When The Kennedy-Johnson-Nixon
Governments Wasted A Whole Generation of Precious Youth In The Folly Of The
Vietnam War Which Caused Every Young Man So Serious Reflection-An Encore-Frank Jackman’s Fate-With Bob Dylan’s Masters of War In Mind
Introduction by Greg Green
Life is full of surprises as everybody over the
age of about three knows firsthand even if that hard fact does not stand out
and light a fire under you at every possible moment. Take my own situation. A
couple of years ago I was working hard at the American Film Gazette managing the overall film review schedule and
trying to outdo the legendary publisher Larry Lorton from Film Daily in the number of films we did reviews on. Then Pete
Markin (aka Allan Jackson who used that moniker in honor of a fallen hometown friend
who taught him and a few of the other writers here a thing or two about the
profession although he eventually fell on his own sword which is a story many
had detailed here over time and I need not go into) brought me over here to run
the day to day operations while he readied himself for retirement or some other
project. Jesus, then the Summer of Love, 1967, or rather the 50th
anniversary commemoration of the event hit this place like a whirling dervish.
I was too young to know much about that time but had heard some pretty raw and
scary stuff about from writers here who had been there under Markin’s guidance,
the real Markin not Allan. In any case Allan went crazy to make sure the damn
event got almost as much coverage after 50 years as when the thing actually got
off the ground and created what he and the others hatched up as a re-work on the
Generation of ’68.
All well and good. Well not all well and good
since the younger writer could in the words of Alden Riley one of the leaders
of the Young Turks give a fuck about the fucking Summer of Love, 1967 or any other
year in that decade. That led to a show-down and the demise of Allan Jackson, a
founding member, and my elevation to site manager and the overall poohbah of
this operation. According to what I hear around the water cooler things are
calmer now that not everybody has to spent 24/7/365 neck-deep in the 1960s like
that was the golden age, like that was the Garden as Lance Lawrence mockingly
called it.
All this to say that some of the stuff from the
1960s, and the recently concluded The Roots
is the Toots rock and roll series is one example that I was more than happy
to give an encore presentation (admittedly after a little nudge froof Eden m
Sam Lowell and others), is worth another inspection. That brings us to the real-life
story below about what happened to Frank Jackman when he was of draft age in the
age when that meant something and meant some tough decisions for a whole generation
of young men who didn’t know what the hell to do when their number got called.
Yeah, maybe this tale is not the sexiest one on the block, on the lowdown of
the 1960s when youth nation went overboard with sex, drugs and rock and roll but
fifty years or so later it still reads like a good story that people should
know about-and shout from the rooftops about as we enter another year of
endless war in the endless wars of our times.
From The Pen Of Sam Lowell
Jack Callahan’s old friend from Sloan High School in
Carver down in Southeastern Massachusetts Zack James (Zack short for Zachary
not as is the fashion today to just name a baby Zack and be done with it) is an
amateur writer and has been at it since he got out of high school. Found out
that maybe by osmosis, something like that, the stuff Miss Enos taught him
junior and senior years about literature and her favorite writers Hemingway,
Edith Wharton and Dorothy Parker to name a few, that she would entice the
English class stuck with him with through college where although he majored in
Political Science he was in thrall to the English literature courses that he
snuck into to his schedule. Snuck in although Zack knew practically speaking he
had a snowball’s chance in hell, an expression he had learned from Hemingway he
thought, of making a career out of the literary life, would more
likely wind driving a cab through dangerous midnight sections of town
occasionally getting mugged for his night’s work. That Political Science major
winding up producing about the same practical results as the literary life
though. Those literary designs stuck with him, savior stuck with him, through
his tour of duty during the Vietnam War, and savior stayed with him through
those tough years when he couldn’t quite get himself back to the “real” world
after ‘Nam and let drugs and alcohol rule his life so that he wound up for some
time as a “brother under the bridge” as Bruce Springsteen later put the
situation in a song that he played continuously at times after he first heard
it “Saigon, long gone…." Stuck with him after he recovered and
started building up his sports supplies business, stuck with him through three
happy/sad/savage/acrimonious “no go” marriages and a parcel of kids and child
support. And was still sticking with him now that he had time to
stretch out and write longer pieces, and beat away on the word processor a few
million words on this and that.
Amateur writer meaning nothing more than that he liked to
write and that writing was not his profession, that he did not depend on the
pen for his livelihood(or rather more correctly these days not the pen but the
word processor). That livelihood business was taken up running a small sports
apparel store in a mall not far from Lexington (the Lexington of American
revolutionary battles to give the correct town and state) where he now lived.
Although he was not a professional writer his interest was such that he liked
these days with Jimmy Shore, the famous ex-runner running the day to day
operations of the store, to perform some of his written work in public at
various “open mic” writing (and poetry) jams that have sprouted up in his area.
This “open mic” business Zack had embarked on s was a
familiar concept to Jack from the days back in the 1960s when he would go to
such events in the coffeehouses around Harvard Square and Beacon Hill to hear
amateur folk-singers perfect their acts and try to be recognized as the new
voice of their generation, or something like that. For “no singing voice, no
musical ear” Jack those were basically cheap date nights if the girl he was
with was into folk music. The way most of the "open mics" worked,
although they probably called them talent searches then, was each
performer would sign up to do one, two, maybe three songs depending on how long
the list of those wishing to perform happened to be (the places where each
performer kicked in a couple of bucks in order to play usually had shorter
lists). These singers usually performed in the period in front of the night’s
feature who very well might have been somebody who a few weeks before had been
noticed by the owner during a previous "open mic" and asked to do a
set of six to sixteen songs depending on the night and the length of the
list of players in front of him or her. The featured performer played,
unlike the "open mic" people, for the “basket” (maybe a hat) passed
around the crowd in the audience and that was the night’s “pay.” A tough racket
for those starting out like all such endeavors. The attrition rate was pretty
high after the folk minute died down with arrival of other genre like folk
rock, heavy rock, and acid rock although you still see a few old folkies
around the Square or playing the separate “open mic” folk circuit that also run
through church coffeehouses just like these writing jams.
Jack was not surprised then when Zack told him he would
like him to come to hear him perform one of his works at the monthly third
Thursday “open mic” at the Congregational Church in Arlington the next town
over from Lexington. Zack told Jack that that night he was going to perform
something he had written and thought on about Frank Jackman, about what had
happened to Frank when he was in the Army during Vietnam War times.
Jack knew almost
automatically what Zack was going to do, he would somehow use Bob Dylan’s Masters
of War lyrics as part of his presentation. Jack and Zack ( a Vietnam
veteran who got “religion” on the anti-war issue while he in the Army and
became a fervent anti-war guy after that experience despite his personal problems)
had met Frank in 1971 when they were doing some anti-war work among the
soldiers at Fort Devens out in Ayer about forty miles west of Boston. Frank had
gotten out of the Army several months before and since he was from Nashua
in the southern part of New Hampshire not far from Devens and had heard about
the G.I. coffeehouse, The Morning Report, where Jack and Zack were working as
volunteers he had decided to volunteer to help out as well.
Now Frank was a quiet guy, quieter than Jack and Zack
anyway, but one night he had told his Army story to a small group of volunteers
gathered in the main room of the coffeehouse as they were planning to
distribute Daniel Ellsberg’s sensational whistle-blower expose The
Pentagon Papers to soldiers at various spots around the base
(including as it turned out inside the fort itself with one copy landing on the
commanding general’s desk for good measure). He wanted to tell this story since
he wanted to explain why he would not be able to go with them if they went
inside the gates at Fort Devens.
Jack knew Zack was going to tell Frank’s story so he told
Frank he would be there since he had not heard the song or Frank’s story in a
long while and had forgotten parts of it. Moreover Zack wanted Jack there for
moral support since this night other than the recitation of the lyrics he was
going to speak off the cuff rather than his usual reading from some prepared
paper.
That night Zack was already in the hall talking to the
organizer, Eli Walsh, you may have heard of him since he has written some
searing poems about his time in three tours Iraq. Jack felt right at home in
this basement section of the church and he probably could have walked around
blind-folded since the writing jams were on almost exactly the same model as the
old folkie “open mics.” A table as you entered to pay your admission this night
three dollars (although the tradition is that no one is turned away for lack of
funds) with a kindly woman asking if you intended to perform and direct you to
the sign-up sheet if so. Another smaller table with various cookies, snacks,
soda, water and glasses for those who wished to have such goodies, and who were
asked to leave a donation in the jar on that table if possible. The set-up in
the hall this night included a small stage where the performers would present
their material slightly above the audience. On the stage a lectern for those
who wished to use that for physical support or to read their work from and the
ubiquitous simple battery-powered sound system complete with microphone. For
the audience a bevy of chairs, mostly mismatched, mostly having seen plenty of
use, and mostly uncomfortable. After paying his admission fee he went over to
Zack to let him know he was in the audience. Zack told him he was number seven
on the list so not to wander too far once the session had begun.
This is the way Zack told the story and why Jack knew
there would be some reference to Bob Dylan’s Masters of War that
night:
Hi everybody my name is Zack James and I am glad that you
all came out this cold night to hear Preston Borden present his moving war
poetry and the rest of us to reflect on the main subject of this month’s
writing jam-the endless wars that the American government under whatever regime
of late has dragged us into, us kicking and screaming to little
avail. I want to thank Eli as always for setting this event up every
month and for his own thoughtful war poetry. [Some polite applause.] But enough
for thanks and all that because tonight I want to recite a poem, well, not
really a poem, but lyrics to a song, to a Bob Dylan song, Masters of
War, so it might very well be considered a poem in some
sense.
You know sometimes, a lot of times, a song, lyrics, a
poem for that matter bring back certain associations. You know some song you
heard on the radio when you went on your first date, your first dance, your
first kiss, stuff like that which is forever etched in your memory and evokes
that moment every time you hear it thereafter. Now how this Dylan song came
back to me recently is a story in itself.
You remember Eli back in October when we went up to Maine
to help the Maine Veterans for Peace on their yearly peace walk that I ran into
Susan Rich, the Quaker gal we met up in Freeport who walked with us that day to
Portland. [Eli shouted out “yes.”] I had not seen Susan in about forty years
before that day, hadn’t seen her since the times we had worked together
building up support for anti-war G.I.s out at the Morning Report coffeehouse in
Ayer outside Fort Devens up on Route 2 about thirty miles from here. That’s
when we met Frank Jackman who is the real subject of my presentation tonight
since he is the one who I think about when I think about that song, think about
his story and how that song relates to it.
Funny as many Dylan songs as I knew Masters of
War, written by Dylan in 1963 I had never heard until 1971. Never heard the
lyrics until I met Frank out at Fort Devens where after I was discharged from
the Army that year I went to do some volunteer anti-war G.I. work at the
coffeehouse outside the base in Army town Ayer. Frank too was a volunteer, had
heard about the place somehow I forget how, who had grown up in Nashua up in
southern New Hampshire and after he was discharged from the Army down at Fort
Dix in New Jersey came to volunteer just like me and my old friend Jack
Callahan who is sitting in the audience tonight. Now Frank was a quiet guy
didn’t talk much about his military service but he made the anti-war soldiers
who hung out there at night and on weekends feel at ease. One night thought he
felt some urge to tell his story, tell why he thought it was unwise for him to
participate in an anti-war action we were planning around the base. We were
going to pass out copies of Daniel Ellsberg’s explosive whistle-blower
expose The Pentagon Papers to soldiers at various location
around the fort and as it turned out on the base. The reason that Frank had
balked at the prospect of going into the fort was that as part of his discharge
paperwork was attached a statement that he was never to go on a military
installation again. We all were startled by that remark, right Jack? [Jack nods
agreement.]
And that night the heroic, our kind of heroic, Frank
Jackman told us about the hows and whys of his Army experience. Frank had been
drafted like a ton of guys back then, like me, and had allowed himself to be
drafted in 1968 at the age of nineteen not being vociferously anti-war and not
being aware then of the option of not taking the subsequent induction. After
about three week down at Fort Dix, the main basic training facility for
trainees coming from the Northeast then, he knew two things-he had made a
serious mistake by allowing himself to be drafted and come hell or high water
he was not going to fight against people he had no quarrel with in Vietnam. Of
course the rigors of basic training and being away from home, away from anybody
who could help him do he knew not what then kept him quiet and just waiting.
Once basic was over and he got his Advanced Infantry Training assignment also
at Fort Dix which was to be an infantryman at a time when old Uncle Sam
only wanted infantrymen in the rice paddles and jungles of Vietnam things came
to a head.
After a few weeks in AIT he got a three day weekend pass
which allowed him to go legally off the base and he used that time to come up
to Boston, or really Cambridge because what he was looking for was help to file
an conscientious objector application and he knew the Quakers were historically
the ones who would know about going about that process. That is ironically
where Susan Rich comes in again, although indirectly this time, since Frank
went to the Meeting House on Brattle Street where they were doing draft and
G.I. resistance counseling and Susan was a member of that Meeting although she
had never met him at that time. He was advised by one of the Quaker counselors
that he could submit a C.O. application in the military, which he had
previously not been sure was possible since nobody told anybody anything about
that in the military, when he got back to Fort Dix but just then, although they
were better later, the odds were stacked against him since he had already
accepted induction. So he went back, put in his application, took a lot of crap
from the lifers and officers in his company after that and little support,
mainly indifference, from his fellow trainees. He still had to go through the
training, the infantry training though and although he had taken M-16 rifle
training in basic he almost balked at continuing to fire weapons especially
when it came to machine guns. He didn’t balk but in the end that was not a big
deal since fairly shortly after that his C.O. application was rejected although
almost all those who interviewed him in the process though he was “sincere” in
his beliefs. That point becomes important later.
Frank, although he knew his chances of being discharged
as a C.O. were slim since he had based his application on his Catholic
upbringing and more general moral and ethical grounds. The Catholic Church
which unlike Quakers and Mennonites and the like who were absolutely against
war held to a just war theory, Vietnam being mainly a just war in the
Catholic hierarchy’s opinion. But Frank was sincere, more importantly, he was
determined to not got to war despite his hawkish family and his hometown
friends,’ some who had already served, served in Vietnam too, scorn and lack of
support. So he went back up to Cambridge on another three day pass to get some
advice, which he actually didn’t take in the end or rather only partially took
up which had been to get a lawyer they would recommend and fight the
C.O. denial in Federal court even though that was also still a long shot
then.
Frank checked with the
lawyer alright, Steve Brady, who had been radicalized by the war and was offering
his services on a sliding scale basis to G.I.s since he also had the added
virtue of having been in the JAG in the military and so knew some of the ropes
of the military legal system, and legal action was taken but Frank was one of
those old time avenging Jehovah types like John Brown or one of those guys and
despite being a Catholic rather than a high holy Protestant which is the usual
denomination for avenging angels decided to actively resist the military. And
did it in fairly simple way when you think about it. One Monday morning when
the whole of AIT was on the parade field for their weekly morning report
ceremony Frank came out of his barracks with his civilian clothes on and
carrying a handmade sign which read “Bring the Troops Home Now!”
That sign was simply but his life got a lot more
complicated after that. In the immediate sense that meant he was pulled down on
the ground by two lifer sergeants and brought to the Provost Marshal’s office
since they were not sure that some dippy-hippie from near-by New York City
might be pulling a stunt. When they found out that he was a soldier they threw
him into solitary in the stockade.
For his offenses Frank was given a special court-martial
which meant he faced six month maximum sentence which a panel of officers at
his court-martial ultimately sentenced him to after a seven day trial which
Steve Brady did his best to try to make into an anti-war platform but given the
limitation of courts for such actions was only partially successful. After that
six months was up minus some good time Frank was assigned to a special
dead-beat unit waiting further action either by the military or in the federal
district court in New Jersey. Still in high Jehovah form the next Monday
morning after he was released he went out to that same parade field in civilian
clothes carrying another homemade sign “Bring The Troops Home Now!” and he was
again manhandled by another pair of lifer sergeants and this time thrown
directly into solitary in the stockade since they knew who they were dealing
with by then. And again he was given a special court-martial and duly sentenced
by another panel of military officers to the six months maximum.
Frank admitted at that point he was in a little despair
at the notion that he might have to keep doing the same action over and over
again for eternity. Well he wound up serving almost all of that second six
month sentence but then he got a break. That is where listening to the Quakers
a little to get legal advice did help. See what Steve Brady, like I said an
ex-World War II Army JAG officer turned anti-war activist lawyer, did was take
the rejection of his C.O. application to Federal District Court in New Jersey
on a writ of habeas corpus arguing that since all Army interviewers agreed
Frank was “sincere” that it had been arbitrary and capricious of the Army to
turn down his application. And given that the United States Supreme Court and
some lower court decisions had by then expanded who could be considered a C.O.
beyond the historically recognized groupings and creeds the cranky judge in the
lower court case agreed and granted that writ of habeas corpus. Frank was let
out with an honorable discharge, ironically therefore entitled to all veterans’
benefits but with the stipulation that he never go onto a military base again
under penalty of arrest and trial. Whether that could be enforced as a matter
of course he said he did not want to test since he was hardily sick of military
bases in any case.
So where does Bob Dylan’s Masters of War come
into the picture. Well as you know, or should know every prisoner, every
convicted prisoner, has the right to make a statement in his or her defense
during the trial or at the sentencing phase. Frank at both his court-martials
rose up and recited Bob Dylan’s Masters of War for the record.
So for all eternity, or a while anyway, in some secret recess of the Army
archives (and of the federal courts too) there is that defiant statement of a
real hero of the Vietnam War. Nice right?
Here is what had those bloated military officers on
Frank’s court-martial board seeing red and ready to swing him from the highest
gallows, yeah, swing him high.
Masters Of War-Bob Dylan
Come you masters of war
You that build all the guns
You that build the death planes
You that build the big bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know
I can see through your masks
You that build all the guns
You that build the death planes
You that build the big bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know
I can see through your masks
You that never done nothin’
But build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it’s your little toy
You put a gun in my hand
And you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther
When the fast bullets fly
But build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it’s your little toy
You put a gun in my hand
And you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther
When the fast bullets fly
Like Judas of old
You lie and deceive
A world war can be won
You want me to believe
But I see through your eyes
And I see through your brain
Like I see through the water
That runs down my drain
You lie and deceive
A world war can be won
You want me to believe
But I see through your eyes
And I see through your brain
Like I see through the water
That runs down my drain
You fasten the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you set back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
As young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud
For the others to fire
Then you set back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
As young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud
You’ve thrown the worst fear
That can ever be hurled
Fear to bring children
Into the world
For threatening my baby
Unborn and unnamed
You ain’t worth the blood
That runs in your veins
That can ever be hurled
Fear to bring children
Into the world
For threatening my baby
Unborn and unnamed
You ain’t worth the blood
That runs in your veins
How much do I know
To talk out of turn
You might say that I’m young
You might say I’m unlearned
But there’s one thing I know
Though I’m younger than you
Even Jesus would never
Forgive what you do
To talk out of turn
You might say that I’m young
You might say I’m unlearned
But there’s one thing I know
Though I’m younger than you
Even Jesus would never
Forgive what you do
Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul
Is your money that good
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul
And I hope that you die
And your death’ll come soon
I will follow your casket
In the pale afternoon
And I’ll watch while you’re lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I’ll stand o’er your grave
’Til I’m sure that you’re dead
And your death’ll come soon
I will follow your casket
In the pale afternoon
And I’ll watch while you’re lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I’ll stand o’er your grave
’Til I’m sure that you’re dead
Copyright © 1963 by Warner
Bros. Inc.; renewed 1991 by Special Rider Music
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