The Free Venice Beachhead – An Appreciation –
The first Beachhead I saw was green – the
color of a dirty dollar bill. I expect that was because unbleached newsprint was
cheaper than white paper-stock, and back then (November 1968) The Beachhead was
created on an even thinner shoestring than now.
I had just arrived in Venice, assigned
(against my will) as a VISTA Volunteer to work on community health issues for
Oakwood's Venice Community Improvement Union. [I say "against my will" because I
had joined VISTA to work with Native Americans, but had been assigned to Venice
instead.] I barely knew a soul in Venice when I picked up a copy of The
Beachhead at Earl Newman's poster studio on what was then called West Washington
Boulevard.
I didn't (yet) know any of
the members of the Beachhead collective, but over the following months and years
I would come to be privileged to call them my friends: John Haag, Carole
Fondiller, Steve Clare, Olga Palo, Maryjane, Moe Stavnezer, Rick Davidson,
Arnold Springer, MaryLou Johnson, DeDe Audet, Chuck Bloomquist and others who
made The Beachhead into a community voice. I was, myself, never an official
member of the collective, although I did contribute a few articles, poems and
photographs here and there during the next
quarter-century.
In my life in
Flagstaff I am currently a graduate student participating in a multidisciplinary
program entitled "Creating Sustainable Communities". As we try to discern not
only the mess Western civilization has gotten itself (and the rest of the
planet) into, but also try to figure out the steps to be taken to move back from
the brink of social, environmental and economic destruction, some of the primary
'models' that we study have long been the hallmarks of The Beachhead experience:
the essential need for community and a sense of belonging to one another, a
open-mindedness to radical (i.e.: 'from the root') alternative solutions; a
critical analysis of the problems we face both in our neighborhoods and the
world at-large, a passionate concern brought into action.
But perhaps the most important lessons
manifested by The Beachhead over these many years is what John Haag once termed
a devotion to self-determination, and an awareness that the means that we choose
are the ends we achieve. The process is all-important, and The Beachhead
collective has always been a magnificent demonstration of that truth. The many
days of layout and paste-up [before computerized design] were and are an
essential Beachhead function. In those gatherings community was built –
word by word. In every page of poems and pictures and opinion a sense of place
was and continues to be constructed. And allegiance to that place (and our
fellow-travelers) became and becomes part of our minds and hearts.
So all hail to The Beachhead and its
2003 reunion. Nice word that: reunion. The Venice community reunifies with
every issue; it's history and future come together; it's identity expresses
itself; its process is reaffirmed; its struggles are played out for all to see -
and an offer is made for folks to join in.
In The Beachhead, solidarity becomes a
fact, and a joyous example is set. This is not some archaic, anarchic
indulgence; this is the pathway to survival. And The Beachhead - Thank God! - is
still showing the way.
Chee wah
wah!
Lance Diskan
Venice 1968 – 1992
Posted: Thu - January 1, 2004 at 06:52 PM