by Victoria Lucas
Matthew Johnson. That was his name. A kid who died because he went joy-riding with his buddies. The last I knew that was not a capital crime. But clearly running from a policeman can be.
It was this time.
Where "Peanut" was shot
How odd that his murderer had the same last name, Alvin Johnson, the police officer who shot him on September 27. He was 16 and his buddies were 15 and 14. They found the car outside Portola Junior High, and the owner had not even reported it stolen yet. Stories about why the policeman fired and how many times at this kid people called “Peanut” vary. Whatever people were saying, rioting broke out in Hunters Point the same evening.
The Mayor meets with the people
The Mayor Is Stoned
After meeting with the commanding officer at the Potrero police station, desperate and grieving people went into the streets and began breaking windows. When Mayor Shelley came out to meet them, people threw rocks and a brick, and the lone Negro county supervisor, Francois, got the same treatment. These were people who were extremely frustrated by their treatment by the City and County of SF, and they could contain it no longer. The unrest was declared a riot around 7 pm.
The National Guard Lands on City Hall
Later in the evening the mayor called Governor Brown to request 2,000 National Guardsmen, who used Candlestick Park and Kezar Stadium for their staging areas. A curfew was drawn around Negro neighborhoods from midnight until morning. I didn’t hear about any of this until about 6 or 7. September 27 was a Tuesday, and I was at work. I caught a bus home, and I guess then I might have heard something I didn’t understand until I got home and was able to hear some kind of coherent account on one of the NPR stations. Now I have a copy of the SF Oracle, hot off the press, and already there are tear stains on it–mine. “Peanut’s” funeral was October 3, and there were 1,000 mourners.
We could still be in custody
The SF Oracle's 2nd issue, 1st page
In the Oracle there are further accounts of police cars bristling with guns and bayonets, and the break up of a peaceful protest in the Haight. It could have been my boy friend Mel & me caught up in a singing, happy mob that was herded into police vans by trapping the crowd with roadblocks and armed force. Many nights we go over to the Haight to pick up the Oracle or the Berkeley Barb, buy some tchotchke and dig the scene. This night, an unpublicized curfew started at 8 pm.
A Poet's Take on Things
Lawrence Ferlinghetti
The first missive on the “Letters” page of this Oracle (page 2) was from Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Here is most of what he wrote: “It looks like the Mayor realizes that the only answer to Black Power is not White Power at the end of a gun. The Mayor didn't do so badly the first day after the riots at Hunter's Point, considering the general spiritual bankruptcy of the Establishment . . . . But if the Mayor had gone on TV and declared that he was withdrawing every armed policeman and National Guardsman from the Hunter's Point area and was instead inviting every minister of every church in the city to come and walk the streets there and talk with everyone in sight, things might be different today. However, we are as far from such soul-action as we are from the Ascension of Buddha on the White House lawn . . . .”
When Will They Ever Learn?
Better than martial law, which we had from September 27 until October 1, with the state of emergency ending Sunday the second–but, as far as I can tell, the curfews, state of emergency and martial law were only for the Negros, hippies, and students.
Maybe I should repeat that, in case it got by you. Only for the Negros, hippies, and students. Now I ask you, will they ever learn? And who is it who should do the learning?
