Marquette University is five miles from the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee (UWM). In 1967, the combined student population of these schools was well over 15,000, providing an attractive audience for singers and authors, politicians and poets. As a photographer for the university newspaper, Tom could join the media for prime shots of the many celebrities who came to town.
The Scene was a hotel ballroom just down the street from Marquette that attracted some of the most important musical talent of the time; for example, Jimi Hendrix's legendary 1968 tour performed at The Scene. The venue was also a great place for local musicians to get recognized; Tracy Nelson, a singer from Madison, Wisconsin, launched a storied career with her performance at The Scene in 1965.
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Tracy Nelson, Singer - 1965
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In 1966 Betty Friedan spoke with a group of women at Marquette, discussing her book, The Feminine Mystique. The book examines "the problem that has no name" -- the prevailing expectation that women should find fulfillment as wives and mothers. That may have been true a generation or two earlier, when cooking and laundry involved as much manual labor by women as their husbands put into farming and tending livestock. But the post war economy produced refrigerators, electric stoves, and multiple kitchen appliances, along with washers, dryers and wrinkle resistant clothing. Women had a lot more time on their hands as their partners were away at the office all day.
Fired from her job when her second child was born, Betty Friedan turned to independent reporting. She surveyed her Smith College classmates at their 15 year reunion and found that most of them were disappointed with their situation; they were asking themselves "Is this all there is?". Freidan turned her survey into newspapers articles and eventually The Feminine Mystique - one of the most influential non-fiction books of the 20th century.
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Betty Friedan at Marquette University in 1966
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In 1964 Robert Kennedy, then the Attorney General of the US, gave the commencement address at Marquette University as he received an honorary degree. On August 15, 1965 he was a Senator from New York when he returned to Milwaukee for a testimonial dinner for lieutenant governor Patrick Lucy, delivering a well attended speech in the Marquette Gymnasium.
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| Bobby Kennedy, NY Senator - Aug 15, 1965 |
In 1967, the Marquette Law School hosted Byron White, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He gave a talk to a large audience at the University.
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| Byron White, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. 1967 |
W. H. Auden, a prize-winning poet, grew up in Britain and moved to the US during WWII, then spent his later years moving between Europe and the US. He read his poetry to a large audience at Marquette in 1967, toward the end of a long and prolific writing career.
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W H Auden, Poet - 1967
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Fine Arts week was held every February at Marquette. In 1967, the Dave Brubeck quartet was coming to Milwaukee, so artists painted an advertisement on a construction barrier.
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| Dave Brubeck Quartet comes to Milwaukee, February 20, 1967 |
That same week a proposal was made to have Allen Ginsberg, a controversial poet, speak at the university. But his work was a bit too risqué for Marquette officials, who refused to approve Ginsberg's appearance. Enterprising supporters found an alternative venue, and on a cold winter night in February students made their displeasure known by marching five miles from Marquette to UWM to hear Allen Ginsberg read his poetry.
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| Gathering to walk to UWM to hear Allen Ginsberg, February 22, 1967 |
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| Allen Ginsberg, Poet, UWM Union Ballroom - February 22, 1967 |
As our time at Marquette drew to a close, euphoria gripped the campus after the Marquette basketball team's improbable victory in the semifinals of the 1967 National Invitational Tournament. Al McGuire was in his third year as coach and this was the first time his team had qualified for a national tournament, so reaching the final round was quite an accomplishment. The team lost the final game that year, but McGuire's teams competed in postseason playoffs every year for the next ten years, winning the NIT championship in 1970 and the NCAA championship in 1977. Al McGuire was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 1992.
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| National Invitational Tournament semifinals victory celebration in downtown Milwaukee, March 20, 1967 |
