Prologue: This is Part II of the final two-part post of Searching for Jeff, a blog history of my long trek to trace and
reconstruct the last decade—1959-1969 – of my brother Jeff Sharlet’s short but
interesting life. Bringing the blog to a conclusion will enable me to devote
full-time to completion of the memoir on Jeff now well underway.
After five years and 125 posts, we have hit all
the major moments of Jeff’s trajectory through the ‘60s. In these closing
entries, we present a pictorial perspective on his journey – a slide show lite
– from cradle to grave. A number of the photos were taken by Jeff himself. As
the saying goes, pictures speak for themselves, so we’ve only appended brief
commentaries.
We thank those tens of thousands who
have followed the blog for your readership – either regularly or periodically.
As we sign off here, for those who might be interested, we will be posting in
the near-future from time to time excerpts from the memoir in progress at our Yola
Web site, http://jeffsharlet-and-vietnamgi.com.yolasite.com/
The second installment of the last picture show
covers the last phases of Jeff’s life as follows (Nb. The first installment on
February 10th covered the preceding
phases of his trajectory.):
- Indiana days
- Destiny Chicago
- Journey’s end
Indiana Days
Logo
of Indiana University
Gateway
to the campus
Jeff
departed Vietnam spring ’64. By August, he was back in college. Jeff returned
to Indiana University (IU) where he had dropped out three years earlier.
Jeff,
once again a college boy
More mature this time around, Jeff buckled down
to study. That first term back in college was a lonely time for him. IU was a
Big Ten university with many thousands of students. Jeff knew no one. His
parents were broke and he had little money. To support himself, he took a job as
a house boy at a sorority. He made it around campus – the size of a small town
– by bike.
The
Gables, popular soda bar just off campus
Initially, Jeff had little leisure time. Classes
demanded his full attention. Then he was off to his daily job at the sorority house,
serving meals and cleaning up the kitchen. Now and then he dropped by the
Gables for a soda or ice cream. Around mid-term, Jeff met a young woman, Karin
Ford, a classmate in Sociology. Weekends he’d bike out to Karin’s house for
dinners with her and her two young kids.
Dunn
Meadow at Indiana University
As
the Vietnam War rumbled on, Jeff watched closely from afar. As a Vietnamese linguist,
he worried he might be recalled to duty if things got hotter. In early spring
of Jeff’s second semester, President Johnson dramatically escalated America’s
involvement in the war. Fortunately, Jeff, a reservist, was not recalled.
Bernella
& David Satterfield, antiwar activists
As the weather warmed in Bloomington, Dunn Meadow
became the site of antiwar rallies and counter-protests. The university had
designated the area as a kind of free speech zone where students could express
themselves. Through Karin Ford, Jeff had met other critically-minded people
concerned about the growing US presence in Vietnam’s civil war.
Bernella and David Satterfield were talented country
and folk musicians. They were also at the center of rising activism against the
war. As an ex-Vietnam GI opposed to the war, Jeff was of great interest to the
small but growing circle of campus radicals.
Civil
rights demonstration & pro-Vietnam War rally, Dunn Meadow, 1965
Not
long after Washington’s escalation, the small number of IU antiwar activists
began holding weekly rallies in Dunn Meadow. The first rally immediately
followed a demonstration supporting the Selma civil rights marchers in Alabama.
Soon pro-war students were mounting counter-protests in response.
The
first major antiwar demonstration in Washington, 1965
In
late April ’65, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) organized the first
great response to LBJ’s war. Thousands of students from the nation’s campuses
descended upon Washington. The IU delegation was in prominent view.
Jeff
(l) with Karin on the road, Mexico, 1965
Jeff
had a good first year academically. Classes over, he and Karin Ford took off on
a long road trip across the West and down into Mexico.
Indiana
SDS’s first newsletter, 1965
The
momentum of spring antiwar protest at Indiana carried over to the new academic
year. During fall ’65, student radicals established the IU SDS chapter and
issued their first newsletter.
Jeff
protesting Nixon’s talk on campus, 1965
Former
Vice President Nixon was invited to IU in October. His pro-war talk gave the
fledgling IU SDS chapter a chance for campus-wide attention. SDS members turned
out to protest Nixon and the war. Jeff joined the march although not yet a
member of the chapter.
Jim
Wallihan addressing the Governor of California, 1964
Since
returning from Vietnam, the problem of how to stop the war had preoccupied
Jeff. He wasn’t sure that idealistic student marches and protests would do it.
His focus was on fellow GIs – the guys in harm’s way, the guys with the guns –
as the solution.
Jim Wallihan
arrived at IU for grad school that fall. A radical activist, he was a veteran
of the ’64 Free Speech Movement (FSM) at Berkeley. When the mass arrests
occurred there, Jim managed to escape and became FSM’s representative to
Governor Brown, appealing for the students’ release. Jim had joined SDS and
persuaded Jeff to lend his authority as an ex-Vietnam GI to the chapter for the
struggle at IU. The two guys became best of friends.
Nick’s,
a favorite hangout
When
Jeff, Jim, and the SDS crowd weren’t gathered in the Satterfield’s living room
or at Peter and Lucia Montague’s house, they were at their unofficial
headquarters, Nick’s, a block from the campus gates.
General
Maxwell Taylor at Indiana, 1966
Nationally,
SDS was a famously loosey-goosey organization. Accordingly, the IU chapter had
little structure. Jeff and Jim drew up a reorganization proposal to make it
more effective. Both became part of a new rotating leadership team.
Spring term provided SDS with opportunities and
challenges. IU’s president – the former Secretary of the Army – invited Maxwell
Taylor to campus. As a former ambassador to South Vietnam, the general gave a
gung-ho speech for the war.
Anti-
and prowar protesters at the Taylor talk
SDS
rose to the occasion, leading a substantial demonstration against General Taylor.
However, supporters of the general and the war assembled a much larger student
turnout. Cops were present, and the occasion was generally orderly and
peaceful.
Jeff,
campus activist, 1966
Jeff
hit the books hard. He also devoted much time to SDS. His special interest was
giving dorm talks on the war – the idea being to politicize students, drawing
them into campus protest.
General
Lewis Hershey speaking at IU, 1966
A few
months later, President Stahr hosted another Pentagon pal at the university.
Another general, this time it was Lewis Hershey, long time director of the Draft,
which delivered up the bodies for the war. His was a rousing do-your-duty
speech.
Jeff played an even bigger role as SDS brought forth
a very large group in protest. Jeff spoke at the rally, taking on a raucous
crowd of pro-war student hecklers.
Antiwar
& prowar demonstrators outside Hershey’s talk
The
conflicting demonstrations outside the auditorium with their speech on a stick
and chants dueled to a standstill, but SDS again gained campus-wide publicity.
The student daily paper covered the event as front-page news.
Bernie
& Betty Morris at their Cape Cod summer place
Having
become a top flight student, Jeff worked closely with his mentor, Professor
Bernard Morris of Political Science. Jeff also saw a lot of him outside of
class since Bernie was campus advisor to the student New Left.
War
memorial, Indianapolis IN
Summer
’66 – Jeff needed to earn some money. He landed a summer job in the railway
freight yards in Indianapolis (Indy), just 50 miles north of the Bloomington
campus.
The Indianapolis freight
yards Karlis Zobs’ house
He worked as locomotive fireman on a yard engine
shunting freight cars. Since it was a diesel engine, his job was mainly keeping
an eye out for collisions and climbing down from the cab to throw track switches.
He rented an inexpensive room in an old house owned by a young Latvian man.
Karen
Grote, Indiana senior
Karen
Grote (now Ferb) and Jeff had been an item since they met in January. She too
was in SDS, and they worked together in the campus New Left. On weekends, Karen
took the Greyhound bus up from Bloomington to Indy to spend time with Jeff.
President
Johnson at the Indianapolis War Memorial,
1966
In
July, news reached the IU activists that LBJ would be speaking in Indianapolis
later in the month. A call went out for volunteers, permits were granted, antiwar
signs were made, and a peaceful protest planned. Karen was staying with Jeff in
Indy that weekend. Before he had to go to work, he dropped her off at the
protest site on Monument Circle. Karen was waiting for the IU contingent
driving up from campus. A few local protestors were already there.
The Secret
Service had other ideas and preempted the demonstration. Indianapolis police
arrested nearly everyone involved before the President’s arrival. Karen was the
first to be arrested. All were falsely charged with misdemeanors. When Karen
was released later that evening, Jeff was waiting for her outside the lockup.
IU’s
alternative paper with Jeff’s speech, 1967
Jeff
became president of SDS spring term his final year. He was a pro-active leader.
In remarks to the faculty, President Stahr had sharply criticized the IU New
Left. Jeff promptly took up the challenge, responding to Stahr in a speech
entitled the ‘State of the Students’, which was widely publicized in the
alternative campus paper, The Spectator.
House
Jeff shared in Bloomington
Jeff
shared a house on the edge of campus with Jim Wallihan and Bob Johnson. The
place became a combination strategy center, meeting place, and, not least,
party venue.
Jeff
at the Indianapolis War Memorial, 1967; Robin Hunter (smoking), IU grad
student, Indianapolis
As
wintry weather began to lift, Jeff spoke at an antiwar rally from the steps of
the Indianapolis War Memorial. His IU comrade-in-arms, Robin Hunter, was in
attendance.
Woodrow
Wilson Foundation logo
Mid-semester,
Jeff received the welcome news he had been selected for a coveted Woodrow
Wilson National Fellowship for outstanding students going on for a PhD and an
academic career.
A
rally at President Stahr’s residence, Jeff presiding
Early spring, Jeff took SDS’s antiwar campaign
to the steps of the IU president’s campus residence. He opened the rally noting
that it was the second time he found himself under Elvis Stahr – first in Vietnam
serving under Army Secretary Stahr, now a student under President Stahr. He
posed a rhetorical question – What is a honcho of the war machine doing running
a university, a place of higher learning.
Guy
Loftman (l) & Jeff, student elections night, 1967
During
Jeff’s tenure as SDS leader, it was decided to run a candidate for student body
president. Jeff worked behind the scenes on the platform. Guy Loftman ran and
won – the New Left gained power and legitimacy at IU.
An
afternoon dip, Jeff & Miki Lang, Bloomington
Jeff’s last term at IU wasn’t all coursework and
protests. The activist crowd enjoyed a lively social life.
Vietnam
Veterans Against the War march, New York, 1967
Upon
graduation, Jeff chose to take his Woodrow Wilson fellowship to the University
of Chicago. But first he headed East to hook up with the newly founded Vietnam
Veterans Against the War (VVAW). Still dwelling on how the war could be
stopped, Jeff wanted to make contact with fellow ex-Vietnam GIs before entering
the groves of academe.
Destiny Chicago
Chicago
bound
Back
in the Midwest, Jeff went up to Chicago summer of ’67 to settle in before the
school year. The city was intensely political, overflowing with protest of all
kinds. For Jeff, there was just a single issue – the war. He ran into another
Vietnam veteran, an ex-sailor, and the two of them made contact with a draft
resistance group. The group was run by an antiwar Green Beret reservist, Gary
Rader.
University
of Chicago campus
Jeff
moved into the university graduate dorms, and classes got underway. Good
student though he was, his ambivalence got in the way. Should he bear down and
work toward a PhD or make a major commitment to the antiwar struggle? Both
directions required singular concentration and were mutually incompatible.
Opposing the war was winning the day, Jeff’s academic work suffered.
Vietnam
vets run an ad against the war
Veterans of the Vietnam War now had an
organization, VVAW, and began to speak out. In a full-page ad in the New
York Times, which Jeff signed, they called the conflict a civil war
between North and South Vietnam and demanded that American troops, their
buddies, be brought home before anyone else died.
Latter-day
photo of Tom Barton, left activist
Restless
at the university, Jeff went to New York for a weekend. He looked up Tom
Barton, a long time man of the left whom he knew from Indiana days. Jeff was
more focused on stopping the war than his coursework. He had a plan – to create
an organization of active duty GIs, not just ex-GIs, to oppose the war. Jeff
sought Tom’s advice as an experienced organizer.
Dave
Komatsu at a Chicago protest, early ‘60s
Tom
Barton put Jeff in touch with Dave Komatsu in Chicago. Tom and Dave had been
comrades in the Chicago chapter of the Young People’s Socialist League (YPSL),
the youth affiliate of the Socialist Party. Dave, who had briefly attended the
University of Chicago, was also a seasoned man of the left.
Banner
of ‘Vietnam GI’ coiled in barbed wire
Jeff
and Dave Komatsu brainstormed the idea of an active-duty GI group. The
obstacles were formidable – the authoritarian structure of the military for
one, harsh military law for another. Dave suggested Jeff start with a
newsletter for GIs. Late fall ’67, the idea became an underground newspaper
called Vietnam GI or VGI for short. Jeff could write in the authentic voice of
someone who’d been in Nam, while Dave had the technical know-how and editorial experience for putting
out a tabloid-style paper.
Dave
Komatsu’s apartment building
The
funding question came up. How to finance the launch of a newspaper, especially
the hard costs of typesetting, paper, printing, and mailing. Jeff decided to
withdraw from the university and use his Woodrow Wilson fellowship to launch VGI.
To save money, he moved out of the dorm and crashed with Dave and family.
Talking with a friend about his decision, Jeff unwittingly
foresaw his destiny, telling him that Vietnam GI “would be the most important
thing he had ever done in his life.”
Vietnam
GI coming off the press
The
first issue of Vietnam GI came off the press in late January ’68 just as the
Viet Cong launched the Tet Offensive. Jeff was the editor with Dave as
associate editor; a pro bono staff of Dave’s Chicago comrades as well as
volunteers from CADRE, Gary Rader’s Chicago Area Draft Resistance group, lent a
hand.
Early on they found a printer in Chicago, but soon
the local FBI urged area printers to refuse ‘subversive’ material. VGI had to
go far afield, locating an obliging printer well up the western shore of Lake Michigan in Wisconsin.
From
the VGI masthead
In
addition to the paper’s staff, Jeff persuaded fellow Vietnam veterans to lend
their time and/or names. As contributing editors, Gary Rader had never deployed,
but Jan Crumb, co-founder of VVAW, and Dink McCarter both served in Vietnam.
Other veterans lent their names to VGI including Peter Martinsen, a POW
interrogator; Francis Rocks and David Tuck, combat riflemen; and James Zaleski,
an Air Force Vietnam veteran.
A
typical VGI front page
Typically,
Jeff led off a monthly issue with a long interview with a combat veteran about
what was really going on in the field below the radar of sanitized national
media coverage. The second lead, such as the article entitled “Phuc-A-Truc”
above, was related to Jeff about how
motor pool troops on the QT sabotaged trucks and military vehicles as a form of
protest.
A key player
in getting Vietnam GI to Vietnam beneath the radar was Jeff’s friend Tom
Barton. At the end of Tom’s pipeline, VGI had an informal sub-rosa distribution
net in Vietnam – GIs who requested extra copies to pass around their units in
defiance of the brass.
As VGI
rapidly gained an increasingly larger readership among serving troops in
Vietnam, the ‘Mail Bag’, or letters-to-the-editor on page 2, became a big
feature. Sailors, Marines, and GIs wrote to Jeff with incredible stories of
what was actually going on in the war behind the smokescreen of military PR. At
last, Vietnam GIs and their brothers in arms had a voice in the war.
Fred
Gardner, founder, GI antiwar coffee house network
While Jeff had been pondering his near-term
future at the University of Chicago, Fred Gardner, an Army reservist, had been
setting up the first GI antiwar coffee house near Fort Jackson, a large
infantry training base in the South. Fred’s idea was to provide an alternate
place for off-duty GIs who usually gravitated to grungy bars and rip-off joints.
GIs with doubts about the war were drawn to the
coffee house where they could read material critical of the US mission in
Southeast Asia and rap with guys of similar views. Once Vietnam GI began to
appear, free copies were available for reading over coffee or carrying back to
the barracks, a riskier maneuver.
Waynesville
outside Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri Ozarks
Fred had established a second GI hangout near
Fort Leonard Wood, another huge base for training Vietnam-bound troops. Named
for a Revolutionary War hero, Mad Anthony Wayne, the coffee house opened in
tiny Waynesville deep in the Missouri Ozarks. As would take place elsewhere,
the military brass and the local authorities colluded to harass the volunteer
staff.
Jeff had begun touring base camps to collect stories
and locate returning combat troopers for VGI interviews. He stopped by
Waynesville where he met Fred who was helping out at the coffee house. They
became fast friends.
1st
Armored Division troops sent to Chicago, 1968
On April 4th, 1968, Martin Luther King was
assassinated in Memphis TN. Riots broke out in Black ghettos across the
country. Violence in Chicago was severe. Federal troops were dispatched to the
city to restore order. Jeff traveled the streets of ‘occupied’ Chicago taking
photos. The next issue of VGI was headlined, “The War at Home.”
Sp4 Joe Carey, combat photographer, 1967
Back in the States, ex-Vietnam GI Joe Carey, arriving
in Chicago, heard that Jeff was putting out a GI paper. Joe and Jeff knew each
other from Indiana University. In Vietnam, Joe had been a combat photographer
based at Cu Chi.
He’d come back with a bunch of his photos not
suitable for military publications. Jeff published several of the pix in
various issues, including one of an American officer interrogating an alleged
Viet Cong suspect at knife-point.
GIs
posing with their grisly trophies
After
a firefight, GIs decapitated dead VC. A GI snapped pictures and quietly slipped
the film to Joe Carey. Stateside, Joe passed it on to Jeff, who ran the
shocking photo prominently in the next issue of VGI. It was the first atrocity
photo to surface, and it caused a sensation.
Madame
Maria Jolas, grande dame of Paris
Shinto
shrine , Kyoto, Japan
During
summer ’68, Jeff was invited to represent the GI antiwar movement in Kyoto at
an international peace conference. He was glad to revisit Japan. At the
conclusion of the proceedings, Jeff’s hosts insisted he join them in a protest
march on city hall. As a foreign guest they put him in the front rank. Arms
locked, the marchers took off toward the massed riot police. Heads were busted,
but fortunately Jeff escaped unscathed.
Off-duty
GIs at the UFO antiwar coffee house, 1968
VGI’s
circulation grew exponentially. Its readership even more so since troops in
Vietnam often passed a single copy surreptitiously through an entire unit. The
paper was also read throughout the extensive GI coffee house network at bases
across the States. The New York Times devoted a front page article on the
emergence of a GI protest movement illustrated by the photo above of GIs
reading VGI at the UFO coffee house in Columbia SC.
Conscripts
with VGI at the Cambridge MA
Induction Center, 1968
Jeff
and his staff were assisted by the Boston Draft Resistance Group (BDRG), an
active outfit back East. Borrowing the VGI templates, BDRG would run off
several thousand additional copies. Volunteers in turn would distribute the
paper at the Cambridge Induction Center, the vast South Boston Army Base, and at
various Army camps in New England as well as at bus stations through which GIs
passed to and from their bases.
Bill
O’Brien of Chicago
The VGI
staff got a valuable assist in politically navigating Chicago. The city was
awash in myriad protest groups, but the counter-forces to keep them in check
were formidable, including the FBI field office, Chicago PD’s Red Squad, Army
Intelligence agents, and the shadowy Legion of Justice.
Jim Wallihan moved to the city to help Jeff on the paper
and brought him together with Bill O’Brien, long time Chicagoan and a go-to guy
on the left as well as around Mayor Daley’s Chicago. Jeff, Jim, and Bill shared
an apartment on the city’s North side.
The
guys’ favorite after-hours place
Jeff
put in long days and nights on the paper. He needed to unwind from time to time
with a little booze and diversion. Bill had a favorite hangout, ‘Get Me High’,
a terrific jazz joint where he, Jeff, and Jim would go to relax.
Bernardine
Dohrn, Chicago Police files
Along with Bill O’Brien’s wide circle of
contacts, Jeff was well connected with the New Left, including SDS national
leadership headquartered in Chicago – Tom Hayden, Rennie Davis, and Jeff Segal,
as well as Bernardine Dohrn, who would eventually lead SDS’s successor, the
violent Weather Underground.
Toll
from a bitter battle
There was rarely a shortage of dramatic headlines for VGI. Military briefers in Saigon would spin the after-action reports, and VGI would subsequently publish the true account.
The
GI movement on the move
As
the first GI-led antiwar paper addressed to serving GIs, Jeff’s Vietnam GI gave
impetus to the emerging GI antiwar movement. Although Jeff personally avoided
publicity – better to operate in the shadows, he said – the media found him. He
and VGI were written up in the New York Times, Esquire, and by a couple of
national wire services whose dispatches ran in a number of regional papers.
Vietnam GI expands
By
late summer ’68, VGI had inspired many stateside GIs to create base or unit underground antiwar papers. Much more
information from inside the training camps now got out despite local editors
having to watch out for disapproving brass and NCOs. Jeff and his team decided
to create a separate ‘Stateside Edition’ to circulate stories of particular
interest to military personnel still training before deployment to Vietnam.
Stockholm
Fall
’68: Jeff flew to Stockholm. Thanks to Swedish sanctuary policy, the city had
become a magnet for deserters from the Vietnam War, most, but not all, of whom
had left their units out of opposition to the war.
The CALCAV delegation
in Stockholm, 1968
(Jeff standing left,
hand in pocket)
In Stockholm, Jeff was the GI rep on a delegation of
clergy, theologians, academics, and writers sponsored by the organization
Clergy and Laity Concerned About Vietnam known as CALCAV. Their mission was to
counsel with the isolated deserter community, much maligned stateside, and
bring them into the big tent of the antiwar movement writ large.
The
Oleo Strut, Jeff’s last stop on the circuit
Still committed to the cause, Jeff traveled to the most noted outpost on the GI
coffee house circuit, the Oleo Strut in Killeen TX outside the gates of Fort
Hood. He followed his usual routine, rapping with off-duty GIs, staying on the
lookout for stories for VGI.
Tom Cleaver,
the ex-Vietnam sailor Jeff had met earlier in Chicago, was volunteering at the Strut
and noted that Jeff didn’t look well, tired easily, and slept a great deal.
Jeff could no longer ignore his health problems in the interest of the grand
struggle. He told his VGI comrades he was taking a leave of absence and headed
south to his parents’ place for some doctoring.
Journey’s end
Veterans Administration (VA) hospital,
Miami FL
Jeff’s journey landed him in a hospital in Miami.
Exploratory surgery found that the malady plaguing him for the past couple of
years had spread and was inoperable. In effect, it was a terminal diagnosis,
but he didn’t give up. There were still new experimental treatments to be
tried. One of them appeared to work, and his condition went into remission.
Jeff’s last picture, 1969
Though he was frail and weak, the VA doctors agreed
to let Jeff stay at his parents’ place in nearby Coral Gables. Many of his
friends from Chicago, New York, and Boston drove down in relays to visit him.
They’d listen to music, drink wine, and talk about the continuing antiwar
struggle.
At spring break in my teaching schedule, Nancy and I
flew down to spend the week with him. We’d drive him back and forth to the
hospital for his outpatient treatments and generally hang out and talk about
better times. One afternoon I took the above photo of Jeff with Nancy and our
parents, the one that became our last picture of him.
Courage
from His Courage
Unfortunately, the remission waned, the pain
reoccurred, and Jeff had to return to the hospital. Two months later, on June
16, 1969, he died, dead at 27. We buried him in a cemetery outside Miami where
my parents would be able to visit the grave. The day of Jeff’s funeral remains
the saddest moment of my life.
What was to
be the last SDS convention opened in Chicago just a few days after Jeff’s
death. The first order of business was a minute of silence in his memory. The nearly
two thousand people rose to their feet to honor Jeff as a founding leader of what
was becoming the powerful GI movement against the war.
With Vietnam GI, Jeff had achieved his destiny.
Jeff remembered, 2005
Decades later in ’05,
the first award-winning documentary on GI opposition to the Vietnam War, Sir! No Sir!, was premiered at the Los
Angeles Film Festival. The director, David Zeiger, called to tell me that he
had dedicated the film to Jeff “for starting it all.”
RIP Jeff, you did well.
