TOM: So this will turn from your father to your being a father. Will was born in ’62, I was born in ’64, Laura was born in ’69, and you were very involved in the civil rights movement, going to Mississippi in the summer of ’64 and being a part of the anti-war movement at Cornell. How do those involvements influence how you thought of yourself as a dad?
DAD: It was a turbulent time. There were major events in the public and political domain that I cared about intensely. But in the same period I was trying to figure out how to be a college professor and keep employment there at Cornell—which in the end I didn’t. What I was doing directly with the civil disobedience, particularly of the anti-Vietnam war period, had to be balanced against my responsibility to keep a livelihood for the family because that was the primary responsibility of a father.
If I was going to actually make a move—like send back my draft cards—it might end up getting me put on trial and sent to prison for a while, which would be a very heavy impact on your mom, Jean, and on you kids. That was a tough period.
TOM: In the end, you did send your draft card in.
DAD: I thought it was important enough that I had to do it, but I didn’t just burn it. I sent it back with a letter to the draft board down in New Jersey, undamaged because it was a felony to destroy your draft card. I talked to the board trying to persuade them that if they were going to punitively reclassify me for non-cooperation, it should be 1-O, which was conscientious objector status which they had already recognized in my case.
They did reclassify me punitively, 1-O. I got a letter from a big mental hospital in North Jersey saying, we understand you’re reporting for duty. The date was about two-and-a-half months away. They had assigned me there in lieu of military service for being up for the draft because I had not cooperated by sending my cards in. Then the whole process got intercepted by a class action law suit on behalf of all the people who had been punitively reclassified without due process. I did not have to report to the mental health hospital.
TOM: Did you think at that time that the sacrifice that Mom and we as kids would have to make if you had to go to jail or serve at the mental hospital was worth it in terms of the example you were setting for us?
DAD: I suppose that’s one way to say it. It is hard to go back to the intensity of the feeling of that period. The war seemed so wrongly conducted and so inadequately justified. It was just swallowing monthly new infusions of young men through the draft. A lot of them were getting killed and maimed. I felt it extremely important to try to bring correction to national policy through the old Quaker testimonies about not participating in war to balance the political forces that mindlessly seemed to be saying onward and further into Vietnam when it already was proven there would be no real victory at the end.
I worried that if the whole sequence led to trial and two years at federal prison, that that would be such a hardship for your mom and you kids, that I didn’t know where that would go. I suspect by the time we really talked through it and tried to face up to how it might work out, it was evident to me that it wasn’t clear Jean would hang on, that it might put such a strain on that she’d decide that this relationship is not worth it, if the outcome was my spending two years in jail. Thankfully that never happened.
Next: A Different Man
Photo Credit: RedHatRob
Hi, Tom-
I took a couple of courses with your dad at Cornell in spring and fall of 1970 (so he was not at U Mass then). He was a wonderful lecturer and one of the teachers I admired most at Cornell. He definitely influenced my views on race. He was also a tough grader, which did not help my GPA at all, but it was worth it. I was interested and pleased to hear of the direction his life took and that he is alive and well in beautiful Rockport, Maine.
Tom, It took me a couple year’s after my Father Passed away in September of 1999, to understand who he was but more importantly The man I thought I had to be… I think our Fathers, seem so Hero like as children in our eye’s! As we age and mature, They have exspectation’s and we tend to think or believe what they want for us, is Not in our plan’s. So we fighnt it every step along the way. Tom, My Dad many times through out my childhood made me feel WEAK and Unexcepted! Growing up My eye’s saw his… Read more »
What an interesting guy your dad is, Tom!.
One of the striking things that comes through this conversation is that despite your returning to the father/son theme over and over, in so many instances that you and your dad address the fathers were not present, or the men were not in family situations etc. Makes it clear how major a shift your generation is in the midst of, and how timely your focus is!
Thanks for showing open interest in your son’s cause, Jean Matlack, in your comment here and your own interview in May. Discovering his TGMP work is one of the best things that’s happened for me in the past few months. It does my heart good to see Tom honoring his father and mother while finding his own way!
Excellent interview, Tom. I am very glad that you were able to sit down and connect with your father like this. As much as we think we know our dads at times, there is always more to the story—small (or in your case, large) details that would have gone otherwise untold unless you spend quality talk time.
I enjoyed this. You both are good men.