A while back Sahar posted something about how awesome Brandeis’ history is. Those of us who went to today’s MLK Week event, Remembering Ford Hall, got to experience a bit of that history firsthand, and it was AWESOME. Seriously, folks, if you weren’t there you really missed out.
Picture, if you will, four older black gentlemen, jovial and classy as all hell, plus Gordie Fellman, talking about that one time forty years ago where they took over, for eleven days, the campus’ main building to secure rights for minorities. They talked about their backgrounds, about the various circumstances that brought them to a nascent Brandeis University, the feelings of passion and community, the parties in Rosenthal and the old Ridgewood buildings, the fear they had about the police and their scholarships and their futures, the national mood about civil rights (Dr. King had been killed the year before) and the Vietnam war, the faculty on campus, their motivations and their sacrifices…as cheesy as it sounds to say this, I felt like I was sitting in the presence of true heroes of activism.
Check out some info here.
Mad props and respect for DFA, the Office of Undergrad Admissions, and MLK & Friends for bringing such a cool slice of Brandeis history to life.