(Petaluma, California, Gothic News Service, 04/03) The descendants of radical and progressive chicken farmers of America - including many of Petaluma's new and anti-war citizens - gathered today for a public sendoff of Uncle Sam's corpse on a bicycle propelled pilgrimage across America. Destined for an August revival celebration on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, crowds gathered around the float at the intersection of Main and Washington to witness the open wounds on Samšs large red, white and blue body which lay crumpled upside down on a large float - his haggard, sad and open eyes barely able to look out on the crowds that stopped City traffic for miles around.
Petaluma, now a mainly white suburb north of San Francisco, spent most of the first half of the 20th Century known as the chicken and egg capital of the nation. Founded and sustained by secular socialist, Yiddish speaking chicken farmers, the community was internationally known for its contriubtions to the defense of Sacco and Vanzetti, the Scottsboro Boys and the Spanish Republic, including the participation of some of its members in the famed anti-fascist Abraham Lincoln Brigade.
"Much of the leadership was threatened and quieted during the McCarthy period, including the executions of the Rosenbergs," said Eileen Fishman, one of the daughters and organizers. "Wešve come back to revive our roots as well as join with our fellow citizens. Our pilgrimage is to send a message of defeat to the neo-McCarthy/Ashroft alliance and to revive and protect our Constitutional liberties."
In the morning crown many concerned citizens lined up around the float to cover Sam's costume with fresh and familiar stickers, including:
Take Back America
Rage Against the Coup
Resist Repression
Democracy Not Hypocrisy
If You Are Not Outraged
You Are Not Paying Attention
Others took turns to place painted eggs, chicken feather pillows, as well as other procreative symbols under and around Sam's body and face.
At eleven ošclock, the float - pulled by the "Abe Wheeler Brigade", its volunteer members drawn from Bicycle Peace Coalitions up and down the West Coast slowly pedaled out of town. The cross-continental trip will stop to rally citizens in town rallies across the country including a major July 4th stop in Wichita, Kansas on July 4th. There, in a nocturnal gathering, 100 poets will join in a rare choral reading of the "Wichita Vortex Sutra," considered by many as one of Allen Ginsberg's major poems.
"Allen was the visionary baby of our elders," is all Ms. Fishman would say as to why the poem was chosen. "You might go read it or get the recording of Allen," she told reporters. "The work is really quite tender."
In addition to providing muscle power, the bicycle coalition forces expect to fend off attacks from OšReilly and other Fox Network Cable SUV brigades, some of whom have already publicly promised to threaten the highway pilgrimage.
"When we get to the Lincoln Memorial, there will a public celebration in which we crack fresh eggs, revive Sam with feather ticklers, stand him up, show off his stickers and let him dance and sing a little to the bike coalition brass band - nothing too corny while we let Lincolnšs shrine invoke the bravery of our Petaluma elders and this countryšs many other progressive ancestors," Ms. Fishman said, just before hopping on her bike to leave town.
Posted by Brian Stefans at April 04, 2003 06:57 AM | TrackBack