John Hill T. Photo
May Day 1970 rally on the Green.
A half century after a Black Panther trial consumed New Haven and thrust it into the national discussion over racial and social justice, survivors of the episode as well as a new generation revisited that time to see what it means today.
Lucy Gellman Photo
Mercy Quaye.
New Haven journalist and activist Mercy Quaye (pictured) wasn’t born when National Guard troops filled the streets in response to the May Day 1970 rally over the murder trial. Today she has involved herself in issues that the Panthers took up.
Now she has produced a multipart podcast about that time and its legacy.
The podcast, produced by Quaye’s The Narrative Project in conjunction with Artspace, is called “Revolution on Trial.” The first episode, entitled “The Makings of A Movement,” was released Friday. Click here to listen to it and subscribe to the series. (Artspace is planning a series of events to commemorate the 50th anniversary of May Day.)
In the podcast, Quaye lays the groundwork for the Panthers’ arrival in town in 1970. She interviews Elyse Brown about the work of Hillhouse black students and the Hill Parents Association.
“Political activism has always been in New Haven’s DNA. It would be a huge disservice to talk about the New Haven Panthers without talking about the organizing that made it possible,” Quaye reports in the podcast.
She also interviews Ericka Huggins, one of the two Panther leaders (along with Bobby Seale) on trial for allegedly conspiring to murder falsely suspected party informer Alex Rackley. Speaking from her home in Oakland, Huggins recalls how the Panthers “did not have to find the people” to start a chapter here. Interested parties already active in the community approached the party to form a chapter.
Robert Clark Templeton
Courtroom artist’s depiction of Huggins at trial.
Also Friday, Ericka Huggins recalled her experience in New Haven and on trial here, and the legacy of those days, in an interview on WNPR’s “Where We Live.” Former Mayor Kurt Schmoke joined the program to discuss the role he played as a Yale student leader in preventing violence during the May Day rallies.
“There isn’t a day that goes by that I do not think of Alex Rackley,” Huggins told host Lucy Nalpathanchil.
Mercy Quaye and Inner City News Editor and WNHH FM “Love Babz Love Talk” host Babz Rawls-Ivy also reflected on the legacy today of those events, during a recent episode of WNHH FM’s “Dateline New Haven.” Click on the above video to watch that episode.
Related stories:
• May Day@50: City Shutters, Shudders Anew
• 50 Years Later, Panther Murder Echoes
• Seale/Huggins Transcript Returns To Public View
• Co-Conspirator Comes Clean
• Black Panther Torture “Trial” Tape Surfaces
• A Testament To Second Chances Passes On
• Catherine Roraback Knew Who Was Watching
• An Act of Subversion Comes To Light
• After 37 Years, Spy Comes In From Cold