brian cassidy bookselle

12.
[Protest]: [Photography
[Original Photo Album of Vietnam-Era
Demonstrations]
Raleigh, NC, [ca. 1970]
Oblong folio album in card slipcase, 11” x 14” approx. Vinyl gilt decorated
boards. Metal clasp binding with 37 matte card leaves holding
109 gelatin silver black-and-white photographs loosely inserted into
pages: 55 8” x 10”, 54 4” x 5”. Most captioned or titled, many with
lens used. Four photos apparently perished. Else near fine.
An album of protest photographs, likely taken by a North Carolina
State University student, of two anti-Vietnam campus demonstrations
in May and October of 1970. The May event, planned in objection to
Nixon's April announcement of U.S. plans to invade Cambodia (and an
ensuing public message of support by North Carolina Governor Bob
Scott), was dubbed “The Peace Retreat.” NCSU, even during the radical
1960s, remained a decidedly conservative institution, but after
the May 4, 1970 events at Kent State, support for “The Peace Retreat”
grew. On the Raleigh campus — as at similar, previously passive institutions
nationwide — massive protests erupted. The May 8th march
included over 6,000 demonstrators (out of a student body of just
13,000). The October protests were organized around a visit by Vice
President Agnew and show not only the anti-Agnew contingent, but a
sizable group of supporters from the campus' Republican groups. The
final 51 images of the album show more typical campus life, as well
as the photographer's family. Nearly all prints captioned or titled
by the photographer. An unusually well-executed collection of images
from a pivotal American moment, and an accomplished visual record
of late counterculture protests.
-1250-
23