'Power to the People'

February 4, 1969--Amid growing student protest on campus, and with the memory of the 1968 Columbia University riots still fresh in their minds, the Faculty votes to remove academic credit from Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) courses and faculty rank from ROTC instructors. They also agree to set up a standing committee on Afro-American Studies.

April 7--Students intercept correspondence between President Nathan M. Pusey '28 and Dean of the Faculty Franklin L. Ford indicating the administration's plan to delay implementation of the Faculty vote. Reports are circulated that Pusey has promised that the Corporation "will do everything possible to keep ROTC."

April 8--Three hundred sympathizers march at midnight to Pusey's house, and tack a list of six demands to his door. The demands include the termination of all ROTC contracts and their replacement with Harvard scholarships; no further Harvard expansion in Cambridge without the approval of two-thirds of the displaced tenants and adequate alternative housing; and immediate discussions to set up a Black studies program.

April 9

11:50 a.m. SDS convenes a mass meeting to protest Harvard's "intransigence" on terminating ROTC contracts and "imperialist expansion" in Cambridge.

12 noon--The demonstration, now growing, moves to the steps of University Hall. One speaker shouts into a bullhorn, "It is time for us to tell the Corporation by action what we've been telling them all fall."

12:15 p.m.--Chanting "Fight, Fight", 200 demonstrators surge into University Hall, and forcibly evict Dean of Students Richard B. Watson, Dean of Freshman F. Skiddy von Stade '38, Assistant Deans Archie C. Epps III an W.C. Burriss Young '55, and others.

12:45 p.m.--Ford orders students to leave the building. They refuse. The last of the University Hall administrators and staff leave, although Ford is allowed to return to the building to retrieve his coat.

6 p.m.--Ford, reading a statement from Widener Library, criticizes the protestors for refusing to discuss their demands, and closes the Yard until further notice. Throughout the day, Ford and Pusey meet with deans and House masters, trying to resolve the crisis.

10 p.m.--Students occupying University Hall settle in for the night, singing protest songs and discussing strategy for the next day. Slogans are spray-painted on some of the walls, but others repaint them to minimize the damage. The hall directory is rearranged to read "Liberated Area...Che Guevara Hall...Fight Racism...Get out of Vietnam...Power to the People...ROTC Must Go...Amen."

April 10

4 a.m.--Four hundred state and suburban police begin mobilizing in the Yard, wearing riot gear and marching in formation.

5:00 a.m.--Dean of the College Fred L. Glimp '50, speaking over a loudspeaker, gives students five minutes to evacuate the building. Students later says the announcement was inaudible inside the building.

5:05 a.m.--Police storm the building, breaking down the first floor door with a three-foot battering ram. Using billy clubs, officers clear the hall. Robert Tonis, chief of University Police, circulates throughout the hall, apologizing to students and saying that the administration is "way over our heads now." Two hundred and seventy-five students are arrested, and 75 are injured during the bust.

Meanwhile, 500 students in the Yard chant "Pusey Must Go," "Strike, Strike," and "Close the Place Down."

10 a.m.--Two hundred students gather in Memorial Church and vote a 3-day strike of classes.

April 11--Pusey issues a statement justifying the police action as "the only possible alternative" and attacking the University Hall occupies for their "dire assault upon the authority of the University and upon rational processes and accepted procedures."

Only one-fourth of the student body attends classes.

April 14--Six thousand people at a meeting at the Harvard Stadium vote to continue the strike for three more days; a more extreme motion to strike until all demands are met loses by only 16 votes.

April 17--The Faculty again petitions the Governing Board to follow the principle that ROTC operate purely as an extra-curricular activity, with no special privileges. The group also passes a resolution that criminal charges against students be dropped.

April 18--The Corporation accepts the Faculty resolution on ROTC and agrees to grant amnesty to the occupiers of the building, to relocate any low-income tenants displaced by Harvard expansion, and to allow student input into discussions about setting up an Afro-American Studies Department.

Five thousand students vote to suspend the student strike "in view of the Faculty's commitment to continuing progress."

May 1--Despite a written appeal by President Pusey, Judge Edward O. Viola '50 refunds to let Harvard drop charges against the students arrested on April 10. One hundred and seventy are convicted of criminal trespass and fined $20 each.

The Committee of 15, set up to determine academic punishment for the occupiers, asks 13 students to withdraw, gives "suspended suspensions" to 20, and places 99 on official warning.

May 29--The Pentagon refuses to keep ROTC units on campus on a strictly extra-curricular basis. The Corporation recommends phasing out all ROTC programs by 1971.