages long and cost no more than two cents to purchase. The newspapers were all published in the afternoon, allowing readers who did not have time to read a newspaper in the morning to do so after work. As such, the editorial edge of Scripps’ publications generally tilted to “fighting for its working-class readers” by advocating for labor rights and against corrupt government.

Another trait of Scripps’ “penny press” newspapers was its style of writing. Unlike various national publications, stories in Scripps’ newspapers were written in a simple manner blue-collar readers could easily comprehend. For an industrial community with a predominantly German and Irish labor force, Greater Cincinnati was an ideal area for a Scripps newspaper.

Scripps founded The Cincinnati Post in 1881 under the name of The Penny Paper. At the time, greater Cincinnati had a dozen newspapers, five of which were written in German. The Kentucky Post was founded in 1890. Shortly thereafter, The Kentucky Post and The Cincinnati Post were being sold together as wrap-around editions.

In 1958, Scripps acquired a second Cincinnati newspaper, The Cincinnati Times-Star and incorporated its name into the Post’s banner. For decades, it reported on the news of Northern Kentucky. The Kentucky Post and Times-Star published its last edition in 2007. Near the end of its run, the Kentucky edition had a larger circulation than its Cincinnati counterpart.

In 1968, an Arkansas native who had been raised in Oklahoma, Vance Trimble, was the editor of The Kentucky Post and Times-Star. Years earlier, Trimble’s hard-hitting reports for the Washington Daily News on nepotism and payroll abuse in the United States Congress earned him the “triple crown” of news awards – the Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting, the Sigma 29

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Delta Chi Distinguished Correspondence Record for Washington coverage, and the Raymond Clapper Award. Trimble had the credentials necessary to move a reporter from the street beat to an editor’s desk.

During the time Vance Trimble served as its editor (from 1963 to 1979), The Kentucky Post and Times-Star had a stranglehold on the news of Northern Kentucky. As editor of The Kentucky Post and Times-Star, Trimble’s influence on Northern Kentucky cannot be understated.

In 2013, Trimble gave an interview to Oklahoma State University for an oral history project. In the interview, he recalled being offered the job of editor of The Kentucky Post and Times-Star. A senior executive at Scripps advised him to decline the job until a paper in a larger town came along, but Trimble was not moved. “I’d always wanted to run my own show, you know,” he said in his oral history. “You know how it is, to be head man, to be in charge like you are, and so what I did, I told [the executive], I said, ‘I’ll go look at it first…, but unless pigs are running in the street, I want to take it.’”

Despite the region’s reputation Vance Trimble also authored over a dozen books before his for pork slaughterhouses, Trimble death in 2021 at age 107. apparently discovered swine were not roaming in the streets of Northern Kentucky. He took the job.

“Well, when I went there, the paper was strictly a Democratic paper,” Trimble said. “Republicans didn’t get in at all, and I changed that. I made it an independent paper, and we gave the Republicans as much space for what they did as the Democrats got.”

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With Trimble’s background in investigative government reporting, along with political inclusion came increased scrutiny for local politicians. Trimble said each time an elected official came to the newsroom seeking editorial support from the paper, he’d give them the Wonderlic test, a quiz measuring business aptitude. He’d then threaten the person with publication of the results. “[O]ne guy who’d run for mayor about eight times, of Covington, took the test,” recalled Trimble in his oral history. “I told them they could only take it once, but he scored zero, and my heart was too heavy to do that, so I let him take it again. He scored zero again. (Laughter) I let him take it a third time, still failed.”

William “Bill” Straub, a 2016 inductee into the Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame, remembers Trimble as one of the meanest men he ever met, expressing little empathy for reporters.

When reviewing a story, Trimble “cared not for your feelings.”

Reporters were frequently summoned to Trimble’s glass-enclosed office in the middle of the second-floor newsroom on Madison Avenue in Covington for what they referred to as “going into the inner sanctum to take a beating.”

Although Straub was still in high school in 1968, looking back at his career at The Kentucky Post and Times-Star, he said there was “never a newspaper in the history of the United States that reflected the personality of its editor more than Vance Trimble and The Post. He controlled every aspect of the product.” Straub recalled Trimble loved standard beat reporting (as opposed to editorial analysis) focusing on crime, grief, human interest, and city council meetings. Straub referred to Vance’s lust for these types of stories as “tabloid journalism at its finest.”

At the time, reporters were assigned to “Desks” according to the topics for which they reported, such as the City Desk, the National Desk, or the Frankfort Desk. The reporters at the newspaper recalled Trimble’s favorite stories as originating from 31

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the “Crime and Grief Desk.” Straub even remembered a telling headline to one such article at the heart of Trimble’s theory of news reporting – “This Story Will Make You Cry.” One of the last people Vance Trimble ever hired as a reporter before leaving Kentucky was Mark Neikirk, who is currently the Executive Director of Scripps Howard Center for Civic Engagement at Northern Kentucky University. Neikirk, a 2015 inductee into the Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame, confirmed Trimble’s love of the sensational. “If a person died in a car crash on the way to work,” Neikirk recalled, “Vance wanted the story to lead with what the person had for breakfast.”

“I absorbed his faith in going to the street,” Neikirk continued.

“Talk to people. Ask questions. Listen to the answers. Ask more questions. Don’t be intimidated by power. Save your intimidation for the powerful but not moments when you must interview people facing tragedy. They deserve to be approached carefully, kindly. But approach them. Let them tell the story to you, and then tell it to your readers. Write for your readers. No one else.

Finished? Go find another story.”

Trimble was also big on a section of the newspaper known as The Town Crier – a daily listing of everything from marriage licenses and property transfers to civil lawsuits (including divorces) and police blotters. Northern Kentuckians spent endless hours reading The Town Crier, in large part to see if they knew any of the people being married, divorced, arrested, sued, etc. In essence, The Town Crier was social media before Facebook, except each voyeuristic entry was based upon actual public records. Straub said Trimble would cut a news story to make room for the Town Crier.

“The public had a love/hate relationship with The Town Crier,” recalled Mark Neikirk. “There is no telling how many times the rich and powerful called and asked Vance to leave their name or their kid’s name out of The Town Crier. What is certain 32

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is he said ‘no’ every time. That is what Vance’s readers expected; it’s what he gave them.”

Bill Straub concluded Trimble’s lasting legacy was holding elected public officials accountable for their actions. “Nobody wanted to be on the front page of the paper,” said Straub.

According to Mark Neikirk, Vance Trimble gave Northern Kentucky an identity. “To Northern Kentucky, he gave an unabashed, tabloid-style newspaper that held a mirror up to the community but left no doubt that what happened in ‘Kentucky Post Country’ (we even called it ‘KPC’) was important enough to warrant the daily reporting for a tireless team of reporters, photographers, and editors,” said Neikirk.

Three interesting aspects of The Kentucky Post and TimesStar in 1968 were the influence of the Catholic Church over the paper’s content, its misogynistic headlines regarding women, and the lack of news stories about Northern Kentucky’s African American community. Headlines referring to women as “gals” or “Dolls” and stories resembling a Catholic Diocese Press Release were common. Whether these issues were a sign of the times or a reflection of the views of its editor is debatable.

Mark Neikirk offered some insight. “Vance had his faults, as do all of us,” he said. “He was plainly unenlightened on racial justice, and it would fall to his successors to try and do better by that.”

The influence of Trimble on the bright line between those supporting and those opposing the conflict in Vietnam came through in The Kentucky Post and Times-Star’s story coverage and editorial comment on a February anti-war conference at the University of Kentucky.

The University of Kentucky was to host on its Lexington campus the “Kentucky Conference on The War/The Draft.”

According to flyers about the conference, it would be “… a place where all of us concerned about the war and the draft can begin to build a state-wide movement against the war and learn the skills 33

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to organize and educate others.” The conference was sponsored by several groups, including Students for a Democratic Society.

At the time, the SDS was a primary student-led organization of the country’s anti-war movement.

The conference caused an uproar in the Kentucky state legislature, pitting free speech advocates and academics against pro-war legislators. Covington Representative Philip King (D) co-authored a resolution (never formally introduced) in the Kentucky General Assembly to deny the use of university facilities for the conference. The resolution was cosponsored by other state representatives from the region. It took a long meeting in Frankfort between legislators and University of Kentucky officials for the conference to gain approval.

Kentucky Post and Times-Star reporter John Murphy introduced the story as follows: “A small indefinite wedge of caution has been pounded into freedom of expression as the basic right of personal liberty in Kentucky.” Such an editorial declaration in a news piece rarely occurred in a Trimble-edited story.

The conference took place on February 10, 1968.

Among the speakers featured at the conference was Wendell Berry, then a young English professor from the University of Kentucky. Berry eventually became one of Kentucky’s most prolific writers, and his list of literary works and awards are numerous. The speech he gave at the conference would be included in his first book of non-fiction, a collection of essays titled The Long-Legged House.

Berry recently wrote, “The first paragraph of that essay will give you a sense of the status, and the stress, of such a protest in Kentucky at that time. Remember well my own worries about it, but I don’t remember ‘the controversy surrounding’ it.”

Indeed, the opening of Berry’s speech expressed the concerns of his friends and family about his appearance at the conference.

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“I have received a dire warning that if I consort with such groups as this, I may be made a tool of ‘the communist conspiracy.’”

But Berry ignored the cautions of those around him and gave a thoughtful and eloquent speech on why he opposed America’s presence in Vietnam. The reasons were very personal and set forth in a manner of civic responsibility not often expressed. “…

I do deplore the wrongs and atrocities committed by the other side. But I am responsible for the wrongs and atrocities committed by our side.”

The Kentucky Post and Times-Star reported extensively on the conflict surrounding the gathering but did not print a single word about the conference itself. Yet the news stories in the paper on February 10, 1968, were clearly aimed at the conference. The top banner of the day’s edition bore the bold headline “Our Viet Death Toll...51 Men,” and the story listed those from the region killed in Southeast Asia since 1962.

The bottom fold included a story on the views of ten Northern Kentuckians regarding Vietnam. Most expressed thoughts supporting the presence of American troops. All believed it should end as soon as possible. Only one, a World War II veteran and railroad employee, said, “I don’t think we should have been there in the first place.”

Inside the same edition, there was an editorial titled “Where Valor Proudly Sleeps,” pondering when Kentucky will start honoring those who had fallen in Vietnam with appropriate memorials.

The coverage of the Kentucky Conference on The War/The Draft occurred just over a week into what has become known as the Tet Offensive. Tet is the annual celebration of the Lunar New Year in Vietnam. The Tet Offensive refers to a series of surprise attacks coordinated by the North Vietnamese to take place simultaneously against multiple South Vietnamese cities, military installations, towns, and villages. North Vietnam’s 35

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military leaders believed the offensive would lead to a popular uprising of people against the government of South Vietnam.

The headlines in The Cincinnati Post and Times-Star were all about the deadly battles being waged. And editorially, the Cincinnati paper was already concluding victory in Vietnam was a “goal beyond our means.” Still, in his own style, Vance Trimble had dodged the issue of America’s presence in Vietnam and offered a “grief story” and editorial analysis appealing to all readers.

The Tet Offensive was deadly for both sides. The losses of northern forces in February were never fully determined, but estimates ranged as high as 45,000. The South Vietnamese lost 2,788. U.S. and other allied forces suffered 1,536 casualties, 7,764 wounded, and 11 missing. The deadliest day in Vietnam occurred on one of the first days of Tet. Early in the Tet Offensive, Marine Lance Corporal Samuel T. Marshal of Erlanger was killed in Quang Tri; Marine Lance Corporal Paul Webb of Elsmere was killed by mortar fire near Da Nang; and Army Specialist 4 Samuel Hurry of Covington died in the hospital from wounds he had received in Saigon.

Retired Northern Kentucky physician Dr. Tom Bunnell went to Vietnam in 1967 and served as a Navy Regimental Surgeon for the Marine 5th Division. In 1968, he was transferred to a hospital in Chu Lai. He recalled that during the Tet Offensive, his hospital was “out in the boondocks, in the hills” and was Cover of Life Magazine – February 9, 1968 - On the right (according to a report the only one authorized to take in The Kentucky Post and Times-Star) is locals. His operating room was Army 2nd Lieutenant Arthur Dickson of very active. “There were lots of Covington 36

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casualties coming in,” Bunnell remembers. “Lots of civilians. We were operating 24/7.”

One of Dr. Bunnell’s weekly assignments in Vietnam was to make “sick calls” at clinics located in local villages. When the Tet Offensive started, Bunnell skipped visits for about three weeks.

He returned to one about twenty minutes from the hospital, “When I finally went back, it was gone. The building was gone.

The people were gone. Nobody knew what had happened to them. The North Vietnamese had occupied the area for a while, and everybody was just gone.”

At one point during his tour in Vietnam, Dr. Bunnell was asked to visit a village where gas had allegedly been deployed by enemy forces. A helicopter left him in the village with a couple of Marines as protection for him. Bunnell recalled what happened when 1,500 enemy troops surrounded the village:

Cover of Life Magazine – February 9, 1968 - On the right (according to a report in The Kentucky Post and Times-Star) is Army 2nd Lieutenant Arthur Dickson of Covington

While I am standing in the village waiting for the helicopter, all of a sudden, there were these explosions all around the edges of the village. And one of the Marines (Fernandes Jennings) says, ‘Oh my God, here come the North Vietnamese. Get in that hole.’ And he points to 37

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a trench. So, we’re in this trench, and I’m watching all the South Vietnamese Army scatter when Jennings says, ‘We got to go.’ We jumped out of the trench and started running across a rice paddy. A couple of steps in, I fell and dropped all my stuff. I was picking it up when three South Vietnamese soldiers were shot and fell. I ran to the edge of the rice paddy and dived behind the dike.

Jennings told me to start digging a hole and get in it.

We spent the night there. The next morning, the North Vietnamese were gone, and the helicopter came and picked us up. When I arrived at base, my commanding officer told us they thought we had been killed. I told him we survived, but I would never make another house call.

During Bunnell’s time in Vietnam, he and his wife Nancy (at home with their one-year-old son) kept contact by sending tapes back and forth to each other. “Communication wasn’t great,” she said. “You’re at home, and you’re in the dark. There was one point I did not hear from him for a long period of time.” Nancy kept her sanity via meetings of the Waiting Wives Club, a group of local women whose husbands had been deployed to Vietnam.

Shortly after the Tet Offensive, Bunnell returned home but initially did not talk much about what he experienced. “I was really pissed off,” he said. “I felt like they had stolen a year out of my life, and I was angry about it.” After he returned, Bunnell concluded the war was “a huge mistake, and we never had any business being there in the first place. Nothing was accomplished.”

Bunnell eventually made peace over his time in Vietnam, and, in recent years, he gave talks to schools and civic groups about his time overseas.

Another important aspect of the Tet Offensive was the news coverage. The Tet Offensive was not only being covered on the front pages of print media but on television as well. ABC’s Huntley-Brinkley Report aired a stunning incident showing the 38

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harsh realities of war with shocking footage. One of the targets of North Vietnam during the Tet Offensive was the South Vietnam capital of Saigon. During the attack, the city’s police chief led a captured VC officer to a group of reporters who watched as the prisoner was executed with a single shot to the head at pointblank range. The image remains one of the iconic pictures of the conflict.

Legendary news anchor Walter Cronkite went to Vietnam during the Tet Offensive to film a special report for CBS to be aired near the end of February. The broadcast images of the Vietnam battlefields were brutal and bloody, exposing American viewers to a side of war rarely seen on television. In concluding the report, Cronkite declared, “It seems now more certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate.”

It was a stunning statement, eventually leading President Lyndon Johnson to not seek reelection.

And if the Tet Offensive was not necessarily on the minds of Northern Kentuckians, it was certainly on the minds of our elected officials in Washington.

In 1968, Northern Kentucky was divided between two Congressional Districts for its representation in Washington.

Campbell County and the southern half of Kenton County were in the Sixth District, represented by John Watts (D) from Lexington.

The northern half of Kenton County and Boone County were in the Fourth District, running along the Ohio River to the suburbs of Louisville, which was represented by Gene Snyder (R). In the United States Senate, Kentucky had Thurston Morton (R) and John Sherman Cooper (R).

Congressman Snyder was also known for his quarterly newsletters to constituents, annual questionnaires, and his Vote for Gene Snyder campaign jingle. The result of Snyder’s 1967 annual questionnaire was released in February of 1968. While not a scientific poll, the responses Snyder released show a crack 39

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in community support for America’s presence in Vietnam.

The first question on Snyder’s survey was simply stated: “What would you do about the war in Vietnam?” One respondent stated, “Vietnam appears to be the most stupid chapter in American history.” A Fort Thomas woman opined, “We can’t win the way it’s going.”

In February 1968, Senator Thurston Morton announced he would not seek reelection. Days later, he blasted President Johnson’s handling of Vietnam.

Kentucky made national news in the middle of February when a United States Senator from New York, Robert F. Kennedy (D), visited eastern Kentucky to hold hearings on the effectiveness of poverty programs in Appalachia. Kennedy was accompanied by Kentucky Senator John Sherman Cooper. The Kentucky Post and Times-Star followed Kennedy’s visit with two editorials – one on the substance of the hearings and the other on the youthful star power of Senator Kennedy. “The way they (young people) act, you’d think he was going to break out loaves and fishes,” said a 40-year-old mother of twelve.

The final footnote to February 1968 is a story about the passage of a resolution in the Kentucky House of Representatives that highlights the racial divide at the time. The resolution called on police departments to rid themselves of officers who were members of the Ku Klux Klan. The resolution passed 24-14.

Sixty members of the Kentucky House of Representatives “took a walk” and did not cast a vote.

Additional Chapter Credits:

Vance Trimble, interview by Tanya Finchum and Alex Bishop, July 16, 2013, in Wewoka, Oklahoma, transcript, Oklahoma Oral History Research Program at Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK, available online.

Berry, Wendell, letter to Rick Robinson, 10 January, 2023.

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Berry, Wendell, “A Statement Against the War in Vietnam,” speech, University of Kentucky (10 Feb 1968), also found in The LongLegged House (1969) Counterpoint Press, page 64.

Bunnell, Dr. Tom, and Nancy, interview by Rick Robinson, January 2023. Photo of Dr. Bunnell in Vietnam from his private collection.

Niekirk, Mark, interview by Rick Robinson, January 2023 Straub, Bill, Interview by Rick Robinson, January 2023 Harper, Kenneth, Interview with Rick Robinson, April 2023

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March – 1968 “With America’s sons in the fields far away; with America’s future under challenge right here at home; with our hopes and the world’s hopes for peace in the balance every day, I do not believe that I should devote an hour or a day of my time to any personal partisan causes or to any duties other than the awesome duties of this office--the Presidency of your country. Accordingly, I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President.”

—President Lyndon Johnson March 31, 1968

Eye-Catching Local Headline: Suspend Long-Haired Schoolboy On the covers of LIFE Magazine: March 1 – Paintings – Georgia O’Keefe in New Mexico – stark visions of a pioneer painter March 8 – Crying Child – The Negro and the Cities – the cry that will be heard March 16 – Boris Karloff – Happy 150th, Dear Frankenstein March 22 – Ho Chi Minh – Behind the Peace Feelers March 29 – Jane Fonda (as Barbarella) – Fonda’s Little Girl Jane On the covers of Sports Illustrated: March 4 – LSU’s Piston Pete Maravich – The Hottest Shot

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March 11 – Johnny Bench, Don Pepper, Alan Foster, Mike Torrez, and Cisco Carlos -The Best Rookies of 1968 March 18 – How Good is New York Knick Bill Bradley?

March 24 – Julius Boros Gives Golf Tips On the covers of Time Magazine: March 1 – Chicago’s Bobby Hull – The Fastest Shot in the Game March 8 – Richard Nixon and Nelson Rockefeller – The Race for the GOP Nomination March 15 – Joffrey Ballet’s “Astarte” March 22 – Eugene McCarthy – Three’s a Crowd – The Johnson-Kennedy-McCarthy Fight March 29 – International Monetary Fund’s Pierre-Paul Schweitzer – The Future of Money #1 on WSAI: Love is Blue by Paul Mauriat #1 on WCIN: Dock of the Bay by Otis Redding #1 on WCXL: Take Me to Your World by Tammy Wynette Popular at local cinemas: Valley of the Dolls On Television: The Monkees and Batman air final episodes Happy Birthday: actor Daniel Craig (March 2), country singer Kenny Chesney (March 26), actress Lucy Lawless (March 29), and Celine Dion (March 30) In Memoriam: Russian astronaut Yuri Gagarin (age 34)

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March 1968 was a banner month for the region as Governor Louie Nunn fulfilled a year-old campaign promise and signed legislation establishing a four-year college in Northern Kentucky.

The all-encompassing impact of this singular stroke of the pen continues to resonate throughout the community to this day.

It is hard to imagine life in the region without Northern Kentucky University. Yet, its establishment was anything but a cakewalk. The legislation enabling NKU’s founding faced numerous and substantial obstacles.

“All the other state universities were opposed to it,” said former State Representative Ken Harper (R). “They saw it as a threat to their own enrollment.”

At the time, Art Schmidt (R) represented Highland Heights, the community where Northern Kentucky University sits today.

In an oral history, Schmidt remembered the opposition. “You’ve got to realize that a lot of kids from Northern Kentucky went to Morehead and went to Eastern and to UK,” said Schmidt.

“Morehead and Eastern depended a lot upon this, so none of the universities wanted Northern to be established. They were opposed to it. Kentucky . . . the University of Kentucky didn’t want it either.”

Harper remembered, on top of the opposition from college presidents, that the state was facing a deficit in the state budget.

Success in the establishment of a four-year state college was tied directly to increasing the sales tax from three percent to five percent. “And man, did we take some heat for supporting ‘Nunn’s Nickel,’” said Harper.

Harper’s assertion is backed by newspaper articles about caravans of people traveling from Northern Kentucky to Frankfort to oppose an increase in the state’s sales tax.

Clyde Middleton was a freshman in the State Senate in 1968.

In his oral history, he recalled how Nunn broke the log jam. “[A] ll of the Northern Kentucky legislators favored it. Louie Nunn likes to tell a story about how Julian Carroll was riding both sides 44

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of the issue. And so Louie called all of the university presidents in and got them in his office, and then he called Julian Carroll down and said, ‘Julian, here are the presidents of all the colleges; now, tell me. Are you for Northern Kentucky University or against it?’

And I guess Julian said he was for it. And it went through.”

Many students and teachers were also opposed. The University of Kentucky operated an “extension” campus in Park Hills, allowing students to work on a degree from the state’s flagship institution. Teachers were concerned a new college could not obtain proper certification and student’s degrees would be worthless.

But as Ken Harper pointed out, “When Louie made a promise, it was etched in stone.”

Schmidt mentioned how Nunn used the power of his office in establishing NKU: “Also happens at the time, the governor by virtue of being governor was chairman of the boards of regents of all the schools, so even though the presidents and so on didn’t want it, they weren’t about to buck the governor too bad on this thing.”

When discussing the establishment of Northern Kentucky University, the work of State Representative Phillip King (D) is often overlooked. While the Republican governor may have set the agenda for the legislature at the time, the General Assembly was controlled by Democrats. Rep. King cosponsored the legislation establishing Northern Kentucky State College and authored the bill appropriating its initial funding (a whopping $200,000). Years later, Rep. King was instrumental in passing legislation making it a university.

In King’s personal files, he kept copies of the Kentucky Labor News. King was a switchman on the Louisville and Nashville Railroad while he was earning his law degree. His voting record reflected his blue-collar background. Yet, King’s daughter, Kenton Circuit Court Judge Terri King Schoborg, recalls her father’s dedication to NKU as being steadfast. “He was committed to 45

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making sure we had our own university,” she said.

The Kentucky Post and Times-Star covered the proceedings throughout the first quarter of 1968, but editorial support was noticeably absent. Early in the legislative session, the paper pointed out the region already had a four-year college – Villa Madonna College. In fact, the newspaper spent more editorial ink on Villa Madonna changing its name to Thomas More than on the establishment of NKU. In an editorial issued following passage of the legislation, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star opined: “By 82 to 0 in the House and 38 to 0 in the Senate, the states legislators recognized the real need for a full-fledged state college in the commonwealth’s second most populated area. Reality may be some time away, but we’ll be officially on the way to our college goal with Gov. Nunn’s signature of approval.”

At the signing ceremony for the budget, Governor Nunn explained how the new college was closely tied to his sales tax increase. “You … and other sections of Kentucky … would not have your college, or the planned bridges, roads, highways, and other projects were it not for the new tax program.”

While Northern Kentucky University would have never happened without the backing of Louie Nunn, the funding mechanism of an increase in the state sales tax haunted Nunn for years. “Nunn’s Nickel made NKU happen,” said Harper.

“But Louie never recovered politically. It cost him his career in politics.”

All the while the debate over Northern Kentucky’s four-year university was happening, Vietnam was becoming more visible in the community and driving national politics.

Based upon a call from the United States Department of Defense for an additional 48,000 troops, local Selective Service boards increased their induction numbers. For the first time, socalled “Kennedy Husbands” would be included in the ranks of those to be drafted.

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President John Kennedy was the author of an executive order declaring single men should be called in the draft before married ones. The Executive Order had been rescinded by President Lyndon Johnson in 1965, but the exemption continued to apply to men covered during the active time of the order. Thus, men who were married between February 16, 1963, and August 16, 1965, were referred to as “Kennedy Husbands,” and their classification was such that they would only be drafted if the supply of single men ran out.

Due to a shortage of draftees, the delayed sequence of calls for local Kennedy Husbands changed, and they were moved to the front of the induction line. In its first substantive position on Vietnam in 1968, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star opposed a policy calling “…men who had planned their families and future with civilian confidence who now find themselves being summoned for war.”

Also in March, Fourth District Congressman Gene Snyder took to the floor of the United States House of Representatives and called for President Johnson to stop the war or have “the blood of dying Americans on his hands.” In the fifteen-page speech, Snyder alleged Johnson violated the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution (allowing American forces in Vietnam to retaliate) by actually escalating the war. “This mess transcends politics,” said Snyder. “The end of this war should not wait. The slaughter of Americans should not have to await an election.”

With these comments, Congressman Snyder joined Kentucky Senators John Sherman Cooper and Thurston Morton in criticism over the manner in which the war was being conducted.

Congressman Snyder was not the only person upset with President Johnson’s handling of Vietnam. Local Democrats supporting New York Senator Robert F. Kennedy and Minnesota Senator Eugene “Clean Gene” McCarthy met to try and get delegates to the Democratic National Convention to attend unpledged to any one candidate. In the week following the 47

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meeting, President Johnson’s election vulnerability would be shown when, in the New Hampshire Primary, he would eke out a win over McCarthy. Johnson’s narrow victory also pushed Senator Robert Kennedy to formally enter the race.

By the end of the month, in a nationally televised speech, President Johnson would announce he was abandoning his reelection effort.

With 79 percent of the New Hampshire primary vote, former Vice President Richard Nixon solidified his drive for the Republican nomination for President.

And when former Alabama Governor George Wallace ditched his Democratic party affiliation and joined the race for President of the United States as an independent, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star said: We’re glad the Bluegrass voters will have an opportunity to express their preferences in the white supremacy while electing a new United States Senator and helping to elect a president.

Our impression has been that most Kentuckians are not strongly racist in their attitudes, but we shall see.

On Nov. 6 will come the final separation of the ins from the outs, the sheep from the goats, the eagles from the hawks, doves, buzzards, and other aves.

While all of this was happening nationally, the local men continued being shipped overseas, and the regional death toll from Vietnam continued to grow.

The Covington parents of twenty-year-old Army Sergeant Ronald McCollum got word their son, missing in action for over a month, had been killed. He was stationed in Dak To near the border of Laos when he went missing. “I hated to see him go,” said his young wife. In a letter home, McCollum told his family, “But there’s a job that must be done there, and I’m no better than my buddies. My men look to me for guidance.”

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Army Second Lieutenant Dennette Edwards, III, was killed.

Edwards had moved to Florida following his 1963 graduation from Simon Kenton High School but had kept in close contact with his former classmates. Marine PFC Gary Wayne Litton from Edgewood was killed by mortar fire just north of Hue. Marine Lance Corporal Sam Marshall of Erlanger was killed while trying to pull a comrade to safety. His brother John, at the time stationed in Okinawa, accompanied his brother’s body home for funeral services.

Feature stories in The Kentucky Post and Times-Star focused on life in and out of Vietnam. William G. Wilson was happy to be home with his parents in Boone County but admitted his time in the military had changed his way of thinking. “I heard thunder the other night, and I thought, ‘Incoming fire.’ In Vietnam, we’d have jumped in a hole,” he said.

Northern Kentuckians also read the story of fifty-two-yearold Master Sergeant Lloyd Saylor from Newport. A veteran of World War II and Cincinnati-based recruiter, Sgt. Saylor had put in for retirement and instead got orders to head up helicopter operations in Saigon.

Two Newport Catholic High School graduates from Highland Heights, PFC William Bailey and PFC William Stratman, were reunited in Hawaii. Bailey, wounded by shrapnel, was recuperating in the hospital where Stratman had been assigned.

Stratman wrote his parents about the reunion: “Boy, I’m so very, very glad I saw him. It’s kind of hard to describe the feelings inside of you when you meet someone under these conditions.”

Moved by the Tet Offensive and the growing number of local casualties, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star sent a team of reporters into the field to talk with its readers about Vietnam.

Nearly half of the persons interviewed supported the presence of United States troops in Vietnam. The remaining group was split between being opposed and having mixed emotions.

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A Newport woman said, “I think we should bring peace to that troubled country if we can, but not by pulling out. Quitting never accomplished anything.” A Covington man worried his son would be sent to Vietnam but added, “I guess it’s a good war.

I don’t understand it, but I feel it has to be fought.”

The article reporting the responses noted the people opposed to the war “answered more quickly and emotionally,” describing it as “‘pointless, a scandal, drain, lost cause, mess, useless, and unnecessary.’”

A Fort Thomas businessman called the war “just plain monkey business.” He added, “I don’t understand why a big country like ours lets little countries dictate to us.” A Warsaw laborer said it was a repeat of Korea. A railroad worker from Covington said plainly, “We ought to mind our own business.”

While this story was not a scientific poll, it certainly shows the growing discontent from Northern Kentuckians regarding the country’s presence in Vietnam.

Near the end of the month, Students for a Democratic Society held its largest national conference to date in Lexington.

According to reports, there were over a hundred delegates and some 350 observers at the two-day meeting. Covington resident Thurman Wenzel attended the conference. A former Naval officer and math professor at the Naval Academy, Wenzel was one of the observers, and he credits attending the meeting for transforming him from math professor to lifelong activist. “The Lexington meeting was the first time I had been around a large group of anti-war demonstrators,” he said. “After Tet, people started taking the anti-war movement more seriously.”

The March 1968 meeting of Students for a Democratic Society in Lexington was not reported on in Northern Kentucky.

One other incident not reported on in Northern Kentucky (or anywhere, for that matter) was a U.S. military raid on a small village of My Lai, where hundreds of villagers were slaughtered

by American military forces. The Pentagon would cover up 50

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the story for more than a year. Exposure of the incident and the criminal charges against the man leading the raid, William Calley, would once again force the public to face the brutality of Vietnam.

Hair Mattered in ’68 Marking the times of 1968 were two incidents involving hair.

First, a Louisville-based motorcycle club – the Louisville Outlaws – went to Frankfort to discuss legislation with their elected officials. Because of their appearance, they were not greeted with the warmth generally given to clean-shaven constituents. The Kentucky House of Representatives passed a resolution telling them to go back to Louisville and not return until they “improved their appearance.” Specifically, the resolution instructed them to get haircuts and shave.

Another story was about a young man being suspended from Campbell County High School because the superintendent disliked his long hair. As additional punishment, his photo was going to be removed from the school’s annual yearbook. As a point of reference, the haircut in question looked more like Donny Osmond than Duane Allman. Nevertheless, it took a lawsuit to reinstate the offending longhair and get his picture back into the yearbook.

Additional Chapter Credits:

Schmidt, Arthur L. Interview by Eric Moyen. 30 Oct. 2003.

Lexington, KY: Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History, University of Kentucky Libraries.

Middleton, Clyde Interview by Christy Bohl. 07 Jul. 2006. Lexington, KY: Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History, University of Kentucky Libraries.

Harper, Kenneth, telephone interview by Rick Robinson. 14 January 2023.

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Thurman Wenzel, interview by Rick Robinson. 31 January 2023.

King Schoborg, Terri interview by Rick Robinson 23 February 2023.

King, Phillip, personal files

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April – 1968 “Well, I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now because I’ve been to the mountaintop.”

—Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. April 3, 1968

Eye-Catching Local Headline: Acid Chemist Thinks He Found Something Great On the covers of LIFE Magazine: April 5 – The Marvel of Egypt’s Past April 12 – Martin Luther King (1929 – 1968) – Week of Shock April 19 – Coretta King – America’s Farewell in Anger and Grief April 26 – The French Spy Scandal On the covers of Sports Illustrated: April 1 – Lew Alcindor – Lew’s Revenge – The Rout of Houston April 8 – Stanley Cup Hockey April 15 – Lou Brock – Baseball Preview April 22 – Bob Goalby and Roberto De Vicenzo – The Masters April 29 – Elgin Baylor and Jerry West – Celtics-LA Showdown On the covers of Time Magazine: April 5 – Dubcek – Self Determination for Czechoslovakia 53

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April 12 – President Lyndon Johnson – The Search for Peace in Asia – The Specter of Violence at Home April 19 – General Creighton Abrams – New Man in Viet Nam April 26 – Author John Updike – The Adulterous Society #1 on WSAI: Honey by Bobby Goldsboro #1 on WCIN: Since You’ve Been Gone by Aretha Franklin #1 on WCXL: Fist City by Loretta Lynn Popular at local cinemas: Walt Disney’s Blackbeard’s Ghost On Television: The Andy Griffith Show aired its final episode.

Happy Birthday: actor Anthony Michael Hall (April 14), actress Ashley Judd (April 19), and domestic terrorist Timothy McVeigh (April 23) In Memoriam: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (age 39)

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The life and legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. remain an integral part of American society. As so many of the marches and protests he led are legendary in the civil rights movement, his time in Kentucky is often overlooked or forgotten. And while his appearances in the Commonwealth were in Louisville and Frankfort, the impact of his visits was felt statewide.

Dr. King’s visits to Kentucky began early in his career. In 1957, he was the commencement speaker at Kentucky State University. He was twenty-eight years old at the time. King told the graduates of Kentucky’s traditional African-American college that they were “traveling towards the promised land of social integration, of freedom, and of justice.”

In the mid-sixties, King’s brother, Reverend A.D. King, became the pastor of a church in Louisville. Thereafter, Martin Luther King’s visits to Kentucky became more frequent. On a cold March day in 1964, King led a march on the state capital in Frankfort. King was joined in the march by Major League Baseball legend Jackie Robinson, the singing trio Peter Paul and Mary, and over 10,000 marchers.

Northern Kentucky participated in the rally as local churches sent busloads of people to join in the march. An estimated 300 people from the region attended. For those who could not attend the march in Frankfort, local prayer vigils were held. There were calls for the Kentucky General Assembly to adopt a state civil rights law. Although initial efforts to pass such a law failed to get out of committee, in 1966, Kentucky became the first southern state to adopt a state civil rights law.

The passage garnered much local support. State Senate ProTempore James Ware (D) of Lakeside Park said, “I am reluctant to deprive others of rights which I enjoy.”

King’s presence in Kentucky was never more impactful than in 1967 when he led a series of marches in Louisville advocating for a fair housing ordinance in the city. While King did not attend each march personally, they were occurring on a nightly 55

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basis. Police lines separated protesters and hecklers. Arrests were made. Tear gas was dispensed into crowds. At one event, Louisville native Muhammad Ali spoke.

The Louisville marches of 1967 came to a head during Kentucky Derby week when protesters threatened to disrupt the annual Run for the Roses. Dr. King appeared in Louisville that week and spoke to marchers. “If we are engaged in a righteous and just struggle for freedom, we know the jails can’t stop us,” King said. “We have tried to get the city to do what it ought to do.

And since it refused, we have to let them know that we are not afraid to fill up the jails.”

“No housing ordinance, no Derby,” was the rallying cry.

During the week preceding the 1967 Kentucky Derby, robed and hooded members of the Ku Klux Klan appeared at Churchill Downs, offering aid to local police in maintaining law and order. On the morning of the first Saturday in May, over fears of violence, Dr. King called off the Derby Day protest.

Later in the summer of 1967, just prior to the passage of a city housing non-discrimination ordinance, King was back in Louisville registering voters. It was his final appearance in Kentucky.

On April 4, 1968, following a speech the night before in support of striking city sanitation workers, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot and killed outside his room at the Lorraine Hotel in Memphis, Tennessee.

The days preceding and following King’s murder remain etched in America’s collective conscience.

The speech Dr. King gave the night before he was shot was an eerie foreshadowing of what was to come. After recounting several times when he was concerned for his safety, he told those assembled: Well, I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn’t matter with me now. Because I’ve been to the mountaintop. And I 56

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don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life.

Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you.

But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. And I’m happy tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

The next day, residents of Northern Kentucky (and the world) learned Dr. King had been assassinated.

In the spring of 1968, Bob McCray was a seventeen-year-old student at Newport High School struggling with his own path in life. On the one hand, he closely followed the non-violent teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The other hand was a bit more complicated. As it was with many young African Americans at the time, the voices of the radical Black Panther Party spoke to him.

“I was personally torn,” McCray recalled, “between peaceful opposition to racism or radical violence.” McCray had written a high school term paper on the Black Panther Party. “There were so many voices … H. Rap Brown … Bobby Seale … Huey Newton … who believed peaceful means would not accomplish anything. They spoke in a way that made us proud to be black.”

McCray grew up in the west side of Newport and remembers his tight-knit minority neighborhood as being shocked over King’s death. Even today, McCray struggles to express the deep pain his family Northern Kentucky march following the death of Dr. King

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experienced. “My family ... my brother … my mom … my sisters,” he closed his eyes and formed his words carefully, “we were distraught beyond comfort.”

In the days following Dr. Martin Luther King’s murder, McCray recalls protest marchers from Covington attempting to cross the Fourth Street Bridge into Newport, only to be turned away by African-American residents of Newport’s west end.

“A bunch of our people met them at the bridge and let them know they were not welcome in Newport,” McCray said. The encounter on the bridge was not violent. “I think it was because Newport’s black and white community had a unique relationship. Back then, everybody knew everybody, and we respected each other.”

The Rev. King’s assassination set McCray on a journey to becoming the first black police officer in Newport, Kentucky. He retired after thirty-six years on the force.

McCray’s perspective of a tightknit minority community is important to understanding life in Northern Newport’s Bob McCray Kentucky in 1968. Northern Kentucky is far more diverse today than it was in 1968. In Campbell County at the time, the African-American population of just over 800 was less than 1 percent of the county’s total population, and almost all minority families lived in McCray’s neighborhood on the west side of Newport. In Kenton and Boone counties, the minority population was under 3 percent and under ½ percent, respectively. In all three counties, other minorities were nearly nonexistent in census data.

Across the Licking River from McCray’s Newport home lived Covington’s Arnold Simpson. The future Democratic State Representative was a sophomore at Holmes High School in 58

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1968. He echoed McCray’s comments about Covington being a small, segregated minority community where everyone knew each other. Reflecting on the times, Simpson thinks of 1968 as “the great clash of ideas … a merging of two societies, each quite unfamiliar with the other.” On one side were people who wanted to maintain the status quo. On the other side was “a revolution of independent thought of what should happen.”

Arnold Simpson’s father – Jim Simpson – was a groundbreaking minority business leader in Northern Kentucky who taught his son that in order to further a dialogue about race, you had to first get a seat at the table. The elder Simpson taught his son by example by being very active in Northern Kentucky.

Jim Simpson served on many boards and commissions, including being the chairman of the Northern Kentucky/Greater Cincinnati Airport Board, and he was the first African American to serve on Covington’s City Council.

In an interview, the younger Simpson laughed at the thought of him being involved in any of the violence occurring following the death of Dr. King. “My parents kept me on a pretty short leash,” said Simpson.

Newspaper coverage by The Kentucky Post and Times-Star was limited to the aftermath of King’s death. There was not a single story declaring King’s murder. Local readers looking for stories about King’s shooting or the search for his killer were directed to visit the newspaper’s Cincinnati edition. The stories written for local readers were a mixed bag of stories often contradicting each other.

Editorially, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star commented on the riots in Cincinnati by heralding the violence did not cross the river. “Order in Kentucky” was the headline. Of course, the order was somewhat forced. The bridges connecting Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky were policed by National Guardsmen.

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according to a police spokesman, were “mostly from white people going to Cincinnati to work.”

The rose-colored editorial was betrayed by the newspaper’s actual stories. Firebombs were hurled in Covington, which then set up a special telephone line to deal with emergencies. Newport adopted emergency ordinances. The river towns and other cities with little or no racial population also adopted curfews. Schools were closed, and buses were searched. Students from Holmes High School slashed seats on buses. Florence remained open.

While the disruption in Northern Kentucky was minimal compared to what other cities across the nation were experiencing, tensions were undeniably high. Headlines trumpeted the preparedness of city police departments. One local city official declared, “If anyone starts looting, we’ll start shooting.” Congressman Gene Snyder praised Chicago Mayor Richard Daley (D), who had issued a shoot-to-kill order for arsonists and a shoot-to-maim order for looters.

Much of the emphasis in stories was placed on the fact liquor sales had been restrained. “Our curbing of liquor sales is not aimed at the Negro population, but at anyone who might want to start trouble,” one official said.

But in the days following King’s death, life in Northern Kentucky was not all fear of violence and looting. A light shone through for some. Many Northern Kentuckians – black and white – were coming together in the name of racial harmony.

The bishop of Covington, Richard Ackerman, said, “If all men shall recognize that the abrupt and abhorrent manner by which Dr. King was removed from the crusade to which he dedicated all his talent and physical energy is the fruit of prejudice, then his death shall not have been in vain. His struggle for social justice is now baptized in his blood, and it shall be strengthened by it.”

Inter-faith memorial services and marches across Northern Kentucky were held. At one such event, over 200 marchers were separated from hecklers by police. State Senator Clyde Middleton 60

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attended the march with his young sons. “I came to join in dedication to Mr. King,” Middleton is quoted as saying. “If we don’t join with them, we’ll have many difficult years ahead.” Local civil rights activist Alice Shimfessel feared the younger marchers in the crowd would not follow King’s lead of nonviolence. “I’m afraid to think what will happen if things don’t get better.”

The Reverend Richard Fowler was raised in Covington, where he graduated from a segregated high school. He and his wife were in Los Angeles visiting family when he learned memorial service for Martin of King’s assassination and Inter-faith Luther King Jr. at Mother of God Church remembers being in a blur, in Covington disconnected from time and reality. “Many people can tell you exactly where they were at the time they learned,” he said. “I can’t.” He does recall experiencing a wide range of emotions, from anger to anguish and the “strange feeling of being attached and detached all at the same time.”

A final pronouncement from The Kentucky Post and TimesStar on King’s killing and its aftermath came in a tone-deaf editorial titled “Count Our Blessings,” wherein the newspaper stated we should be grateful for the blessing of racial peace. The premise of the editorial was racial violence in our region did not happen because: “The races live in mutual friendship and respect here in the upper Bluegrass – as indeed they do throughout the commonwealth.” The remaining language of the editorial is chillingly patronizing and refers to the area’s minority population as “responsible, industrious, intelligent and law-abiding” and lacking the “hoodlum element” present in other cities.

And while all this was happening in Northern Kentucky, the war in Southeast Asia continued.

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Another soldier being followed by The Kentucky Post and Times-Star, Army Specialist 4th Class Charles Crowder from Campbell County, received a shrapnel wound to his head. In a letter to his parents, he said it was a booby trap along a road set off by a dog. A more sobering account of the war was told

by Lance Corporal Max Wharton of Lakeside Park. The sniper recounted his days in the jungles of Vietnam. “Every time you get shot at is a new experience and every time you see somebody get killed it changes you.

Private First Class William Eldridge of Walton would eventually be posthumously awarded the Silver Star for the actions costing him his life in a battle south of Lai Khe. According to the commendation, in a heavy gunfight with diminishing ammunition, Eldridge “unhesitatingly exposed himself ” to get more supplies. His actions directly saved American lives.

National news stories were not the only headlines in the region. In the final week of April, a tragic tornado hit Falmouth.

The Kentucky Post and Times-Star brought the storm to its readers with pictures and first-hand accounts of the devastation. Also, the newspaper did an extensive series on the state of Catholic education in the Dioceses. These detailed investigative stories capture the newspaper at its finest, delivering news to readers in Northern Kentucky.

Additional Chapter Credits: Louisville Courier-Journal, “A Derby Standoff, a Statehouse Rally and Louisville Marches: MLK’s Legacy in Kentucky” by Hayes Gardner, January 21, 2021

McCray, Robert interview by Rick Robinson, 3 February 2023 Pieces of the Past 3 by Jim Reis, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star (1994), “Dr. King Led March on Frankfort,” page 119 Simpson, Arnold interview by Rick Robinson, 16 February 2023 Fowler, Richard interview by Rick Robinson, 21 February 2023 62

May – 1968 Etre libre en 1968, c’est participer.

Translated — To be free in 1968 means to participate.

Wall poster during Paris demonstrations

Eye-Catching Local Headline: Mystery Shrouds Drug Use in Derby On the covers of LIFE Magazine: May 3 – James Earl Ray – The Revealing Story of a Mean Kid May 10 – Paul Newman – The Stars Leap Into Politics May 17 – The Generation Gap May 24 – John Lindsey – Cool Mayor in a Pressure Cooker May 31 – Ancient Egypt Grandeur of Empire On the covers of Sports Illustrated: May 6 – Ron Swoboda – The Movin’ Mets May 13 – Turbine Cars Invade the Indy 500 May 20 – Dancer’s Image – Derby Drug Mystery May 27 – The Reds Brash Pete Rose On the covers of Time Magazine: May 3 – Hubert H. Humphrey May 10 – Peace Talks – The Scenario in Paris May 17 – Poverty in America – Its Cause and Extent May 24 – Robert F. Kennedy May 31 – Charles De Gaulle

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#1 on WSAI: Mrs. Robinson by Simon and Garfunkel #1 on WCIN: I Got the Feelin’ by James Brown #1 on WCXL: I Wanna Live by Glenn Campbell Popular at local cinemas: In Cold Blood On Television: advertisements for a new toy called Hot Wheels Happy Birthday: skateboarder Tony Hawk (May 12), MLB player Frank “the Big Hurt” Thomas (May 27) In Memoriam: Harold Gray, comic strip artist of Little Orphan Annie (age 74)

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In May 1968, Kentucky’s governor, Louie B. Nunn, was the commencement speaker for 312 students graduating from Boone County High School. Nunn’s comments were pointed. He labeled those causing disruption in the streets as “noisy minorities challenging society” and called upon the graduates to “Stand up and be counted. Grow up to be constructive … build, do not tear down. The strong in spirit and character are those who build.

The weak in spirit and character are those who destroy.”

Nunn’s words were more telling than he may have anticipated.

While at the high school, Nunn received word of race riots taking place in Louisville. According to a reporter listening to Nunn as he took the call, the governor said, “Okay, get ’em what they need…move in armed and do what is necessary to put it down – and right away.”

Baby boomers in high school in 1968 faced a set of circumstances their parents never expected, and today the children of those boomers cannot comprehend. Margo Grubbs and Gary Pranger are examples of people then in high school.

Attorney Margo Grubbs was a sophomore at Boone County High School at the time. With her father as an undertaker and living above his funeral home, she was used to hearing about and dealing with death. But 1968 was something different. “We’d watch Walter Cronkite every night for the body count,” she said.

“And we trusted the adults to do the right thing. Then, two boys we all knew were killed. Our eyes were suddenly opened to the world around us. Enlightenment came as we buried our boys.”

In addition, as many around the country were calling for civil rights for African Americans, Grubbs vividly remembers there was also a struggle for women’s rights in its infancy. Grubbs was a talented athlete with limited opportunity to play. “We had to find a teacher to fight for us to just get us practice time in the gym, and our seasons were only a couple of games a season,” she said. High school became even more complicated in her senior year when she became pregnant, and her family had to fight for 65

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her to remain in school. Grubbs was only allowed to participate in commencement after other students threatened to boycott the event over her exclusion.

Additionally, Grubbs, who came out about her own sexuality in 1973, chuckles about today’s LGBTQ movement. She recalls the only time alternative lifestyles were addressed in 1968 was when people addressed someone’s non-straight sexuality with a pejorative insult.

In 1968, Gary Pranger and his family were living on Pike Street in Covington, and he was a freshman at Covington Latin High School. His anguish of the times remains clear in his mind today. “I had just finished my first year of high school and was well on my way to adulthood just at the time that everything seemed to be going to heck in a handcart,” he recalled. “And it all troubled me greatly.”

Pranger recalls that by day, he was working hard at school to become successful, but when he went home and watched the news, he felt the entire system was falling apart. “I felt like the world was coming to an end, and I had yet to have the opportunity to participate,” he said. “I was too young to know how to process all of it, but I knew it didn’t bode well for the future.” His laundry list of issues eating at his soul in 1968 mirrors those of so many high school students at the time.

Margo Grubbs and Gary Pranger remain passionate over the vivid memories of the year challenging (and perhaps changing) their youthful innocence. Despite their reservations at the time, the teenage angst over the events of 1968 is a foundation for what they became in their separate lives.

In Vietnam, as a result of phase two of the Tet Offensive, May 1968 was the bloodiest on record. This second wave, aimed at Saigon and other urban centers, has come to be known as the May Offensive. The articles in The Kentucky Post and Times-Star from the month of May certainly reflect the carnage. Many young men from Northern Kentucky were either wounded or killed.

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Danny Boone, an 18-year-old paratrooper from Ludlow with the 101st Airborne Division, was killed while stationed at an air base at Bien Hoa, just north of Saigon. In December, he had written a letter to the editor of The Kentucky Post and TimesStar saying he wasn’t gung-ho or wanting to be a hero. “Actually, I’m like everyone here – pretty scared,” he wrote. “I believe that everyone should have a chance in life. It could mean giving my own life, but at least it would be worth it. At least I’d have died for a reason.” He concluded his letter by stating, “Perhaps if people understood each other and cared for one another, this world might be a better place to live in.”

Boone was not the only Northern Kentuckian to lose his life during the May Offensive. A family in Boone County learned their son, Arthur “Teddy” Kramer, Jr., had been killed in action.

Marine Corporal David A. Jones of Dayton was killed by shrapnel near Quang Tri. Specialist 4th Class Fred Bauerle was killed. All three had brothers also serving in combat.

Of Teddy Kramer, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star said his family could “envision him in the uniform of his country, forever youthful and free from anguish, a martyr and a hero who was called to the service and answered the call with the very last beat of his heart.”

A Marine from Covington, Private First Class Phillip Wayne Salter, described in horrific detail how he had been wounded as his unit was attempting to hold a village on the Cua Viet River about 15 miles east of Khe Sanh.

The NVA had a bunch of grunts pinned under fire, and we took a 105 mm mounted gun in to help them.

We were told there was an NVA company in there, but it turns out there was a whole regiment. We started through a rice paddy, and they opened up on us. A bullet hit our radio and started a fire. We had to get out. I was the last one out. As I jumped, a bullet hit my right leg, knocked me over and I rolled off the tractor. About the time I hit 67

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the ground, I got hit twice – in the back and in the hip.

I tried to roll around back and was hit in the shoulder.

I scrambled through a rice paddy trying to get to cover – some bushes about 75 feet away. About halfway out, another one got me in the left arm. It seemed like every time I moved, I got shot. So, I stopped and just lay there pretending to be dead.

Salter said the two hours he spent waiting to be rescued seemed like a week. Remarkably, he spoke of the incident in a very matter-of-fact manner. “It was just one of those things.

Some of my buddies got it worse.”

During May, a 108-member National Guard unit from Carrollton, Kentucky, (nicknamed the “Old Ironsides Battalion”) that included Carroll County Judge Executive John Tilley was called up to active duty. On a rainy day, the unit headed to Fort Hood in Texas. No one asked for a hardship deferral, but all worried about their families and the future. Their state representative was quoted as saying, “Outsiders can’t understand what this has done to our community. It would be like your area losing its largest industry and all the families moving out with it.”

Stories of other soldiers going to and returning from Vietnam also filled the newspaper. In May, Congressman Gene Snyder reached out to Marine brass to see if Gary Malapelli (the brother of Northern Kentucky’s first war victim) could serve somewhere other than Vietnam. Because of his brother’s death, Malapelli could have avoided the draft. Instead, he enlisted and eventually got orders for Vietnam. “I believe in our country,” said Malapelli’s Master Sergeant Coy Miller leads drills mother, “but as a family, I feel for Carrollton National Guard unit.

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we have given one son and should not be asked to give another.”

Gary Malapelli was ordered to Vietnam, where, later in the year, he would sustain shrapnel wounds to his head and neck.

Despite the danger Gary Malapelli faced in Vietnam, his mother remained proud of his service. “I would rather he would serve his country than be a draft card burner,” she said.

Campbell County High School graduate Sergeant Hobart Strange learned he had been awarded a Bronze Star for his service in Southeast Asia. Strange said he did not want to brag about the award. “I just did the best I could and tried to stay alive,” he said humbly. “Over there, you get shot at so much and so often that if a day goes by without being shot at, it seems funny.”

Marine Private First Class Jerry Gilbert of Fort Mitchell was hit in his hip by a round, which first went through his wallet. In a letter to his mother, the eighteen-year-old said, “I’ll have to get a new wallet when I get home. And it better be bulletproof.” Mike Mulberry, also from Fort Mitchell, came home from Vietnam but did not want to talk much to a reporter about the fighting, noting instead he felt much older than 20.

In a news story garnering editorial comment, Marine Corporal Randall Browning of Warsaw was awarded the Navy Cross for actions he took saving an entire battalion from annihilation during a fierce battle near Quang Tri Province.

He had been wounded in the battle but returned to “maneuver his vehicle through intense hostile fire and began delivering highly effective machine gun and recoilless rifle fire against the enemy’s successive human wave assaults.” Browning’s actions were commended on the editorial page of The Kentucky Post and Times-Star: “His furious and highly effective mobile fire against the Reds at Con Thien in 1967 demand the highest praise and admiration from all Americans.” *** 69

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In the weeks following the death of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., local ministers planned participation in the so-called “Poor Peoples March.” The march was planned to start in Cincinnati and cross the bridge into Covington, where King’s brother, A.D. King, was scheduled to speak. Residents were asked to assist in providing lodging for the marchers. The Rev. Edgar Mack of Barnes Temple AME in Elsmere said of the event, “We want to make this the largest outpouring of goodwill and brotherhood ever held in Northern Kentucky.” On the day of the march, the participants were advised not to cross the river. Still, a rally was held at the Ninth Street United Methodist Church to hear the Rev. Jesse Jackson speak. The meeting was heralded as the largest civil rights event ever held in the area.

Despite the death of Dr. King and the supportive marches, news of racial harmony in Northern Kentucky was not forthcoming. The Kentucky State Human Rights Commission held a hearing involving an incident involving an African American sailor home on leave who was denied entrance to the Lamplight Patio in Bromley. The owners of the bar claimed the restaurant was a private club. *** Kentucky also conducted primary elections in May. With no real local races pushing voters to the polls, turnout in Northern Kentucky was low. “This was the pattern statewide as a disturbing psychology dampened what little interest had been evident,” wrote Kentucky Post and Times-Star reporter John Murphy regarding the 22 percent statewide turnout. Statewide winners Kathrine Peden and Marlow Cook each won Boone, Campbell, and Kenton counties in their respective primaries for United States Senate. Neither candidate spent over $50,000 in their race.

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Gene Snyder for the Fourth District Congressional Seat in the fall.

Far more interesting than the primaries was the political news from Frankfort of State Representative Ken Harper vacating his seat in the Kentucky House of Representatives to join the Nunn Administration as the Assistant Commissioner of Child Welfare.

Harper recalls Nunn’s commitment to children’s issues as being key to Nunn’s term in office. Harper had been the first Republican to hold his legislative seat since 1920, and vacating the position in the middle of his third term left potential candidates of both parties salivating for their side’s nod in a special election. *** Over and over, the research for this book revealed many of the issues being dealt with today were issues in the late ’60s.

Three of them in May of 1968 are worth noting.

The use of firearms by police officers was being scrutinized.

The Kentucky Post and Times-Star called upon local law enforcement agencies to better define when police officers could use firearms. The gun policy at the time gave authority to shoot people they believed may have committed a felony. The newspaper called for change. “Let’s have a set of clear-cut rules stating precisely when a policeman is justified in drawing, in leveling, and in firing. Playing it by ear is not compatible with the civilized man’s concept of the value of a human life.”

Also, in what can only be described as “past being prologue” for what is today referred to as “critical race theory,” another editorial in The Kentucky Post and Times-Star warned the teaching of black history in schools “is particularly susceptible to distortion.” The editorial stated: “Any honest, self-respecting historian recording the progress of the American Negro in this decade will have to take into account the recent report by the House Committee on Un-American Activities, which states that 71

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Communist-oriented black nationalists are fomenting riots as a prelude to open guerilla warfare against the United States.”

Finally, in May 1968, student rioters filled the streets of Paris, France, protesting … well … a bunch of things ranging from the war in Vietnam to a policy disallowing male and female students to spend the night in each other’s dorm rooms. Regardless of the reason for the uprising, protesters were able to shut down Paris for weeks. The protests moved to the countryside and threatened the stability of the French government and economy. As this book was being written, fires were burning in the streets of Paris over a government decision to raise the retirement age by a year.

If the math is correct, some people likely participated in both riots.

Additional Chapter Credits: Pranger, Gary, interview by Rick Robinson, 2 February 2023 Grubbs, Margo, telephone interview by Rick Robinson, 13 April 2023 Harper, Kenneth, telephone interview by Rick Robinson

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June – 1968 “My brother need not be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life; but be remembered simply as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it.”

—Senator Edward Kennedy’s eulogy for his brother Senator Robert Kennedy

Eye-Catching Local Headline: Hungry Smokers Loot Rabbit Hash’s Only Store On the covers of LIFE Magazine: June 7 – Senator Eugene McCarthy — The Voyage of the Loner June 14 – Senator Bobby Kennedy June 21 – James Earl Ray and Sirhan Sirhan — The Two Accused – the psychobiology of violence.

June 28 – Jefferson Airplane — The New Rock On the covers of Sports Illustrated: June 3 – Villanova’s Dave Patrick (runner) June 15 – The U.S. Open — who rules the game?

June 22 – LA Dodger Don Drysdale – the hitting famine June 29 – Lively Lee Trevino wins the U.S. Open On the covers of Time Magazine: June 7 – The Graduate 1968 – Can you trust anyone under 30?

June 14 – Senator Robert Kennedy 73

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June 21 – The Gun in America June 28 – Aretha Franklin – The Sound of Soul #1 on WSAI: This Guy’s in Love with You by Herb Albert #1 on WCIN: Think by Aretha Franklin #1 on WCXL: D-I-V-O-R-C-E by Tammy Wynette Popular at local cinemas: Wild in the Streets On Television: Fred Rogers explains the assassination of Robert Kennedy to the youthful audience of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood Happy Birthday: comedian Bill Burr (June 10); Football Hall of Famer Shannon Sharpe (June 26) In Memoriam: Senator Robert F. Kennedy (age 42); American author, political activist, and lecturer, and the first deaf-blind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree, Helen Keller (age 87)

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“Bob Kennedy Dies; Funeral is Saturday.”

The front-page headline of The Kentucky Post and Times-Star was simple and to the point. On June 6, following his victory in the California Democratic primary for President, United States Senator Robert F. Kennedy was shot while walking through the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. He died twenty-five hours later. He was forty-two years old.

Kennedy entered the Democrat Party’s contest for the presidential nomination shortly after President Lyndon Johnson’s dismal performance in the New Hampshire primary. Within two weeks of Kennedy’s entry into the race, President Johnson dropped out, and his endorsed candidate, Vice President Hubert Humphrey, jumped in. Anti-war candidate Senator Eugene McCarthy won early Democratic primary victories, but the Kennedy camp believed a victory in California would set up a one-on-one floor fight with Humphrey at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. As Kennedy finished his victory speech to campaign supporters, the anti-war candidate flashed a peace sign and declared, “Now, it’s on to Chicago, and let’s win there.”

Days later, people across the nation mourned Kennedy’s shocking death. Locally, flags across Northern Kentucky were ordered to half-staff. Church services were held. Meetings were canceled. Resolutions of sympathy and respect were passed by governing bodies. Vice President Hubert Humphrey canceled a presidential campaign trip to Cincinnati.

Covington lawyer Patrick Flannery, the coordinator of Northern Kentucky Citizens for Kennedy and who had attended the funeral of President John F. Kennedy, called it “an unbelievable tragedy” and added, “It’s hard to believe that two Kennedys were shot down when they were doing so much good.”

Governor Louie Nunn said the assassination of Senator Kennedy was “tragic beyond words and thoughts” and noted the collapse of law, order, and morality in the country. Congressman Gene 75

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Snyder attacked recent court decisions he believed were giving too many rights to those committing violent acts.

Gun control was on the minds of many. Florence Mayor C.M. Ewing said, “It’s getting so a man can’t seek public office. I don’t have the answer to the recent acts of violence. I don’t think gun legislation will solve the problem.” Mayor Leo Brun of Elsmere took the opposite approach. “Something has to be done about violence in our country. Legislation must be passed,” Brun said.

Crescent Springs Mayor Jack Jensen urged citizens to write to their representatives in Washington in support of gun legislation.

Not mentioned in any of the news stories about Robert Kennedy’s death were his very close ties to Northern Kentucky – in particular, his involvement with fighting organized crime in Newport.

In 1957, Robert Kennedy gained national recognition when he became chief counsel to the United States Senate Select Committee on Improper Activities in Labor and Management, known by some as the “Rackets Committee.” Committee Chairman Senator John McClellan (D-AR) gave his young counsel broad authority over the special panel. The committee is best remembered for its inquiry into organized crime’s influence over the Teamsters Union and its president, Jimmy Hoffa. However, Kennedy’s work also introduced him to crime syndicates operating openly in Northern Kentucky.

Robert Kennedy left his position with the Rackets Committee to assist his brother, Massachusetts Senator John F. Kennedy, in his campaign for President of the United States. This is where Robert Kennedy met a reporter for the Louisville Courier-Journal named Hank Messick, who had been covering the anti-crime reform movement in Campbell County. Messick was invited to a private press briefing in Cincinnati with Robert Kennedy about the John Kennedy campaign for president. The other reporters present focused on Kennedy’s Catholic faith and the impact, 76

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if any, it would have on his governance. Messick was there to address Newport.

In his book Syndicate Wife (The Macmillan Company, 1968), Messick recalled the encounter: When the religious issue was exhausted, there was a pause. The author (Messick) fired some questions of his own – about Newport and organized crime. Kennedy seemed startled about the abrupt change in subject, then pleased. He sank back in the couch. A little color waned his face.

Instead of worrying so much about religion, the next Attorney General of the United States declared, the public and the press should give thought to certain other matters of which organized crime was one of the most important.

‘How can an administration handle Khrushchev and Castro when it can’t handle Hoffa,’ he asked.

Yes, he was familiar with crime conditions in Newport. If his brother was elected President, there would be effective action taken against syndicate hoods in Newport.

This action happened a year later. John F. Kennedy had won the election for president and had appointed his brother Robert Kennedy to head up the Justice Department as Attorney General. In Newport, the reformers were backing a local football hero, George Ratterman, for Campbell County Sheriff. Shortly after Ratterman announced his candidacy, he met with a local mobster, was slipped a “Mickey Finn,” and woke up as onthe-take police broke into a Newport brothel bedroom to find Ratterman in bed with a stripper, stage name April Flowers. The scandal, the resulting trials, and the aftermath are legendary in Northern Kentucky (as well as national) political lore.

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With some encouragement from a Cincinnati attorney who knew the Kennedys, Robert Kennedy and the Justice Department quickly became involved, sending special federal prosecutors into Newport to follow the Ratterman trial and to bring charges against multiple individuals for violating Ratterman’s civil rights.

Lawyer Ronald Goldfarb was recruited by Robert Kennedy to work at the Justice Department, focusing on the prosecution of organized crime. In Goldfarb’s brilliant account of the United States Justice Department’s involvement in the Ratterman case, titled Perfect Villains, Imperfect Heroes (Capital Books, 1995), he described how Robert Kennedy had testified before Congress about how large the stakes were in Newport. The Attorney General estimated $30 million was wagered annually in Newport.

Numbers and horse racing bets alone were around $6 million.

And the take from gambling operations did not include the revenues crime figures were receiving from the city’s numerous brothels. Elected officials and police were most certainly on the take. “Of all the wide-open, corrupt cities in the country,” Goldfarb wrote, “Newport competed to be the worst.”

According to Goldfarb’s account, Robert Kennedy was initially concerned about getting involved in the election of a local county sheriff. “Kennedy knew Newport, as a center of crime and corruption, was ripe for our group’s attention, but he was understandably chary about taking sides in a local case he knew little about.” Goldfarb convinced Kennedy it was worth the risk. Perhaps over these concerns, Kennedy kept a close eye on the case, personally George Ratterman and Ronald Goldfarb

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signing off on various actions of Goldfarb and his team. And according to Hank Messick, Kennedy often personally leaked files about portions of the case to Messick.

On the day George Ratterman went on trial, Attorney General Robert Kennedy described to a Senate Committee how Newport was a prime example of organized crime using gambling to control and eventually destroy a community and requested more resources for the Justice Department to fight organized crime.

After Ratterman beat the charges against him and won the election for Campbell County Sheriff, Kennedy personally signed off on bringing charges against those responsible for the setup. By the end of the year, Kennedy declared in the Justice Department’s annual report: “Wagering has virtually ceased at a major gambling center, Newport, Kentucky.”

Ratterman served four years as Campbell County Sheriff. An unsuccessful bid for United States Congress ended his political career. Following politics, Ratterman returned to what he knew best – football. He announced football games for NBC and CBS. In January of 1967, Ratterman was the color commentator for the very first Super Bowl. Ratterman eventually moved to Colorado, where he died from complications from Alzheimer’s disease in 2007.

The impact of Robert F. Kennedy on Northern Kentucky would be felt long after his sad and untimely death.

As the region mourned the assassinations of a second member of the Kennedy family, the Vietnam war continued.

Lance Corporal Thomas Lee Loschiavo of Winston Park became the sixty-fifth Northern Kentuckian killed in Vietnam when a rocket attack hit his unit near Quang Tri. Marine Private First Class Bradley Bowling of Demossville was also killed in combat.

Bowling had written letters to his brother describing how bad the action had been but asked the details not be shared with his mother. Bowling had been in Vietnam for less than three months.

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Northern Kentuckians also read about the dream of Marine Corporal Larry Wiedemann of Newport. The Kentucky Post and Times-Star described a letter Wiedemann sent home to his mother.

I was driving the wrong way on 12th Street in Covington – going home. It was so real. Anyway, I drove up 11th Street to Joyce Avenue so casually. That was the funny thing because I know I could set a world’s speed record if I was REALLY doing it. I got so excited right before I got to the house, I woke up. SOME DAY I’ll be making it for sure and for real.

Stories from The Kentucky Post and Times-Star in June 1968 reflect a changing racial landscape in Northern Kentucky – some reflecting change for the better while others caused pause.

“Whites Accepting Fair Housing Law” was a story describing how Kentucky’s Commission on Human Rights reported little open hostility to enforcement of the state’s newly adopted openhousing law. Another story heralded the first marriage license issued in Kenton County to a mixed-race couple (albeit issued on the heels of a state Attorney General’s opinion concluding the state statute forbidding such would be declared unconstitutional by courts).

Yet, while progress was seemingly being made in civil rights, all three county courthouses were closed in observance of Confederate Memorial Day. In June of 1968, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star focused on four separate series of articles once again proving its worth to the region. First, they featured stories about the identity of a deceased young woman found in a camping tent. The identity of “Tent Girl” was an ongoing storyline that continued for the remainder of the year. Additionally, the newspaper uncovered a fraudulent scheme whereby local real estate investors were 80

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scamming the Federal Housing Administration by providing overvalued home appraisals to lenders.

Next, there was a great deal of coverage regarding the horrendous conditions at state juvenile detention centers. Ken Harper remembers having just sat down to lunch at a restaurant when the waitress approached to tell him Governor Nunn called looking for him. “Louie was waiting for me when I got back to the Capitol,” Harper recalled. “The two of us and a reporter went straight to Kentucky Village. On the way, Louie explained he had heard rumors about the conditions there. He was furious at what he saw.” The visit and press attention resulted in the reform of juvenile facilities across Kentucky.

Finally, and most interestingly, was a series of articles by reporter Sigman Byrd, who was traveling across Kentucky to write about the pulse of the state. Near the end of the month, Byrd reported the dour mood across the Commonwealth.

“There was much pessimism among the people I met,” wrote Byrd. “Sometimes it bordered on hopelessness.”

“Kentuckians, like most Americans, have lost faith in the people who govern, in the elected officials and the appointed bureaucrats,” Byrd continued. “They are fed up – up to here – with professional politicians.”

Additional Chapter Credits:

Hank Messick, Syndicate Wife, The Macmillan Company, 1968 Ronald Goldfarb, Perfect Villains, Imperfect Heroes, Capital Books, 1995 Harper, Kenneth, Interview with Rick Robinson, April 2023

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July – 1968 “If the people of Campbell, Kenton, and Boone counties really get in there and work together, they can exert a lot of power.”

—Governor Louie Nunn

Eye-Catching Local Headline: Fess Parker Surveys Boone Sites for $10 Million ‘Disneyland’ On the covers of LIFE Magazine: July 5 – Special Issue – The Presidency July 12 – Starving Children of Biafra War July 19 – Young Americans Nomads Abroad July 26 – Moscow to New York, New York to Moscow – Aboard the First Flights On the covers of Sports Illustrated: July 1 – The Black Athlete – A Shameful Story July 8 – Ted Williams – The Science of Hitting July 15 – Ray Nitschke – Green Bay’s Best Team Ever July 22 – Swimmer Mark Spitz – The Master’s Star Pupil July 29 – Detroit’s Denny McLain On the covers of Time Magazine: July 5 – Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas – The Changing Court July 12 – Commercials – The Best and Worst of Television July 19 – Los Angeles Chief Reddin – The Police and the Ghetto

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July 26 – Nelson Rockefeller and Edwin Muskie – The Challengers #1 on WSAI: Jumpin’ Jack Flash by the Rolling Stones #1 on WCIN: I Could Never Love Another by the Temptations #1 on WCXL: Folsom Prison Blues by Johnny Cash Popular at local cinemas: The Odd Couple On Television: David Frost hosts The Next President with interviews from Robert Kennedy (recorded before his death), Richard Nixon, Hubert Humphrey, Ronald Reagan, Nelson Rockefeller, Harold Stassen, and George Wallace.

Happy Birthday: Soccer star Brandi Chastine (July 21), NFL great Barry Sanders (July 16), actor Terry Crews (July 30)

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The Kentucky Post and Times-Star was not the only source of news for Northern Kentuckians in 1968. Television news from the three local network affiliates covered the events of the day.

WLW, WCPO, and WKRC all had robust news departments.

The Greater Cincinnati media market was small yet innovative, utilizing advanced technologies of the day and employing local programming relevant to the region.

However, those old enough to remember dialing in to hear from anchors like Al Schottelkotte might likely gripe about the thin coverage of news from Northern Kentucky. And while Northern Kentuckians often felt ignored by local news broadcasts, there was one place in 1968 where viewers on the south side of the Ohio River felt at home – The Bob Braun Show.

Bob Braun, the grandson of German immigrants, was born and raised in Ludlow, Kentucky, where his father owned a local grocery store. Braun first appeared on radio at thirteen, hosting a game show on WSAI-AM where two teams of Little League players competed against each other in baseball trivia. As a young man, Braun did everything from hosting radio dance shows to singing live at local nightclubs. After a stint in the military, Braun’s big break came when he gained national recognition by winning Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scout television show (the era’s answer to America’s Got Talent or The Voice). Within weeks of winning, Ludlow’s Bob Braun Braun was signed by WLW-TV and became co-host to the legendary television pioneer Ruth Lyons on her popular noon talk show. He would eventually have his own afternoon talk show. In 1967, Lyons abruptly retired, and Braun had taken her place in the noon timeslot.

Bob Braun’s first cousin, Ludlow artist Tom Gaither, remembered his relative’s popularity. “Everyone in Northern 84

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Kentucky knew Bob,” Gaither said, recalling Braun’s local influence. “He made everyone feel like they were his best friend.

People trusted Bob. He was one of us, and he never forgot where he came from.”

Braun’s time hosting radio dance clubs led to one of Gaither’s many colorful stories. Braun gave Gaither some money to take one of his guests – Brenda Lee – to lunch before an episode of his show. “I told everyone in Ludlow I was dating Brenda Lee,” Gaither said, laughing.

The Bob Braun Show was broadcast across a regional network of stations covering Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Indiana. In the network cities (Dayton, Columbus, Indianapolis, Louisville, Lexington, Huntington, Charleston, Nashville, and Knoxville), local productions – like The Bob Braun Show – led network broadcasts in ratings. Commercials were done live, without a teleprompter or script. Northern Kentuckian Richard “Dick” Murgatroyd produced The Bob Braun Show. “Bob seemingly possessed an internal clock, knowing exactly when to move on from a 60-second spot,” Murgatroyd recalled. “And if we endorsed a product, it sold.”

This unique platform and multi-market penetration opened the door for many high-profile guests to visit the show.

Comedians, entertainers, singers, and actors and actresses all wanted to be on the show. Politicians looking to cast a wide net salivated for exposure to Braun’s loyal viewers. “We had a regional network that spread across several cities,” Murgatroyd said. “And our regular viewers trusted us. There was a three-year waiting list for tickets to be part of the live audience. So, when national politicians visited, they all wanted to be on the show.”

In 1968, the campaign to replace President Johnson in the White House made an interview by Bob Braun ideal exposure for candidates. Vice President Hubert Humphrey, Senator Eugene McCarthy, California Governor Ronald Reagan, and former Vice President Richard Nixon all appeared on The Bob Braun 85

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Show. In years to come, Presidents Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and George H.W. Bush would all make appearances. From the south side of the Ohio River, Kentucky Governors Julian Carroll and John Y. Brown, Jr. would also be guests.

Murgatroyd was particularly fond of Ronald and Nancy Reagan, who appeared on The Bob Braun Show shortly after his election as governor of California. “He stood out among the rest,” said Murgatroyd. “He had a presence Bob Braun with 1968 Democratic unmatched by anyone else.” candidate for Vice President, Senator Murgatroyd also remembered Edmund Muskie of Maine Humphrey as being particularly enthralled by the singing voice of one of Braun’s singers, an operatic soprano, Marian Spelman.

“Humphrey absolutely loved Marian.” Murgatroyd paused and laughed. “But then again, who didn’t love her?”

In the ’70s, the sources sending guests to The Bob Braun Show – like The Playboy Club and The Kenley Players – ceased operations. Beverly Hills burnt down. And regional broadcasts became a thing of the past. Bob Braun ended his show and headed to California, where he got roles in several movies. He would return to his roots and host an oldies radio program on WSAI-AM. As the campaign for president progressed in 1968, both parties were in disarray. For Tom Gaither, it was all about the war in Southeast Asia. “Everything was about Vietnam,” he said. It was a frustrating sentiment expressed by the candidates. Still reeling from the horrific death of Senator Robert Kennedy, Democrats were faced with a choice between an anti-war candidate (Muskie) and President Johnson’s hand-picked candidate (Humphrey).

Republicans were watching a comeback candidate (Nixon) being challenged by an establishment candidate (Rockefeller). “To 86

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many people at the time,” Gaither recalled, “Vietnam was still an ‘admirable war,’ supported by a lot of people.”

The chaos in the national campaigns was causing growing pains for the state political parties. At the time, both political parties in Kentucky utilized a convention process to choose candidate-committed delegates to the national convention, giving a great deal of power to the party leaders.

On the Republican side, former Vice President Richard Nixon seemingly had the local party apparatus in his corner. However, New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller was attempting to cut into Nixon’s support. And just in case either candidate stumbled, California Governor Ronald Reagan was waiting in the GOP wings.

In Kentucky, leadership in the Republican Party was split on who to back. United States Senator Thurston Morton was for Rockefeller, calling him “the one man who can unify this country.” Morton added the New York governor could “extricate us from the dilemma we are in … such as Vietnam … and won’t let us get in a mess like that again.” Morton would later compare Rockefeller to the legendary thoroughbred racehorse Whirlaway, who was dead last at the start of the 1941 Kentucky Derby but overtook the leaders in the homestretch.

United States Senator John Sherman Cooper endorsed Nelson Rockefeller from his hospital bed where he was recovering from gall bladder surgery. “Governor Rockefeller is the only candidate of either party with executive experience. His proven success in New York is in the Eisenhower tradition, marked by fiscal responsibility, progress, and humaneness.” Cooper added Rockefeller was not “locked in by old Vietnam policies of escalation, by rash statements or easy solutions.”

Kentucky Governor Louie Nunn knew the power he held over the convention process. He was backing Richard Nixon and gave Nelson Rockefeller little chance for success. Nunn pondered 87

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Nixon was so far ahead in Kentucky’s convention delegate count, “it is nearly impossible,” Nunn said, for Rockefeller to catch up.

Despite Nunn’s negative admonition, Rockefeller came to Kentucky to meet with the twenty-four delegates to the national convention and held a “floating campaign rally” aboard the Belle of Louisville. At the rally, Rockefeller decried the war in Vietnam, stating the U.S. should “de-Americanize” its effort and allow the South Vietnamese to control its own country. He was cheered when he called the military draft the “most inequitable system” of building a military since it favored the rich.

Lurking in the GOP political shadows was California Governor Ronald Reagan. His July appearance on The Bob Braun Show accentuated his commanding Hollywood persona.

Kentucky Post and Times-Star reporter Clay Wade Bailey opined if Richard Nixon stumbled at the Republican National Convention in Miami, Florida, the Kentucky delegation was likely to back the affable California governor. Kentucky Governor Louie Nunn apparently understood Reagan’s appeal. Even though he was backing Nixon, Nunn held a lavish dinner for Reagan during the National Governor’s Association in Cincinnati.

In Northern Kentucky, there was apparently very little support for Rockefeller. Whether by Nunn’s influence or the former vice president’s popularity, nearly all local Republican leaders supported Nixon.

Despite the backing of Kentucky’s two senators, it appeared Rockefeller had a mere four of Kentucky’s twenty-four delegates to the 1968 Republican National Convention in Miami.

The battle for Northern Kentucky Democratic convention presidential delegates was much more raucous.

When President Lyndon Johnson decided not to seek another term as president, his vice president, Hubert Humphrey, jumped in. The assassination of Bobby Kennedy left many torn over who to support – Vice President Humphrey or the anti-war candidate, Senator Eugene McCarthy.

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As Kentucky Democrats readied for the local conventions used to nominate delegates to the district and state conventions, a dispute arose regarding what was known as “unit rule.”

Simply put, the procedure was United States Senator (and 1968 a winner-takes-all all process, Presidential hopeful) Eugene McCarthy holds a campaign rally at Greater which would cause the top Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Airport. vote-getter at any level of the Democratic convention nomination process to receive all the votes.

Humphrey supporters were in favor of unit rule, while McCarthy supporters opposed it. The divide was generational, pitting the Old Guard versus the youthful “McCarthy Army.” The headline of the local story describing the conflict read, “Novice Dems Battle Old Pros.”

Leading McCarthy’s Army into political battle was young Ed Winterberg of Erlanger. A twenty-two-year-old law student and McCarthy supporter, Winterberg was opposed to the process.

“We would oppose the unit rule even if we win the majority of the delegates,” he said.

Future Kenton County District Judge Chaz Brannen was just out of law school and a McCarthy supporter. Brannen remembers it being a very frustrating time for young people opposed to the Vietnam War. “Major cultural changes were taking place across the country,” Brannen said, “but they had not reached here (Northern Kentucky) yet. It was a stable community. We didn’t appreciate until later the changes taking place.”

On the other side of the Democratic candidate divide, Lawyer Phil Taliaferro had just returned to Northern Kentucky from a stint in the Navy, where he had been deployed to Vietnam and the Philippines. He was chosen to be chair of Young Kentuckians 89

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for Humphrey. Even though he was supporting the establishment candidate, Taliaferro confirmed the conflict in the local party.

“The local Democrat Party was very, very cliquish. And if you were in the clique, you were expected to keep your mouth shut.”

He paused and laughed. “I had trouble keeping my mouth shut.”

Still, Taliaferro ended up on the side of the Old Guard. “I thought McCarthy was too far left…too extreme,” Taliaferro said. “Of course, I also thought a Nixon presidency was about the worst thing that could ever happen to this country. I was left with Humphrey.”

Prior to the local conventions, Senator Eugene McCarthy made a stop at the Greater Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Airport and spoke to about 1,000 supporters about “peace abroad and justice at home.”

When the local conventions were held in Northern Kentucky, McCarthy won two districts, but the news focused on the 66th District convention for electing two separate delegations to move forward in the process. At the state convention, party leadership attempted to calm the McCarthy folks by offering to seat a handful of their delegates at the national convention. Many of McCarthy’s Army walked out of the convention in protest.

Following the Kentucky Democratic Convention, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star scolded the “Young Dems in Dissent” with an editorial. “Politics is a game. Remembering this, the young politicians should recall that, when a team scores a point against yours, you don’t walk off the field. After all, democracy dictates that majority rules.”

While political battles were being waged at home, the Northern Kentucky death toll from Vietnam continued to rise.

Boatswain Mate First Class John Bobb of DeMossville was killed in an enemy attack while Bobb was traveling up a river in the Mekong Delta. His brother, Ernest Bobb, received the news first.

Then he went with two Naval officers to pick up a doctor before they told his ailing father. “The two men who came to my door 90

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were very sympathetic and understood my father (was) in poor health. They didn’t want to shock him,” Ernest Bobb explained.

“One thing I remember about Johnny, he was always a great handcrafter. He could take something and make just anything out of it.”

Northern Kentuckians also read the tragic story of Marine Private Marvin Callahan from Covington. Earlier in the year, Private Callahan had survived an enemy attack with a ruptured ear drum and a scarred leg. With a Purple Heart, he recovered and returned to combat. In July 1968, Callahan stepped on a landmine while on patrol in Quan Nan. These injuries were far more severe, and his legs had to be amputated. The article describing his injuries noted Callahan and his young wife had only one week of married life before he shipped out to Vietnam.

The week together had resulted in a child. When the family was finally able to speak to the young Marine, they all told him they didn’t care about his legs. They were just happy he was alive.

Even as politics and the war in Vietnam would soon collide on the streets of Chicago at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, Northern Kentuckians were about to face an issue still being spoken of today – Newport’s steamy underbelly of gambling, prostitution, and organized crime.

Additional Chapter Credits:

Gaither, Tom, interview by Rick Robinson, June 2023 Taliaferro, Phil, telephone interview by Rick Robinson, June 2023 Brannen, Chaz, interview by Rick Robinson, 31 January 2023 Murgatroyd, Richard, interview by Rick Robinson, June 2023 Here’s Bob, by Bob Braun, Doubleday Books (1969)

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August – 1968 “The whole world is watching.”

—Chant of protesters during riots at Democratic National Convention in Chicago

Eye-Catching Local Headline: State Has 64.5 Percent of White Pupils Integrated On the covers of LIFE Magazine: August 2 – George Wallace – The Spoiler from the South August 16 – The Nixons and the Agnews – Finale at Miami Beach August 23 – Law and Order – Volatile Campaign Issue – Security Alert for Democratic Convention August 30 – Czechoslovakia – Death of the Bright Young Freedom On the covers of Sports Illustrated: August 4 – Nevele Pride August 12 – Paul Brown Returns: The Old Master Makes a New Start in Cincinnati August 19 – Curt Flood of St. Louis August – 25 – Rod Laver Rushes the Immortals On the covers of Time Magazine: August 2 – Building for the Year 2000 August 9 – Dan Evans - Republicans: The Men and the Issues August 16 – Nixon and Agnew – The G.O.P Ticket

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August 23 – Colonel Ojukwu – Biafra’s Agony August 30 – Army Tank Invasion #1 on WSAI: People Gotta Be Free by the Rascals #1 on WCIN: Stay in My Corner by the Dells #1 on WCXL: Mamma Tried by Merle Haggard Popular at local cinemas: Hang ’Em High On Television: WXIX Channel 19 goes on the air, allowing Larry Smith and His Puppets to entertain a generation of lateblooming boomers.

Happy Birthday: golfer Darren Clarke (August 14), baseball player Hideo Nomo (August 30) In Memoriam: golfer Tommy Armour (age 71), singer Red Foley (age 58)

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Corlis Highlander loved getting letters from her son, Army Private First-Class Micky Highlander. In August of 1968, she received a letter expressing his desire to leave Vietnam and return to Dayton, Kentucky. “I have only a few months to go,” he wrote. “I can just dream how it will be. I’ll get off the plane and you and Dad will be there, and we can go home … home is where I want to be right now.”

Mrs. Highlander told The Kentucky Post and Times-Star she had a good cry over the letter and then straightened out. “About that time, I heard the front gate rattle.” She saw the Army officer approach her door. “And I knew what he was here for.” Micky Ray Highlander had been killed when his vehicle hit a land mine in An Khe. “That letter,” Mrs. Highlander said. “It was almost as if he knew. The poor child never had a chance to live.”

The arrival of a military officer at a residence was a primal fear of any parent with a child in Vietnam.

The father of Corporal John Becker of Cold Spring, who was killed near Quang Nam Province when the helicopter in which he was a gunner was shot down, described the horrific experience to a reporter. “We got home yesterday about 2:30, and when we pulled in, we saw the car up near the house. When the doors swung open and the men stepped out, they didn’t have to tell us what happened. We knew our son was dead.”

Each time the experience played out on the front page of the newspaper, one set of parents grieved while all the others sent up a silent prayer of relief for having no officers visit their home – at least for the day. The agony of waiting was nearly unbearable and became the foundation – both pro and con – for their position on Vietnam. Some believed it was a just cause. Others felt the United States had no business in Southeast Asia. All painfully waited for letters home or the arrival of bad news at their front door.

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Later in the year, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star editorialized the experience of having soldiers arrive at the doorstep of a fallen son.

The first feeling is dread. Are they bound here? Next, the terrible fear they are indeed. Then, the crushing knowledge that is like a bullet to the heart – only less merciful.

Far less merciful, for it leaves the victim alive and conscious and mentally and emotionally aware of the personal tragedy of losing a son.

Finally, there is overwhelming, almost unbearable anguish, the heartbreak that some authors of platitudes say must diminish with the healing years.

Sometimes, it never diminishes.

During August of 1968, not all the news coming out of Vietnam was about death. Thirty-seven-year-old Air Force Captain Joe Victor Carpenter of Maysville was one of three pilots released from a Vietnam prisoner-of-war camp. Six months earlier, Carpenter was shot down over enemy territory while flying his 100th and final mission. With Carpenter’s parents deceased, his aunt, Gault Haughaboo, watched television as Captain Carpenter was interviewed about his captivity. “I just love him dearly,” said Mrs. Haughaboo. “I haven’t heard anything about him while he was a prisoner. It about drove me crazy.”

Captain Joe Victor Carpenter would be awarded the Silver Star. The citation stated: “Captain Carpenter made repeated attacks against an armed convoy of forty trucks carrying men and supplies toward the Demilitarized Zone. Despite adverse weather conditions which necessitated extremely low-level passes in the face of intense, accurate anti-aircraft fire, and with complete disregard for his own personal safety, Captain Carpenter damaged several trucks, setting four on fire, and succeeded in stopping the entire convoy. The courage and outstanding 95

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airmanship demonstrated by Captain Carpenter in stopping the convoy significantly degraded the North Vietnamese logistics capabilities.” Carpenter died in 1982. *** Nationally, politics took center stage in August. Republicans and Democrats alike prepared for their national nominating conventions. Republicans were headed to Miami Beach.

Democrats were going to Chicago.

As local politicos prepared for their respective party conventions, former Louisville Courier-Journal reporter Hank Messick dropped a bombshell in Northern Kentucky with the release of his book on organized crime in Newport titled Syndicate Wife (The McMillan Company, 1968). The Kentucky Post and TimesStar wrote a weeklong series of articles reviewing Messick’s tale of gambling, prostitution, and death in Newport. The book was called “a kind of nightmarish Who’s-Who and Who-WAS-Who of Newport.” In the opening story of the series, the reporter, Sigman Byrd, opined Messick’s tale would “raise the blood pressure of many living persons, some of them still in Newport, for a number of real-life characters are presented in a highly unflattering light.”

Syndicate Wife is the story of Ann Drahmann, a Cincinnati woman who worked at the Lookout House in Park Hills and who twice married into the mob. However, organized crime and political corruption in Newport were a substantial part of Messick’s narrative.

In particular, the book gave lurid details about the way hometown sports hero and reform candidate for Campbell County Sheriff, George Ratterman, was framed by an unholy collusion between public 96

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officials elected to enforce the law and the gangster who had been in de facto control of the city.

Syndicate Wife did more than tell a story. Messick named names. It had been seven years since Ratterman’s election, but nerves were still on edge. All sorts of elected officials, lawyers, judges, and police officers were mentioned by name in the book.

Of the book, reporter Byrd surmised, “Dallas will live down the assassination of John F. Kennedy before Newport can overcome its sordid past.”

Dodging the issue of corruption in Newport was on full display. The judge in the Ratterman case said he knew Messick, “but any conversation I had with him during the George Ratterman trial was just a matter of ‘no comment’ on my part.”

Newport’s mayor threatened legal action. “I’ll sue him if there is anything derogatory in the book about me, and I can get a footing on it.” The Campbell County Judge Executive, who had represented local mobsters in court, was conveniently unavailable for comment.

A local Newport police officer, labeled by Messick as being in the pocket of local gangsters, had the most colorful response.

“Messick’s nothing but a big, fat, sloppy pighead. Everything he said about me is an (expletive) lie. I’m not through with that tick yet. I’m talking to a lawyer about him.”

Hank Messick eventually wrote a second book about Newport titled Razzle Dazzle (For the Love of Books Publishing, 1995) – the name of a popular dice game no gambler ever won. Yet, it was his first book, the story of Ann Drahmann, which is forever woven into the fabric of Northern Kentucky.

Prior to the publication of Syndicate Wife, Ann Drahmann committed suicide while living in protective custody at a hotel in Rome, Italy. In her suicide note, she pleaded with then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy to “not lose the courage of (his) convictions. Don’t allow gambling in Newport or Covington, Kentucky,” she wrote as her lethal dose of pills and Scotch began 97

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to take effect. “Mr. Kennedy, why are city officials of Newport allowed to take money from gangsters to permit such horrible things to take place in Newport? I suggest, do not only wipe out the gangsters but please wipe out the city officials. Please, Mr. Kennedy, stop this. Don’t give up.”

While most, if not all, of the people mentioned in Syndicate Wife are deceased, Northern Kentuckians still discuss Newport’s past as if it were front-page news.

Nationally, the Republican Convention was the first to be held. Art Schmidt and Otis Readnour were the only two delegates from Northern Kentucky. Despite several state officials supporting Nelson Rockefeller or Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon easily won the nomination.

The Kentucky Republican Richard Nixon at the 1968 Republican delegation voted 22 for Nixon National Convention with Louie and Beulah Nunn and 2 for Rockefeller.

There was some floor support for Louie Nunn to be Nixon’s running mate. Nunn was a floor whip for Nixon, counting votes among six state delegations. He scoffed at the idea of getting a VP nod from Nixon but apparently came well prepared, just in case. The Kentucky delegation carried handmade signs reading, “Nunn for Veep” and “We Love Louie.”

Fourth District Congressman Gene Snyder wanted Reagan on the ticket, and Senator Marlo Cook was pushing for Senator Howard Baker from Tennessee. In the end, Nixon chose Maryland Governor Spiro Agnew as his running mate.

A few weeks later, the Democrats gathered in Chicago and, despite spirited opposition, nominated Hubert Humphrey as their candidate for president. After considering many for the 98

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number two spot on the ticket (including Republican Nelson Rockefeller), Senator Edmund Muskie (D) from Maine was added to the Humphrey ticket.

Carlton Anderson, a thirty-three-year-old teacher from Hebron, was an alternate delegate to the Democratic Party Convention. His expenses for the week give context to the times -- $42 for a flight to Chicago and $14 per day for a hotel room.

Anderson had been involved in local politics for years. “It’s become a kind of hobby for me,” Anderson said. “I think that every good citizen should be interested in politics.”

What wasn’t mentioned in the local newspaper accounts of the Democratic National Convention was what was happening outside in the streets of Chicago. Anti-war protesters gathered in a park near the convention center. Peaceful demonstrations quickly escalated into violence as police and protesters clashed.

Television stations covered the convention, as well as the bloody protests. Senator Abraham Ribicoff (D) of New York called the actions of the Chicago police “Gestapo tactics.” To which, from the podium of the convention, Mayor Richard Daley bellowed an antisemitic response. Reporter Dan Rather was roughed up on the floor of the convention while trying to interview a delegate from Georgia.

Hubert Humphrey supporter Phil Taliaferro was there.

“It was a mess,” he said. Taliaferro was not sympathetic to the protesters. “I was just out of the service and absolutely hated the thought of people tossing rocks at veterans trying to get from their hotel to the convention center,” he said.

The chaos in Chicago was yet another illustration of the growing divide in America regarding the war. It also likely sealed the fate of the Humphrey/Muskie ticket.

Both parties had their nominees for president, but there was one fly in the ointment – George Wallace was gaining support in Northern Kentucky.

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When George Wallace was sworn in as the 45th governor of Alabama, he boldly declared, “In the name of the greatest people that have ever trod this earth, I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny, and I say segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.” Wallace did more than utter words written by his Klu Klux Klan member speechwriter; he acted and stood in the doorways of schools attempting to integrate.

In the spring of 1967, Wallace met with several prominent white supremacists and anti-Semites to discuss a third-party run for the presidency as a member of the American Independent Party. His appeal to voters hiding racist attitudes behind the label of “populism” worried leaders from both parties.

One reason local Democrats were very concerned about the Wallace candidacy was because he engaged in serious discussions with former Kentucky Governor A.B. “Happy” Chandler about joining his ticket as the vice-presidential candidate. Chandler had already angered party officials by backing Louie Nunn for governor of Kentucky. Then, before the Democratic National Convention, Chandler withdrew his support for Katherine Peden, the party’s nominee for United States Senate. The party responded by removing the popular former governor as a delegate to the national convention and inserting a “loyalty pledge” into the party’s platform. The governor struck back at what he called the “Chandler Clause,” pointing out that neither Governors Ruby Laffoon nor Lawrence Wetherby had supported his bid for governor.

Then Chandler took his conflict with the Democratic party a step further and announced he expected to soon be named as the vice-presidential running mate of George Wallace. Some thought Chandler was joking. One reporter said, “If you went up to Happy and asked him about reports he would be the next pope, he wouldn’t deny it.”

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For days, newspapers were filled with stories about Chandler joining the Wallace ticket. And Chandler was all too happy to spread the rumor even further. “I’m strong, healthy, and mentally alert,” Chandler told a reporter for The Kentucky Post and Times-Star. He also used the opportunity to take a swipe at his opponents. “The Democrats undertook to read me out of the party because I supported Governor Nunn,” he said. “They left me off the convention list.”

While tweaking the collective noses of party leaders, he also spoke very favorably of the former Alabama governor. “George Wallace is one of the most dynamic young men in America today.

He’s got the two parties on the run. All they can offer is more of the same. Wallace offers something better, and people are flocking to him in overwhelming numbers.” Chandler predicted Wallace would win Kentucky and the presidency.

Following a long meeting with George Wallace, Happy Chandler initially told the press he intended to be on the ticket. Then, in an interesting reversal, both men suddenly distanced themselves from each other. The writing was on the wall; Chandler was not going to be on the ticket with Wallace.

Apparently, after meeting with Wallace staffers, Chandler was dumped. Wallace’s advisors believed Chandler’s support for civil rights – and particularly his role as Commissioner of Baseball in allowing Jackie Robinson to integrate baseball – would cost Wallace votes. Chandler’s national campaign was over before it ever began.

The popularity of on-again/off-again VP candidate A.B. “Happy” Chandler aside, support for George Wallace in Northern Kentucky from both political parties was clearly apparent. When trying to determine the political leaning of party jumpers, each pointed to the other.

The Chairman of Republican Party of Kentucky declared there were five issues in the race: the Vietnam War, racial disorder and civil rights, crime and civil disorder, cost of living, and 101

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public welfare. But he added, “George Wallace has us all worried.

We are deeply concerned.” Democrats were pondering the fact Hubert Humphrey was polling third in Northern Kentucky and the state. The chairman of Kentucky’s Democrat Party believed support for George Wallace had peaked.

The Kentucky Post and Times-Star fueled the debate with a series of articles where reporters “straw-polled” local events.

The series confirmed what both parties already knew – George Wallace had traction in Northern Kentucky. A shop owner declared, “Humphrey will throw it to Johnson. It’s all so crooked it’s hard to say.

Politics is like a bowl of spaghetti … all mangled.” At a bus stop in Covington, a woman said, “I’m a registered Democrat, but I’m certainly not going to vote that way. Put me down for Nixon.” An African-American commuter said, “All the candidates together ain’t worth two cents.” A stroll through a truck stop found each driver supporting Wallace.

Many being interviewed thought Wallace had enough electoral support to throw the election into the United States House of Representatives.

The campaign for president promised to be lively...and maybe funny.

In 1968, comedian Pat Paulsen was at the peak of his popularity. He was a regular on the Smothers Brothers variety show, offering his deadpan delivery to pontificate about the issues of the day. Following a run-in with CBS brass over political advertising on the show, Paulsen announced he was running for president – demanding equal time from CBS for his views.

On television, Paulsen played his entry into the presidential race perfectly. Parodying the speech Lyndon Johnson gave to the 102

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nation when he decided to not seek reelection, Paulsen declared, “If nominated, I will not run. And once elected, I will not serve.”

Paulsen announced he was a candidate for the presidency under the Straight-Talking America Government Party (STAG Party). He declared he was neither left-wing nor right-wing but more “middle of the bird.” His campaign slogan was: “We’ve Upped Our Standards. Now, Up Yours.” And he defined himself as “… just a simple, common, ordinary savior of America’s destiny.”

When asked questions about his stances on positions, Paulsen was prone to talk in delightfully brilliant double-speak. “To get to the meat of the matter, I will come right to the point, and take note of the fact that the heart of the issue in the final analysis escapes me,” was his standard reply. In speeches on the campaign trail, Paulsen would calm audiences by telling them they had nothing to fear but fear itself. “And, of course, the boogeyman.”

Paulsen proposed to end the war in Vietnam by taking the money America was spending overseas and just buying out the North Vietnamese. He believed marijuana should be kept out of the hands of college students because it was too good for them. On gun control, he thought the government should give everyone a gun but lock up all the bullets. And he blamed most of the country’s problems on the unenlightened immigration policy established by Native Americans. *** In August 1968, yet another one of those issues still making headlines came to the forefront. The Kentucky Post and TimesStar reported on an issue still at the forefront of debate over 50 years later – traffic safety on the Cut in the Hill and the Brent Spence Bridge. Listing eleven deaths occurring on the portion of Interstate 75 leading into Cincinnati, local officials gave their ideas on how to address the issue.

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Most officials focused on lowering speed limits and better regulating the flow of traffic. Police chiefs from Fort Mitchell and Florence thought the speed limit from Buttermilk Pike to the river should be lowered from 50 to 40 miles per hour. Erlanger’s chief criticized the grading of the highway and travelers’ lack of knowledge about the “deviltry of the hill.” The Covington traffic bureau suggested more guardrails, placement of flashing accident warning signs, and lengthening the exit and entrance ramps.

Perhaps the best idea on Cut in the Hill safety came from an engineer at the state highway department who noted, “It would be helpful if drivers remained sober.”

Additional Chapter Credits:

Hank Messick, Razzle Dazzle, For the Love of Books Publishing (1995).

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September – 1968 “May we all be calm and free and wise and steady. There is something about ‘steady’ that I always associate with Kentucky, and that’s why I’m here.”

—President Lyndon B. Johnson Dedication speech at Thomas More College September 28, 1968

Eye-Catching Local Headline: Six Vie for Tobacco Queen On the covers of LIFE Magazine: September 6 – Humphrey and Muskie – The Winners: But What a Week September 13 – The Days in the Lives of The Beatles September 20 – He Topped the Tennis World – The Icy Elegance of Arthur Ashe September 27 – Sweden’s Wild Side On the covers of Sports Illustrated: September 2 – The Swinger – Baseball’s Ken Harrelson September 9 – College Football Preview September 16 – NFL Pro Football Preview – Don Meredith: Dallas on Top September 23 – Denny McLain wins 30 September 30 – Mexico ’68 – The Problem Olympics On the covers of Time Magazine: September 6 – Hubert Humphrey, Edwin Muskie, and Chicago Mayor Richard Daley – The Democrats After Chicago 105

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September 13 – Denny McLain – The Year of the Pitcher September 20 – Spiro Agnew – Becoming a Household Word September 27 – Russia’s Dissident Intellectuals #1 on WSAI: Hey Jude by the Beatles #1 on WCIN: You’re All I Need to Get By by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell #1 on WCXL: Harper Valley PTA by Jeannie C. Riley Popular at local cinemas: Funny Girl On Television: 60 Minutes premieres, the National Football League expansion franchise Cincinnati Bengals play their first regular season game.

Happy Birthday: actor Will Smith (September 25), singer Marc Anthony (September 16)

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In September 1968, Northern Kentucky had a surprise visitor—United States President Lyndon B. Johnson.

President Johnson came to town for the dedication of the newly named Thomas More College. Thomas More president Monsignor John Murphy had extended the invitation at the beginning of 1968 when Johnson was still running for reelection.

However, confirmation of the presidential visit occurred only days before the actual dedication ceremony, leaving college officials scrambling to prepare. The Kentucky Post and Times-Star noted President Johnson looked down from the podium “like a benevolent dictator.”

President Johnson’s speech covered everything from theology to politics, with a laundry list of his accomplishments while in office. While Johnson did not mention those seeking to replace him in the Oval Office by name, the political portion of the speech was certainly aimed at candidates Richard Nixon and George Wallace and those opposing the war in Vietnam. He compared the turmoil of 1968 to that occurring at the country’s first Constitutional Convention. “Today, you and I, and the whole American nation, face another time of controversy and choice. And in a way, I guess we must create our own miracle,” the president said. “We must emerge from a season of bitter debate with a national decision – with a choice – which will strengthen our unity and not endanger it. We must-- as we Americans must every election year-renew that great experiment in democratic government that was begun 181 years ago.”

Johnson then turned his thoughts to the 1968 campaigns for president: Some people discovered a long time ago that it is easier to scare people than it is to reason with them; that it is easier to shout fire than to fight fire; that it is easier to condemn crime than to conquer crime.

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fear, and who exploits hate, and who exploits prejudice, and who preaches division and disunity – whoever he may be – chooses the low road and the wrong road.

The Kentucky Post and Times-Star called the well-kept secret of the surprise presidential visit almost flawless, noting “one woman outwitted the security corps by embracing him [Johnson] vigorously and smacking him on the cheek.” There is no indication whether the incident was one of admiration or confrontation.

Valera Koester was at Thomas More that day and reflected on how exciting it was to see the motorcade arrive and shake the president’s hand. “Back then, television wasn’t like it is today,” she said. “You didn’t constantly see the president on TV. So, seeing the President of the United States and shaking his hand was quite a thrill.”

President Lyndon Johnson was not the only politician making waves in the region in September 1968. With the election on the horizon, politics were on full display in Northern Kentucky.

A Senatorial debate between Marlow Cook and Kathryn Peden became heated when Peden accused Cook of “trying to demagogue the Vietnam President Lyndon Johnson at Thomas War.” Her declaration of Nixon More - Photo credit: Provided by Thomas and Eisenhower as the people More University archives who “got us in there in the first place” drew boos from the predominantly female audience at the Kentucky Federation of Women’s Clubs. It also drew a strong rebuke from Cook, who asserted that the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations were following the Geneva Treaty provisions regarding Vietnam.

“Today, under Lyndon Johnson, the commitment has been elevated from 7,000 men to 580,000,” he said.

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Peden stumbled a second time when she responded to Cook’s plans for a volunteer military force and referred to Americans who would willingly become soldiers as “mercenaries.” A woman in the first row with two sons and a grandson who was wounded in Vietnam stood up and ripped Peden for the characterization.

The reporter covering the event thought Cook clearly won the confrontation.

In the campaign for president, Northern Kentuckians supporting the presidential bid of Eugene McCarthy offered lukewarm support to the Humphrey/Muskie ticket. William Billingsly of Fort Mitchell had been a floor leader for McCarthy at the state convention and noted, “The McCarthy people are split up about what they are going to do.” He hoped McCarthy backers would not be lured away from Hubert Humphrey by the “demagoguery” of George Wallace.

The concept of having no other option was a common response of McCarthy supporters. Covington attorney Jim Nolan, who had chaired the McCarthy campaign in Kenton County, predicted some may stay at home on Election Day. He personally had concluded, “There is no reason to vote for Republican Richard Nixon or George Wallace … except out of anger.”

One local Democrat hoped Humphrey would move further left. While in the United States Senate, Hubert Humphrey maintained a liberal voting record. One could logically conclude the statement was aimed at his support of President Johnson’s tactics in Vietnam and his failure to support a “peace platform” at the Democratic National Convention.

Endorsements mattered in 1968, and politicians scrambled in and out of the offices of local newspapers to get them. The Kentucky Post and Times-Star was no exception.

In the race for the 4th District seat in the United States Congress, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star endorsed Republican Gene Snyder over Democratic lawyer and newspaper publisher 109

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Gus Sheehan. The editorial carrying the endorsement noted the pair had similar views on many issues – “particularly in conservatism, adherence to constitutional principles and states’ rights.” But the editorial noted, “The chief difference as we see it is Snyder’s now-established Washington know-how, his verve, wider public contact and recorded interpretation of public opinion.”

The newspaper endorsed a second Republican when they endorsed Marlow Cook for the United States Senate.

Interestingly, while previously praising Snyder’s conservatism, the endorsement of Cook labeled him as a “modern, moderate Republican, a sober individual who confronts but is able to reduce crises.” And his neither “hawk” nor “dove” stance on Vietnam played into the endorsement. “In broad terms, he calls for a much larger participation there by other Southeast Asian nations and for an ‘honorable’ American withdrawal.”

An endorsement of Richard Nixon for President of the United States made it a sweep for Republicans. The editorial set forth the concept that Vice President Hubert Humphrey would have to heal the Democratic Party before he dealt with the nation. It also stated George Wallace offered no hope at all. The editorial went through the issues facing the country and explained how Nixon was better equipped than Humphrey to handle each of them. Nixon, the editorial concluded, “has the experience, the knowledge and the innate intellect which we expect and need in a president.”

All politics aside, it was headlines about Army Private Michael Branch, a twenty-one-year-old soldier from Alexandria, causing a major stir in Northern Kentucky.

Private Branch dropped out of high school to enlist in the Army. He served some time in Germany before getting deployed to Vietnam in February of 1968. Once in-country, Branch began driving an ammunition supply truck between Utah Beach and Da Nang. Sometime in April, he quit writing letters to his family 110

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in Campbell County, and they became worried. Unbeknownst to them at the time, Branch was listed as AWOL (Absent Without Leave). When the Army eventually informed the family of his formal status, they were in shock. They began asking questions and shared their story with The Kentucky Post and Times-Star.

According to the articles, accounts of Branch’s whereabouts varied. A cousin of Branch’s wife heard a radio report on Radio Hanoi stating Branch had defected. Another said Branch went AWOL but had been apprehended. The AWOL rumor, from an Army official at the Pentagon, claimed Branch was in the custody of United States military police in Hanoi. Another soldier alleged to have seen Branch voluntarily walk off the base where he was stationed.

Branch’s wife, Marilyn, did not believe any of the accounts being told to her. “He was getting out July 16,” she said. “Why would he do that?” She began a letter-writing campaign.

The first to respond was a Major General of the Army stating, “Every effort is being made to confirm or deny these reports and to positively ascertain the exact status of [Branch].” The letter only made the situation more confusing to the family.

United States Congressman Gene Snyder got involved and clarified the status of Michael Branch had been changed to “Missing in Action.” Snyder’s letter to the family included a telegram from the Army stating, “After an extensive investigation by military personnel and new evidence acquired by military intelligence established that Specialist Branch may not have acted under his own volition.” The telegram also noted the report of Branch being in the custody of military police was given in error.

The letter from the congressman added a new twist. Michael Branch’s family wondered what was meant by the reference in the telegram of “new evidence” meant. They would soon find out when a special board was convened in Vietnam to determine if Michael Branch had deserted his post.

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In a harsh editorial, The Kentucky Post and Times -Star attacked the Army for its Pentagon double talk and contradiction. It sided with the family and blasted the Army for charging a soldier near the end of his hitch with desertion when he would not be there to defend himself. “Is Specialist Branch a dead hero, a live deserter, a prisoner of war, a defector, a victim of Communist drugs and torture, or of Washington bureaucracy or of military snafu?”

Indeed, Michael Branch was very much alive. He was, in fact, a prisoner of war.

To learn the rest of the saga, you must fast-forward five years to March of 1973 when POW Specialist Michael Branch finally came home from Vietnam. His first stop back in the United States was at Ireland Hospital on base at Fort Knox, Kentucky. There, he was warmly greeted by his parents and members of his family.

The Kentucky Post and Times-Star covered the tearful reunion.

The helicopter circled down, the MPs straightened their stance, and Brig. General Homer S. Long came forward.

It was 5:45 p.m. The ’copter’s engine was cut; the doors opened.

And there, after five years in the jungles of South Vietnam and the rubble of the north stood Spec. 4 Branch.

He saluted and, sided by members of the base’s Operation Homecoming, walked steadily forward.

He looked slightly to the right and left. He was thin and peaked and apprehensive.

It was quiet as onlookers filled their eyes with the sight of a returning soldier, home from a cruel war.

Before returning to civilian life, Branch went to Washington, D.C., to face charges regarding his service. While imprisoned, Branch was alleged to be a member of a group of prisoners known as the “peace committee.” Many returning POWs were upset at members of the peace committee for speaking out against 112

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America’s presence in Vietnam in return for special treatment by prison guards. Fueled by a New York Times article labeling Branch as a self-described deserter, he faced charges related to his actions while in captivity. Charges were dropped against Branch, and he was granted an honorable discharge. While in D.C. defending himself, Branch was unceremoniously dropped from the guest list at a White House celebration honoring POWs.

Michael Branch returns in 1973

Shortly thereafter, Michael Branch faced the media. He explained that, following a meeting with the base chaplain over a “Dear John” divorce letter from his wife (a letter his wife later denied writing), he left the base to take a thoughtful walk along a nearby beach. There, in sight of U.S. military vessels offshore, he was captured by three North Vietnamese regulars and taken to prison.

According to The Kentucky Post and Times-Star: He told of beatings, being bound and gagged, being forced to kneel with his arms raised above his head for hours at a time so that the blood drained from them and made them numb.

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...

He admitted calmly he had signed ‘certain statements,’ including one he was a deserter, ‘because I was forced and beaten.’

‘And I was not a member of any “peace committee.’’’

A reporter asked him if he thought he was a hero.

‘No, I am not a hero,’ he said reflectively. ‘But there were heroes, I suppose, and if I’d been a hero, I would have died over there.’

Much like Vietnam itself, Northern Kentuckians were split about Michael Branch. His 1973 return was at the end of Vietnam and just a month before the South Vietnamese capital fell to communist-backed Viet Cong forces. As a returning POW, many gave Branch a hero’s welcome home. Michael Branch Day in Campbell County included a special Mass, a parade, accolades, and the presentation of a scholarship to NKU. Others, including those in the anti-war movement, viewed Michael Branch with a jaundiced eye. When speaking about President Gerald Ford’s amnesty plan for men who had fled to Canada to avoid military service, Branch said, “You see, when I got back, I expected the anti-war movement to be there to support us. They weren’t there, and I was real disappointed.”

Back in September of 1968, when the whereabouts of Michael Branch were unknown and the local body count from Vietnam continued to rise, Williamstown resident, Private FirstClass Edgar Lee “Scooter” Tomlinson, who had previously been awarded three Purple Hearts and a Bronze Star for his actions in combat, was killed when the armored personnel carrier he was driving struck a land mine. He was only 19 years old. “After his 17th birthday, he decided he was going to enlist,” his father said.

“We couldn’t talk him out of it. My son was that kind of boy.”

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Another 19-year-old, Marine Private First-Class Bobby Reece Sumpter of Alexandria, was killed while on patrol in Quang Nam Province.

More than any other month in 1968, September had shown the intertwined relationship between Vietnam and politics. A heralded visit from a Democratic president was offset by a clean sweep of endorsements of Republicans running for federal office.

It brought the policy behind Vietnam into focus. The deaths of Bobby Reece Sumpter and Edgar Lee “Scooter” Tomlinson, coupled with the case of Michael Branch, made the focus on policy very personal to Northern Kentuckians.

As this was happening, young people were listening to a new generation of music being played across the region.

Additional Chapter Credits:

Koester, Valera, interview by Rick Robinson 20 August 2023 Photo of President Lyndon B. Johnson used with permission from Thomas More University archives.

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October – 1968 “The Love she gives is warm, She’ll hold you in her arms, But when she turns you on, She’ll kiss you and be gone.”

—“That Girl” by The New Lime Written by Judge Mickey Foellger

Eye-Catching Local Headline: “Editors Say Students Not Smoking Pot” - Author’s note – The story behind this headline involved the collective opinion of editors of college newspapers across Kentucky. It’s hard to imagine any of them becoming successful investigative journalists if they could not find marijuana on a college campus in 1968.

On the covers of LIFE Magazine: October 4 – Sea Probe – Man Moves Into a Rich New World October 11 – An Artist’s Memoir of Saintly Pope John October 18 – Paul and Rachel Newman October 25 – Wally Shirra and Apollo 7 On the covers of Sports Illustrated: October 7 – World Champion St. Louis Cardinals October 14 – USC v. Miami – No Way to Stop O.J. October 21 – Olympics on the Way October 28 – The Green Bay Packers are Not Dead On the covers of Time Magazine: October 4 – Chicago Police Officer – Law and Order 116

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October 11 – Dan Rowan and Dick Martin – Laugh-In October 18 – George Wallace and Curtis LeMay – The Revolt of the Right October 25 – Aristotle Onassis and Jackie Kennedy-Onassis #1 on WSAI: Hey Jude by the Beatles #1 on WCIN: Say It Loud: I’m Black and I’m Proud by James Brown #1 on WCXL: Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye by Eddy Arnold Popular at local cinemas: Night of the Living Dead On Television: American Olympic track medalists Tommy Smith and Juan Carlos raise their gloved fists in protest while on the medal stand in Mexico City Happy Birthday: actor Hugh Jackman (October 12)

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Mickey Foellger fondly remembers his youthful Saturday morning ritual, a bus ride from Fort Thomas to Cincinnati.

“There was this great record store on Fountain Square called The Song Shop. I’d spend hours flipping through ’45s,” he said.

“They had a listening room where you could play a record before you bought it, and I’d sit and listen to all the new releases,” he remembered. “The first record I ever purchased – Elvis – Side A, Hound Dog and Side B, Don’t be Cruel.”

“Then I’d head over to the second floor of the Hotel Sinton and listen to the broadcast on WSAI-AM,” Foellger said, laughing.

“That was a full day.”

The beat flowing through Foellger’s veins came honestly. His father, Milford Foellger, was the band leader for Mil Foellger and the Music Masters, who played on the Island Queen and on the beaches of Bellevue and Dayton. The younger Foellger followed in his father’s musical footsteps and began playing drums at an early age.

When Foellger was 12 years old, he got a call from Danny Morgan, who had a garage band called The Vibrations. Morgan and his family lived in Fort Thomas where his father booked acts for military clubs. The Vibrations needed a drummer. “Even though I was younger, I had my own drum set,” Foellger said about becoming the drummer for The Vibrations. He began playing at parties and in church basements throughout Northern Kentucky. “I was so young, my mom had to drive me to band practice and to gigs,” Foellger recalled. “Eventually, my dad took some of the money I was making and bought an old Cloverleaf Milk truck for us to pack our gear in and drive ourselves to gigs.”

This early venture into music left a young Mickey Foellger with only one goal in mind. “I was going to make it in the music business,” he said.

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would give the band a portion of the gate. Shad O’Shea had a popular show on WCPO radio and took a liking to Foellger and the new group for which he was keeping a beat – but he wanted to change the name. “Shad wanted to jump on the British Invasion and call us ‘The New Limeys,’” Foellger said smiling.

The New Lime: Dave Cassell, Mickey “We settled on ‘The New Lime.’” Foellger, Gary Lee Fausz, Mike Boyd, Under the production guid- and Jim Geyer ance of O’Shea, The New Lime started cranking out ’45s. In 1965, Whenever I Look in Her Eyes made it to No. twelve on local charts.

Then, during one recording session, O’Shea asked the band if they had any ideas for a B-Side of an upcoming single. “So, another band member (Mike Boyd) and I wrote this four-chord keyboard song about a girl who had dumped me,” said Foellger.

The song was That Girl.”

O’Shea made sure That Girl got a lot of airplay and was eventually picked up by Columbia Records. In 1967, under the Columbia label, That Girl made it to No. 1 on several regional charts across the country, as well as onto the national charts. A friend of Foellger’s heard it on the radio while on vacation in England.

Mickey Foellger’s dream of making it in the music business was realized when he got his first BMI royalty check. “It was a big number by 1968 standards,” he said, slowly drawing out the word “bbbbbiiiiiggggg.” “My dad made me promise I would not do something stupid with the money, like buy a new car. I consented, but the next day I went out and bought a Jaguar XKE.” Even though he would eventually be elected to the Campbell County bench, Mickey Foellger was not very interested in politics at the time. However, does remember The New Lime playing a set 119

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before Hubert Humphrey made a political speech in Cincinnati.

Foellger paints a picture of a vibrant Northern Kentucky music scene in 1968. On any given weekend, you could go to hear great live music from groups like The Dingos, The Exiles, The Corvairs, The Satins, or The Denems. Many of the players in these groups went onto bigger groups. Panny Sarakatsannis of The Satins played with James Brown. Bill Reeder of The Corvairs became the musical director for Wayne Newton in Las Vegas.

Danny Morgan teamed up with Foellger and Cincinnati Bengal/Nashville songwriting legend Mike Reid and opened for John Denver and the Beach Boys. He also toured with the original Pure Prairie League frontman, Craig Fuller, and opened for Little Feat.

During 1968, John Domaschko was toting his bass around the region as a member of The Dingos, playing dances and being the house band at a club called Grannies in Elsmere. He remembers the year as a schizophrenic one for music. “On one hand, you saw all these breakthrough bands following the influence of the Beatles,” Domaschko said, referencing names like Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton. “On the other hand, bubble-gum pop groups started to get airplay.”

By John Domaschko’s account, two things happened in late 1967, influencing music in the following year. First, there was The Beatles’ release of the LP Magical Mystery Tour. He described life in a band at the time as “waiting for the next Beatles’ album to come out and then just copying the whole thing.”

“Magical Mystery Tour was different,” Domaschko said of The Beatles’ new psychedelic sound. “The day it was released, we bought a copy, listened, and were absolutely blown away.

We immediately worked up an arrangement of the title track, and The Dingos played it the next night at a Battle of the Bands competition. Even the other bands gave us props.”

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The second thing happening to rock music setting the stage for 1968 was more personal to Domaschko and the Dingos. They went to a concert to hear Herman and the Hermits but left with a new sound running through their heads, compliments of the warmup band – The Who. “Crowds wanted to be engaged,” he recalls. “So everybody started looking to these new sounds The Dingos (from top to bottom): for songs to play.”

John Domaschko, Denny Davis, The Denems were also quite Larry Quill and Cliff Adams popular in Northern Kentucky. For their haircuts, matching outfits, and British covers, many local radio stations referred to the group as “Cincinnati’s Beatles.”

Adrian Belew of the Denems became – well, Adrian Belew – one of the most influential guitarists in rock music. A drummer for the Denems, Belew taught himself guitar during a high school bout with mononucleosis. He left Northern Kentucky and headed to Nashville, where he was discovered by Frank Zappa, for whom he ended up playing lead guitar.

Quite simply, the list of Adrian Belew’s musical chops is longer than a Zappa concerto. Known in 1968 as Steve Belew, he played lead guitar for the likes of David Bowie, Talking Heads, Tom Tom Club, the Bears (a.k.a. The Raisins), and Nine Inch Nails. He was the driving force behind King Crimson. Belew has 20 solo albums under his moniker and an Oscar on his shelf for composing the score to the Pixar short film Piper.

The New Lime, The Denems, and The Dingos (as well as several players from those groups) have all been inducted into the Northern Kentucky Music Legends Hall of Fame.

On the countryside of music, Northern Kentuckian Skeeter Davis continued her legendary career by releasing her 13th and 121

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14th albums. The LPs Why So Lonely and I Love Flatt and Scruggs climbed to 33 and 39th, respectively. Davis’ single There’s a Fool Born Every Minute reached 18th on the country singles charts.

Skeeter Davis is best remembered for songs still getting airplay to this day. Her crossover country/pop End of the World and her classic anti-war anthem, One Tin Soldier, can be heard on a regular basis. What is often forgotten about Davis is her influence on a generation of performers. Songs by Skeeter Davis were covered by a group of performers with diverse styles ranging from Bob Dylan to Deborah Harry and Michael Stipe.

Lou Reed once credited Skeeter Davis as being an early influence on his music.

Another country star, Kenny Price from Florence, was at the beginning of his career. Standing at 6’6” and weighing close to 300 pounds, Price was known as the “Round Mound of Sound.”

In 1968, the future Hee Haw regular released his second of 23 albums, titled Southern Bound. The album topped out at No. 23 on the country charts. And one song from the LP, My Goal for Today, topped out at No. 11 on the country singles chart. A section of U.S. 42 in Boone County – from I-75 to Gunpowder Road – is named after Price.

The enjoyment of an active music scene in Northern Kentucky was tempered by the continuous bad news coming out of Vietnam. Sergeant Randall Welch of Covington lost his life in Vietnam. His mother said, “If prayers could have saved him, he’d have come back to us.” Corporal Clyde David Downard of Falmouth was killed just three days after his nineteenth birthday.

The reserve unit deployed from Carroll County got two weeks’ leave in October. While the men were enjoying their time back home, they were nervously anticipating being shipped to Vietnam. Captain Gerald Wilhoit had been talking to the soldiers returning from the conflict. “We found out firsthand what it’s all about,” he said. Many of the men he had spoken to refused to be 122

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sent to Chicago to quell the anti-war demonstrations. “They had been to Vietnam,” said Wilhoit.

When asked where they might be stationed once deployed to Southeast Asia, one soldier replied he did not know. “But to our families, the Vietnamese towns all sound alike.”

Also coming home in October was one of the draftees being followed by The Kentucky Post and Times-Star, Army Specialist John Gerding of Southgate. Just prior to his return, an enemy soldier breached the security where he was stationed and boobytrapped their recreation area. “I guess I got out just in time,” he said.

The promise of a spirited presidential campaign in the Commonwealth was squashed. The Humphrey camp announced early in the month that they were writing off the chance of winning Kentucky in an effort to be competitive in states with larger electoral vote counts. Knowing the news was a harsh blow to every candidate on the ballot, local Democrats scrambled at the news.

The Democratic candidate for the United States Senate, Katherine Peden, tried to distance herself from Hubert Humphrey. “Kentucky is not going to elect the next president John Gerding welcomed home by with its nine electoral votes,” she his parents and fiancée at Greater declared. “But it will elect a senator Cincinnati Airport. by popular vote.”

In the race for the Fourth District Congressional seat, the incumbent Gene Snyder and the challenger Gus Sheehan were both focusing on those voters backing George Wallace. “WallaceSnyder” and “Wallace-Sheehan” bumper stickers began popping up around Northern Kentucky. Snyder went as far as saying he and Wallace shared many policy views.

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The Kentucky Post and Times-Star doubled down on their previous endorsement of Richard Nixon for president, publishing two more editorials. In one, they said Nixon was “a changeover to fresh, experienced, able leadership already facing in the direction of achieving an honorable peace in Southeast Asia, a sound and responsible fiscal policy, a return to law and order in the cities and deceleration of precipitous sociological programs.” The editorial stated voting for Hubert Humphrey or George Wallace was “unthinkable,” labeling Humphrey as status quo and Wallace as an agitator.

There was an unsuccessful effort to get President Johnson to make a follow-up appearance to his Thomas More visit.

Democratic Vice Presidential candidate Edwin Muskie made a brief stop at the airport and assured about a thousand supporters his ticket would win Kentucky.

Democratic Party leaders were not buying it. The chair of the state Democratic party reminded local officials of the “loyalty oath” they signed when running under the party label in order to keep them from backing George Wallace. Republican voter registration was up in Boone, Kenton, and Campbell counties.

Some polls showed Humphrey running a poor third in Kentucky, a proposition conceivably striking the party from its automatic position on the state’s next ballot.

In the midst of the electoral turmoil, the Republican nominee, Richard Nixon, came to town for a rally across the river, choosing to stay at the President Motor Inn on Dixie Highway in Fort Wright. Supporters waving handmade signs lined the streets as the Nixon motorcade made its way to the motel. The Kentucky Post and Times-Star ran an entire article about their stay, commenting on what they ate, the staff waiting on them, and the pages running errands for them.

Possibly the most notable news of the month was about the region’s inside ties to the Nixon and Humphrey campaigns.

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aide, and Cynthiana’s Ann Swinford was heading up one of Humphrey’s advance teams.

Following his 1957 graduation from Dixie Heights High School, Ron Ziegler and his wife (Nancy Plessinger of Fort Wright) moved to California, where he worked in advertising. He had met Nixon during the candidate’s unsuccessful run for governor of California. sign at the President Motor Inn “In June, Nixon asked me to join Awelcomes Richard Nixon the campaign, and I jumped at the chance,” he said. Ziegler and his staff of eight ran the entire Nixon press operation. “We handle all requirements of the national press in relation to the candidate,” Ziegler stated. He even had a court stenographer constantly following Nixon, taking down his every word. He gave high praise to his boss, saying, “Mr. Nixon is highly intelligent. He has the quality to get the most out of people. He draws confidence.” Ziegler was twenty-nine years old at the time.

Following Nixon’s victory, Ron Ziegler would become the White House Press Secretary. He never forgot his roots and returned to Northern Kentucky regularly.

Cynthiana’s Ann Swinford was the twenty-five-year-old daughter of United States District Court Judge Mac Swinford and quite proud of her Democratic Party roots. She was at the party’s convention in Chicago as a staffer and witnessed Northern Kentuckian Ron Ziegler on the 1968 Nixon campaign trail.

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the violence in the streets. “I don’t believe in revolution,” she said. Instead, she chose to make her mark by working through the system. Following the convention, she was given a job as an advance person, traveling in front of the candidate to make sure everything ran smoothly.

The contrasting articles about Ziegler and Swinford mark the times about the role of men and women in the world of politics and business. The article on Swinford noted that while she would likely be out of a job following the election, there were plenty of opportunities in Washington for secretaries like her who could take dictation at 120 words a minute. Zigler was asked if Nixon won, would he become the new president’s press secretary.

The establishment of Northern Kentucky University hit another bump in the road when a dust-up occurred on whether the extension campus of the University of Kentucky located in Park Hills should remain a part of U.K. Eastern Kentucky University President Robert Martin, who also served as the chair of the state Council on Higher Public Education believed the extension should be turned over to the newly established college.

The president of Thomas More College opposed the move, as did The Kentucky Post and Times-Star. Their reasoning sounds much like today’s arguments for workforce training. “Some educators see [community colleges] as primarily technical training schools, capable of turning out employable technicians in two years.

Others consider them weeding-out centers for future university students. Still others contend they must be a combination of the two, and it will take time to discover what the state needs most from them.”

While it took more time than was reasonably expected, today, Kentucky has a flourishing community college under a Board of Regents independent of the University of Kentucky. Gateway Community and Technical College stands as a testament to the need for community-based education.

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Finally, in October 1968, two of those ever-reoccurring issues came to the forefront in Northern Kentucky – interstate traffic and city/county government. News reports about when I-275 and I-471 would be started tried to determine truth from fiction.

Road planners expected the first section of I-275 (from Erlanger west to the Ohio River) to be completed sometime in the 19711972 fiscal year, with I-471 possibly taking longer. Of course, politics were allegedly involved in the delays, with Kentucky Governor Louie Nunn blaming a freeze in federal road funds and promising a vote for Richard Nixon would bring attention to the need for Northern Kentucky roadwork.

Near the end of the month, The Northern Kentucky Area Council (with representatives from each city in Boone and Campbell counties) asked the Northern Kentucky Area Planning Commission to conduct a study of joining the two counties into one mega-city. Campbell County Judge Executive Lambert Heil (D) compared it to Gulliver being tied down by the little people in Lilliput. “We could be so much stronger if we were cooperating – working for each other – instead of against,” said Heil.

Nearly six decades (and a countless number of merger studies, consolidation recommendations, and visioning sessions) later, Northern Kentucky remains a cookie-cutter map of thirty-seven municipalities, twenty-two fire departments, twenty-six police departments, and 13 school districts.

Additional Chapter Credits:

Foellger, Mickey, Interview by Rick Robinson, 12 July 2023 Domaschko, John, Interview by Rick Robinson, 10 August 2023

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November – 1968 “Having lost a close one eight years ago and having won a close one this year, I can say one thing: winning’s a lot more fun.”

—President-elect Richard M. Nixon Election Night, 1968

Eye-Catching Local Headline: “Youth Wants Answers – Should a Girl Smoke Pot?” On the covers of LIFE Magazine: November 1 – Jackie’s Wedding – Jackie and Aristotle Onassis November 8 – As the bombing stops – This Girl Tron November 15 – The Nixon Era Begins November 22 – Frederick Douglass – The Search for a Black Past November 29 – Russia in the Middle East On the covers of Sports Illustrated: November 4 – Earl “the Pearl” Monroe – Magic in Baltimore November 11 – Ohio State Football – The Buckeyes Are Back November 18 – Jean Claude Killy – Ski My New Way November 25 – Earl Morrall of the Baltimore Colts On the covers of Time Magazine: November 1 – New York Mayor John Lindsay – The Breakdown of a City November 8 – President Lyndon Johnson – The Bombing Decision November 15 – President-Elect Richard Nixon 128

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November 22 – Pope Paul: Rebellion in the Catholic Church November 29 – World Money Crisis #1 on WSAI: Hey Jude by the Beatles #1 on WCIN: Who’s Makin Love by Johnny Taylor #1 on WCXL: Stand by Your Man by Tammy Wynette Popular at local cinemas: Yellow Submarine On Television: Star Trek broadcasts television’s first interracial kiss Happy Birthday: actor Owen Wilson (November 18), actor Tracy Morgan (November 10), actor Sam Rockwell (November 5) In Memoriam: author Upton Sinclair (age 90)

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On Election Day, Richard M. Nixon and Spiro T. Agnew were elected to lead the country.

The Republican ticket captured the Commonwealth’s nine electoral votes. Of Kentucky’s 120 counties, Hubert Humphrey won forty-two, and George Wallace captured five. Nixon won the remainder. Their respective percentage of Kentucky’s vote: Nixon/Agnew – 43.8 percent, Humphrey/Muskie – 37.7 percent, and Wallace/LeMay 18.3 percent.

Elections results in Campbell and Kenton counties closely mirrored the state and the nation, while George Wallace outpaced his statewide percentages in Boone County.

Boone County Nixon Humphrey Wallace

4,08145.09 percent 2,72530.11 percent 2,24024.75 percent

Campbell County Nixon 13,68148.51 percent Humphrey 9,74734.56 percent Wallace 4,75016.84 percent Kenton County Nixon Humphrey Wallace

17,26343.64 percent 14,65637.05 percent 7,61219.24 percent

In the other two federal races, Republicans Gene Snyder and Marlowe Cook won their bids for the United States House and the United States Senate, respectively.

Republicans gloated. Democrats licked their wounds and plotted a resurgence. And, of course, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star pontificated about what it all meant.

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In a post-election editorial, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star opined: “Kentucky has stoutly reaffirmed its strong preference for moderate-to-conservative course in national government.” The editorial noted Marlow Cook became the first Roman Catholic senator from the state and labeled Gene Snyder “a stalwart conservative.”

The newspaper also published an open letter to Nixon, Cook, and Snyder. Should anyone ever wonder about the editorial position of The Kentucky Post and Times-Star in 1968, this letter made it crystal clear.

Stating the heartland was becoming weary of the Great Society policies of President Johnson, the published letter declared: We’re sick at the heart of over permissiveness, minority worship, defeatist welfare, toleration of crime, anti-traditionalism, inflation with an anemic currency, paternalism, maternalism, over-taxation, grants-in-aid, waste in general and over government in everything except law and order. … It is our firm belief that over paternalism of the past, particularly in welfare programs, have atrophied the moral sinew of this country and her people.

Following Cook’s election, in a show of bipartisanship unheard of in today’s toxic partisan environment, retiring Democrat Thurston Morton resigned from his seat in the United States Senate. This move allowed Republican Governor Louie Nunn to appoint Cook to take over immediately, thus giving Cook seniority over other newly elected senators to be sworn in come January.

It did not take long for potential candidates for county offices and the state’s General Assembly to put the election behind them and declare their political intentions for 1969. There were not enough column inches in the newspaper to run pictures of every person considering their immediate political future. As opposed 131

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to the recent federal election, however, county courthouses were under the control of Democrats. And there were only a handful of Republicans from Northern Kentucky in the General Assembly.

Democrats talked of their local reorganization and the inclusion of younger people into the party. Republicans were hopeful to build upon their victory in the ’68 federal elections. *** November was yet another bad month for regional Vietnam casualties. Marine Private First Class Howard Wilhoit of Ludlow had enlisted with several of his friends from high school. He had been stationed in Vietnam for over a year when he was killed in fighting within the Demilitarized Zone. “He felt he had to go,” said his father. Fleming High School graduate and career officer Lieutenant Colonel Alden O’Brien was killed in the crash of a C-47 cargo plane. The fifty-year-old father of two had been a fighter pilot in World War II. In addition, Private First-Class Raymond Bruce McKinney was killed by mortar fire while on patrol in the Quang Nam province. From letters, McKinney’s parents thought their son was in Okinawa. “I suppose he didn’t want to worry us about being in Vietnam,” said his sister.

As casualties mounted, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star reached out to several of the draftees they had been following to report on their experiences in Vietnam.

Bill Brewer from Crescent Springs said of the enemy, “You fight ’em, but you don’t see ’em. All you hear are the rounds popping over your head.”

Covington’s Carl Fryman, who went into the military despite his religious concerns about killing, rationalized his actions with his faith. “Well, if a guy walks up to you and is going to kill you, you gotta kill him. It’s survival. You don’t have much choice. You don’t think about it much.”

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“You don’t understand how scared a guy can get over there,” said Richard Goetz of Cold Spring, who had a scar from shrapnel from his time in Vietnam. “You get down on your knees and start praying.” *** As detailed in the book Syndicate Wife, the battle against gambling and prostitution in Newport began with the election of George Ratterman as Campbell County Sheriff. While it was a major step in cleaning up the region, it was not the end of illegal activity. Those believing Northern Kentucky’s illegal gambling days were far behind the region were shocked as November brought several raids against gaming operations. Once again, reporters from The Kentucky Post and Times-Star proved the paper’s investigatory prowess by going into and reporting on these illegal casinos.

Reporter Alan Markfield described how, at the 514 Club on Madison Avenue in Covington, he sat at the bar watching welldressed men and women disappear behind a door at the back of the bar. He sat at the bar as people around him bragged about their winnings. He went to the door and was led to another marked as the men’s rest room. Just beyond that door he found out where everyone was going.

They were in a bright, smoke-filled room that resembled a miniature Las Vegas casino.

The room was about 18x45 feet, and there were no windows.

On a table in front of me, there was a dice game: to the left, a tall man in a blue shirt and dark slacks was dealing blackjack.

About 40 people were crowded around both tables, trying to get their bets covered.

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On the wall were race results from major tracks across the country.

This noisy room was packed. The horse players sat at rows of tables, carefully screening Saturday’s picks.

The next night, Markfield visited two more Covington gambling establishments, the Past Prime Restaurant on Madison and Howard’s Club on Pike Street. Accompanying the reporter to these venues was a local well-known anti-gambling reformer.

At the first stop, the reformer was a little too well-known. After placing a bet on a horse race, a bouncer brandishing either a billy club or a gun ran them out of the building. At their second stop, the pair observed a game of five-card stud with a $35 ante and $15 minimum raises.

The stories led to numerous raids of illegal casinos and indictments of their operators in Kenton and Campbell counties.

What many might consider a novelty story properly sets forth the changing role of Covington City Manager Bob Wray looks women in society, as well as the at items taken in a raid of the city’s 514 Club. struggles they faced. In 1968, Penny Ann Early became the first licensed female jockey. She attempted to ride in three races at Churchill Downs in Louisville, but the threat of a boycott by male jockeys caused her to lose her mounts. One male jockey brazenly declared Early would fall off her horse and have to be rescued.

Following the meet in Louisville, Penny Ann Early took her saddle to Latonia Race Track. The night before the Latonia meet started, the Kentucky Colonels of the American Basketball Association put Early into a game for one second as a guard – making her the first woman to play in a men’s professional 134

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basketball game. In protest of the mounts she lost at Churchill, she wore No. 3.

When Early came to Latonia Race Track, Life Magazine and CBS were there to cover it. Three minutes before the scheduled start of the fifth race, a high wind caused a power outage and cancellation of the rest of the races for the day. Despite Penny Ann Early being the first female licensed jockey, she never got a mount.

Life Magazine did write about Early’s attempt to break horse racing’s glass ceiling. But it also allowed jockey Bill Hartack to pen a guest editorial about his outrage. “They’ll find out how tough it is, and they’ll give it up. The tracks won’t have to worry about being flooded with women because a female cannot compete against a male doing anything. … They might weigh the same as male jockeys, but they aren’t as strong. And as a group, I don’t think their brains are as capable of making fast decisions.

Women are also more likely to panic. It’s their nature,” Hartack wrote.

In February 1969, Diane Crump rode at Hialeah Park Race Track in Florida and became the first woman to compete in a pari-mutuel race. Two years later, her ride in the Kentucky Derby would set the stage for other women to enter the sport.

In yet another instance where headlines sound vaguely familiar, on Election Day, The Kentucky Post and Times-Star published an article titled “Electors Could Ignore the Will of the Public.” Offering several scenarios of how electors from each ticket could cause the vote to move from the Electoral College to the House of Representatives, the reporter noted, “Considering the presidency is at stake, the electoral system is not a tightly run operation.”

Additional Chapter Credits:

Fryman, Carl, telephone interview with Rick Robinson, 31 August 2023.

135

December – 1968 “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.”

—Astronaut William A. Anders aboard Apollo 8 Christmas Eve, 1968

Eye-Catching Local Headline: Move to Merge Counties – Leaders Envision One City of 250,000 On the covers of LIFE Magazine: December 6 – Corruption of Chicago Police – The Police Rioted at the Democratic Convention December 13 – My (Baltimore) Colts December 20 – The Unpublished Manuscripts of Mark Twain December 27 – Picasso On the covers of Sports Illustrated: December 2 – College Basketball Preview – Challenge to UCLA December 9 – Joe Namath Eyes the Super Bowl December 16 – Green Bay Packers – A Dynasty Totters December 23 – Sportsman of the Year Bill Russell On the covers of Time Magazine: December 6 – Race to the Moon December 13 – Yasser Arafat: Defiant New Force in the Middle East December 20 – William Rogers: Nixon’s Secretary of State December 27 – Johann Sebastian Bach: Music from the Fifth Evangelist 136

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#1 on WSAI: Love Child by Diana Ross and the Supremes #1 on WCIN: I Heard It Through the Grapevine by Marvin Gaye #1 on WCXL: Wichita Lineman by Glenn Campbell Popular at local cinemas: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang On Television: Elvis Christmas Special (a.k.a. The Comeback Special) Happy Birthday: actress Lucy Liu (December 2), actor Brendan Fraser (December 3)

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On the evening of December 3, 1968, a fourteen-yearold ninth grader from Ockerman Junior high school, Pamela Robinson Porter, sat impatiently in front of a large wood cabinet encasing a small Motorola color television set. The anticipation was agonizing. A Christmas special was about to start. This, however, was no ordinary television show. Singer Presents...Elvis was about to air.

Elvis Presley had not performed in public for seven years.

His musical abilities had become secondary to his appearances in over two dozen low-budget movies. Elvis had charted only one top ten hit over the previous five years.

Originally, Elvis balked at the idea of singing Christmas carols in front of a national audience. He initially considered the concept to be yet another corny profiteering scheme devised by his manager, Colonel Tom Parker. Elvis changed his mind when producer Bob Finkle and director Steve Bender decided to focus on the music and make wholesale changes in the show’s format.

For instance, Colonel Parker wanted to hand-pick the people in the audience. Finkel and Bender went to a nearby diner and put them around Elvis.

“In today’s world, no celebrity would fail to make a public appearance or appear in the media for six or seven years,” said Northern Kentucky lawyer, author, and filmmaker John Lucas.

A seventeen-year-old at Holmes High school at the time, Lucas was compelled to tune in, “He had only been in movies. So, like many fans, I was curious.”

Dressed all in black leather and surrounded by a casual audience, Elvis Presley delivered. Singer Presents . . . Elvis drew a whopping 42 percent in the ratings. The soundtrack of the special went gold. And the first release from the soundtrack, If I Can Dream went to No. 8 in the charts.

Pamela Robinson Porter was thrilled. “I couldn’t WAIT to return to school to chatter with my girlfriends about our fave 138

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songs,” she says. She also noted it probably took her a decade to realize how legendary the night had been. Later in life, her multiple trips to Graceland in Memphis were “almost a reverent, spiritual experience, a confirmation of the peace Elvis sought and found there.” In a 2001 column, she wrote, “I think it’s fair to say that the course of American and world/musical popular culture would have been radically altered without Elvis. The legend may have permanently ‘left the building’, but his contributions to music and his legacy have ensured he will remain an international icon for the ages.”

Not everyone shared the enthusiasm. Some critics panned it. Locally, people like John Domaschko, bass player for The Dingos, had moved on to other types of music. “By 1968, Jimi Hendrix, Cream, the Yardbirds, the Who, and many others had hit the scene, making Elvis seem like a musical dinosaur,” said Domaschko. With those emerging sounds as a backdrop, “Elvis became the equivalent of Lawrence Welk for many people our age.”

Despite criticism, the impact of the television show eventually became known as simply The Comeback Special cannot be overlooked.

The song If I Can Dream is a story in and of itself – an exclamation point on the turmoil of 1968. Although it was airing in December, the special was filmed months earlier in June.

Vietnam and the murders of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Bobby Kennedy were at the forefront of Elvis’ mind. He was supposed to close the show by covering I’ll be Home for Christmas. Instead, a song was hastily written to reflect Elvis’ view on all the turmoil facing America. In a white three-piece suit, backed by giant red letters spelling his name and with no audience, Elvis sang into a white handheld microphone: “If I can dream of a better land, Where all my brothers walk hand in hand, Tell me why, oh why, 139

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Oh, why can’t my dream come true.”

The words hit home in a region where headlines were still featuring stories about the deaths in Vietnam.

His tour in Vietnam having ended in November, Covington’s Carl Fryman was back in the states for Christmas. On his time in-country, “You see things no person should ever see,” he said recently. Unlike others he knew who had to clean up the bodies on the battlefield where he was wounded, Fryman never experienced any post-traumatic stress. “Being a Christian, I just called on the Lord. He’s never failed me.”

The Niewahner family of Villa Hills had three sons stationed in Southeast Asia – Louis, Mike, and Ronald. Early in December, the youngest of the trio, Army Sergeant Ronald Niewahner, was killed about twenty-five miles outside of Saigon. The family’s last letter from their son had been a week or so earlier in which “He told us he was going to church and serving Mass the Sunday before – said it made him feel good.”

On Christmas Day, Army Sergeant Ken Bryant of Cold Spring became the final Northern Kentuckian to be killed in combat in 1968. A Bronze Star recipient, Bryant had been injured twice previously. He had ninety-two days left in Vietnam when he was killed on patrol near Saigon. He had planned to get married.

Lloyd High School made headlines in December 1968 by banning Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger from the school’s required reading list. Forty-nine parents had presented a petition to Lloyd officials demanding it ban the 1951 best-selling novel about a boy running away from home to New York City. One parent called the book “dangerous.” Another objected to the vulgar language, saying, “Novels are supposed to be enjoyable, but this book is not enjoyable.” An open meeting of the ErlangerElsmere School Board brought out supporters and detractors.

“It’s about academic freedom,” said one parent. The Board appointed a secret panel to review the book, which eventually compromised and allowed Catcher in the Rye to remain on the 140

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required reading list unless parents objected. In such a case, an alternate novel would be assigned to the student. The secret committee acknowledged parents’ concerns over what their children are reading in school. “On the other hand, the literature teacher should not try to escape the possibility of controversy by presenting only safe but barren works.” *** At the end of any year, newspapers seem to focus on what may be expected in the upcoming year. The end of 1968 was no exception as The Kentucky Post and Times-Star ran many stories about planning for the future.

Governor Louie Nunn planned for a 1970 start date for Northern Kentucky State College, and everyone waited to see where the new campus would be located. The newly formed Board of Regents began planning to hire top-level college executives.

Frontier World (Fess Parker’s Boone County-based amusement park) planned for a 1970 opening that never happened.

A modernization plan for Covington’s Riverside Drive was met with citizen opposition.

A multi-level “living bridge” between Cincinnati and Newport was planned to include apartments and a helicopter pad. Decades later, a similar plan was proposed for the Purple People Bridge.

The Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana (OKI) Regional Transportation Study issued a twenty-one-year bridge plan, including a new span to replace the Brent Spence. The Kentucky Post and TimesStar explained it simply: “We can’t wait until 1990 for a better river crossing.” It’s 2023 and we are still waiting.

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The Northern Kentucky Riverport Authority started a longrange feasibility study for public port facilities. A port was never constructed, but the port authority still exists.

And a long-term plan of President John F. Kennedy inched one step closer to fruition.

In the ’60s, Southeast Asia was not the only place where America was fighting the Cold War. It was also being fought in the most faraway place imaginable – the moon.

The Space Race began when President John F. Kennedy challenged America to reach the lunar surface by the end of the decade. In a speech at Rice University, President Kennedy said: We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things not because they are easy but because they are hard. Because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we’re willing to accept. One we are unwilling to postpone.

And therefore, as we set sail, we ask God’s blessing on the most hazardous and dangerous and greatest adventure that man has ever gone.

Underlying the Kennedy challenge was beating the Soviet Union in the quest. Having an American astronaut walk on the moon before a Russian cosmonaut was a Cold War challenge more easily accepted by most Americans than the war in Vietnam.

To close out 1968, Northern Kentuckians sat transfixed to their television sets as Apollo 8 took America one step closer by orbiting the moon ten times before safely returning to Earth.

Astronauts Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders became the first to witness an “Earthrise” from the dark side of the moon.

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astronauts on board were present in the newspaper every day of its historic voyage, including the edition on Christmas Day. The comments from Northern Kentuckians reflected the enthusiasm being felt around the country.

Bernard Brinkman of Ludlow said, “I don’t know how to say it, but I guess it’s the most marvelous thing that ever happened.”

Nancy Abercrombie, a waitress at the Copper Kettle, said it was “grand.” Thomas More student Tom Aylor said from his job at Bodkin Liquor that he was “glad we’re the first up there.

On Christmas Eve 1968, before a worldwide television audience, the three astronauts read the first ten verses of Genesis from the King James version of the Bible.

Bill Anders We are now approaching lunar sunrise, and for all the people back on Earth, the crew of Apollo 8 has a message that we would like to send to you.

In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.

And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

Jim Lovell And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

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And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.

And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

Frank Borman And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.

And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.

And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night, good luck, a Merry Christmas – and God bless all of you, all of you on the good Earth.

Less than a year later, although separated by distance, Neil Armstrong would unite us in a bond by fulfilling President Kennedy’s challenge by stepping on the lunar surface.

The success of Apollo 8 capped off an unprecedented year of political unrest, social upheaval, and international turmoil. In a year where many Americans feared for the future of the country, Apollo 8 changed the mood of the nation – a notion not lost on the three astronauts and their families.

The wife of astronaut Air Force Major General Bill Anders, Valerie Anders, remembers 1968 as a chaotic year that was all about Vietnam. “Apollo 8,” she said, “was a very positive thing in a year of very negative things.”

Navy Captain Jim Lovell knew 1968 had been a bad year for the country. “But what Apollo 8 did was solidify one thing everybody was proud of,” Lovell said in an interview on PBS. “The biggest gift we gave was to the American public – to be eventually proud to be an American.” Lovell would go on to write 144

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the book Lost Moon upon which the movie Apollo 13 was based.

And Air Force Colonel Tom Borman recalled only one telegram from the thousands he and his fellow Apollo 8 crew members received following their mission: CONGRATULATIONS TO THE CREW OF APOLLO 8.

YOU SAVED 1968.

Additional credits for Chapter:

Porter Robinson, Pamela, emails to Rick Robinson, 19 August 2023 PBS, The American Experience, “The Event that Saved 1968” 31 October 2005.

Jim Lovell, interview by Mary Louise Kelly, PBS - All Things Considered, 24 December 2018.

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Lessons Learned from 1968 My inner nostalgic spirit is begging me to label 1968 as “a simpler time.”

It wasn’t.

My day-by-day analysis of 1968 brought to bear the laundry list of problems facing America in the late 60s: Vietnam, King, Kennedy, civil rights, women’s rights, politics, policy, etc.

Northern Kentucky was certainly not unique in addressing these issues. I also suspect our responses to those problems were also not unique but instead a pattern experienced in many communities our size. Throw a dart at a map of the United States, read newspapers from that city, and you’ll likely find a similar pattern of stories.

The news in 1968 was not always bad. The groundwork for Northern Kentucky University was laid. Roads were being built.

The economy was growing.

But, news stories about success are put into scrapbooks. News stories about bad things make their way into history books. The year was not always pretty and, on occasion, bordered on brutally painful. For better or worse, this was us.

Context The most difficult part of researching this book was trying to remember the context of the times.

It started with language. The language in news stories from ’68 seems so foreign to modern culture, and many stories read

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like fiction for which a reader must “suspend disbelief ” to comprehend.

But the articles I read for this book were not fiction and define a moment in time not easily understood when viewed under a microscope of social standards not applicable in ’68. The idea of understanding context is not meant to cast personal judgment on any particular behavior during the year (although there was plenty worthy of objection). Instead, it’s to understand that 1968 was a revolution of right and wrong America had not faced for a century. I did not want to lose sight of the turbulence in favor of comparing words.

The terms used in the news stories of ’68 easily conjure reactions of racism and misogyny by today’s standards. When interviewing Bob McCray for this book, at one point, he closed his eyes and pondered out loud, “What were we back then?”

He then went backward, remembering all the proper terms used over the past sixty years for African-Americans. I’m not talking about the pejorative N-word, but terms likely were set forth in the Associated Press Stylebook at the time. So-called “political correctness” is not new. News outlets have been setting such standards for years. Looking at headlines from 1968, it is not hard to understand how terms proper at one point in time became offensive as those times changed.

For instance, a story about a twenty-year-old AfricanAmerican named David Housley seeking a party position bore the headline “Young Negro Seeks Democrat Role.” While inappropriate by today’s nomenclature, it was appropriate usage in 1968.

That is not to use context as an excuse. I often found context as an indictment upon 1968. In the context of understanding civil rights, instead of looking for bias via violations of today’s social language mores, I first looked at bias in what was actually said or written. That was sadly not hard to find. However, I also focused my thoughts on what was left unsaid. I wondered about 147

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news stories involving African-Americans left unreported.

Implications of bias in failing to report on certain news stories spoke as loudly to me as printed words. The lack of news reporting about Northern Kentucky’s minority communities in 1968 speaks volumes.

And it was not just reporting on stories involving AfricanAmericans. It was particularly hard to escape context when reading stories about women, headlining them with labels like “Dolls” and “Gals.” Stories were often either cringeworthy or laughable. What became more telling were the news stories directed at female readers. The “Women’s” section of the newspaper was flush with recipes, photos from charity events, and housekeeping advice. The emerging influence of women in society and the workforce was being ignored.

Finally, context demands an understanding of how differently Americans view news today. In 1968, people watched one of three news outlets to form an opinion on an issue. There was no internet. There was no social media. Telephones hung on kitchen walls and were exclusively for talking. You could not take a picture of your cat with a telephone and text it to a friend.

Overriding worldviews were politely discussed on front porches and over backyard fences. Today, the process has been turned upside down. People form an opinion and then choose from a plethora of news outlets to validate their pre-formulated bias. Today, it is not uncommon for a factual story to be reported with contradictory headlines depending on the news outlet. Left and right -- news is biased to fit the bias of the viewer.

Did the news change? Did we cause it? Was the change organic?

In 1968, the presentation of news was far less complicated.

There were three news broadcasts every night. Editorial content was labeled as such. The radio was for music and ballgames, not talk shows.

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Political humorist P.J. O’Rourke believed it was the changing role of advertising in the age of cable that changed news reporting. Local advertisers kept the three news outlets in line.

The furniture store in town wanted to sell couches to people of all political leanings. If a broadcast leaned too far to one political side or the other, advertising revenues would suffer. News walked more in the middle. With the advent of cable television, local advertising waned. The twenty-four-hour news cycle emerged, and more stations struggled to fill time. To find more viewers, the line between news and editorial comment blurred.

To some degree, the misunderstanding of context is a repetitive cycle. The “Generation Gap” of 1968 was a clash of judging turbulent times with conflicting values misunderstood equally by parents on one side and their kids on the other.

Greatest Generation parents told their baby boomer kids they could change the world but then balked when the kids attempted to do so on their own terms.

As we baby boomers are put out to pasture by more named generations than can be counted, all of this may sound vaguely familiar. Loathing the work habits and social mores of young people sounds an awful lot like Greatest Generation parents complaining about hair length and “that damned rock-and-roll music.” We are one Facebook Post away from becoming our parents and telling everyone to get off our virtual lawn. Just like baby boomers became who we are by reacting to the lives of our parents, Millennials, Gen X, Gen Y (and whatever other labels are out there) are paving their own path by reflecting on our lives. In some respects, baby boomers should look in the mirror before criticizing subsequent generations.

If you are reading this and still don’t understand your parents, don’t feel bad. Someday you’ll likely become perplexed by your kids and them about you. The cycle has been ongoing since the beginning of time. Even Jesus had an argument with his dad.

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Perhaps this sharing of context will make us boomers a tad more palatable to our children and eventually their kids to them.

Vietnam Ludlow’s Tom Gaither was truly correct when he stated, “Everything in 1968 was about Vietnam.” During the year, a day did not go by without a reminder of America’s bloody presence in Southeast Asia. Pro-war. Anti-war. The stances on both sides defined us as a nation and as a region.

It was not as if America had not seen wars before Vietnam.

The Greatest Generation was so named for the gallant way they responded to World War II. However, the brutality of war in Europe and the Pacific was experienced firsthand only by military combatants. Folks back home did not see it personally.

Government-produced movie newsreels often painted too rosy a picture of the war effort. Soldiers and sailors did not bleed in black and white.

As Margo Grubbs noted, Vietnam was different. Families had televisions and watched the brutality of war over dinner.

Young people attended the funerals of boys they knew. I was deeply moved by Gary Pranger’s statement about feeling as if the world was coming to an end before he had the opportunity to experience it.

Parents may not have read articles in the local newspaper about the war going badly or its violence. It did not matter. Their kids were watching and talking about it daily. It was not lost on the children of 1968 that they were next in line. One person I spoke with about being draft age in 1968 put it well: “I knew I was supposed to be pissed-off, I just didn’t know why.”

The nightly view of war caused many young people to sign up and join the fight. Others were not necessarily supportive but felt it was their duty to accept their draft into service. It also caused some to question the reasons behind the war. Most who opposed the war were firm in their principles. However, the anti150

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war effort was born of people wanting to avoid going to Vietnam.

One person I interviewed for this book stated how he spent a great deal of time devising ways to avoid service.

Parents were similarly split. The sight of a military car pulling up in front of the house of a soldier marked the personal family horror of Vietnam. The main difference between parents and their kids was – pro or con – parents mostly believed in America’s institutions. They were proud their sons had died for a noble and patriotic cause. Their kids were beginning to question those institutions and the men leading them.

Parents trusted the government, while their children increasingly did not. Perhaps this distrust became my generation’s biggest legacy.

Vietnam permeated politics in 1968, with views forcing people to back candidates supporting their chosen stance.

Vietnam. Lyndon Johnson dropped out of the race for president because of it. Eugene McCarthy got into the race because of it. Bobby Kennedy lost his life because of it. Hubert Humphrey was doomed because of it. And Richard Nixon won because of it.

Unbeknownst to many at the time, political futures were also changed by Vietnam. Prior to Vietnam, being a military veteran was a political resume requirement. Following Vietnam, not so much. Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump all became president with no military experience whatsoever.

Former Vietnam Prisoner of War John McCain could not turn his war heroics into a desk in the Oval Office. Those questioning Vietnam in 1968 laid the foundation for this seismic change.

Thinking of his time as a Vietnam surgeon during the Tet Offensive of 1968, Dr. Tom Bunnell chuckled at the thought of the government having ever learned anything from Vietnam. “It seems like every twenty years or so, we have to learn the same lesson,” he said. “We can’t remake people in our own image. As a country, we need to choose our battles more carefully and make 151

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our goals more transparent.” After some thought, he concluded his time tending to the wounded people of Vietnam made him a better doctor. “Every patient deserves my time and my knowledge.”

Today, Vietnam veteran Carl Fryman likes to go to reunions, where talk always seems to go back to the day he was injured in an ambush. At one such reunion, a fellow veteran came up and tearfully apologized for taking so long to arrive at the battlefield.

A colonel looking for a promotion had refused to let them go until it was nearly too late. “It was useless – a totally different war,” Fryman said. “I never got into the political aspect of it, but we never fought to win. As one generation passes to another, we forget. No, I don’t think we learned anything from Vietnam.”

People changed because of Vietnam, but our institutions are incapable of memory.

One lesson from Vietnam took too long to be learned. In 1968 (and the many years following), some opposed to America’s presence in Vietnam also became opposed to the persons sent in to fight it. Young people responding to the call of service were not “baby killers” but people acting with various motivations.

Their lives were set akilter when they came home as something other than heroes. Today, there is a much greater appreciation for service members and veterans. “Oppose the war but respect the warrior” was born of the degradation and mistreatment of returning Vietnam soldiers.

Civil Rights Civil rights is the area I found most troubling. Opinions on whether Northern Kentucky has made any progress on issues of race vary from person to person – the positions as diverse as black and white.

I went into this project with a preconceived notion that racial relations had to be better today than in 1968. Dr. King had paved a path in which I believed. I thought stories about African 152

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American “firsts” showed progress. The first African American became a state police officer. The first interracial marriage license was issued. Civil rights and housing legislation were passed.

I compared 1968 to today. There are more people of color living and working in Northern Kentucky than ever before. People have elected minorities to public office. African Americans have led the Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce. It had to be better. Didn’t it?

I learned from writing this book “it had to be better” is a mistaken and naive reaction from someone who has never experienced racism. I am someone who has never feared being pulled over for a minor traffic violation. Change had occurred, but it was in those institutions sans memory I mentioned previously.

People. They remember. The memories are not always pretty.

Shortly before I began writing this book, Reverand Richard Fowler was leading a Bible study one night when a white man wearing a backpack entered the church and sat down. Fearing what the man had concealed in his backpack, the tension of the study group was palatable. The man stayed until the end of the lesson, thanked everyone, and left. The man only wanted some religion. Yet, in a world where white men with backpacks are known to shoot up the basements of predominantly black churches, the fear of the parishioners was all too real.

Bob McCray opened my eyes on this topic, explaining how he gets up every morning and expects someone to judge him by the color of his skin rather than the content of his character.

At times, it is subtle – an unfriendly glance or a disapproving headshake. Other times, things are said to purposefully pierce the very soul of humanity.

Over breakfast one morning, Bob and I tried to come up with a rationale for such morally reprehensible conduct. We pondered the impact of social media and allowing people to express thoughts on a screen they may never say directly to someone in 153

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person. Was it cable news feeding hatred? Talk radio? Neither created the voices. They only made the voices louder.

Better? Perhaps it depends on the precise question asked.

More coffee, please. Bob and I are still working, and this may take a while.

Women’s Rights “Our Women, Bless Them, Have Questions Too” This headline, appearing early in 1968, set the stage for understanding the changing role of women in the workplace, politics, and life. The issue of women’s rights is one area where Northern Kentucky has likely seen the most progress. Of course, the above 1968 headline indicates how low the bar had been set. Quite frankly, other than mothers grieving over the loss of children in the war, it was difficult to find printed quotes from women in ’68.

I know women served in Vietnam. However, I did not find a single headline in 1968 recognizing the role of women in the military.

I know women (like my sisters) were entering the workforce in droves, but news stories about women were mostly targeted at stay-at-home moms.

News stories did note when women were involved in politics, but their impact and influence thereupon were usually underplayed. A Northern Kentucky man working on the campaign of Richard Nixon was hailed as possibly the next White House Press Secretary. A similar story about a Northern Kentucky woman working on the campaign of Hubert Humphrey noted she would be able to find a job as a secretary in D.C. What came to be known in the early ’60s as “the second wave of feminism” clearly had not reached newsrooms in Northern Kentucky. While our news in 1968 may not have reported upon the changing role of women, the organic beginnings 154

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were becoming apparent on college campuses and at bus stops carrying female workers to Cincinnati.

For many, this change came because of things happening in 1968. For others, the change was despite it.

Déjà Vu All Over Again One thing truly surprising to me was how so many issues of ’68 remain, in one form or another, at the heart of today’s conflicting political divide. Locally and nationally, what was old is new again. Or maybe it just never fully matured in the first place.

The arguments (pro and con) made before the ErlangerElsmere School Board regarding the literary worth of Catcher in the Rye are time and again being set forth as pressure is placed on educators to conform classroom materials to the political leanings of one side or another. Sometimes, the conflict still involves banning Catcher in the Rye. In 1968, America was nearing the finish line of winning the Space Race to the moon against the Soviet Union. Today, we are pondering a return, racing against what is left of the Soviet Union as well as private companies. As I wrote the final words of this book, India landed an unmanned craft on the moon. Add them to the new Space Race.

Following the deaths of Dr. Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, gun control made repeated headlines. Stories about abortion legislation read like press releases from the Dioceses.

George Wallace was exploring the dark racial underbelly of populism long before Donald Trump developed shin splints.

The use of deadly force by police officers was being questioned, and policies of when “deadly force” would be employed were being written. Stories in opposition to the teaching of “Negro History” sounded a lot like stories opposing “Critical Race Theory.”

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Paris was rioting. Although, I’m not sure Parisians ever stopped.

In 1968 the people leading Northern Kentucky’s institutions loved to plan for the future. Follow up – well not so much. So many reports from 1968 remained on shelves its remarkable that buildings did not collapse under their weight. Thank goodness today’s reports are saved on thumb drives we’ll never be able to find when we need them.

As to politics, ballot choices often remain the lesser of two evils. Despite Pat Paulsen being dead, I’m still likely to vote for him for president.

Culture In 2015, I had the opportunity to ask Barry McGuire about his thoughts regarding the 50th anniversary of the release of his classic protest anthem Eve of Destruction. McGuire was part of a musical movement with a passion to change the world with music. When Eve of Destruction rocketed to No. 1 on the charts, McGuire naively thought he was leading America to a renaissance of righteousness. Reality quickly set in when Eve of Destruction was knocked out of the top slot by Hang on Sloopy.

As we grew up, the baby boomers of 1968 questioned their parents’ institutions. We listened to Bob Dylan and Joan Baez for musical guidance. We read Catcher in the Rye. We raised antiestablishment comedians like George Carlin to near Messiah levels.

And then something weird happened.

We grew up.

Suddenly, baby boomers were unceremoniously charged with leading the institutions we once questioned. Eve of Destruction became a nostalgic tune on a SiriusXM oldies channel in our SUVs. We went from rebelling against the status quo to being the status quo. In the blink of an eye, those wanting to change 156

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the world were happy with minor tweaks we dreamed up while drinking small-batch bourbon and smoking cigars.

Words get tempered downward, and change happens incrementally. Beauty may be in the eyes of the beholder, but carbon dating to rid institutions of relics lies in the hands of young people with success-based actuary charts.

When I was in my late 40s, I was Chairman of the Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce. Following a meeting where the Board of Directors discussed a controversial issue, I overheard a young female board member refer to me as an “old dinosaur.”

So how much of 1968 is in the psychological DNA baby boomers passed on to their children?

Read the mission statements of any group voicing change today. It will sound like a 1968 dorm room “rap session” railing against the establishment and espousing individual rights and inclusiveness. Note, however, that the inclusiveness being sought is not always inclusiveness of thought. Many groups seem to embrace demographic differences but are often not so keen on hearing differing points of view. Younger folks may be shocked to discover this is one place where they are following in their parents’ footsteps. Flip back and forth between Fox News and CNBC and you’ll understand. The divide has been there for a while. Institutions being built today are merely perfecting the segregation of thought created with the 24-hour cycle of cable news, politics and social media. Excluding differing points of view is not change. It is embracing the status quo.

So maybe we injected the idea of “change” into our children’s blood. Or maybe rebellion is simply a trait of each succeeding generation. Either way, complacency is the enemy to overcome.

Even an old dinosaur understands the implications of becoming extinct.

Peace, Love and 1968, Rick 157

Acknowledgments This effort was not an undertaking I could complete by myself. So many folks helped out.

Mark Morris, Dave Waite, and Kevin Kelly put up with way too many emails from me. I thank them for responding each time and for continuing to be my friends (I think) despite me constantly bugging them.

A lot of people sat down with me, wrote emails to me, and answered phone calls from me to discuss their memories of 1968. Throughout the pages of this book, I have noted their contribution. Thanks to each of you for giving me insight and encouragement. Special shout out to Terry Carnes, Carl Fryman, Tom and Nancy Bunnell, Wendell Berry, Mark Niekirk, Bill Straub, Ken Harper, Harper, Kenneth, Thurman Wenzel, Judge Terri King Schoborg, Bob McCray, Reverand Richard Fowler, Arnold Simpson, Gary Pranger, Margo Grubbs, Tom Gaither, Phil Taliaferro, Chaz Brannen, Dick Murgatroyd, Valera Koester, Mickey Foellger, John Domaschko, and Pam Porter Robinson.

In my conclusions, I pulled a few thoughts from past interviews. For that I’d like to thank Barry McGuire and the late P.J. O’Rourke.

I tried to mention all the region’s ’68 Vietnam casualties. If I missed one, no disrespect was intended, and I sincerely apologize.

I also searched for many of the people quoted in the newspaper articles I referenced. Many were deceased. For those that replied to my intrusive emails, thank you.

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A huge shout-out to everyone at the Kenton County Library for humoring me every time the printer ran out of paper. Thanks to the University of Kentucky, Oklahoma State University, and Thomas More University for granting permission to use materials from their oral histories and photo archives. The staff at LINK were extremely gracious in printing monthly excerpts from the book. People read the excerpts and responded with their own stories about ’68.

Thanks to Cathy Teets of Headline Books for allowing me to write in the genre of “ME.” For Joshua, Zachary, and MacKenzie – I hope this makes some sense to you.

My wife Linda remains my best editor and best friend. Thank you for loving and supporting me despite all my crazy journeys.

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Additional Books by Rick Robinson Political Thrillers The Maximum Contribution Sniper Bid Manifest Destiny Writ of Mandamus The Advance Man Killing the Curse (co-author with Dennis Hetzel) Opposition Research Literary Fiction Alligator Alley The Promise of Cedar Key Non-Fiction Landau (coauthor with Landau Eugene Murphy, Jr.) Strange Bedfellow (electronic only) A Fish Ate My Homework: A Beginner’s Guide to Fly fishing (coauthor with Wade DeHate)

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