NRR Project: The Lone Ranger -- 'The Osage Bank Robbery' (Dec. 17, 1937)

 

Earle Graser, the first great impersonator of the Masked Rider of the Plains.

NRR Project: The Lone Ranger – “The Osage Bank Robbery”

Written by Fran Striker

Directed by James Jewell

Broadcast Dec. 17, 1937

“He is simply the best-known hero of the West ever created,” writes radio historian John Dunning, and of course he is right. It is a fact that the one character dramatic radio produced that survived its heyday, and that remains known throughout the culture, is the one and only Lone Ranger.

His creator George W. Trendle referred to him as “the embodiment of answered prayer.” He was the most upright of heroes, a vigilante lawman of the Old West who went masked and never stopped to receive thanks from those he saved from the clutches of evil. He did not drink, or smoke, or curse. According to Fran Striker, the man whose prolific writing brought him to life, the Lone Ranger even had a creed – 

“1. I believe that to have a friend, a man must be one.

2. That all men are created equal and that everyone has within himself the power to make this a better world.

3. That God put the firewood there, but that every man must gather and light it himself.

4. In being prepared physically, mentally, and morally to fight when necessary for that which is right.

5. That a man should make the most of what equipment he has.

6. That ‘this government, of the people, by the people, and for the people,’ shall live always.

7. That men should live by the rule of what is best for the greatest number.

8. That sooner or later... somewhere... somehow... we must settle with the world and make payment for what we have taken.

9. That all things change, but the truth, and the truth alone lives on forever.

10. I believe in my Creator, my country, my fellow man.”

He was incorruptible, honest, utterly and unswervingly dependable. He never had romantic doings with women, that we knew of. He spoke correct English, and never misused it. He fired his pistols expertly, only to disarm, never to wound or kill. He was a saint in cowboy gear.

As the best-known opening narration of the show stated so eloquently:

“With his faithful Indian companion, the daring and resourceful masked rider of the plains led the fight for law and order in the early Western United States. Nowhere in the pages of history can one find a greater champion of justice. Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear. From out of the past come the thundering hoofbeats of the great horse Silver! The Lone Ranger rides again!”

His origin story is mythic. He is one of six Texas Rangers who were ambushed at Bryant’s Gap by the outlaw Butch Cavendish and his gang. Surrounded and outgunned, all the Rangers were killed – save one, John Reid who was mortally wounded and left for dead. Reid is found and nursed back to health by a childhood friend, the Native American, Tonto, who also digs six graves so that no one will know he survived. Reid swears to avenge the death of his fellow Rangers by upholding the principles of truth and justice. He is ready to take on a new identity.

“You lone Ranger now,” comments Tonto. And the man is born.

He was born on Jan. 31, 1933, via station WXYZ in Detroit. The station’s owner, the aforementioned Trendle, left his association with the CBS network, losing access to its shows. He determined to operate independently, and starting searching for a show that would be a hit.

He settled on the idea of a Western series, and then he and several others, some of whom also complained that they were all least partly responsible for the creation of the character, hashed out the details of the show. The outline was then passed on to hack writer extraordinaire, Fran Striker, who is said to have crushed out 60,000 words a WEEK for for various radio shows, magazines, books, and the like. It was Striker who developed and refined the character.

The show was an immediate hit. Promotions that were advertised on the air resulted in thousands of responses. Soon WXYZ could syndicate the show to other stations, eventually creating what came to be known as the Mutual Broadcasting System, which wound up bigger than only NBC and CBS. The Lone Ranger founded a financial dynasty.

The show is still instantly recognizable, as the closing strains of Rossini’s (public domain) overture to his 1829 opera William Tell rang out, ever to be identified as the Lone Ranger’s theme. (It can only be speculated what Rossini might have thought of this.) After the stirring opening narration, each self-contained episode would begin.

There was trouble at the bank, or with ranchers vs. farmers, or bandits, rustlers, crooked sheriffs, and on and on. The conflict was quickly established, as the good and bad characters interacted for the first half of the episode, setting up a confrontation. Then the Lone Ranger would swoop in (frequently Tonto clued him in to what was going on), and through words of wisdom and, if necessary, gunplay, he would put the situation to right.

“The Osage Bank Robbery” is a typical Ranger story. Two grizzled, kindly old prospectors have run out of money and face starvation. Two bandits, merciless killers, hide after a robbery in the abandoned mine the two prospectors had worked. The Ranger brings the prospectors out to the mine under the impression that there was more silver to be mined from it. There they set off a charge that closes the mouth of the mine, leaving the bandits helpless inside. The Ranger lets the prospectors capture them and get the reward, saving their bacon, so to speak. And, of course, before he can be thanked, it’s “Hi-yo, Silver! Awaaay!” And off he and Tonto go.

Director James Jewell had been with the project since the beginning, having already created a repertory acting company for the station, and blessed with a talented and resourceful sound effects department. Upwards of a dozen actors could be called on for a single episode. The Ranger was played primarily by Earle Graser until his tragic death in 1941 – after that, Brace Beemer filled the role. John Todd played Tonto the whole way. Taken all together, this small mob of collaborators created shows that still stand up to a good listening.

Of course, the show was not woke and had its problematic aspects, first of all in the character of Tonto. Although he is portrayed as intelligent and possessed of a will of his own, he speaks in monosyllables that render him frequently as though he were simple-minded. Still, the show avoided ethnic stereotypes – there were no comic Chinese, Black, or Mexican characters, a rarity for the time.

The show had a religious group of fans, and the show persisted through 1954, a 21-year run unmatched in the industry. He was the idol of children and, as they grew up, adults as well. The Ranger was impossibly perfect, but if you’re going to have a hero, why not insist on the best? At his best, the Lone Ranger affirmed that right and wrong existed, and that right can win out over wrong. Not a bad creed to live by.

The National Recording Registry Project tracks one writer’s expedition through all the recordings in the National Recording Registry in chronological order. Nest time: The Wisconsin Folksong Collection.

NRR Project: 'Vic and Sade' - "Decoration Day Parade' (May 28, 1937)

 

NRR Project: Vic and Sade – “Decoration Day Parade”

Written by Paul Rhymer

Broadcast May 28, 1937

The greatest show in the history of network radio was simplicity itself. Using only two to three characters, writer Paul Rhymer evoked an entire eccentric, hilarious world. 

Rhymer was an NBC copywriter with a wicked sense of humor. In 1932, he started the grueling practice of writing a 15-minute comic serial episode every Monday through Friday and getting it on the air, working steadily at it from 1932 through 1946. In the few hundred recorded episodes that survive, his level of comic genius never falters. There's not a so-so bit in the bunch.

He set his mini-sitcom in an unnamed Midwestern town, somewhere south of Chicago. There, in the “small house halfway up in the next block,” dwelt Victor Gook, his wife Sadie, and their teenage son Rush. Victor was an accountant at the Consolidated Kitchenware Company’s Plant Number Fourteen. Sade was a housewife. Together they looked over their boy and went through all the activities that you might expect small-town folks to take part in.

Though they were set in a stereotypical “average home,” the daily vignettes took the listener into a crazy reality where people were named things like Y.Y. Flirch and Rishigan Fishigan of Sishigan, Michigan. There was Fred and Ruthie Stembottom, who Vic and Sade always played cards with. There was Mr. Gumpox, the garbage man. Vic belonged to a lodge, the Drowsy Venus chapter of the Sacred Stars of the Milky Way; when Sade wanted a treat she would scoot down to the Tiny Petite Pheasant Feather Tea Shoppe. Rush would play with his friends, Blue-Tooth Johnson and Smelly Clark, whose uncle Strap worked at the Bright Kentucky Hotel, down by the railroad tracks. He followed the on-screen adventures of Four-Fisted Frank Fuddleman and read books about the indomitable Third Lieutenant Clinton Stanley.

Vic was played by Art van Harvey, an older actor whose nasal tones made him seem always a little befuddled and put out. Sade, played by Bernadine Flynn, was a typical wife and mother, speaking in a broad flat accent that perfectly catches the cadences of Midwestern speech. Billy Idleson played Rush as a curious, warm-hearted, enthusiastic young man. In 1940, added to the cast was Clarence Hartzell as Uncle Fletcher, who was loopy and dense and kept telling outrageous stories about people he slightly knew, such as a man who was a guard at the Missouri State Home for the Tall, “who later died.”

Now, here’s the key – Vic and Sade reveals all this bizarre information through the dialogue among Vic, Sade, and Rush. None of the aforementioned supporting characters ever appeared on the show; we learned about them as the three discussed them. Each installment would be a self-contained little story, on topics such as “R.J. Konk’s Improved Portrait” or “Milton’s Dirt in Fruit Jars.” Using the barest premise, Rhymer would pile absurdity on top of absurdity, making the typical small-town life seem impossibly bracing, fantastic, and mysterious.

The actors always play it straight, like regular folks, unfazed by the bizarro world around them, which makes the jokes even more hysterical. The obvious affection Rhymer has for the Gooks keeps the show from just being a torrent of absurdities. We can identify with the Gooks, who are good people just living their daily lives. It made every listener to the show feel like a warm and friendly guest (and indeed, many prominent Americans stopped everything to tune in to the show at 3 p.m.).

Rhymer is said to have written more than 3,500 Vic and Sade scripts, with no loss of vigor or inventiveness throughout the show’s 14-year run. There are only a few hundred recordings of episodes that survived. One can only imagine what an immensity of laughs are trapped in the pages of Rhymer’s archives (which, fortunately, are extensive – several collections of scripts from the show have been published).

The episode chosen by the National Recording Registry is one of the earliest ones still in existence, and it is a typical hoot. Vic is in charge of the town’s Decoration Day parade, but he has to go out of town and insists that the mayor take over his elaborate set of plans for the day’s events. “Don’t they just line up at 10 a.m. and walk to the cemetery?” asks Rush, provoking a scoff from Vic. Vic’s grand scheme is doomed to failure, and he will definitely not get the respect that he thinks he deserves.

Vic and Sade set an example of what radio could do, and where comedy could go. Its influence is subtle but pervasive. Billy Idelson went on to become a prominent TV actor, writer, director, and producer, giving us shows such as The Bob Newhart Show and Love, American Style. The quirky observational humor, and the divine absurdities evoked, still set a gold standard for American comedy.

The National Recording Registry Project tracks one writer’s expedition through all the recordings in the National Recording Registry in chronological order. Nest time: The Lone Ranger.

NRR Project: The destruction of the Hindenburg (May 6, 1937)

NRR Project: The destruction of the Hindenburg

Reported by Herbert Morrison

May 6, 1937

It’s one of the most iconic recordings of all time, instantly recognizable, a byword for disaster. When the zeppelin Hindenburg caught fire and fell to earth, killing 36, it was the end of an era for this peculiar method of transportation. It also demonstrated the value of radio in capturing historic events as they happened.

The zeppelin was created in Germany in the late 19^th century. It is an immense rigid airship, consisting of several bags of lighter-than-air gas trapped in an aluminum shell in cigar shape, from which depend engines, propellers, and compartments for passengers and crew. It was a prestigious and unique way to travel, and many cross-Atlantic flights took place in zeppelins during the early part of the 20^th century.

The zeppelin was designed to be filled with inert helium gas, but the United States controlled the supply, so flammable hydrogen gas was used instead. On May 6, 1937, the Hindenburg was scheduled to come to rest in Lakehurst, New Jersey. As the craft was preparing to land, it caught fire and plunged to the ground. The fire was spectacular; the ship was completely consumed in less than a minute.

In addition to the newsreel cameras, reporter Herbert Morrison was covering the landing live for radio. His famous eyewitness report gives us an indelible impression of destruction and dismay. Morrison was there to interview passengers arriving in America from the Hindenburg, and only happened to be recording to a disc when the airship exploded. His voice cracked with emotion, Morrison stuck to his microphone and gave us an indelible record of the incident.

Stations did not normally play recorded pieces; usually, all reporting was done live. However, this recording broke that tradition. Soon, recorded pieces from all over the world would begin to make their way onto the airwaves, enriching the listeners’ understanding.

After this incident, the impetus that drove the development and use of zeppelins ended abruptly. The footage was just too intense. Other zeppelins were retired. Would-be travelers had their fares refunded. From this point on, the history of aviation focused on the use and evolution of the fixed-wing airplane.

The National Recording Registry Project tracks one writer’s expedition through all the recordings in the National Recording Registry in chronological order. Nest time: Vic and Sade.

NRR Project: 'The Fall of the City' (1938)

 

NRR Project: ‘The Fall of the City’

Written by Archibald MacLeish

Directed by Irving Reis

Performed on the Columbia Workshop, CBS Radio

Premiered April 11, 1937

30 min.

Commercial radio, at its conception, was thought of as mere entertainment (although much “elevating” classical music was featured on the airways in early years). Comedies, soap operas, detective shows, horror – genre shows were the norm, and network ambitions did not stretch beyond their confines.

However, there were a few people in radio who could see its potentiality as an aesthetic medium – one the virtues of which could be exploited in a new and unique way, to enlist the listener in the creation of imaginary landscapes and situations that could only be conjured by sound alone.

Such a man was Irving Reis, a former engineer who came to CBS with the idea for a 30-minute sustaining (meaning network-sustained, commercial-free) program that experimented with radio’s possibilities, both technically and dramatically. In July 1936, the Columbia Workshop was born.

CBS was always the more adventurous network. NBC had been established earlier, was more popular, and had gathered all the stars of radio into its schedules. (Such was its dominance that there were two NBC networks, NBC Red and NBC Blue – Blue was sold off and became ABC in 1942.) So CBS had to try harder, to attempt risky material and push the boundaries of the medium. Anyone who listens extensively to old-time American radio will find that CBS productions were sharper, from the writing all the way down to the sound effects.

Columbia Workshop brought the medium to the threshold of artistic significance with this production, mounted live on April 11, 1937. The drama, the first in verse on the radio, was crafted by the Pulitzer-winning poet and dramatist Archibald MacLeish.

“The Fall of the City” was inspired by the rapid takeover of weaker territories by fascist governments in the 1930s, most notably by Italy and Germany. MacLeish was also thinking of the overthrow of the city of Tenochtitlan by Hernan Cortes in 1521. It’s the story of a great city that capitulates to fear, abasing itself eagerly before a conqueror who is not as he seems. (The parallels with today’s American dilemma are not lost on this writer.)

The show was special – the production called for the sound of great crowds, mingling with a score by the great Bernard Herrmann. To stage it, CBS took over the Seventh Regiment Armory in New York City, needing the reverberations its cavernous space could provide. A young Orson Welles, then rocketing to fame, took the part of the Narrator, working out of an isolation booth; a then-unknown Burgess Meredith held a key role as well. Two hundred extras, augmented by four taped crowd noises played at the same time, gave the impression of a huge, milling crowd in a sunbaked central city square.

The show almost didn’t come off. Tennis players wanted to use the space the day of the broadcast; so did the National Guard. Somehow the producers dissuaded these interlopers, and the show went off.

It’s a remarkable creation, very assured for all its being the first of its kind. The tension mounts as the Narrator describes the growing panic of the city as the conqueror approaches. A woman rises from the dead and declares “The city of masterless men/Will take a master./There will be shouting then:/Blood after!” Speakers rise up and decry the surrender of the citizens to fear, to no avail. The conqueror enters, clad in armor; the crowd falls to the ground. The conqueror raises his visor; there is nothing inside. “The people invent their oppressors,/Thet wish to believe in them./They wish to be free of their freedom/Released from their liberty/The long labor of liberty ended.”

The show was an amazing success, and proved that listeners had a hunger for more than mere entertainment. Orson Welles took note of this success, and it moved him and others to create The Mercury Theater on the Air a year later. Another young and ambitious radio writer, Norman Corwin, would take heart as well, and would soon be known as the resident bard of dramatic radio.

With the death of commercial radio in the late 1950s, the idea of producing content strictly for radio went by the by. (It continued in England, where radio drama and aesthetic innovation thrives to this day.) Still, “The Fall of the City” showed everyone what only radio could do – create, with the help of the listeners’ imaginations, fantastic and compelling new worlds.

The National Recording Registry Project tracks one writer’s expedition through all the recordings in the National Recording Registry in chronological order. Nest time: the crash of the Hindenburg.

NRR Project: 'Bonaparte's Retreat' (1937)

 

NRR Project: ‘Bonaparte’s Retreat’

Performed by W.H. Stepp, fiddle

Recorded 1937

Again, I must defer to essayist David S. Lynch’s fine work outlining the tune, its background, and the fascinating life of the performer who recorded it. Read it here.

“Bonaparte’s Retreat” was a titled applied to many different fiddle tunes in the early 19^th century, all of which commemorate Napoleon Bonaparte’s disastrous retreat from Russia in 1812. This tune is lively and instantly recognizable as a movement from Aaron Copland’s “Billy the Kid” Suite. The rollicking high spirits one gets from listening are infectious.

Stepp lived in eastern Kentucky, which is where folklorists Alan and Elizabeth Lomax found him in 1937. Stepp’s mastery of the instrument is amazing, as he seems to be wielding multiple fiddles at once, spinning out a rapid counterpoint. Alan Lomax called him the best fiddler he had ever heard.

The National Recording Registry Project tracks one writer’s expedition through all the recordings in the National Recording Registry in chronological order. Nest time: Archibald McLeish’s Fall of the City.

They want you stupid

 

The present administration is doing its darndest to turn America into a fascist autocracy. To this end, they are attacking many government departments, services, laws, and regulations in order to deliver the nation into the hands of Trump and his billionaire friends. To date, this effort has not been stymied by lawmakers or by the judiciary (although the judiciary is beginning to get its back up). It’s on us, the citizens, to stop it.

There is plenty to complain about. A laundry list of the executive branch’s malevolent actions would fill many pages. Part of their plan is to hit us all with as many encroachments as fast as possible, so that we’re overwhelmed. But what action do we take, and how?

The key piece I would like to address is the attack on education. The destruction of the Department of Education, the defunding of the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences, the takeover of the Kennedy Center, and the ham-handed attempt to control the curriculum of universities all add up to one thing: they want you stupid.

We are already faced with the reality that we have a long way still to go to function as an educated and informed public. 90 million people didn’t vote; 54 percent of adults can’t read above the sixth-grade level; 21 percent of Americans are illiterate. 21 percent.

And that’s how those in power like it. Stupid people obey. Stupid people don’t think their way to solutions. Stupid people live in an environment dominated by fear and anger. They fall for a dictator’s lies without the ability to use critical intelligence to peel apart and destroy those untruths.

Mitch Albom writes: “If the culture doesn’t work, don’t buy it. Create your own.” Conservatives have been working for decades to create a culture in which minorities, immigrants, the LGBTQ population, women, “unproductive” people (meaning people with disabilities, a subsection of the population that the Nazis murdered), and those who champion them don’t count. Let’s face it, if you’re not an able-bodied white straight Christian male, those in power do not have any use for you. The “official” culture they seek to impose (MMA? WWF? Square dancing?) is a recipe for regimented disaster.

So, it’s time to create a new culture. How do we do that? It begins with creating a space of self-respect, a feeling that you are a valuable and significant human and that you have something to contribute to the larger world. Then, there’s the little matter of will power. Can you make the time in your life to be a little more conscious and informed person?

This is always possible, even for us with full-time jobs and no discretionary funds to speak of. The diverse and multicultural society that America is isn’t going anywhere. It’s there, we just have to celebrate, honor, and exercise in it. The best way to do this is to KEEP LEARNING.

You can do it. Anyone who feels that they have done their due diligence in the realm of their personal education by graduating from college (another rapidly shrinking part of the populace) is mistaken. We need to STAY CURIOUS. We need to utilize our libraries to the greatest extent possible. Every book you check out, every hour you spend on the library’s internet, every class you take there increases your knowledge base, and it certifies the usefulness of the institution. Libraries are the last safe space, the place where you don’t have to buy anything to hang out there, the place where you can read and think and learn.

Every trip to a museum opens up your mind a little. Every concert, even every new type of cuisine you try, every time you try something new – music, art, film, books, plays, dance – you are increasing the I.Q. of the general populace. It doesn’t take much time or money.

I don't come from money, I come from just-barely-making-it. When I was little, I fell in love with the arts. I feasted on them growing up, and I dreamed of being a playwright, of being an actor. After an aborted college career, I decided to continue to work in the culture, to become a comedian. And I became one. (I wasn’t very good, but I do get an A for effort!) When that career ended, I decided to become a journalist. Just like that. I had no training, no certificate or diploma to legitimize my ambition. I just went for it. And I did it!

I created a position for myself where I could dig into and report on the culture extensively. I couldn’t afford to patronize opera houses, concerts, museums. Instead, to get access for free I reviewed plays, concerts, albums, and books. It worked! Soon I was writing on arts and entertainment for newspapers and magazines – while they were still in good health.

Then the bottom fell out of the journalism industry – no more work there. What to do next? I decided to write a book. And I did. Then I sold it. Then I wrote another one, and sold it. I’m working on three more books right now. I look at my efforts and I think, “Wow, how did you do that?” The learning never has to end.

I am still living life on the low end of the economic spectrum, but my days are filled with purpose and interest. You don't have to be rich to enjoy art – and in fact, a non-wealthy people’s perspective on the culture is just the kind of subversive thinking we need. By expressing yourself, you can still create new and better realities.

Keep your mind open. If I can do it, you can. YOU CAN DO IT. Try new things. Think about and discuss issues that perturb you. Culture gives us two great things needed for an ethical society to function – empathy and remorse, neither of which our opponents possess. Live and breathe the culture YOU WANT TO BRING INTO BEING, and spread it.

NRR Project: 'One O' Clock Jump' (1937)

 

NRR Project: ‘One O’ Clock Jump’

Written by Count Basie and his Orchestra

Performed by Count Basie and his Orchestra

Recorded July 7, 1937

3:02

First of all, I must recommend John Wriggle’s masterful and comprehensive essay on this piece at the National Recording Registry, which you can read here. It tells you everything you need to know!

I can only add my personal observations. William James Basie (1904-1984) came to Kansas City in 1927, and became enamored of what can be termed a Kansas City style of jazz – extended solos over improvised riffs. The scene was remarkably active for the size of the city it was in; soon the influence spread across the country, shaping swing music in its image.

Basie played with Walter Page’s Blue Devils for a couple of years, then fell in with Bennie Moten’s band. When Moten died, unexpectedly, in 1935, Basie built a new band for himself based primarily on Moten’s veterans. Several remarkable soloists were part of the ensemble – including Hot Lips Page, Buck Clayton, Jimmy Rushing, Lester Young – that a kind of ever-springing inventiveness marked their collaborations.

And they truly were collaborations. “One O’ Clock Jump” is a “head arrangement” – that is, one the band has worked out without writing down the music. This kind of facility is impressive enough in itself, but the progression of melody and countermelody in “Jump” is nothing short of amazing. It starts out with Basie on piano, backed by the rhythm section, tossing off a nimble musical thought. The thought is passed and elaborated on, contrasted, toyed with, a genuinely improvised little masterpiece.

This kind of composition is anathema to most composers, but it’s the soul of jazz.

The National Recording Registry Project tracks one writer’s expedition through all the recordings in the National Recording Registry in chronological order. Nest time: Bonaparte’s Retreat.

Do white people suck?

What in the hell is going on? The new administration’s hostility to Black people, gay people, women, and just about any minority you can think of is palpable. It is moving to dismantle all the diversity, equity, and inclusion programs in the country – not just governmentally, but in the private sector as well. Any and every racial justice program is facing termination. I expected a lot of hateful action and petty behavior from Trump’s people, but this is ridiculous, granular in its approach to detail, going out of its way to incarcerate, humiliate, abuse, and torture individuals it doesn’t like without due process.

What in the world makes white people think that their grip on reality is threatened by the existence of people unlike them?

The achievements of these minorities are being scrubbed from government websites. Books about minority issues and contributions have been removed from military libraries. Censorship is stifling free speech at universities, in the media, at our workplaces, and it is only a matter of time before we will be warned not to express ourselves freely in public. That’s how dictators do.

What is the motivation? First, let’s remember that only 30 percent of the American electorate voted these Nazis in. 30 percent of you didn’t vote. THIRTY PERCENT. So much for civics. Of those who did vote, a slight majority favored the fascists, and put them in power.

Now this third of our nation, the part that’s vengeful and prejudiced, is in the driver’s seat. Remember, there is another third of the country that opposes what is happening, and is just now getting its head around a plan of action to ensure that people are treated decently. So there is hope.

But it’s such a LOT of hate out there. The pent-up anger and resentment of white supremacists is real. What is it based on? It’s based on pure, stark, unreasoning fear. They have a “replacement theory” which states that minorities are flooding the country in a conscious and concerted effort to outnumber the white inhabitants of the U.S. A. To which I say: so? And to what end? I was raised on the concept that America is the great melting pot – not one that pours its matter into identical molds, but one that allows us to work together while retaining our unique qualities and sharing them with others.

The knuckleheads are afraid that, if for some reason more non-white people lived here, there would be retribution. That white people would be treated in the way they’ve treated minorities down the centuries here – that they’d be killed, oppressed, locked up, and beaten in their turn. Because they can’t imagine people being different from them, of having higher moral standards than that.

President Lyndon B. Johnson once said, “If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you.” The Trump administration is gleefully trying to restore the separation of the races, the suppression of the other, and the forcing of ideological conformity all down the line. It’s trying to ship us back to a so-called golden age that never existed, one in which everyone but straight white males didn’t count. There is a desperate edge to all the administration’s actions, a blind lashing out that’s creating damage and havoc.

One thing we do know about white people is that, when they threatened, they get violent. They are experts at killing other people and taking their stuff. That’s the principle this country was founded on! And since we have more guns than anyone, look for the last vestiges of restraint to flake away, bringing us back to the days of the Wild West. Look for self-appointed armed militias to spring up and terrorize the populace. Look for it and keep looking – the institutions we thought would guard us from this did not do their job, and the mainstream media is in the hands of the powerful. We have to work together and keep each other informed in order to coordinate action to change the dreadful state of affairs we are in.

And, hey, what would we do if we had to lean on only white culture? Square dancing, spelling bees, quilting, country music, hymns, pie-eating contests? Will we all wear gingham? Imagine the culture as a Lawrence Welk broadcast, repeated over and over, forever. No thank you. I need the whole culture, the full spectrum. I want to hear from Black artists, women artists, gay artists, Muslim artists, Albanian-American artists, I don’t care. We need the collision of identities and ideas. That, and not conformity, obedience, and suppression, is the hallmark of America’s greatness.

So do white people suck? They do when they feel cornered.