MAINSTREAM MEDIA

By CW Wolff and Robin Read

 “The socialists were there…”

 Meanwhile, The Manchester Union-Leader, the state’s largest, most powerful and most conservative newspaper, launched a relentless “Red Tide” campaign, trying to paint the Clamshell Alliance as a communist and terrorist organization. Rather than fuming about the paper’s hysteria and half-truths, we found creative ways to respond.

For example, Union-Leader coverage of one Clamshell rally included front page cutlines under three photos:  “The sodomites were there … The socialists were there… And so was Dick Gregory.” (Gregory was a popular and liberal comedian). A Manchester, NH, singer-songwriter and Clam member took that phrase and made it into a satirical song we enjoyed singing for years. Read the rest of this entry »

Clam Magic

Court Dorsey

            Early in 1977, a group of young activists in DeKalb, Illinois began a self-study seminar created by The Movement for a New Society (MNS) called the Macro analysis Seminar.  We were all a part of a network of affiliated projects centered around Juicy John Pinks, a restaurant and coffeehouse that included a food coop, Duck Soup Coup, a conservatory of folk music, and a theater project, The Colmpany of the Ashis Tree.  Just as we finished the unit on nuclear power, we heard about the Clamshell Alliance.  We aborted the seminar, created a performance piece about nuclear power, formed The Crumbs of Bliss affinity group, packed ourselves into two old beaters and headed east to join the Occupation.  We arrived at Joan Bigler’s Kensington, New Hampshire campground a few days early, intending to perform our street theater around the Seacoast.  Local organizer Kristie Conrad made up a list of destinations for us, and we set out to perform wherever we could.  Our most memorable performance was in front of the Manchester Union Leader headquarters in Manchester.  The Union Leader was a notoriously right-leaning daily with front-page editorials written by publisher William Loeb.  During our performance, a man in a suit and tie leaned out of the doorway to watch, and cranked his forefinger around his head a couple of times to say, “You guys are nuts!”  It was Loeb himself. Read the rest of this entry »

The Grapes of Rath: the decision to cancel the 1978 planned civil disobedience “occupation” of the Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant site

 By Cindy Girvani Leerer

             By the end of 1979, The Clamshell Alliance seemed to have passed its zenith. Many activists within the Clamshell date the decline to the decision to accept the “Rath Proposal” ending the large scale civil disobedience “occupations” of the proposed Seabrook Nuclear Power plant site. Then-NH Attorney General Thomas Rath, who later directed the public and government relations efforts for Northeast Utilities in its successful acquisition of Public Service Company of New Hampshire, proposed a deal to give the Clamshell Alliance access to the plant site for a legal rally in exchange for calling off a planned June 24, 1978 civil disobedience action. Read the rest of this entry »

This prose poem borrows history from an unpublished work of William James Sidis, thought by many to be the most intelligent known human of the 20^th century. The youngest student ever to matriculate at Harvard, Sidis became convinced as the result of his wide-ranging research that the tribe who had been displaced , and faced eradication, by the European settlers at Boston –  the Okamakamesset (his spelling) –  had passed knowledge of their form of government to the “New Englanders”– a corrupted version of which was eventually implemented, and survives here today. Read the rest of this entry »

Role of Music in Actions and Organizing 

by Charlie King

Grass roots movements create culture.  How else do we get the story out?  How else do we feed our hearts and souls for the long haul?  Read the rest of this entry »