Deja Vu All Over Again

As the VU Centennial Class comes back to campus, some themes continue to re-occur. When we were students many of the major daily news stories of the time revolved around the use of American military power in Vietnam and Southeast Asia. Now as we return to Vanderbilt 40 years later, there is a similar debate over the nation's possible military involvement in Syria.

Despite these headlines in our student publications, Vanderbilt was rarely a hot bed of campus or student unrest about the Vietnam War even though we arrived at the peak of such protest activities. In fact, we had just gotten to school in the fall of 1969 when the first of two major national  demonstrations occurred The Student Moratoriums, were held, first on October 15 and then a month later on November 15. Getting in our "Way Back" machine from the Vanderbilt TV News Archives, here's how Walter Cronkite and THE CBS EVENING NEWS covered it that evening almost 44 years ago...... 

http://blip.tv/vanderbilt-class-of-1973/1969-october-15-moratorium-1142304


Personally, I remember working for WRVU and covering the local teach-ins and other demonstrations held that day. I also remember how excited we were to supplement our coverage with a new UPI wire machine. We had just installed it that day right outside our news room in the south tower of Neely Auditorium where WRVU had its studios.

Periodic campus demonstrations continued over the next several years while peace talks in Paris ebbed and flowed. At one point following the widening of the war with the invasion of Cambodia and the student shootings at Kent State and Jackson State in May, 1970, protests got so strong the faculty at George Peabody College across the street (now a part of Vanderbilt) voted to close the school in protest.

As we mentioned in an earlier post, Vanderbilt Chancellor Alexander Heard was asked by President Richsrd Nixon to be his Special Advisor on Campus Affairs. One reason he was likely tapped by the President was the great reputation the Chacellor had built in terms of building positive satudent relationships at Vanderbilt. It's also likely one reason our campus remained peaceful at the time was due to the "open forum" policy of the Chancellor and the adminstration in which students felt their voices were being heard (both anti and pro-war) through such activities as the Speak-Outs on Rand Terrace......

 Finally at the beginning of our last semester at Vanderbilt, the Paris Peace Talks resulted in a ceasefire on the battlefield that ultimately ended the Vietnam War. Again, from our "way back machine", here's how NBC NIGHTLY NEWS covered it on January 10, 1973 when the peace terms were first announced.....

http://blip.tv/vanderbilt-class-of-1973/1973-january-10-warends-1142331

As we all know, ultimately, Communist North Vietnam took over the country. But that came two years after American troops left and after our Prisoners Of War came home. Here's that emotional news coverage by ABC when the first POWS were released on February 12,1973.....

 http://blip.tv/vanderbilt-class-of-1973/1973-february-12-pow-1142328

So while many things have changed in this world, in this country, in Nashville and at Vandebilt since we went to school together over four decades ago, the debate over the use of American military force continues.