Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Editor’s note: In her story on 1A, Brenna Hawley wrote about a particularly tense period at the University of Kansas. She wants to tell readers what she learned from the semester-long project.
In November I started a project about the history of campus buildings for a class. As I was sifting through photos in Spencer Research Library, I came to the box of Kansas Union photos. Halfway through the box was a file folder filled with images of the historic Kansas Union fire in 1970. I’d always known about the fire and hoped to write a story about it. I was lucky enough that the 40th anniversary of the event came in the same semester I would be enrolled an in-depth reporting class.
I started researching what I thought would be simply a project about a magnificent fire, the damage it did and what people remembered about it. When I started making calls, though, I realized that what happened in April 1970 wasn’t just limited to that month. It was so much bigger. The late ’60s and early ’70s were full of racial tension, the looming draft lottery, murder, drugs and a multitude of other issues. The more I researched and read through countless articles, I realized that something happened almost every day — a major fight, a firebombing, a fire.
I want to emphasize that my story, while filled with as much information as I could fit, still touches only the tip of the iceberg. I could only fit a small amount of what happened in a more-than-3,000-word story. And I suspect that even if I wrote a book about the time period, I would still see only slightly more of the iceberg. But I’m trying to stay loyal as possible to what happened in the space and scope I had.
This has been my favorite project I’ve worked on, in both journalism and the rest of college. The people I talked to and the stories I heard were fascinating. It’s also been the hardest project I’ve worked on. Obviously I wasn’t alive in 1970, and everyone I talked to had a slightly (or vastly) different perspective of what happened then. Memories of the same event varied from person to person, and it was interesting to see what events stuck out for them. Fusing all of these views into one story was difficult, and I’m sure in the process, I left some experiences out.
What I wonder most after writing this story is what I would have done. Would I have been an activist? Would I have quit school and left my finals unfinished? Would I have stuck around that summer? I have no idea. But it made me think. It’s inspired me to continue working on this project past this story and expand what I’ve already learned. I love history, and there is so much contained in this Lawrence movement. I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I did researching.
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Comments
Guest Column: Research only touches tip of iceberg
I noticed that you only put ONE conservative point of view in your story, just one. Please explain that... It would have also been accurate to explain how much the radical left wing damaged this country during those days. Those students hurt people and damaged property and now they are "leaders" in society today??? I forget the name but you had one "hero" calling others rednecks and then physically attacking them. The man is a criminal and should have a record. I also recommend James Michener's Kent State and a couple of pertinent chapters from Herbert: The Making of a Soldier by Anthony Herbert. You may learn that Kent State protesters were not that peaceful and what was happening back in Kansas at the time.
Guest Column: Research only touches tip of iceberg
I loved reading all of this.
Great job, Brenna!
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