[Dialogue] from Lucille Chagnon - The Camden 28 on PBS P.O.V Sept. 11th

[Lifeline248 at aol.com]

Tomorrow, September 11 on P.O.V. (Point of View), PBS stations will be 
carrying The Camden 28, a documentary which Richard and I saw in Camden, NJ soon 
after it was finished and before its release.   It is indirectly, but profoundly, 
tied in to south Camden where I was an interim Principal at Sacred Heart 
School in the mid-80s, where Richard was an organist, and which we, like hundreds 
of other South Jersey suburbanites from three counties--including the parents 
of the young man who made the award-winning film, Anthony Giacchino--called 
our parish from 1979, the year after we were married, until we moved to Delaware 
in 2002.   Most of the K-8 inner-city children who attend Sacred Heart are 
not Catholic, and the pastor, our close friend, Father Michael Doyle, refuses to 
take money from the diocese which would have long since closed the school's 
doors.

Michael Doyle, was one of four priests arrested with 24 others in 1971 for 
attempting to break into the local draft board.   Betrayed to the FBI by one of 
their own, they were jailed but eventually acquitted.   And when the son of 
the man who betrayed them died soon after their friend's betrayal was revealed, 
they nevertheless were there for him.   

Here's more from P.O.V.
“The unspoken parallels between Iraq and Vietnam and the antiwar movements 
then and now are illustrated by 'The Camden 28,' a poignant documentary 
recalling
 the all-but-forgotten trial of 28 Vietnam War opponents, mostly members of 
the Catholic Left . . .” - Stephen Holden, The New York Times

Early Sunday morning, August 22, 1971, then-FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and 
Nixon Attorney General John Mitchell announced that 20 antiwar activists had 
been arrested the previous night attempting to break in and vandalize a Camden, 
N.J., draft board office.   Five days later, eight more plotters were 
indicted.   Charged with conspiracy to remove and destroy files from draft, FBI and 
Army Intelligence offices, destruction of government property and interfering 
with the Selective Service system, members of the “Camden 28” faced up to 47 
years in federal prison.   Who were these dangerous radicals that America's 
premier law enforcement agency so proudly took down?   They included four 
Catholic priests, a Lutheran minister and 23 members of the “Catholic Left.”

The Camden 28 were a far cry from bomb-planting Weathermen or even 
fist-waving militants.   But the very difference of these “Catholic Left” conspirators 
- their religious motives - as shown in the new documentary The Camden 28, 
premiering on PBS's P.O.V. series, may well have made them more dangerous 
opponents in the eyes of the Nixon Administration.   A growing Catholic and religious 
opposition to the war could not be dismissed as extremist to mainstream 
America, so they had to be brought down.   

Anthony Giacchino's The Camden 28 has its national broadcast premiere on 
Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2007 at 10 p.m. on PBS, as part of the 20th-anniversary season 
of public television's groundbreaking P.O.V. series.   (Check local listings.) 
  American television's longest-running independent documentary series, 
P.O.V. is public television's premier showcase for point-of-view, nonfiction films.

The Camden 28 reveals just how far the government was prepared to go in the 
cloak-and-dagger story leading up to the arrests, including the participation 
of a 29th man who was wonderfully adept at solving practical problems that 
otherwise baffled the well-meaning but un-handy activists.  But “the best-laid 
plan of mice and men often go awry,” as Nixon, Mitchell, Hoover and the nation 
would learn from the ensuing trial. 

You can find more about the film at its website
www.camden28.org/

and more information about this P.O.V. presentation by going to
http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2007/camden28/


 
Lucille T. Chagnon, M.Ed.
Literacy Acceleration Consultants
6448 Arbor Lane   -   P O Box 438
Chincoteague Island, VA 23336-0438
757-336-5047      fax -1391
cell   302-561-4575
e-mail:   lifeline248 at aol.com
www.teachtwo.net         …check it out!




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