Catonsville Nine Commemoration

Some of the real heroes of the Vietnam era anti-war movement are being commemorated Saturday 5/21. From the Indypendent Reader at   http://www.indyreader.org/content/catonsville-nine-commemoration:


CATONSVILLE NINE COMMEMORATION


May 21, 2011 - 12:00 - 14:00
CATONSVILLE NINE COMMEMORATION SATURDAY 21 MAY, 12N



The Baltimore Phil Berrigan Memorial Chapter of Veterans For Peace on Saturday 21 May
at 12 noon will commemorate the Catonsville Nine Viet Nam draft file burning action taken
by the chapter's namesake Phil Berrigan and 8 others.  Forty three years ago on May 17th
9 peace activists took draft files from the Catonsville Draft Board office and burned them
with homemade napalm in a Catonsville parking lot, and were eventually sentenced to jail
for their action.


At noon Baltimore VFP will gather at the Catonsville Post Office at Frederick Road and
Beaumont across from the Catonsville Public Library to vigil and hand out flyers, and will
later adjourn to the Knights of Columbus parking lot across the street for recollections
and fellowship. Please join us. Bring banners and posters. For information call Ellen
Barfield at 410-243-5876, or e-mail ellene4pj@yahoo.com.


Location


Catonsville Post Office
Frederick Road and
Baltimore, MD
United States
39° 36' 32.3712" N, 77° 42' 18.1764" W

Vietnam-Era Heroes

I just saw the new film about Daniel Ellsberg and I'd have to rank him at the top among heroic figures of the Vietnam era. He did, perhaps, more than any other person to end the war. Other heroic figures, IMHO, would include the Catonsville Nine, Noam Chomsky, and Howard Zinn.

Of course, any computer scientist could consider Chomsky a hero "simply" due to his contributions to linguistics. And perhaps I overrate the Catonsville Nine, having never heard of them before I moved to Catonsville. Or maybe I'm just too young.

OTA DTV in Catonsville

I've been transitioning to over-the air digital TV with my $12 converter box (the feds paid $40 of the cost). As of the weekend I had mixed feelings because stations were coming in well when the antenna was oriented correctly, but the antenna had to be reoriented for different stations, and sometimes it wasn't easy. I spent maybe 90 minutes online tonight reading about and shopping for antennas, and came close to buying a new one. A reviewer at Crutchfield said that he got much better reception when he moved his antenna away from the TV. My antenna--a several-year-old amplified Radio Shack model--was sitting on the TV. Made sense--this was higher than most anything else in the living room I could set it on, and my dad always put the rabbit ears on top of the set, at least up till when we got cable in the early '70s or so. So I looked at the setup, and moved the antenna into my bay window. I also visited antennaweb.com to get vectors to the various TV stations (most are at 56 degrees 5.2 or 5.3 miles, but a couple are at 291 degrees 2.1 miles, and MPT is at 174 degrees 19.7 miles. I can't say I used that info in a particularly deductive sense: my antenna's pointed vaguely NW and I'm getting good signal strength for every station I want. Stinking amazing. I'm getting the best picture I've ever gotten on that old RCA TV, and the lineup's pretty complete: ABC (2.1, 2.2, and 2.3), NBC (11.1 and .2), CBS (13.1), MPT (22.1, 22.2, and 22.3 in Spanish), Fox 45.1 and 45.2 CW 54.1 This is pretty good without cable, and with a clarity I'm not at all used to.