UNIVERSITY of CINCINNATI July 26, 2005 Susan Streeter Carpenter
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UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI Date:___________________ I, _________________________________________________________, hereby submit this work as part of the requirements for the degree of: in: It is entitled: This work and its defense approved by: Chair: _______________________________ _______________________________ _______________________________ _______________________________ _______________________________ LIBERTY BOULEVARD by Susan Streeter Carpenter Doctoral Dissertation Department of English & Comparative Literature University of Cincinnati July 2005 ABSTRACT: Liberty Boulevard is a historical novel set in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1968. The primary characters are radical activists, members of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), increasingly aware of how the Vietnam war, the racism of Cleveland police, the poverty of inner city neighborhoods, and their own alienation as students are all part of the sick “system” which must be overthrown. Inspired by the Columbia University students’ takeover, they plan to ignite the revolution in Cleveland. Ivy Barcelona, a twenty-year-old Case-Western Reserve student, adds the local draft resistance to her militant activities. Her boyfriend, Chuck Leggit, is putting himself through school at Cleveland State. After a lucrative summer bank job proves demeaning, he drops out to work full-time for revolutionary change – thus losing his draft deferment. With Jane Revard, the third major character, he starts an underground newspaper. Jane is twenty-five, a seasoned activist who has worked on Ban the Bomb campaigns, registered voters in Mississippi, visited Hanoi on a peace mission, and helped organize a Welfare Rights group. She has also developed feminist consciousness which she transmits to Ivy. Cleveland’s popular African American mayor, Carl B. Stokes, has calmed the black community after the King assassination and garnered financial support from Cleveland businesses. But in July, a lethal shoot-out between police and a small black nationalist group leads to widespread distrust of Stokes and a polarized city. Ivy, Jane, and Chuck are caught in the cross-fire. Before there is time to reflect on this experience of violent near-revolution they are in the streets of Chicago during the Democratic National Convention, running from tear gas and police clubs. In the fall of 1968, some of their movement comrades decide to “bring the war home” and become urban guerillas. Ivy, Jane, and Chuck decide against violence – each for different reasons. They go separate ways, questioning, confused, scared, and uncertain about the future. Table of Contents: 1. Chapter 1 ……………………………………………………………... 1 2. Chapter 2 ……………………………………………………………… 32 3. Chapter 3 ……………………………………………………………… 57 4. Chapter 4 ……………………………………………………………… 87 5. Chapter 5 ……………………………………………………………… 106 6. Chapter 6 ……………………………………………………………… 127 7. Chapter 7 ……………………………………………………………… 147 8. Chapter 8 ……………………………………………………………… 172 9. Chapter 9 ……………………………………………………………… 194 10. Chapter 10……………………………………………………………… 222 11. Chapter 11……………………………………………………………… 279 12. Chapter 12……………………………………………………………… 298 13. Chapter 13……………………………………………………………… 319 14. Chapter 14……………………………………………………………… 339 15. Chapter 15……………………………………………………………… 365 16. Chapter 16……………………………………………………………… 388 17. Chapter 17……………………………………………………………… 409 18. Chapter 18……………………………………………………………… 431 19. Chapter 19……………………………………………………………… 450 S.S. Carpenter June 2005 LIBERTY BOULEVARD Chapter One April 23, 1968 When the applause began, Ivy stepped backward and bumped into a picture frame, knocking it askew. She straightened it, and while the audience surged toward the candidate who stood near the fireplace, she studied the print. At the center a boy’s body stretched across a rayed disk surrounded by furious action: a gold lion charged, a white stallion reared, great wheels spun. “Phaeton,” said a neat, bald man in a navy blue blazer. “The boy who tried to drive his father’s sun-chariot.” “He lost control of the horses and crashed,” Ivy said. She’d had a book of Greek myths as a child. Now she was an art history major. “I like the French symbolists. Moreau?” The man smiled assent. “1878,” he said. “But the chariot did not crash. Zeus shot it down, so Phaeton couldn’t do any more damage.” “Oh, here you are, with Mr. Levine.” Ivy’s Aunt Peg appeared, spiffy in beige silk that exactly matched her hair, a cup of draft beer in one hand. “Thanks so much for having this party. Mr. Gilligan’s speech was terrific!” Her voice brightened, addressing Levine – the host, owner of the Phaeton. “To actually say it, out loud: America must not be policeman to the world. Such courage!” Aunt Peg said. “And they cheered! In Cleveland Heights!” She nudged Ivy. “Aren’t you glad you came?” one -- 2 “Of course.” Not wanting to offend, Ivy smiled at her aunt and Mr. Levine. Strangers filled the enormous room, everyone groomed with the suburban sheen that Ivy could never quite manage. “Have you seen Chuck?” “Chuck? Oh, your boyfriend.” Aunt Peg looked around. “I’ll bet he’s near the refreshments. Have you had any? Unusual spread!” The last two words were for the host. She pointed Ivy to the table where a loaf of rye bread the size of a bed-pillow dominated whole salamis and blocks of cheese, each stuck with a wooden-handled knife. Wooden bowls offered pickles and both kinds of olives. Crystals dripped from the chandelier above the feast. Ivy needed air. A hand pressed her shoulder, and Chuck’s voice rumbled in her ear. “We should go.” he said. “I’ve got your coat.” He held up the London Fog for her. “Thanks so much,” she said to Aunt Peg and Mr. Levine. “Sorry we can’t stay longer. We’ve promised to eat dinner with Movement people in Glenville. See you soon! Bye-bye!” Chuck pulled her by the hand out through the heavy front door. “Hand-carved oak, no less,” he grunted, pulling it closed. They were free in the cold damp night. “Aunt Peg is shocked,” Ivy said. Glenville was the ghetto. Though not as bad as Hough, most white people did not go to parties there, even those who cheered an anti-war Democrat running for senate. Chuck was so tall that Ivy could easily walk under his arm without stooping. His car was two doors away, past enormous lawns redolent of fresh earth. After the revolution, Ivy imagined, these mansions would be chopped into apartments or even communes. She would live in one room, which she pictured as a version of her father’s one -- 3 library: books floor to ceiling and an old dark leather armchair, with a quilted bed in the corner. She slid into the long front seat of Chuck’s Pontiac and slammed the heavy door twice to get it properly closed. “What a relief to be out of there.” Chuck ripped off his nametag and stuck it on the window-visor. He kissed her lips and eased out of the line of cars. Ivy pasted her tag next to Chuck’s, so their names overlapped and cocked toward each other in a friendly way. After dinner, she would spend the night at Chuck’s apartment, her first time on a week night. She was already dressed for class tomorrow – plaid skirt, pumps and stockings – so she didn’t have to go back to her dorm where the housemother kept watch. She brushed Chuck’s arm with her cheek as he turned the corner onto North Park. “Did you see the giraffe?” he said. “A giant Steiff thing occupying the whole corner of – what was that, a drawing room? They’ve got too much house.” “The owner’s got interesting taste,” Ivy said. “I like that they served keg-beer.” “They had three kegs of imported lager,” Chuck said. “And it’s cool that Gilligan came out against imperialism,” she said. “He’s more liberal than my university president.” “He was standing on an antique coal-hod,” Chuck said. “Costly, I bet, and no coal in sight. It’s okay for liberals to be against the war now. Ever since Tet, they’ve been worried about all that money poured into Vietnam, all those dead sons, all those GIs pissed off at the system. They’re still not facing the connections. Did you see any black faces there?” She hadn’t. The road curved between a park and a school, then swooped downhill, out of the Heights into Cleveland proper. It was a Tuesday night. One siren rose and fell one -- 4 in the distance. Cleveland had not burned after the King assassination, not like Detroit or Washington. Many cities were still smoldering. The difference was Cleveland’s black mayor: handsome Carl Stokes had done a lot of talking to the right people, so the black community had stayed cool. They passed the Case buildings; then Chuck turned left and drove between the art museum and Severance Hall. Ivy sighed – too slowly: her lungs were beginning to feel like balloons with the valves pinched shut. She hoped this wasn’t another asthma attack. Not tonight. She had to save her inhaler. If she used it more than once every three hours, she’d mess herself up. She’d spent spring break at her parents’ home in Bloomington, and when the asthma had come she’d used up her inhaler. Her parents were medical – Dad, an obstetrician, Mum, a nurse. Her “wheezes” annoyed them. So as not to bother them, she’d quietly swallowed four aminophyllin tablets at once. All night she sat up with her heart pounding, trying not to vomit, waiting for her lungs to let go, which they did finally at sunrise. Neither parent had asked how she was. There were more important events – Johnson’s abdication and Dr. King’s murder, five days apart. Sick and furious that she’d not done more to stop the forces that killed King, Ivy resolved to work harder. On the bus back to Cleveland she’d sat next to a white-haired man with a clerical collar, avoiding the greasers who made lewd lip-smacks at her.