In this episode of From the Vault, we explore how May Day celebrations manifest themselves in different ways here at home and around the world, using historic audio from Pacifica Radio Archives.

We begin with excerpts from an original Pacifica Radio Archives series called Club Evolution. We compiled archive material which captures the essence of May Day as it evolved from the commemoration of the struggles of the Labor Movement to include the fight for peace, equality, and justice. Author and activist Sabina Virgo weaves together these common threads in this inaugural program called May Day and the American Labor Movement.

Next, we look at how May Day is celebrated around the world as Pacifica correspondents Daniel Singer, Alan Snitow, and others report from Mexico City, Italy, Mozambique and Angola, in a program called May Day 1977.

Finally, while May Day celebrations in the United States are relatively tame compared to other parts of the world, WBAI producer Bruce Soloway, armed with a tape recorder and a New York City Police Department-issued press badge, reports on an especially confrontational May Day demonstration in 1971 from Washington D.C.

From the Vault is presented as part of the Pacifica Radio Archives Preservation and Access Project.

Archival recordings used in this week’s episode, May Day May Day:

PZ0431.01 May Day and the American Labor Movement MORE INFO

AZ0046 May Day 1977 MORE INFO

BC0582a Insurrection City: May Day 1971 MORE INFO

Click here to purchase a copy of this program or learn more about and purchase copies of the historic archival recordings used within this episode. To purchase a CD copy of this program by phone, please call Pacifica Radio Archives at 800.735.0230 x 262.

Click here to send an email to From the Vault.

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Like the crackle at the center of a firestorm, students at Columbia University intensified the anti-Vietnam War movement on April 23, 1968 by starting a revolt against the school administration — seizing campus buildings and barricading themselves for days. Eventually the police moved in with military-style force, injuring 140 and arresting more than 700 participants.

Pacifica radio station WBAI 99.5 FM in New York was there to cover it all, raw and unfiltered, with much of their coverage – not surprisingly – contradicting mainstream media reports. WBAI reporters also recorded the rallies in the days after the unrest, and interviewed various students, student leaders, and thinkers – including Democracy Now! co-host Juan Gonzalez, award-winning radio producer Barbara Bernstein, and author Ayn Rand. This week, on From the Vault, we celebrate the 40th anniversary of this watershed 1968 student strike by revisiting this historic audio preserved within our vault.

From the Vault is presented as part of the Pacifica Radio Archives Preservation and Access Project.

Archival recordings used in this week’s episode, 1968 Columbia University Student Strike:

BB3542 Radicalization at Columbia University MORE INFO

BB3777.03 Campus or Battleground / Ayn Rand MORE INFO

Click here to purchase a copy of this program or learn more about and purchase copies of the historic archival recordings used within this episode. To purchase a CD copy of this program by phone, please call Pacifica Radio Archives at 800.735.0230 x 262.

Click here to send an email to From the Vault.

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The Black Panther Party is one of the most controversial and misunderstood groups coming out the the Black Power Movement in the 1960’s. The Black Panther Party was founded in October 1966 by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale, who created a ten-point program to address political oppression, poverty, joblessness, hunger, housing, and the lack of justice in the Black community.

Most people remember intimidating images of armed patrols of Black Panthers. Few people recall the intensity of racial profiling and police abuse in Black neighborhoods. Even fewer know of the Black Panther Party’s proactive measures to assist the neglected Black community such as the Breakfast Program that provided hundreds of the thousands of meals to children across the nation.

In February of 2008, Pacific Radio Archives Production Coordinator Edgar Toledo teamed up with longtime Archives volunteer Debbie Demery to help make sense of the controversy by sifting through a mountain of material to produce a six-disc box set of the most relevant Black Panther Party materials from our collection. This week on From the Vault, we feature true Pacifica treasures — historic recordings of Bobby Seale, Huey P. Newton, Kathleen Cleaver, H. Rap Brown, Stokely Carmichael, voices from the Black Panther Party Breakfast Program, and the Panther 21 from New York. You’ll also hear music from Elaine Brown, former Chairperson of the Black Panther Program; Brown released two albums, Sieze the Time (1969) and the self-titled Elaine Brown (1973), both arranged by late Jazz great Horace Tapscott.

From the Vault is presented as part of the Pacifica Radio Archives Preservation and Access Project.

Archival recordings used in this week’s episode, The Black Panther Party:

PZ0728a-f The Black Panther Party Box Set MORE INFO

Click here to purchase a copy of this program or learn more about and purchase copies of the historic archival recordings used within this episode. To purchase a CD copy of this program by phone, please call Pacifica Radio Archives at 800.735.0230 x 262.

Click here to send an email to From the Vault.

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William Shakespeare serves as the inspiration for this week’s episode of From the Vault. In moving forward with the Pacifica Radio Archives 1968 Revolution Rewind Initiative, we searched for recordings that not only covered the events of that year like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination, The Poor People’s Campaign, and student uprisings across the country, but also recordings that exhibited the explosion of creativity that was finding its way onto community radio airwaves forty years ago. Pacifica producers dove into the classic arts headfirst – and the work of William Shakespeare became common place on radio stations like WBAI-99.5 FM in New York City. In fact, between 1966 and 1968, one prolific enthusiast named Alfred Rothschild performed on-air at least 13 readings of Shakespeare’s plays; in the first part of today’s show we’ll hear his rendition of Romeo and Juliet. We couldn’t resist another adaptation of Shakespeare’s love story, this one imagined by legendary New York dramatist and radio producer Baird Searles and the famed Mind’s Eye Theatre, truly avant guard by any standard. Their deliberate use of anachronisms, using songs by The Beatles and Rolling Stones, along with pushing the limits with a relatively new technology called stereophonic sound, made for one far out and hippie-fueled production of Romeo and Juliet. Enjoy this forty year journey back to 1968, and the arts on community radio!

From the Vault is presented as part of the Pacifica Radio Archives Preservation and Access Project.

Archival recordings used in this week’s episode, Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet 1968:

BB3846.01 The Reading of Shakespeare: Shakespeare with a Difference MORE INFO

BB3846.13 The Reading of Shakespeare: Shakespeare with a Difference MORE INFO

BB3818.29 Romeo and Juliet / Directed by Baird Searles MORE INFO

Click here to purchase a copy of this program or learn more about and purchase copies of the historic archival recordings used within this episode. To purchase a CD copy of this program by phone, please call Pacifica Radio Archives at 800.735.0230 x 262.

Click here to send an email to From the Vault.

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As part of our ongoing Preservation and Access Project, the Pacifica Radio Archives has identified one hundred of the most outstanding recordings from 1968 in our collection. In this From the Vault episode, we’ll feature select audio from these outstanding historical documents. Some of the voices you will immediately recognize; some you won’t. Some sound like they are forty years old; some sound like they were recorded just this morning. These recordings of our history represent how much things have changed… and how little. We have also selected some choice music from 1968 to help play it all along.

Featured recordings from 1968 include Dr. Benjamin Spock, Ray Bradbury, Allen Ginsberg, actuality from inside and outside the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, H. Rap Brown, Arthur C. Clarke, Greek actress and politician Melina Mercouri, Olympic gold medalist Tommie Smith, Muhammad Ali, Joan Baez, Seymour Hersh, Pacifica Reporter Dale Minor from Vietnam, James Baldwin, Coretta Scott King, and field reports from the People’s March on Washington, DC with Jesse Jackson.

Music from 1968 includes Sun Ra, Van Morrison, Nina Simone, Bob Dylan, Cream, David Bowie, The Band, Aretha Franklin, Ike & Tina Turner, Simon and Garfunkel, The Rolling Stones, Canned Heat, Traffic, The Doors, Buffalo Springfield, Blood Sweat & Tears, Jethro Tull, The BeeGees, Big Brother and the Holding Company, Pink Floyd. Jefferson Airplane, Moody Blues, Velvet Underground, Sly and the Family Stone and The Grateful Dead.

From the Vault is presented as part of the Pacifica Radio Archives Preservation and Access Project.

Click here to purchase a copy of this program or learn more about and purchase copies of the historic archival recordings used within this episode. To purchase a CD copy of this program by phone, please call Pacifica Radio Archives at 800.735.0230 x 262.

Click here to send an email to From the Vault.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download