...and their memories

Michael Mitchell
What a great service you and your associates are providing! I can't thank you enough. Working on the DT in the early '70s was a great experience. I was on the staff just before the Watergate scandal broke (the break-in occurred in June, 1972, literally days after I started to work at the Associated Press as a summer intern). The biggest single event during my tenure occurred in my freshman year, 1969-70, during that spring. Then-President Nixon ordered bombing of Cambodia as part of the Vietnam War, which ignited protests on college campuses across the nation. USC, while then considered a relatively conservative place, was whipped into a frenzy. Classes were canceled and the DT, in protest, printed a blank newspaper one day (no editorial copy; only the ads that had been purchased and a brief explanation from the editor). During my tenure, newspaper production was in transition from hot metal to cold type. During my freshman year we still produced the paper in hot metal at a print shop in Glendale. Soon thereafter, we switched to cold type, also using a Glendale print shop. All type was messengered to the printer, set in type, and the editors then drove to Glendale to put the paper to bed. It made for some late nights, which was part of the fun of newspapering. The Vietnam War a huge ongoing issue. USC grappled with its place in the community as a bastion of conservative privilege and its emerging social conscience. There really was a palpable tension between the Frat Row conservatives and the liberal and radical forces on campus. The DT had representation from both groups, though the liberals/radicals held the advantage. Such were the times that it was distinctly un-cool to not be, at least outwardly, a bit radical. Football, then as now, was still big, despite the overarching concern for politics and the Vietnam War. Then, unlike now, USC was a powerhouse. My senior year, USC won the national championship and went undefeated with a team that included Lynn Swann and several others who went on to the NFL. Football was a bridge between the Frat conservatives and the "independent" liberals. It was very exciting. I had the bad luck to be sports editor of the DT my junior year when USC lost the Pac-8 championship to Stanford, which won the Rose Bowl that year behind quarterback Jim Plunkett, who won the Heisman and had a terrific career with the Oakland Raiders after a tough start at New England. Without question, my years on the DT were the most important and formative of my early life. Thanks for letting me share some that it and for building this important database. Add your own memory

Frank O'Donnell
Socal Magazine was (in?) the DT's Monday edition. Add your own memory

Stephen Randall
Since I was on campus from 68-72, I was there for much of the antiwar frenzy, the beginning of the feminist movement on campus, the '71 earthquake and I saw O.J. Simpson walking around. It's all too much for an email, but perhaps someday... Add your own memory

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