Greg Mitchell is the author of more than a dozen books (see link) and now writer/director of three award-winning films aired via PBS, including “Atomic Cover-up” and “Memorial Day Massacre” which are still up at PBS.org. You can still subscribe to this newsletter for free.
Just decided to post a little something after the Monday afternoon holiday shocker, the death of basketball (and much else) legend Bill Walton, at 71, from cancer. I will keep this brief, and just direct you to obits or tributes or what have you but with one more personal connection that follows.
Many today know Bill only as fun, sometimes oddball, commentator on TV b-ball games. Or anecdotes about his hallowed reputation as one of the biggest (nearly seven feet) and longest-running Deadheads. Plus being hailed as one of the all-time greatest college players in any sport (at UCLA, three times Player of the Year when you could only play three years in college), and then an NBA star though often wracked with injuries.
But he was also the most “political” white sports star of his time, arrested for protesting Vietnam but also speaking out for African-Americans, the poor, Native Americans and on and on, despite knowing the consequences at the time for any sports activist, black or white. He was also a militant vegetarian, which also drew wide condemnation from many in mainstream media and among sports fans. ESPN in its obit today noted: “In his final years, Walton spoke out about issues that mattered most to him, such as the problem of homelessness in his native San Diego.”
Shall we quote Barack Obama? We shall:
Bill Walton was one of the greatest basketball players of all time – a champion at every level and the embodiment of unselfish team play. He was also a wonderful spirit full of curiosity, humor and kindness. We are poorer for his passing, and Michelle and I send our deepest condolences to his family.
Walton arrest photos:
Anyway, no time to write more, except this…
In early 1975, Walton was drawing (the expected) controversy early in his pro career with the Portland Trailblazers. He had stopped talking at length to reporters but we had one link: Our regular sports columnist at Crawdaddy, where I served as the long-running #2 editor, was Michael Jay Kaufman, who had interviewed the likes of Muhammad Ali for us. He knew Bill’s pal, the former college athletic director and similarly lefty Jack Scott and his wife Micki McGee Scott (pictured up top). Jack Scott talked to Walton who agreed to sit down with Kaufman at his home in Portland for an exclusive.
This went well, Bill pulled no punches, and we (myself and editor Peter Knobler) prepared this spring 1975 issue with a classic Walton pose on the cover:
Then, an unexpected twist. As many may recall, Patty Hearst was at that time on the run after her kidnapping by the Symbionese Liberation Army and her subsequent (apparent) conversion to their goals, even bank robbery and gun-toting It was one of the top stories in the press for months and months on end. As our article was about to go to press, the FBI revealed that they believed she had been, and perhaps was still being, escorted/hidden by none other than the Scotts!
So now they were grilling Walton about all this—did he know the whereabouts of the Scotts? Had Patty ever stayed at his house?
Bill denied knowing anything but major stories across the country revealed that, lo and behold, he had been interviewed at home by a writer for a national magazine with the odd name of Crawdaddy, with the piece arriving any day! And that the FBI was now trying to get Kaufman to talk.
Kaufman refused to say anything. When the FBI called our office, we also declined to talk. A few weeks later, our office in NYC suffered two break-ins which, rightly or wrongly, we attributed to the FBI. I should add that among our regular writers at the time was firebrand attorney “Don’t Mess With” Bill Kunstler.
When our story came out, reporters looked for clues about the Hearst case while dutifully mocking some of Bill Walton’s quotes. Well, it was the widest national publicity we had received since we named another fugitive, Abbie Hoffman, as our esteemed Travel Editor. Abbie would detail for us his underground visits to Los Alamos, a glitzy Hollywood movie star party, and Jimmy Carter’s hometown Plains, Ga., among other stops.
I’m out of time here, but…the Scotts, unlike Hearst, never were charged with a crime. Bill Walton became an NBA MVP, and much later beloved by most Americans as his counter-cultural views became better understood and accepted, and his zany broadcasting drew many laughs. He never stopped speaking out on politics and attending Dead concerts.
Kaufman today: “He was taking a lot of abuse at the time for his nonconformist lifestyle, beliefs, and antiwar activism, and he was one of the nicest people I met during my years as a sports writer.”
But before I go, from an official statement by Bill released in the mid-1970s as he continued to draw criticism for his association with the Scotts and tried to explain why he still chose to speak out against political repression, racism and what we would now call “income inequality”:
Some of the actions of the government of this country that have led us to these conclusions are: the brutal assassinations of President John Kennedy, his brother Robert, and the Rev. Martin Luther King; the imperialist and genocidal wars that have been waged against the people of Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam; and now possible US role in a war in the Middle East.
Also, the backing of a military coup that overthrew a democratically elected government in Chile, just because Salvador Allende’s economic politics did not coincide with those of special-interests groups in the country; the murders of students exercising their constitutional rights at Kent State and Jackson State, among many others.
Also the dichotomy that allows for the simultaneous rise of unemployment and corporate profits; the systematic suppression of natural living and healing methods; the double standards of justice that exist for poor people compared to rich people; the fact that if you are unemployed and broke and you steal to feed your starving family, then you face extremely long prison sentences in despicable places like Attica and San Quentin, while Richard Nixon, who tried to steal the country and jeopardized free elections, lives in luxury on the white sandy beaches of beautiful San Clemente..,,
The struggle of athletes to gain their rights is not new. It goes back years and years. Many athletes have given up their struggle because of the repressive conditions set by leagues, owners, and the media.
.. gracias for that gem, Senor !
Sorrow for the loss of a legend and a leader.