By Steve Otto
Chapter Three
From the Cleavers to the Yippies
It was probably during my first year of college that I came across books by Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin. Do It! was Rubin’s best known book. Hoffman wrote Revolution for the Hell of It and Steal This Book. I wasn’t really familiar with Yippie writings before then. I was struck by a theme found in Hoffman’s book Woodstock Nation. He kept insisting that what really pissed him off the most was:
“My friends are in prison for dope and cops stop me on the street cause I have long hair.”
He stated that he opposed the Vietnam War, opposed capitalism and supported the Black Liberation Movement, but drug laws made him really angry. I could relate to that because it was marijuana laws that first got me interested in politics, during my sophomore year at Goddard High, in 1970.
Goddard was a newly built modern school, located in a really small town, outside of Wichita. It was a large round building with a few hallways stretching out like the arms of a spider. The hallways were an orange color and the rooms were painted a real light brown. The building had new plush blue carpet.
It was my second week into the fall semester that I was sitting in Mr. Lempits’ speech class trying to decide what my first speech topic would be. As I sat on the wooden seat of my green metal desk, Mr. Lempits, about 30, a tall, light haired man with dark heavy spectacles said:
“You’ve had several days to decide on a topic for your speech. Today I want you to give me your topic. I’ll call out your name and you tell me what it is.”
He sat down at his large brown wooden desk and took out a green class roster booklet. He got his little blue Bic pen and began calling out names. I wanted to do something on marijuana laws. But I wasn’t sure if I should be as bold as to say that legalizing marijuana was my topic. One by one he read off the students names and wrote topics, everything from abolishing capital punishment to supporting the Vietnam War. Then I heard something I wasn’t expecting.
“My speech will be on legalizing marijuana,” a student said. His name was Dave Nelsin. After that, I figured if Dave could speak on legalizing marijuana, so can I.
“Mark Spies?” Mr. Lempits called.
“Legalizing marijuana,” I answered.
The bell rang and we headed out the doorway into the orange hallway. Dave, a stocky dark haired kid, slightly taller than I, walked up to me and asked:
“Do you get high?”
“Yea. I like to smoke hash and grass.”
“I’ve got some hash at home. I could bring it tomorrow. You want to try some?”
“Sure.”
“We’ll go to my car during third period when we take our break. Can you get anything to smoke?”
“I have some grass I got from some of my friends from the last school I went to. It’s pretty good.”
“You can bring that the day after tomorrow. That will give us some dope to smoke for two days.”
Third period was a study hall, but no one studied. They didn’t even refer to it as a study hall. We all referred to it as a morning break. We all just got in front of the pop and candy machines located in a large hallway just outside of the cafeteria. The cafeteria had a large room full of tan plastic tables and chairs. It was located just inside the front glass doors. It was the largest room in the school. It wasn’t hard for students to go out to their cars on break. Many did that for a cigarette break.
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