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PROGRAMME INFO |
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Nigel Wrench examines two seminal moments from the 1960s and '70s.
You can listen to the programme on the website shortly after broadcast.
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Don't Miss - Nigel Wrench on Making the Programme
 "I wasn't prepared, as we set out to make the two parts of From This Moment On, for the way in which I'd be transported into the past..."
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Programme 1 - The 13 Seconds That Ended Flower Power.
 On 4 May 1970. At a protest against the Vietnam War on the campus of Kent State University, Ohio, soldiers of the National Guard shot and killed four students. From This Moment On argues this was the moment that flower power ended.
On a bitterly cold night in May 2002, two hundred people gathered to mark the 32nd anniversary of the massacre at Kent State University. When soldiers fired on the students as well as those killed nine lay injured. Alan Canfora was one of those wounded that day. "Out of the 77 Guardsmen only a dozen from Troop G stopped and raised their weapons. They began to shoot. I thought they were just firing blanks until I felt a bullet go through my right wrist."
That moment of gunfire, thirteen seconds - sixty-seven shots -- was not only one of deep and lasting tragedy, but of a fundamental cultural shift. The moment, the programme says, young America lost its innocence.
 Listen to Programme 1
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Programme 2 - When The Philosopher Sat Down.
 Whitehall, London. February 1961. Several thousand people marched down from Trafalgar Square. At their head an 88-year-old man under a banner that read 'Action for Life.' Bertrand Russell, the philosopher was flanked by members of the 'Committee of 100.'
Whatever the doubts of the professional politicians, the demonstration was an extraordinary success. Famous people were involved, not just as signatories but as participants. They were on the newspaper front pages: a precedent had been set. In the decades that followed, those with causes they regarded as similarly critical would take note.
Bertrand Russell told reporters: this was just a dress rehearsal. The Committee of 100 began laying plans for another, much bigger demonstration in the autumn. But the authorities were nervous. This movement had to be stopped. In court the celebrities and their supporters refused to sign the binding over orders before them. 'Jailed the Star Sit-Downers' was the banner headline in the Daily Mirror - the publicity had done its job. Later that month fifteen thousand people gathered for the biggest ever ban-the-bomb demonstration in London.
Listen to Programme 2
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RELATED LINKS |
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Kent State website dedicated to the tragedy
The Bertrand Russell Archives
at McMaster University
The Bertrand Russell Society
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Audio Help
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PRESENTER |
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| Nigel Wrench |
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Nigel Wrench has been a regular presenter on PM for almost five years. Aside from work in Britain, he's reported from locations as diverse as Jerusalem, St Petersburg and Bucharest.
Nigel was born in Birmingham, but he grew up in South Africa where he began his journalistic career. He reported on the anti-apartheid protests of the 1980s, and was one of the BBC's reporters at the prison gates when Nelson Mandela walked free.
In Britain, he has reported for the Today programme. He is the recipient of a gold Sony Award for presenting the gay and lesbian news programme Out This Week, and a New York Radio Award for his Radio 4 documentary Aids and Me.
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RELATED PROGRAMMES |
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The Commission
Straw Poll
Taking a Stand
Taking Issue
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