It Was Fifty Years Ago Today Re-Living 1968 (March)

It Was Fifty Years Ago Today Series: Mallory’s Journal Entries for March

On March 5, 1968, I wrote:

It comes down to this: take a good, long look. Then keep in the front (not the back, but the front) of your mind the phrase: “I don’t want to regret my life.” Then decide what you want to do about that. You’ve got this thing, this time and space. So what do you DO with it? You get one shot at doing something, being something. So don’t waste time with foolishness. No compromises. So when you come to the edge and you’re staring down into the bottomless blackness of eternity, you can say, “I did okay. I have few regrets. I spent my time well.”

March 17

Made an excursion to Washington D.C. We stayed with John’s cousin—a Lt. Commander in the Navy who works in the Pentagon. He and his wife showed us a great time. Saw the city—Arlington, JFK’s grave, towers and monuments. Had several good dinners and, best of all, visited the National Gallery twice. Titians and Rembrandts, 19th century French painting. The Rembrandts knocked me out!

March 26

A haze of blurry days. Yesterday I stood in Bentley Hall listening to myself talk about Manifest Destiny and staring out the window at grey nothing. But not ALL is grey. A bright spot is my darling son who just turned three—happy, smart, curious, spontaneous. His moods come and go like sunshine and clouds. Had a wonderful party last Saturday. Great mix of faculty and students and friends old and new. Lots of good food and wine. Those who stayed past midnight were in a wild mood. The rugs went out and the Blues Project went on and we danced the night away.

“Once upon a time, there was no time and that was when there also was no gods and no man walked the surface of the land. But there was the sea, and where the sea met the land, a mare was born, white and made of sea-foam. And her name was Eiocha.”

And in the larger world…

March 12, 1968

The Eugene McCarthy campaign, benefitting from the work of 2,000 full-time student volunteers and up to 5,000 on the weekends immediately preceding the vote, comes within 230 votes of defeating the sitting president Lyndon Johnson.

March 16

Senator Robert Kennedy, former Attorney General and brother of former president John F. Kennedy (1961-63) ends months of debate by announcing that he will enter the 1968 Presidential race.

March 16 (same day)

Although it will not become public knowledge for more than a year, US ground troops from Charlie Company rampage through the hamlet of My Lai killing more than 500 Vietnamese civilians from infants to the elderly.

March 28

Martin Luther King Jr. leads a march in Memphis which turns violent. After King himself had been led from the scene one 16 year old black boy is killed, 60 people
are injured, and over 150 arrested.