The Hard Hat Riot of 1970 took place a few days after the shootings at Kent State. During that brief skirmish on Wall Street, construction workers from the World Trade Center site battle hippies who were protesting the deaths of their fellow students in Ohio.
The "hard hats" briefly came to represent Nixon's "silent majority," the "Archie Bunkers" whose sweat (and taxes) built the very nation which the ascendant Left seemed determined to destroy.
That same Left later more or less erased the Hard Hat Riots from the historical record. Photographs of the event are particularly rare.
This year, previously unseen photographs of the Hard Hat Riot emerged. Photographer Henry Gordillo spotted my articles on the event and contacted me. I've posted two of his photographs here -- but there are more, and they are all terrific.
I asked Gordillo to tell me what it was like to be on the scene in New York that day.
This is his story:
"As a committed Communist at the time, I felt that world revolution (and peace and good times, etc.) could be achieved through Tri-X film- - if only I could take enough photographs. However Kent State seemed to prove that Fascism was on the march. We could be rounded up at any moment. It was all quite frightening and delightfully exhilarating and titillating.
"So I head down to Wall Street to photograph the anti-war demonstration. Like a good student Communist, I slept in and got there around 11:30am. I could not reach the anti-war demonstrators because of the large number of on-lookers and the lines of police protecting the demonstrators. Though I could see the demonstration’s large 'Free Bobby' (Seale) banner. So I wandered amongst Wall Street workers headed out to lunch. Because of my prejudices against suits and Wall Street, I thought the audience threatening, but looking back on the photographs there are lots of pictures of suits and long hairs debating, other folks just holding forth, and even one enterprising fellow selling anti-communist buttons, paraphernalia, and small American flags. It was fun. And nobody minded my taking pictures.
"The anti-war demonstrators occupied the high ground on the left steps of Federal Hall. From there they loudly chanted their point that everyone around them was a pro-war, Daddy Warbucks capitalist, fascist, uptight old person, and an all-round no-goodnik. No Kumbaya hugs. Wall Street was enemy territory and aggressively telling people off was the agenda.
"The steps of Federal Hall are divided into left and right with the statue of George Washington in the middle. The student demonstrators held the left side with reporters on the right side.
"Then the construction workers arrived singing patriotic songs and handing out broadsheets that had an American flag with the slogan 'Rally for America."
"The construction workers attracted a lot of attention. So the student demonstrators upped the volume of their chants and their condemnation of society.
"The intersection is small and narrow and was packed tight with people. It was hard to move.
"After a bit of point and counter-point chanting between the workers and the students, the construction workers rushed the right side of the steps where the reporters were. The workers chanted from their new vantage point and the students continued to respond from theirs.
"And then it all got quite confused. Maybe the workers crossed from their (right) side to the student’s (left) side by going behind the statue of George Washington. But the police seemed to be suddenly stuck in a small space with the students evacuating their position and the workers flowing into it. Scary, for sure, but more like a game of capture the flag than violent European-style fascist street fighting.
"After a bit more chanting from the workers on the Federal Hall steps, it seemed that lunch hour was over and folks started drifting away. I remember seeing a lot of sandals (especially Dr. Scholl’s!) on the pavement of the side street down which the students had retreated.
"Don’t know what happened elsewhere that day. I was busy quickly getting home to be first to announce to my comrades that I had seen fascism being born.
"My paranoid evaluations are memories of my own psychological state at the time; the objective view comes from looking at the photographs themselves especially in light of events that came later.
"The photographs are offered now ne prorsus interirent – lest they altogether perish and the past be lost."
Comments
Thanks, Kathy.
A bunch of hardhats with work boots "trowing a beatin'" to a bunch of foul smelling, commie pinko, hippie freaks wearing sandals. Damn that had to be PRICELESS!!!!
Happy Kent State Day everybody! As with my annual Altamont celebration every December, I say "Keep the Kent State spirit alive!" I hope Neil Young will remember, when he's whining about "Four dead in Ohio", that if students in 1970 Moscow behaved like Kent State students, there would have been 400 dead. If students in 1970 Peking behaved like Kent State students there would have been 4000 dead. And then the PLA would have mowed down ANOTHER 4000 during the mopping-up operation just as an example to the ones left alive.
Anywho, these Hard-Hat Riot pix are very gratifying indeed. When I was a kid I loved MAD Mag, which would occasionally allude to construction workers beating up hippies with placards -- but I never knew if MAD was alluding to a specific actual event, or just inventing a fictional (yet plausible) conflict that COULD happen because the two groups hated each other. I'm very pleased to learn the correct answer is "specific actual event."
Great work Kathy! On a day when the New York Times is busy discovering new ways to betray their country, you have written a timely and provocative news item for your fellow countrymen. I do hope that Rush notices you. We have.
Nice to see Canada's preeminent right wing schwein celebrating the violent behavior of her social and intellectual equals in the US. I love the comments, brutal low class trash exposing their microbrains for my amusement.
Sounds like "Jakester" needs a good ole fashioned hard hat beat down. A good ole attitude adjustment is readily needed to cure elitist fart sniffers like the ole "Jakester" of their elusions of grandeur. In addition to the sheer joy of pounding a commie, supplying a hard hat lecture offers therapeutic stress relief for the good samaritan perscribing just what the doctor ordered for A-holes like "Jakester."
I like your writing so much I wanted to see if you're single so i looked you up on google. You look like the ass-end of a gibbon. No offense. I just can't believe I had that thought.
Keep up the good work, toots!
Seriously, somebody answer on here if you know. Where does Rush find those hot conservative sweeties? I am very serious abut my politics and I want to meet someone who shares my conservative values who doesn't look my mustacheod Uncle Gino.
Well, Frankie, have you ever thought about why so many of the ultra-conservative women you meet are dogs?
Me, I've got access to all the grade-A progressive/liberal pussy I can handle. There are gorgeous, really nice, funny, intelligent, kind women everywhere libs gather! Good luck with the bowsers.
And the answer to how Rush Limbaugh gets all these "good-looking" women: he's a millionaire. His new 33-year-old wife looks like she's 43, by the way. Being a gold-digging star-fucker tends to harden a dame. Maybe Obama's birth certificate shouldn't be the *only* birth certificate this clown demands to see!
Funny you should write about work ethic with such passion. From what I can tell, you've never worked a day in your life, Kathy.
Why don't you get a job and use your fat fingers to produce something useful, instead of to tweet inanity about Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck? Why don't you get off your titanic ass and walk outside your small apartment and experience the world?
Also, if you hate Canada so much, why don't you leave it? Oh, right, the United States won't have you because you have no useful skills or education. And isn't Canada footing the bill for your expensive medical conditions?
I love how those too lazy to work like to try and wear the cloak of the working man.
LOL. Lazy twat. Kathy's busy schedule:
Morning:
Eat doughnut
Eat another doughnut
Watch Sean Hannity while eating pastry
Tweet whatever Hannity says
*whew, rough morning*
LUNCH:
Golden Corral all-you-can-eat bar with Fox News in background
Early Afternoon:
Listen to Rush
Tweet what Rush just said
Listen to Ann Coulter
Tweet what Ann Coulter said
Listen to Dr. Laura
Tweet what Dr. Laura said
Snacktime! (2 head of cattle plus bon bons)
Afternoon:
Watch Fox & Friends
Watch Fox News
Apply Gold Bond lotion to obese, chafed thighs
Make hubby do the ped egg again
Evening:
Watch Glenn Beck in queen-size lingerie while sucking on fried chicken drumstick
Tweet what Glenn said with greasy fingers
Post to five feet of diarrhea site, repeat what Glenn says
Post article written by someone else to twitter feed and say that author is a doo doo head
Early bedtime after long soak in whale tub! Yell for hubby to bring in tray of Twinkies. (*exhausting* day)
Repea
Tyler and Dale, you are cracking me UP! I have shared your comments on my blog for others who will be similarly entertained. We routinely make fun of Kathy Shaidle, but rarely do we rise to your level of realism, gents. Thanks!
Thanks, Sara! Would you post your URL?
In her morning routine, I forgot to add:
9:30 a.m. Wake up and put on Slanket
9:45 a.m. Waddle into living room and plop onto couch
9:46 a.m. Fart
Looks like Dale spends a lot of time writing about Kathy. Betcha Dale is a 40 year old dope smoking slacker virgin who lives in his mom's basement and hasn't worked in the last 2 years.
walrus, I'm 28, own a condo, and have a full-time job as a graphic designer. I'm also in a band. We're thinking about calling it "Shaidle's Slanket" or just "Slanket." My mother is awesome, and I love her very much.
Have you seen Tim Conway's "Dorf on Golf" videos?
Dale lives on this site writing about someone who doesn't know he exists and calling her a looooser. Meanwhile Dale keeps making money for the looooser with every lame comment he post.
She makes about a quarter of a penny (or less) for each comment. And she has to write articles for no pay. Who's the loser, again? Well here's your quarter of a penny for your little hat, monkey!
FYI, there are actually several of us who post as "Dale." Friends of Kathy, you might say. We try to one-up each other.
Yeah and you're all a bunch of LOOOOOOOOOOSERSSSSS
And you're a looooooooooooooooooser whose husband has to comment on articles (she wrote for free) under various sock-puppet names so she can earn a quarter. That makes you both loooooooooooooooosers.
Put that quarter in your piggy bank and save up for an education.
I imagine you're still asleep right now but will be up soon and slip into your Slanket. You have a rough day of watching television, surfing the Web, and listening to the radio ahead of you. Better power up with a big breakfast!
Kathy, please shut the eff up about the United States. You don't live here, and we don't want you. Keep your troll ass in Canada where you belong.
From a 3/6/09 Salon article:
"She, in turn, linked to another blogger, Kathy Shaidle. Shaidle -- who is, to put it politely, not a particularly nice person -- wrote:
Today's "poor" are the rich Jesus warned you about: fat, slovenly, wasteful of their money and other people's...
He spends all his (our) money on cellphones and, most likely, tattoos and drugs and booze and other crap, and has no money left for a home and food. And why should he bother? We pay for his shelter and food anyhow...
What's really funny in that news story by the way is what they're serving at the soup kitchen: risotto with brocolli. Obviously some rich white liberal did the cooking that day, feeling all proud of herself, and what thanks did she get? Some lowclass loser going, "You expect me to eat this?!!"
LOL. Oh Kathy. Weren't you on WELFARE FOR AT LEAST 3 YEARS? To slag someone for being on welfare is, of course, hypocritical. And, um, for being fat and slovenly, even more so.
Shaidle was ON WELFARE?!?!?!!
Yup.
Slanket was a welfare queen! I just Googled it and verified.
I can barely type I'm laughing so hard.
Wonder what all those hard hats she lionizes in this "article" would say to the fat little welfare queen if she emerged in the crowd clad in her Slanket. They would kick her ass, too! ROFL.
Tyler, I'm right there with you. Correcting typos as they happen.
Dale @ Bucktown, you have got to run a story about this.
Oh, Slanket, you complete me.
Dale, this is from her twit feed this morning:
"Dennis Miller on radio: Obama not fit to lead; job is too much for him 9 minutes ago via TweetDeck"
You need to add "Listen to Dennis Miller radio show" to her daily schedule. And "Tweet what Dennis Miller said."
I guess that comes after her 9:46 fart on the couch.
I just pinched off a Tyler after eating my doughnut while watching Beck. Dale & Arnie sound like two homersexuals.
I bet Kathy's pinched off a few by accident while farting into her Slanket. Watch how hard you be fartin'. Some of em is juicy.
Arnie does sound like a homo, doesn't he?
I think walrus might be right about Arnie. Is Arnie a homo?
I don't know. It would explain a lot.
One thing's for sure: Arnie's really stupid.
Arnie, you're not the brightest crayon in the box, are you?
Just ducked back in to read the thread and, wow, Kathy, lots of posts! You might be getting like a $2 check from Examiner this week.
Sara, LOL!!!!!
Seriously, Kathy, you're a winner.
I'm still wondering about walrus's allegation that Arnie is a homo.
Did I say "winner"? I meant "wiener."
Did I say "wiener"? I meant "wiener dog."
Wait, walrus, were you watching the Scientologist pop music star Beck or the human detritus magnet crybaby Fox TV Beck while you were eating your doughnut and before you pinched me off?
Arnie is a dren.
I'm actually Arnie & Tyler.
Where's my two dollars?!?
Ka-CHING!
I'm actually Arnie and poo poo.
Sad about Hugh Slatery. It's heartwarming to see the outpouring of grief on the Internet. When you pass on, I don't think people will have the same reaction, do you, Kathy? 'Cause you're not a thinker, you're a hater. And nobody really misses a hater very much.
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