Tears and Gas

 

This photo wasn’t shot by war journalist Lynsey Addario, and its subject isn’t battle-scarred Libya or Afghanistan or Iraq. It’s Bascom Hill on May 11, 1970, during what historians now call the Cambodia-Kent State riots — the upheaval that nearly shut the UW down forty-one spring semesters ago.

The university didn’t have Addario back in 1970, but it did have Duane Hopp ’55, a photographer for UW Extension. Hopp’s pictorial career began while he was a student — he served as photo editor for both the Daily Cardinal and the Badger yearbook — and lasted until 1986, when the onset of multiple sclerosis forced his retirement. He passed away last October. We at On Wisconsin appreciate his vast and varied body of work, which we often draw upon for Flashback.

Scenes such as this must have come to mind for alumni of a certain age, as they watched the demonstrations that gripped Madison from campus to the Capitol this spring. We’re happy to inform you that while the crowds, shouting, and signs might look familiar, the teargas has been absent.

Published in the Summer 2011 issue