Hamilton Hall lobby, evening of April 23, 1968. I'm in there somewhere. At
that point Hamilton was the only occupied building. This is probably before
the Black and white leaders went upstairs to talk about about how to
proceed; perhaps that is what the voting was about. Under the clock in the
background is Dean Coleman's office; he's locked inside. I remember seeing
armed Black Panthers guarding the door at one point, but I don't know
anything about whether Dean Coleman was a prisoner or he was just staying in
his office. Some people felt hurt by the decision to move the white
students out of Hamilton, but it was the only possibility that made sense;
looking forward to when the police would come, white Columbia students could
do any kind of crazy macho thing and get away with it, but Black students
could easily wind up dead in any kind of police confrontation.
Photo: Don Hogan Charles/The New York Times/Redux.