“And this administration today, here and now, declares unconditional war on poverty in America.” -Lyndon B. Johnson, “State of the Union”
In Episode 3, Anna Goodman explores how a focus on the process of design over its products located community design at the intersection of anti-institutional activism and other social movements. It focuses on a series of events catalyzed by the construction of Berkeley’s People’s Park, using audio clips of participants provided by the Pacific Radio Archives, the documentary Design as a Social Act as well as commentary from the urban and architectural historian Anthony Raynsford.
Download“And this administration today, here and now, declares unconditional war on poverty in America.” -Lyndon B. Johnson, “State of the Union”
“…we no longer have a say in decisions that affect our lives. We call on all students, faculty, staff, and workers of the university to support our strike…” -Newsreel Films, “Columbia Revolt”
“…their viewpoint was community is something you actually have to create, this phrase intentional community…” -Anthony Raynsford
“The background of People’s Park was that this was university land that was acquired in 1967…” -Anthony Raynsford
“…they put an ad out in the Berkley Barb which calls on anyone who’s willing to come with shovels, and tools, and sod, and plants to build this park…” -Anthony Raynsford
“The university got very worried about who were all these people coming in, hippie looking, planting trees, laying in sun and we can’t have this happening…” -Clare Cooper Marcus, Design as a Social Act: Tales of Architectural Activism, Part 2: Community Design
“Protests, and tear gassing, and soldiers with bayonets, and one person killed, one person blinded, it was just a really astonishing time…” -Clare Cooper Marcus, Design as a Social Act: Tales of Architectural Activism, Part 2: Community Design
“He actually asked the college and then it came to me to do a very rapid survey of the neighbors around People’s Park…” -Clare Cooper Marcus, Design as a Social Act: Tales of Architectural Activism, Part 2: Community Design
“The issue of the park is related to racism, to the war, to the structure of the university as to see that our struggle to save the park has to go beyond the park itself…” -Barry Weisburg, 1969 Broadcast on KPFA from Pacific Radio Archives
“See I think the issue is that while your parents and my generation, you know that went to college during those flaccid Eisenhower years…” -Sim Van Der Ryne, 1969 Broadcast on KPFA from Pacific Radio Archives
“But I think all of them, to a greater or lesser extent, were interested in experimenting with the alternative to the traditional family…” -Anthony Raynsford
“…so this became the site of something called the ‘People’s Park Annex’ after it was fenced off…” -Anthony Raynsford
“There actually was no demolition of buildings, so it was all adaptive reuse. They actually liked the scale of these old buildings…” -Anthony Raynsford
Writer and Producer
Anna Goodman
Issue Editor
Anna Goodman
Senior Editors
Joseph Bedford and Curt Gambetta
Production Assistant
Ethan Curtis
Announcer
Trudy Watt
Interview
Anthony Raynsford
Special Thanks
The Pacific Radio Archives, Dr. Patrick Jones, the Roz Payne Sixties Archive, and Portland State University’s College of the Arts