Tags
1974, Bill Ayers, Camilla Hall, James Kilgore, Los Angeles, Minnesota, St. Peter, Symbionese Liberation Army, University of Illinois
Camilla Hall, originally of St. Peter, Minn., died in the SLA shoot-out with police 40 years ago today. RIP, Camilla. She’s buried in Resurrection Cemetery in St. Peter. I’m working on a biography of Camilla.
Forty years ago today—May 17, 1974. On that day, a shoot-out with SWAT team officers in Los Angeles left six members of the notorious Symbionese Liberation Army dead, including St. Peter, Minn., native Camilla Hall. The three remaining SLA members—including the famous hostage/“urban guerrilla” Patty Hearst—collected a few more sympathizers and continued to hide until they were finally captured in September 1975.
The firestorm that destroyed the SLA hideout in Los Angeles, May 17, 1974.
Forty years have passed, yet the SLA continues to inspire heated comments and controversies. The latest flare-up is currently in progress. At the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, James Kilgore—a convicted former SLA member—did not have his adjunct contract renewed for Fall 2014. Many claim this is because his association with the SLA came to light in a local newspaper article earlier this year. Never mind the fact that when he was first hired, Kilgore told administrators of his past, which included involvement in a bank robbery in which a woman was shot and killed.
Jim Kilgore today. Photo taken from Inside Higher Ed website.
But media attention can be a powerful thing—it can take on a life of its own, like a wildfire. Were administrators content to keep Kilgore on the faculty as long as news of his past stayed contained within the academic community? Now that word reached a wider audience, did they feel the need to cave to public pressure?
This is not the first example of the SLA and other similar groups rising up from the past. In 2008, former Weather Underground member Bill Ayers was surprised to find himself as the star of an anti-Obama campaign ad. He had once been in the same room as Obama, which of course certainly made Obama suddenly “terrorist friendly,” right? Ayers also was denied emeriti status upon retirement from the University of Illinois, which many claim was a punishment for his past political actions.
An example of how Bill Ayers was used in the 2008 anti-Obama campaign.
And those of us in Minnesota remember the spotlight that surrounded Sara Jane Olson’s arrest in 1999 and the continued media attention that came during her trial, conviction, prison sentence and parole.
What’s most interesting is reading comments from the public about these stories. As of this writing, there are 88 comments to the Inside Higher Ed story on the Kilgore situation. It’s as if the SLA had been active just yesterday, not 40 years ago. The arguments in the comments section are heated; it’s very clear on where some people stand on the story. It becomes a larger story about crime, responsibility, redemption, rehabilitation and paying your dues.
Why do you think the SLA and Weather Underground continue to attract such attention?
If You Have Five Seconds to Spare 
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I know I’m nearly three months late in commenting on this post, but in fact I couldn’t quite make myself read it until today. And I have not yet read any other recent commentary about the SLA. I was very much aware, months in advance, of the 40-year anniversary of the shootout and Camilla Hall’s death. And i was so hoping you would write about it. Yet because the memory of that event and the time following it remains fresh and painful I then avoided reading your blog entry about it. Based on what you later mentioned in your post about the young hijacker’s story i take it you’re continuing to develop your examination of Camilla’s life. I both look forward to and am melancholic about reading it when you release your work about her. In the meantime, thank you for posting the image of her grave marker. And for your thoughtful and thought-provoking entries.
Until I read this post, I hadn’t realized that one of the people killed in the SLA shoot-out was from a small town in MN. It makes me curious about her relationship with the community where she grew up–and the residents reactions to the shoot-out.