HOME
June 9, 1987
MARTIAL LAW DECLARED IN THE CITY AND COUNTY OF SAN FRANCISCO, CALIF.
All citizens are hereby instructed to return to their dwellings until further notice. The State of California is preparing forceful action against the terrorists and criminals who are seizing buildings in downtown San Francisco. All honest and patriotic citizens are advised to return home immediately to avoid unnecessary destruction of property and life.
Mayor Carol Rude Sliver, S.F.
Governor Thomas Broadley, Ca.
San Francisco Examiner: June 8, 1987 (Editorial)
Attempts to negotiate with the terrorists in the Bank of America buildings have thus far been futile. No one inside seems to be able to speak for everyone and no specific demands have been issued.
There has been, however, a great deal of communication between the terrorists and the outside world via telephones a shortwave radio station which they have commandeered...
...these communists are calling for something completely unrealistic and impossible to achieve- (from their broadcasts) "a world without the state-administered, capitalist austerity of the 'Free World' or the bureaucratic tyranny of the 'Communist countries'... a world where people co-operate freely in providing for each others' needs and desires without the constraints of wage-labor, money, or any kind of institutional authority." - Imagine the foolishness!
...We hope this hostage seizure can be settled peacefully, though the agitated, rash behavior exhibited thus far leads us to fear the worst...
...Utopian visions have been around for as long as human society has existed. They are no more realistic today than they were at the time of Jesus Christ.
Terrorism is unjustified whatever the cause, it cannot coexist with a free society, and must be thoroughly suppressed.
Arriving at her job at 8:57 AM, as usual, Frieda Johnson didn't realize
what was going on just a few blocks away. She parked her car and went into
the Pacific Telephone building at Third and Harrison. She knew about the
Bank of America building occupations but she hadn't heard any of the shortwave
broadcasts or seen any transcripts, so she believed the TV and radio news
reports about terrorists who had infiltrated the BofA staff. She had been
a bit frightened about driving form the safety of her suburban home into
work, only a mile from the B of A World Headquarters siege, but she was
more afraid of losing her chance at the promotion to division manager which
she knew would be decided soon.
As she entered the building she noticed several executives in the lobby,
glancing furtively toward the entrance, urgently discussion something. Frieda
always made it a point to discreetly ignore her superiors unless they spoke
directly to her. She hadn't lasted this long or come this far only to blow
her chances for further career advancement by butting into her boss' conversations.
"Oh Frieda, could you come over here, please?" called Frank Martin,
her boss. "I'd like to introduce you to Seymour Taylor. You know John
Gilles, our general manager."
"Yes, good morning Mr. Gilles, how do you do Mr. Taylor."
"Ms Johnson, Mr. Taylor here is an agent of the FBI. They are requesting
our help in dealing with the terrorist siege at the Bank of America buildings.
You will help him with whatever he needs" said Gilles.
"Of course" she replied coolly, though she felt apprehensive as
she always did when working around law enforcement officials. This wasn't
the first time she helped out in such a way. The San Francisco Police Dept.
and a series of small booths in which they carried out wiretaps. She had
felt justified in helping them since they were primarily used to bust drug
rings, but more and more in the past 3-4 years they served as listening
posts on political communications between different people and groups. This
made her feel uncomfortable since it was difficult for her to believe in
the government's claims about the dangerousness of these "subversive
organizations." She still remembered the lies of Vietnam an Watergate,
and the stories about McCarthyism her parents told her.
She took Mr. Taylor of the FBI up to the 7th floor. As they walked out of
the elevator (it was now about 9:15 Am) Frieda noticed immediately that
there were only about 20 of the usual 53 data entry operators at their terminals.
She decided to get Mr. Taylor settled before dealing with the apparent sick-out.
They walked down the corridor and when they turned the corner they both
started at the sign.
"What's the meaning of this?" demanded Frieda of the group of
data entry clerks who were gathered around a desk which had a radio transmitting
on it.
Taylor tried to bolt as soon as he saw the group standing around the desk,
but he and Frieda were grabbed by several of the workers and put into chairs.
"Listen!" they commanded.
This is the voice of Free San Francisco, broadcasting from high atop the
former Bank of America building, renamed the Tower of Power!. . . And for
now, we have the power here in our city. There are now 12 buildings under
workers' control, the shipyards and Hunter's Point are occupied, the PG&E workers
have risen and electricity and gas are assured us. Muni workers are operating
buses and streetcars for free, and we have reason to believe that supermarket
and restaurant workers along with truck drivers are bringing in provisions
from the Safeway distribution center in Richmond. Ten different high school
and university campuses have been taken over by students. There are thousands
of people out on Market Street and we've just been handed a Martial Law
decree that has been dropped on the crowds -- forceful action is being
prepared -- (A FEMALE VOICE CUT IN, URGENTLY)
Listen, everybody who can help! Organize yourselves at your workplaces and
in your neighborhoods. Arm yourselves! Gather together food, water, and
weapons. Prepare to defend yourselves against National Guardsmen who will
be here soon. We will never stand alone, call your friends and relatives
and tell them what's gong on! . . . Don't get killed trying to be friendly,
but remember fraternization is probably our best weapon. We must reach and
win over these troops. . .
Taylor squirmed as he tried to figure out a way to escape. Frieda didn't
know what to make of it all -- who were these terrorists and was it true
what they said about all the new occupations? "Oh, why didn't I stay
home today?" she wondered to herself.
"Well, Ms. Johnson, whose side will you be on?" asked Joan Chang,
an employee of about 8 months in the data entry center. "His?"
gesturing with disgust at Taylor. "Or ours?"
"You'll never get away with this" said Frieda.
"Don't be ridiculous, we are deciding who's getting away with what
now" said Walter Fortune, a black man with three children who had ended
up here after being laid off from his job as a teacher in San Francisco
for the second time.
"He's got a point there, at least for now" she thought to herself.
Fried had always been "pragmatic" (that is, sensitive and responsive
to power) so she said "I guess you're right about that. I can say quite
honestly that I'm not with him and will never be with the FBI or the government,
though I'm not sure if I'm really with you either."
Walter, Joan, and the others broke into smiles. The plain truth was that
they weren't exactly sure if they all agreed with each other. They had only
been together as a work group for a short time. The longest anyone had been
there was a year and a half, but most people only lasted few months before
they went on to something else.
The common feeling of isolation (which they all shared, each alone) was
rapidly disappearing and a new sense of power was present among them. the
realized something very important was going on and that they could be part
of it. Many felt an almost child-like enthusiasm.
"Let's go make sure they haven't cut off the phones! said Walter, and
most of them hurried off to see what they could do.
"You'll pay for this, Johnson!" threatened Taylor.
They left him handcuffed to the toilet in the men's room on the 7th floor.
"All right men! Our job is to clear the streets and seal off downtown.
The San Francisco Police Department SWAT teams will be making the actual assaults
on the buildings held by these commie, anarcho-terrorists. We are going to assist
them as necessary, but no shooting unless you are ordered. Your officers have
been carefully briefed on what circumstances justify the use of firearms-- you
will have to rely on your crowd control techniques."
Jimmy Radile listened as the colonel tersely outlined their mission. He had
only joined the National Guard about five months ago, and already he found himself
in this important anti-riot unit. During his nineteen years growing in Fresno,
he had heard about riots on TV and they had seemed so distant. Now there were
riots in San Francisco, somehow connected to those terrorists in the Bank of
America buildings, and he was going to help restore order.
After his basic training and a few months on weekend-only duty, he was called
to active duty for this special unit. A lot of the guys in the outfit were involved
with putting down the riots in East Los Angeles and Watts last summer. Jimmy
vaguely remembered something about Guardsmen shooting unarmed citizens and burning
some houses down with incendiary grenades.
"But everyone was acquitted and anyway, those people were going crazy!
Somebody had to stop them before they destroyed the city. It was too bad about
the excesses, but violence can only be stopped by stronger violence" he
remembered his father telling him.
The briefing ended and the Guardsmen went out to the airfield and boarded the
nine C5-A's which would carry them northwest to San Francisco. Jimmy's unit,
code named ''Red-eater' was scheduled to helicopter from Cruise Field on the
north edge of San Francisco. From there, fifteen platoons of 50 each with a
machine-gun on a jeep would fan out through Fisherman's Wharf, Chinatown, Polka
Gulch, and over Nob Hill towards downtown.
"Hey! Look at that!" shouted one of the soldiers, just as they passed
over the Bay Bridge in Sikorsky helicopters. Jimmy and the others craned their
necks for a view of downtown San Francisco to see what the fellow was gesturing
at.
From the top of Transamerica Pyramid, the Bank of America building, and a few
others were enormous colorful banners flapping in the wind. Along the waterfront
thousands of people milled about. AC Transit buses headed out onto the Bay Bridge
and parked broadside, already about six rows deep and growing fast. "'Black-bouncer'
(unit 2) would have a tough time breaking through that logjam even with tanks
and bulldozers!" thought Jimmy.
"Look at all those people!" exclaimed one soldier.
"And check out that bus blockade on the bridge!" yelled another.
"Silence!!" bellowed Major Bricknell, field commander for the mission.
"Back to your seats!" he commanded.
His stern demeanor was briefly animated by the strength of his delivery, but
he immediately lapsed back into the bland grayness characteristic of career
military men.
Jimmy's eyes quickly scanned the others to see if they felt as intimidated and
fearful as he did. Most seemed sullen, but few looked as nervous as Jimmy felt.
His nervousness was greatly increased by his certainty that 'Black-bouncer'
would never get through the bus blockade on the bridge. "I wonder what
those color banners were for?" he thought. "I hope they were right
when they told us in anti-riot training that most people will go home when we
get there" thought Jimmy, as he contemplated the sight of thousands of
people around the waterfront.
A few minutes later they were disembarking at Cruise Field at the northern edge
of San Francisco near the Golden Gate Bridge. It was now about 11 o'clock in
the morning. After about 20 minutes they all assembled, and set out one platoon
at a time. Jimmy's platoon was the second to the last of the fifteen that stretched
out eastward on Bay Street from Funston Field past Van Ness to Ghiradelli Square.
They encountered no resistance, only a few curious onlookers from windows and
a few people scurrying down side streets as they passed by. "All honest
and patriotic citizens should go home and tune in the TV to Channel 7 for further
information and instructions" blared the public address system on each
jeep. "Clear the streets! Martial Law is in effect! Clear the streets or
you are subject to arrest!"
Jimmy walked about 20 feet ahead of his jeep, his automatic rifle resting in
his arms. He felt like he was in a dream -- somehow he had gotten into a WWII
movie but the scene was San Francisco. The streets were almost deserted while
he thought about the warm sun on his helmet, the cool wind on his face, and
the blaring speakers form the jeep.
"Hey, I heard there's a bunch 'o gooks in this town! My brother told me
he met up with three Vietnamese he used to know in Saigon in 1970 in a back
street south of Market. They were gonna rip 'im off but then they recognized
each other so they settled for the half gram of coke he had." Jimmy's consciousness
was invaded by the nervous babbling of another recent recruit, an 18 year old
kid from Modesto.
"Fuck you! Shut up!" said another fellow, even more uptight, in the
other side of Jerry from Modesto.
On they went, turning up Van Ness, past Lombard and Broadway. As they cleared
the top of the hill at Washington Street they came to a sudden halt. Ahead of
them from one side of Van Ness across to the other was a solid line of people,
arms linked, shoulder-to-shoulder. And behind the front line were thousands
more, as far as they could see, and they were slowly advancing down Van Ness
toward platoons 14 and 15 of 'Red-eater.'
Jimmy was struck by the crowd -- their earnest, excited expressions. These sure
didn't seem like the raving commie, anarcho-terrorists they had been briefed
about.
"'This is 'Red-eater'- 14/15 to 'Log Cabin', come in 'Log Cabin.' Facing
thousands on Van Ness, please advise course of action." The platoon sergeant
was frantically radioing in to the major the situation of his troops but aid
and orders were not forthcoming. The Major was too busy with the other units
who were facing similarly overwhelming odds. Platoons 41 and 2 had already been
overrun and had surrendered without a shot down on the waterfront.
The 100 National guardsmen and two jeeps with machine guns, stretched across
Van Ness, couldn't withstand the onslaught of these thousands, though they could
exact a terrible price if the platoon sergeant gave the order to resist and
fire. As the crowd came within a half a block their yells were clearly audible:
"Don't shoot! We are not your enemy! Talk to us! Don't shoot! We have no
arms! We won't hurt you! We are people just like you, not terrorists or rioters!"
Jimmy felt utterly confused, he was not prepared for this. Jerry from Modesto
started crying to his right. "I don't wanna kill nobody" he sobbed.
The platoon sergeant yelled the orders "Use your rifles to hold back the
crowd -- don't let them pass." The crowd drew nearer, Jerry and six other
young recruits threw down their guns and ran off to the rear, stripping off
their uniforms as they ran. Jimmy, sweating profusely, clutched his rifle in
front of him.
There was no more than 10 ft. separating the line of Guardsmen from the crowd.
Jimmy found himself face to face with hundreds of people.
"Listen you guys, we want to be free!" said a middle-aged fellow with
thick glasses.
"Why are you here? Who are you defending?!? demanded a blond man with an
earring in his left ear.
"Wouldn't you like to live in a world where you don't have to worry about
how you're gonna make a living, in a world where you have the freedom to experiment
with life?" asked a young woman in overalls and a green turtleneck.
"Wouldn't you like to grow up without having to go through ten years of
traumatic adolescence full of insecurity, fear, and sexual frustration?"
asked a young man, not long past his own adolescence, only a year or two older
than Jimmy.
By now the crowd was within arms reach.
THWACK!! 44-year-old Don Emory, a fireman from Visalia, smashed his rifle into
the jaw of a leather-clad gay man. Immediately the crowd surged forward and
shots rang out. Screams came from all around. Jimmy tried to hold the crowd
back with his gun and began swinging it at the people who were rushing all around
him.
BAM! BAM! more shots from the other side of the crowd. Blood was everywhere
as Jimmy went down, choked from behind and pummeled by people all around him.
37 people died in the battle of Van Ness Ave. including 23 Guardsmen. 115 more
were injured, including most of the captured Guardsmen who were severely beaten
before being brought to City Hall.
The San Francisco Commune lasted for five and half weeks before the city was
successfully retaken by the U.S. Marines at a horrible cost in human lives:
thousands dead and injured. Severe civil disturbances rocked twelve other cities
during 1987, but none went quite as far in advancing a vision and a social experience
of a world without institutional power, where people worked together without
bosses and shared everything without prices or money, and where the very idea
of Property actually began to lose meaning.
Jimmy Radile joined the defense of the city and had a significant role in seizing
Cruise Field, the battle of Tank Hill in the Haight, and the battle of Russian
Hill. He was killed on the 4th of July when the building he was living in Polka
Gulch was hit by an air-to surface missile.
Frieda Johnson was a changed woman for three and a half weeks. She didn't return
to the suburbs but stayed on and played a vital role in the phone maintenance
group, and also helped out on shore watch, But as the government commandos slowly
tightened the noose around the liberated zone downtown, her temporary residence
was raided and she immediately surrendered, begging to be allowed to go home
to her husband in Belmont.
The Bank of America buildings were retaken finally without firing a shot. They
had been completely gutted by fire and vandalism. As the city joined the revolt,
the B of A employees abandoned the buildings to help in the more general efforts.
When the commandos arrived they were met by some sniper fire from a few buildings
nearby but the Bank of America buildings and the surrounding blocks in the Financial
District and near City Hall were deserted. Soiled and torn banners hung limply
from rooftops, and signs everywhere proclaiming "Free San Francisco"
were ripped down by the troops.
Most of the workers (including Fred, Jenny, and their friend Willie Moreland)
survived the pacification and were never discovered as "The" Bank
of America rebels. They all came to play important roles in the following years
in the snowballing movement for social liberation.