Bostonia: The Alumni Magazine of Boston University

On 24 March 2010 at 1:05 PM, Ival Stratford-Kovner (CFA'73) wrote:

I last saw Howard Zinn at a gathering in Cambridge and was able to introduce a friend to this professor who, as has been noted earlier, truly influenced my life. As an art major, many of us seemed detached from the times around us, yet, I had decided through the Zinn influence, to blend political science courses with my studio & art history classes. It has always proved to be a good decision - and today my work often attempts to be infused with topics related to our society - whether bio-energy concerns or the continuing quest for equalities in all areas. As current historian for a 200 year old cavalry, proud to have been at BU during those significant moments. Prof. Zinn will be remembered through our actions and future works I am sure.

On 11 March 2010 at 8:42 AM, Peter H. Duston (CAS'65) wrote:

I knew Howard Zinn during the turbulent 60's and early 70's when I was an undergraduate student in slavic studies, a BU administrator, a teaching fellow in history and as an army reserve intelligence officer gathering information on the anti-war movement at BU. It was a confusing and chaotic time. I remember Howard Zinn and Murray Levin as the "Bobsie Twins" and bedrock of the opposition. While I didn't agree with their politics, I recognized his intellectually charged presence in the BU community and later was inspired by his "social" approach to history - it became the foundation of my teaching style and content. In 1974, disillusioned by the "War" and the social scene, I resigned from the army, dropped out of GRS and went off to Maine with the "back-to-the-land movement". As I said, it was later that I really began to appreciate Howard's contribution to my character and intellectual seasoning. Thank you Howard Zinn for inspiring me even during my "right wing" youth.

On 11 March 2010 at 1:44 AM, Victor Urbanowicz (GRS'75) wrote:

Is BU's honoring of Howard Zinn a symptom of a shift in the institution? I ask because I learned recently that when John Silber was president he froze Zinn's salary. If that's not accurate, I'd like to know. I was a teaching fellow in English in the later 1960s and officed in the building next to where Zinn's office was. Never met him, but his writings and media presence inspired me: an accomplished, kindly, fatherly man giving quiet affirmation to what so many were saying so intemperately.

On 11 March 2010 at 1:36 AM, Pete Smillie (ENG'70) wrote:

I collided with Professor Zinn in front of Marsh Chapel and was struck by the love and joy I saw in his eyes. I was busy rushing nowhere to a class, and sometime afterwards I read "Disobedience and Democracy", ...a little empathy on the Supreme Court could go a long way...

On 11 March 2010 at 12:29 AM, Willie Blacklow (CAS'69) wrote:

Howard Zinn will always have his detractors--see some of the comments, below. For those of us who knew him and studied with him, however, their words ring shamefully hollow. Howard Zinn was my advisor, a man who has influenced my life in ways his detractors will neither understand nor appreciate. Their loss. He was--unlike them--a real 'mensch', a man with a moral compass. R.I.P., Howard; you too, Steve d'Arazien...two of the gentlest souls and finest political minds I've ever had the privilege of knowing.

On 10 March 2010 at 7:02 PM, Wilma Brier (CAS'72) wrote:

I will never forget the political science class I took with Howard Zinn while I was at B.U. from 1968 to 1972. He was inspiring both in and out of class and made me feel like small actions I took to try to make the world a better place actually mattered.

On 10 March 2010 at 6:59 PM, Michael Scully (CAS'77) wrote:

I wasn't impressed.

On 10 March 2010 at 4:09 PM, robert berlow (CAS'71) wrote:

Howard, as he was known to all who worked near or with him, taught us history even as he carved out his place in it and taught us, his students, to learn from it and apply what we learned to making the future better.

On 10 March 2010 at 3:21 PM, David W. Felder, Ph.D (CAS'67) wrote:

Howard Zinn accepted a little book I wrote for his class, "A Criminal In Utopia," as my term paper for his Political Philosophy (GO391) class in 1966. He inspired me and I went on to publish How to Work for Peace with the University Press of Florida and to become a Philosophy professor, now retiring, from Florida A & M University. I see Howard Zinn as a decent man who asked important questions but did not have answers. The answer to the problem of war is to have enforced international law. My book in Howard's class was an anarchist one, inspired by Howard Zinn's views and the anti-authoritarian anti war movement. I now argue following Thomas Hobbes that we have to build governmental institutions to settle conflicts on the international level. Whether you agreed with Howard Zinn or not, he was inspiring.

On 10 March 2010 at 1:26 PM, Alden Rebecca Spooner (CAS'75) wrote:

I had the privilege to be a student in Professor Zinn's classes in 1974 and 1975. I came to BU from a "gentle" town in the Southwest that seemed to pass through the 60's and 70's in a state of Pollyanna-ish bliss where what was happening in Viet Nam, Chicago, Watts seemed other worldly and of little concern. (It was hard to be a Democrat when your next door neighbor was the Republican precinct chairman and you're surrounded by hawks. We kept quiet vigilance.) Howard Zinn brought me right into new reality. I come from service oriented family, but his gritty, fierce passion fostered a new spirit of personal social responsibility, certainly in this student, and I sensed also, for many sitting beside me. (I can't imagine that I would have read the Pentagon Papers cover to cover for anyone else!) The names and faces of many other teachers have long since disappeared in the recesses of my aging brain cells, but I shall never forget Howard Zinn. Thank you Boston University!!!!

On 10 March 2010 at 12:55 PM, Philip Kamaras (CAS'77) wrote:

Howard Zinn was one of the most sought after tickets in 1974 next to Bruce Springsteen at the boston Garden. Springsteen tix were $8.00, same as the Patriots. Red Sox bleachers--even against the Yankees, $1.50. Zinn tickets--free and priceless. A fountain of endless thought provoking ideas. You never knew who would show up--one day it was Daniel Ellsberg or the Berrigans (look it up if you are under 40). His office was like a Bohemian smoke shop without the smoke and we waited for hours to chat with him for 10 minutes and say: I spoke to Howard, I really did. There are a few people who make me fond of saying I attended BU with -- including those 4 lads from the 1980 Olympic hockey team. Howard was at the top of the list.

On 10 March 2010 at 10:43 AM, Tom Moriarty (GSM'69) wrote:

Folk hero or just one of the oringinal hate America crowd? I guess you need the Zinn's of the world in order for some to really wake up and appreciate how fortunate they are to live in the land of the free.

On 9 March 2010 at 10:31 AM, Carol Rodman (SPH '88) wrote:

If you are truly motivated to honor and memorialize Howard Zinn and his historical pursuits, and to encourage graduate students to study and investigate history in his memory, then you need to alter the intent of this Graduate Fund and be true to Professor Zinn's life work. The awards should be directed to students motivated to pursue aspects of American history that have been hidden from our view, events that have violated our democracy and its principles, and to seek out the people whose voices have been stifled, articulate their acts, stories, and writings, so that we can know them. You need to encourage this pursuit to do Dr. Zinn right, because without historians like him doing this kind of work, these valuable stories, lives, and examples of courage would not be known.

On 9 March 2010 at 10:13 AM, David Dorfman (CLA 88, LAW 91) wrote:

I try to teach the way Howard Zinn taught. His immage is with me every week when I stand before my class. It was an honor to be his student and to follow his example. He remains my teacher.

On 9 March 2010 at 8:20 AM, Nuria Munoz-San Julian (CAS'88) wrote:

As my advisor at the Political Science Department Prof. Zinn always taught me to never give up on your beliefs. I am grateful and will always be, for all the words of wisdom he taught all of us who had the opportunity to have him as a professor. Many things i have learned but the most important thing is never to give up your freedom to speak of liberty and democracy.

On 9 March 2010 at 8:14 AM, sue pursell (COM'79) wrote:

howard zinn was one of my most influential professors. not in a career sense but in a day to day, how i live my life sense. i greatly admired his consistency in speaking up for those who were traditionally not heard. i learned that it was ok to examine your deep beliefs and see if they held up under academic scrutiny. and that you can still love your country (deeply) yet oppose its' governments actions. dr. zinn was always accessible to chat after class or in office hours. a true scholar and a man with deep integrity. i will miss him.

On 9 March 2010 at 8:01 PM, Mary Feldman (SED'72) wrote:

Howard Zinn was one of my favorite professors. I loved his classes, his interaction with students, and his controversial ideas. He pushed us to think and react -- that's what a professor is supposed to do!

On 10 March 2010 at 6:20 AM, kate farrell (COM'82) wrote:

i think obama is the antichrist, but lord, did i LOVE howard zinn. he was a complete and precious gift of god. i know he stills lives in me! "women of the world unite, end global sexism" u heard it hear first.

On 9 March 2010 at 8:01 PM, Marc Von Arx (COM'79) wrote:

While I only took a couple of classes with Howard, and knew his for just a year or so almost 30 years ago, he had a huge impact on my view of politics and life in general. He was a great man, with a generous spirit and a love of teaching. I will miss him.

Please let me know if there will be any memorial services on the West Coast?

On 10 March 2010 at 4:23 AM, Brigitte H. Schulz (CAS'88) wrote:

When I first met Howard Zinn as a beginning doctoral student in January 1979 I knew about him, of course: His political activism during the Vietnam War, most notably his trip to Hanoi in 1969 to obtain the release of US POWs, as well as his important work in the civil rights movement. What I didn’t realize until I got to know him better was how deeply Howard believed in praxis, in living what he professed. His was a wonderful combination of public fearlessness and personal humility, of a deep faith in “the people” and an equally deep loathing of the way in which they had been ignored and manipulated by those more wealthy and powerful.

When Howard heard during that first meeting that I was born and raised in Germany he immediately told me that his first experience with my native country was dropping bombs on it as a young bombardier during WW2, including missions over my home town of Kaiserslautern, where my mother, then a young girl, was hiding in bunkers from these bomb attacks. Howard clearly regretted his participation in these bombings, a regret that significantly informed his subsequent turn to a radical anti-war stance. As he said in one of his last interviews in December 2009: “War is always a business-man’s war.”

Howard Zinn was not an ordinary academic whose life was neatly compartmentalized into private political views and “objective” scholarship. To the contrary, Howard viewed his writing and teaching as important tools for political mobilization, for communicating his conviction that democracy ultimately rests on people power, not on governmental structures that invite citizens to participate in elections every few years. His mission as a scholar and teacher was to open eyes to injustice, to expand the parameters of historical and political discourse, and to help create active citizens willing to challenge the status quo. Writing and teaching history was his tool for political mobilization and social change, while he viewed traditional history as creating passivity and lending credence to of status quo. As he once said in his typically wry sense of humor: “I never wanted to become a professional historian. My aim was more modest: I wanted to change the world.”

And change the world he did – one person at a time. Everyone who met him was deeply touched by him. As a professor Howard Zinn forced his students to rethink many of the basic political assumptions into which Americans are socialized at a very young age. His pedagogy (much to the chagrin of the powers that be) was deeply informed by his overarching mission not simply to analyze the world but to contribute actively toward changing it.

I sent Howard an email a week before he died on 27 January in which I told him how much I admire his seemingly bottomless sense of optimism, even as the clouds gathering all around us are getting darker. He died of a heart attack before he was able to respond but I am sure that his message would have been for me to ignore the clouds and to keep on working toward a bright new day.

On 9 March 2010 at 11:22 PM, Claudia Stanley Moose (CAS'72) wrote:

As a Political Science major in the late 60's and early 70's, and from an old New England conservative background, I listened intently to his every word. I took all his classses, he was my PoliSci Department and small group studies advisor and tutor, my continuing guide through the turbulent decade and someone I will forever remember as a dear friend.

On 9 March 2010 at 8:01 PM, Marc Von Arx (CAS'84) wrote:

While I only took a couple of classes with Howard, and knew his for just a year or so almost 30 years ago, he had a huge impact on my view of politics and life in general. He was a great man, with a generous spirit and a love of teaching. I will miss him.

Please let me know if there will be any memorial services on the West Coast?

On 13 March 2010 at 3:10 PM, Green Mtn Punter (CLA'69) wrote:

News of Howard Zinn's death prompted me, in a moment of nostalgia, and sentimentality, to call my old roommate who was a great admirer of Howard's. I was not. But I still wanted to relive those times, for a few minutes at least , with my old roomie, for old times sake. We had a good chat, we were nostalgic, we were sentimental about Howard, as he was larger than life in those days. I called an old girlfriend who was also quite fond of Howard, and enjoyed some memories of the good old days in the context of Howard's influence on her politics, and on the B.U. campus of the mid-late '60's, a time of great ferment and momentous events set against the alternating center stage/just below the radar presence of the Vietnam War.

They loved Howard Zinn and that was all there was to it. I can see how that could happen, Howard was the single most charismatic figure on the B.U. campus of the mid-late '60's, this was his time in the spotlight, and he became a true celebrity on campus. But I could never understand the attraction to his politics, hell, I was a Goldwater Republican from a then Republican but rapidly moving left Vermont, and therefore my take on Howard Zinn's legacy was then, and still is, quite different than most of the commenters on this blog.

As my B.U. contemporaries will no doubt recall, the years 1965-69 were perhaps the most tumultuous ever on American college campuses as the Vitenam War caused a ferment the likes of which has not been seen since. B.U. was right smack dab in the forefront of East Coast student activism with an active S.D.S. among other budding, left wing student groups. It was an exciting time to be a college student but it was mostly a time which held great apprehension about the future. Like now, it's deja vu all over again, this time not spurred by war but by something much larger and ill defined, the sudden realization that we are adrift on a sea of uncharted waters. Very unsettling.

While many of my friends and fellow students eagerly signed up for Howard's courses, I as a history major did not. I did not fall under the spell of the Pied Pipers of 1960's radical causes on the B.U. campus, including Howard Zinn, of course, and BU News Editor Ray Mungo, the latter gaining instant stardom for his 1967 editorial calling for LBJ's impeachment. I don't know why I didn't fall for it since I, too, was vulnerable to the draft like most other male undergrads. The draft, "1A", a constant underlying threat being identified as the chief motivator of student unrest. I, like many others, became more excited about the B.U. hockey team, a team which began it's long run of Beanpot dominance during those years, teams which included Coach Jack Parker.

I heard bits and pieces about Howard's courses, about how they were romance and poetry in a classroom, the kind of liberal arts education we had all come to Boston to indulge in, where you could not receive less than a "B", always a plus on any campus no matter the course. Howard led student causes and demonstrations, and soon became a faculty hero for the burgeoning band of student radicals on the B.U. campus. I remember teach-ins, and then sit-ins, and finally administration building takeovers on Bay State Rd., especially one day the Boston P.D. riot squad emerging from busses, a shocking blue phalanx marching up Bay State Rd., night sticks and tear gas at the ready. Hey, baby, the real thing, UCal- Beserkely had nuthin' on Boston University!

Against this background, or foreground, the fall semester in 1967 found me leading a B.U. student life in a much slower lane, taking historiography courses with Prof Sidney Burrell, an accomplished scholar and inspiring, intellectually gifted teacher, recently drawn to B.U. from the uber prestigious Columbia University History Dept, to take the appointment as History Dept Chair. I felt quite fortunate to have met this scholar and wonderful man, an expert in Scottish history, and the Stuarts in England. Prof Burrell, too, was charismatic but in a more dignified, academic way, a professor who inspired many undergraduates to become serious about the study of history. He went on to win the Metcalf and other of B.U.'s highest awards for teaching undergraduates, and in later years, with his wife, led B.U. history students in studies at Oxford and University College, London.

My class, including many of the student radicals, graduated in 1969, and we went our separate ways. John Silber arrived as President in the early '70's to begin a new era of Howard Zinn's on going battle with the academic establishment. We began to hear about their clashes from accounts in the Boston papers as well as occasional news items in various alumni publications. It was 1960's deja vu all over again, and was to remain so to the end of Silber's tenure and Howard's career at B.U. Much intrigue, inside baseball/ academia-style, and battles boiling up to the surface from time-to-time. In the end, best described as an academic Mexican standoff?

Sometime in the 1980's I came across a book entitled "Destructive Generation: Second Thoughts About The '60's" by David Horowitz and Peter Collier, two reformed far left radicals who in their maturity recognized the inherently evil, anti-democratic, authoritartian nature of the New Left movement which had been so inpired by the old Marxists, and cloaked once more in the more respectable, euphemistic term "Progressive". This was Howard Zinn's movement and the Horowitz/Collier book revealed it's dark underside. Whatever lingering, romanticized, semtimental feelings I may have had for Howard and his Progressives were dispelled by Horowitz and Collier. The thought of "Progressivism" seemed more like "Oppressivism", and nihilism, and anti-American. Such thoughts were recently summed up in a 2006 essay by Craig and Fennell on Tom Wolfe's novel I Am Charlotte Simmons which appeared in The New Atlantis:

"I Am Charlotte Simmons is an indictment of the primary centers of higher education in America today. These institutions do not well serve the real longings and earnest ambitions of the young people who flock to them, at great cost and with great expectations, year after year. Instead of pointing students to a world that is higher than where they came from, the university reinforces and expands the nihilism and political correctness that they are taught in public schools, imbibe from popular culture, and bring with them as routine common sense when they arrive on campus. Of course, these two ideologies are largely incompatible: nihilism celebrates strength (or apathy) without illusion; political correctness promulgates illusions in the name of sensitivity. But both ideologies are the result of collapsing and rejecting any distinction between higher and lower, between nobility and ignobility, between the higher learning and the flight from reality."

Moving forward further into 2010, and the Main Stream Media's renewed lionization of the Baby Boom Generation, the very generation of B.U. students who became radicalized in 1965 and beyond. The question not posed by the Baby Boomer -worshipping MSM is this: Did the Baby Boom Generation, marked by student radicalism and Progressive politics, bring us to the present perilous state in which we now find the country? Or, as Howard Zinn and the Progs would have it, should the blame be placed squarely on the old American middle class marked by inequality, racism, and overweening pride, ambition, and greed? Where does the truth lie? Historians will say it is too soon to tell but the times demand leadership in the right direction NOW, there is no more time to waste. Which will it be? Whose version of the '60's, and the Baby Boomers, will be vindicated?

On 14 March 2010 at 5:10 PM, Howard Altarescu (SMG'70) wrote:

I took classes from Professor Zinn for four years at Boston University from 1966-1970. We also marched in the streets of Boston with him, joined him at the sanctuary at Marsh Chapel, joined the "teach-ins" on campus, listened to his lectures in class and his speeches on the Boston Common and in Marsh Plaza, and in Cambridge as well. An anti-war advocate, a civil rights proponent, and much more. Professor Zinn admonished us in the spring of 1970 as we were preparing to graduate, a graduation that never happened, to go back to our local communities and be good and decent citizens. Professor Zinn was a decent and a principled man, a role model and an educator.