At Fitchburg State, history lesson rekindled
15.09.11
The former student activists, who went on to become, among other things, a filmmaker, an analyst for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, a food industry salesman, and a Massachusetts state representative, were all shocked to be invited back to the campus where they protested as much as they studied.
When the college invited them to take part in the Constitution Day forum, “we thought they were kidding,’’ said Eleanor Jewett, a student government activist who worked as a producer for WGBH before joining FEMA. “It reminds me that things do change. Sometimes I guess it takes 40 years.’’
Like many college campuses in 1969, Fitchburg State was struggling mightily with the generation gap. The Vietnam War was raging.
Civil rights was a dominant issue, and members of the opposite sex were strictly forbidden from each other’s dormitories. Jewett recalls running through a boys-only shop class to protest institutionalized sexism.
That school year “was a very crazy year,’’ said Ed Thomas, who recently retired after 39 years as a history professor at Fitchburg State. “We didn’t have finals because of the Kent State killings.
Source: Boston Globe