Tag Archives: peace history

April 4

1958
4,000 begin first of what would become eleven consecutive annual Easter protest marches from London to Aldermaston AWRE spy base in England. (1958)
1967
Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, in a speech at the Riverside Church in New York City, called for common cause between the civil rights and peace movements. The Nobel Peace Prize winner proposed the United States stop all bombing of North and South Vietnam; declare a unilateral truce in the hope that it would lead to peace talks; set a date for withdrawal of all troops from Vietnam; and give the National Liberation Front a role in negotiations.

“…this war is a blasphemy against all that America stands for….”

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April 3

1958
Three day, fifty mile peace march began from Trafalgar Square, London, to Aldermaston, Berkshire site of the AWRE (Atomic Weapons Research Establishment). This famous march marked the beginning of many protests against Britain’s development of nuclear weaponry.

David and Renee Gill at the first Altermaston march 1958

David and Renee Gill at the April 2004 march

Some 10,000 people joined the 1958 rally.

still protesting for nuclear disarmament.
Read their story

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April 2

1903
A demonstration of 10,000 liberals, in Monterrey, Nuero Leon, protesting the re-election of General Bernardo Reyes as state governor, were fired on by federales under the command of Reyes himself. 15 protesters were killed & many more wounded.
1917
Jeannette Rankin, (R-MT) the first woman ever elected to Congress, took her seat. (1917)
1960
Nearly 100 student from 19 states attend workshop at Highlander School; Guy Carawan teaches them 1930s labor songs: “We Shall Not Be Moved,” “Keep Your Eyes on the Prize,” “This Little Light of Mine,” “We Shall Overcome.”
1966
One hundred thousand Vietnamese demonstrated in Da Nang against both the U.S. and South Vietnamese governments.
1970
Massachusetts enacted a law which exempted its citizens from having to fight in an undeclared war.

April 1
April Fool’s Day

1621
The Pilgrim-Wampanoag Peace Treaty is signed.
1649
Diggers occupy Saint George’s Hill, seizing land to hold in common & to plant.

1841
Brook Farm, perhaps history’s most famous utopian community, was founded by George and Sophia Ripley near West Roxbury, Massachusetts. Its primary appeal was to young Bostonians who shrank from the materialism of American life, and the community was a refuge for dozens of transcendentalists, including Ralph Waldo Emerson and Nathanial Hawthorne.

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March 31

1492
Jews Expelled from Spain.
1840
10-hour workday established for federal public works employees.
1927
Cesar Chavez born.
1959
Dalai Lama Begins Exile.
1924
Gandhi begins nonviolent campaign for temple entry, Vykom.
1968
President Lyndon Johnson announces he will not seek reelection, orders partial bombing halt in Vietnam & appoints Averell Harriman to seek negotiated peace talks with North Vietnam.
1970
2,500 UC-Berkeley students turned in their draft cards at the Oakland, California, Induction Center in protest of the Vietnam war.
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March 30

1891
Signaling a growing movement toward direct political action among desperate western farmers, “Sockless” Jerry Simpson called on the Kansas Farmers’ Alliance to work for a takeover of the state government. Simpson was one of the most well-known and influential leaders among Populist-minded western and midwestern farmers of the late 19th century. Angered over low crop prices, crippling bank loans and high shipping rates, farmers began to unite in self-help groups like the Grange and the Farmers’ Alliances. Initially, these groups primarily provided mutual assistance to members while agitating for the regulation of railroads and grain elevators. Increasingly, though, they became centers of support for more sweeping political change by uniting to help form the new nationwide third-party movement known as the Populists.

“Sockless” Jerry Simpson

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March 29

1626
First American forestry legislation enacted, Plymouth Colony.
1870
African-American men gain right to vote, 15th Amendment.
1925
Black leaders protest the showing of D. W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation, scheduled to open at the Rialto Theatre in Charleston on April 1, on the grounds it violated a 1919 state law prohibiting any entertainment which demeaned another race.
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March 28

1799</b.
NY State abolished slavery.

1918
2,000 in Quebec, Canada, demonstrated against military conscription in the midst of World War I. Four died in the ensuing riot.

Anti-Conscription Parade in Victoria Square, Montreal, Quebec, May 24, 1917,
The gathering in this photo looks calm. Riots nearly a year later resulted in the death of four demonstrators in Quebec City.

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March 27

1867
Blacks stage ride-ins on Charleston, SC street cars; 2 months later, railway company integrates.

1966
20,000 Buddhists marched silently for peace in Hue, South Vietnam.

1969
The first Chicano Youth Liberation Conference is held by the Crusade for Justice; the poet known as Alurista presents his poem on the myth of Aztlán, which captures the imagination of the conference.

1979
Nuclear power plant accident at Three Mile Island, PA. (1979)

March 26

1966
Over 50,000 marched in the Fifth Avenue Vietnam Peace Parade in New York City.

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