Chicago Is In The Political Spotlight - Time To Remember 1968?

The Democratic National Convention is taking place this week in Chicago, and pro-Palestinian protestors are holding demonstrations and marching outside the United Center, where the convention is being held.  This takes me back to 1968, when the Democratic National Convention was also held in Chicago, and there were riots, along with instances of police brutality, as protestors demonstrated against the Vietnam war. The most violent events took place in Grant Park and along Michigan Avenue, right in front of the Conrad Hilton Hotel, where Hubert Humphrey, the presidential nominee, and other top Democrats were staying. The photograph on the left is of that very same Michigan Avenue, which I took in 2010, the last time I visited Chicago. And I was very surprised to find the ghostly image of Mayor Richard J. Daley front and center. Scary. 

At the time, I was living at home and attending Rich Central High School. And my sister Susan was living in a studio apartment at 1130 South Michigan, just blocks from where all those events were occurring. When she came home to visit, I asked her all about it - the protestors, the police in riot gear, the National Guard troops, the tear gas being used. She told me she knew nothing about what had happened as she took the Roosevelt Road bus to work the next morning but told me that explained all those soldiers driving around in jeeps and the funny smell in the air.  I learned that day Susan was not a political person, or for that matter, even vaguely interested in current events.  And will anything like what happened in 1968 repeat itself this time? Definitely not. The Chicago Police are well aware of the public reaction to their actions back then, and emotions these days are not nearly at the fever pitch they were during the Vietnam war. I think. And by the way, the photograph on the right I took from my sister Susan and brother-in-law George's apartment at 1130 South Michigan a few years after the 1968 convention, showing South Michigan Avenue as it looked back then. Riot free, I might add.