Graduation Year

12-1988

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (M.A.)

Degree Granting Department

American Studies Department

Major Professor

Jack B. Moore, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Ruth A. Banes, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Robert E. Snyder, Ph.D.

Abstract

This thesis addresses the history of the anti-Vietnam war movement in Tampa and at the University of South Florida from 1965-1970. In the introduction, the intellectual background, origin, and definition of the movement are furnished along with the psychological rationale for the existence of the movement. Later chapters address the successive groups, ideologies, and personalities involved in anti-war protest leading up to the 1969 formation of one organization most successful in organizing a Moratorium and a march in Washington of 275,000 persons. Finally the break-up and diffusion of the movement are chronicled, for by 1970 the anti-war movement became swallowed up by other issues and movements, but not without leaving local academic ramifications including the dismissal of a professor and the resignation of USF's founding president.

The research is basically conducted through newspaper reports, collected documents, scholarly secondary sources and personal interviews with other persons who played key roles in protest activities. The narrative also briefly examines statewide, national, and international events in order to place what occurred at the University of South Florida into the broader historical picture, and how USF compared to selected other educational institutions in the quality and extent of its radicalism.

Finally, the author attempts to display the humanistic, non-religious ties of community (almost a sense of spirituality) that bonded students, faculty, and other local persons together to help end America's longest and most controversial military endeavor.

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