Omega Mu Voice: Robert W. Doyle, 1972

Omega Mu Voice
Robert W. Doyle,
1972

Bob Doyle, 1972
​
Background: The events that took place in this country between 1963 and 1973 are almost surreal, particularly to a young man in the prime of his life with so little "life experience" under his belt. It was a decade of extremes, certainly. A decade of hope and despair ... of love and hate .... of belief and disbelief , of confusion and clarity. Why? 

University of Maine
1963-1973

The assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King,.... The Civil rights movement...Woman’s Liberation ... Easy Rider, Catch 22...The Beatles...The Stones...Dylan...Led Zeppelin...Color TV....Stereophonic sound....drugs....sex and rock and roll. 

President John F. Kennedy

1. Robert F. Kennedy

Robert F. Kennedy holding his rosary beads.

Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.

Gloria Steinem

Easy Rider

The Pentagon Papers..Watergate...Riots in Detroit...The Democratic National Convention...Black power...A man on the moon...Terrorist attacks at the Olympics ..500,000 "drug crazed" kids at Woodstock ....4 dead students at Kent State. Student marches, Protests and marches about almost everything .... 

Pentagon Papers

Protests at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago

1968 Olympics

Kent State
"Four Dead In Ohio"

​AND of course The Vietnam conflict . The U.S.military....,,,, Running out of volunteers (young men , black or white...undereducated or underemployed..and looking for a new pool of willing or unwilling participants to fill the void.. This included white males at academic institutions....And thus the story begins

The Draft

I was living in the house on Dec.1 , 1969 and experienced an event that none there would
ever forget ....... The draft lottery .... Birth dates into a jar and chosen one at a time........That number would coincide with a young mans birthdate and ultimately would determine his draft order status Numbers 1-366 would be chosen randomly ..... Many of us believed that if you were lucky that night ..... You would live ..... get a low number .... You would be drafted and go to Nam and likely die .....

"Get a low number...you would be drafted and go to Nam and likely die."

I recall that everyone in the house was drunk that night ....Really drunk .....A happy drunk or angry scared drunk .... The first birthdate chosen .....SEPT 14..... Good so far!......I was lucky that night .....# 284..... The next morning .... Everybody hung over and asking only 1 question to each other.... "What was your number?"

"What was your number?"

​“What if the space be long and wide,
That parts us from our brother’s side
A soul-joined chain unites our band,
And memory links us hand in hand.”
(Phi Gamma Delta fraternity song)

Fraternally,
Chip Chapman, ’82
​Perge