- .

that often mar a summer's night ina Negro neighborhood. In the stiflingheat, Smith grew impatient and im-prudent. Alternately braking and ac-celerating, flicking his headlights onand off, Smith tailgated the policecar. Finally, after a quarter-mile oftailgating, Smith tried to swing pastthe police. They cut him off. Who thehell? ...Goddam ...Son of abitch! There was a short scuffle, andSmith was trundled into the squadcar.

It might have ended there, likeanyone of a thousand police-blotteritems. But Smith's arrival at the sta-tion house happened to be seen byscores of Negro residents of the redbrick Hayes Homes housing develop-ment across the street and by othercab drivers as well. Out over the cab-bies' crackling VHF radio band wentthe rumor that white cops had killeda Negro driver. Within minutes, cabsand crowds were converging on thegrey stone headquarters of the FourthPrecinct in the heart of Newark's over-

crowded, overwhelmingly Negro Cen-tral Ward. By midnight, the firstrocks and bottles were clatteringagainst the station-house walls; bythe next day, the tinkle of brokenglass was counterpointed by cries of..Beat drums, not heads!" Out chargeda phalanx of police to break up thecrowds. After three hours calm re-turned, but not for long. Along theghetto grapevine, the word was passed:..You ain't seen nothin' yet." By thatevening, New Jersey's largest city(pop. 405,000) was caught up in thefiercest race riot since Watts.

Four nights running, and even dur-ing the heat of the day, snipers'bullets spanged off sidewalks, nightsticks crunched on skulls, and lootersmade off with the entire inventoryof scores of stores (one small Negroboy was seen carrying table lampshis own size). New Jersey's Gov-ernor Richard Hughes proclaimedNewark a ..city in open rebellion," de-clared a state of emergency, andcalled out the National.Guard. More

RACES

Sparks & Tinder

(See Cover)The Los Angeles ghetto of Watts

went berserk in 1965 after an un-employed high school dropout namedMarquette Frye was arrested fordrunken driving. In six days of riot-ing, 35 died, 900 were injured. In1966, the Cleveland ghetto of Rougherupted when a white bartender de-nied a glass of ice water to a Negropatron. And in Newark, N.J., a trum-pet-playing Negro cab driver by thename of John Smith last week be-came the random spark that ignitedthe latest-and one of the most vi-olent--0f U.S. race riots.

Smith was driving his cab throughwinding, brick-paved streets in New-ark just after dusk one evening. Aheadof him, moving at a maddeninglyslow pace, was a prowl car mannedby Officers John OeSimone and VitoPontrelli, on the lookout for traffic vio-lators, drunks, and the angry brawls

.

+

I

NEWARK NEGROES TAUNTING NATIONAL GUARDSMEN

T errifying in the very triviality of the immediate cause.

zwn

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.~

SMITH {RIGHT) & LAWYER LOFTONSummary in soul music.

than 4,000 city police, state troopersand Guardsmen patrolled the city's de-bris-Iittered streets.

The toll in human suffering mount-ed hourly. Before the week was out,at least 21 people were dead, morethan 1,000 injured, another 1,600 arrest-ed. Property damage soared into themillions.

No Call for It. The very trivialityof the riot's immediate cause madethe Newark outburst particularly terrify-ing. It seemed to say that a dozen orso people could be killed in almostany city, any night, by the purestchance. In the past three years, racialriots have flared in some 50 U.S. cities,from Harlem to Hough, Chicago to Cin-

-f$~'71,

North-a neat frame house and aroundit flourishing patches of greens and flow-ers: "I can't see no call for it."

Preferred Brands. There seemed tobe little call for the explosion in New-ark, either. Nevertheless, after buildingup slowly, it spewed violence in all di-rections. After the first pop bottlesand bricks were heaved, the lootersmoved in. Harry's Liquor Store, a fuel-ing stop about a block from the pre-cinct house where Cabby Smith wasbooked, became the first target. Abrick smashed the unprotected displaywindow; gallons of liquor poured out-into throats, not gutters. From otherliquor stores, Negro looters formedhuman chains that reached clear aroundcorners. They went first for the import-ed Scotch (Chivas Regal and JohnnyWalker Red Label were the preferredbrands), then for the bourbons andgins, next for vodka and champagneand-when everything else ran out-for cheap muscatels and cordials. TVstores were hard-hit. "I can get $500for this color set," exulted one looter."It's got a $1,000 price tag on it."

Negro youths clambered onto theiron grilles shielding store fronts and,straining in unison, ripped them free.They sometimes spared stores whose

Iwindows bore the crayoned legend

"Soul Brother," a sign of Negro owner-

ship. In stores owned by "Whitey ,"clothing was stripped from mannequins,and the headless, pale pink forms soondotted the length of Springfield A ve- Inue, one of Newark's shopping streets,

ialong with a fine, crunchy layer of win-dow glass. Women pranced through

Isupermarkets with shopping carts, pick-ing and choosing with unwonted in-difference. to price tags. One youngNegro mother was stopped by cops asshe exited from a bicycle shop, herfour children riding on shiny new tricy-cles. She was arrested, along with 350other looters; countless others got awaywith the swag.

Springfield Rifles. One ransackedstore near Springfield Avenue yieldedrifles, shotguns and pistols. Soon shotswere snapping from windows and roof-tops, aimed at police patrols and fire-men en route to battle the dozens ofblazes that broke out. Over the policeradio came cries of alarm. "We're sit-ting ducks out here-give us ~he word.Let us shoot." As Molotov cocktails ex-ploded in stores and around poJicecars, one radio bleated: "We're gettingbombed here. What should we do?"Replied the dispatcher, laconically:"Leave."

But it soon became clear that-asin Watts-Ieaving would only feed themob's appetite for destruction and loot.Soon after midnight on the secondnight of rioting, the police were final-Iy given the word: "Use your weap-ons." As could have been expected,police guns proved much more lethalthan those in the hands of Negro riot-

TIME, JULY 21, 1967)

INJURED RIOTER BEING LED OFF TO HOSPITAL

The direst damage was psychological.

16

cinnati, Boston to Buffalo, Watts toWaukegan. Most began with a vagrantspark, and often it takes nothing morethan that.

In Hartford, Conn., last week, aNegro luncheonette owner threw out aNegro customer for getting fresh witha waitress-and the upshot was twodays of violence. What began as a dis-pute between Negroes ended in dam-age to 14 shops, a few of which werewhite-owned; it also brought injuriesto 14 of both races. Police in Erie,Pa., broke up a sidewalk crap gameamong Negro youths-and the resultwas two days of stonings and stick-work. Officials in Cincinnati, Tampaand Buffalo, where ghetto dwellers ram-paged earlier this summer, nervouslysought ways to avert fresh flare-ups. Ra-cial disturbances also occurred in Plain-field, N.l., Laurel, Md., Kansas City,Mo., and Miami.

As unlikely a place as Waterloo, anice, small city of 75,000 in northeastIowa's dairy area, was touched, too,by the madness. Waterloo's Negroesmake up only 8% of the population,are well integrated into the schools,and enjoy an unemployment rate of aminimal 2.3% (well below the currentnational average of 4% ). But troubleexploded anyway. A young Negro, infull view of a prowl car, deliberatelyknocked down an old white man whowas sweeping the sidewalk in front ofa tavern. His arrest touched off yet an-other 48 hours of rioting by Negroyouths-to the perplexity of their eld-ers. Said Albert Morehead, 68, a Mis-sissippi-reared Negro who takes pridein the symbols of his suCcess in the

c~;c.,.

~

FIGHTING BLAZE IN HABERDASHERYIn a way, like laughter at a funeral.

ers. Of those dead by racial violence ed some 50 looters. Still the mobin Newark last week, only two were reveled in the curious exultation ofwhite. Plainclothes Patrolman Frederick the explosion. "Was the Harlem riotToto, 34, a police hero cited for sav- worse than this?" a Negro girl askeding a drowning child in 1964, was a reporter. When he assured her thatshot through the chest by a sniper it W(lS not, she cried: "That's good;and died two hours later, despite heart that's great!"surgery. A fireman was later shot in Harmony. John William Smith, thethe back and killed. Among the Ne- chance actor who started it all, grewgro dead were children and women, up some years ago near Salisbury,looters and gunmen. N.C., during an era when many whites

Fixed Bayonets. In response to an thought of Negroes (if at all) in Amos-appeal from Newark Mayor Hugh Ad- 'n'-Andy stereotypes. Smith was nodoniiio, Governor Hughes called up Kingfish. He had a year of college (a2,600 National Guardsmen. Soon Jeeps, predominantly Negro school: Northtrucks and a clanking eleven-ton ar- Carolina A. & T.), where he studiedmored personnel carrier mounting ma-chine guns roared into the ghetto.When several police were pinned downby Negro sniper fire, the A PC rumbledup and began blazing away with its.30-cal. guns; unknown to the mob, theywere loaded with blanks. The policegot away. Simultaneously, Guardsmenand police patrols coursed through thestreets-often behind fixed bayonets-picking up every Negro in reach. Black-Power Playwright LeRoi Jones, 32,was snatched from a Volkswagen withtwo loaded .32-cal. pistols in his pock-ets. Jones, who once urged Negroes tohandle white men by smashing their"jelly white faces," ended up beat-uphimself: a blunt weapon split his scalp,and he required seven stitches.

Governor Hughes pretty much tookover. Besides calling up the Guard, heclosed all of Newark's liquor stores("We'll dry this city out"), ordered allguns and ammunition confiscated fromthe stores that were selling them, im-posed a curfew that advanced frommidnight to 11 p.m., and finally to 10.He also worked long hours touringthe riot area, and his task force arrest-

TIME, JULY 21, 1967

music and played the trumpet. Thencame the post-World War II Army, inwhich he served as an enlisted infantry-man in Japan, Korea (where he wona combat infantryman's badge) andthe Philippines. But this was still thesegregated Army and, for the NegroG.I., a discouraging morass of minorhumiliations and kitchen routine.

A short (5 ft. 7 in.), stocky manwith a mustache and goatee, Smithhas been a cab driver for the past fiveyears, paying a daily fee of $16.50 touse a "rent-a-cab." From that invest-ment he can expect $100 a week-ina good week-as personal profit. He isunmarried ("I'm all alone in this jun-gle," Smith told his lawyer, OliverLofton, a former aide to Under sec-retary of State Nicholas DeB. Kat-zenbach). He rents a one-room apart-ment in Newark's "Ironbound" district(so named for its wrap-around rail-road lines), has a collection of 25"cool" jazz records, and is saving fora plate to replace his missing frontteeth (lost in an accident years ago).Says Smith, a quiet and articulateman: "I got to tighten up my upper reg-ister and study a little harmony." Be-fore last week he had been ticketedfive times-not much by cabby stand-ards-for minor traffic violations.

Smith came up against a policeforce commanded by a tough, no-non-sense Italian-American named Dom-inick A. Spina, 56, who won reputeon the virtues that mark the best ofAmerican law-enforcement officers: per-sonal courage and political neutrality.A stocky, cigar-chomping man withsteely grey hair and temperament, heheads a 1,400-man force that is heavi-

Cover story continued on page 20AP

.

HUGHES & ADDONIZIO

Even the improvements fueled the grievances.

17

~

TED CDWELL

,-'-~

.

was taken, man at right was shot andkilled, presumably by a police bullet.

Hauling away booty from shop atheight of turmoil. Soon after picture

ROBERT W. COTTROL

Police aid an injured colleague, were finally given theorder "Use your weapons" after being cornered bymobs repeatedly and pinned down by rooftop gunmen.

Looters are frisked on Springfield Avenue duringsecond day. Rioters made off with entire inventoriesof some stores, favored TV sets, liquor and guns.

Iy Italian, but-according to city offi-cials-includes some 400 Negroes aswell. Until last week, Spina couldclaim the ultimate satisfaction in po-lice work: without undue harshness orpermissiveness, merely by enforcing thelaw as it is written, his cops had keptthe peace in a potentially turbulentcity. Even when the Harlem riots of1964 set off secondary explosions ofracial strife in the neighboring citiesof Jersey City, Paterson and Eliza-beth, Newark managed to keep itscool.

Treat's Trick. It was not an easyplace to keep chilled. Bounded on theeast by the waste-grey waters of the Pas-saic River and shrouded by a chroniccloud of yellow industrial smog, New-ark's black enclave is a grassless realmof rotting brick and crumbling con-crete; no less than 32.6% of the city'shousing, according to a 1962 study, issubstandard. Newark was founded 301years ago by a dissident ConnecticutPuritan named Robert Treat, who, bycurrent standards at least, tricked theIndians into selling him a site includ-ing most of what is today, in all itsgreenery, Essex County for $700 worthof gunpowder, lead, axes, kettles, pis-tols, swords, beer and a number ofother items. As recently as 1950, Ne-groes constituted a scant 17% of New-ark's population. With the rush to thesuburbs by whites in the affluent erathat followed, and the northward he-gira of Negro refugees from Dixie,the black population is now estimatedat 50% to 55% and even more, mak-ing Newark the only major city in theNorth, except for Washington, with aNegro majority.

Under Mayor Addonizio, 53, a bulky,balding liberal Democrat who oncequarterbacked for Fordham behind the..Seven Blocks of Granite" and servedas an infantry officer from Algiers tothe Bulge, Newark until recently wasconsidered a city in control of its prob-lems. Addonizio, who served 14 yearsin the U.S. House of Representativesbefore his election as mayor in 1962-largely on the strength of Negroand Italian votes-outlined an ambi-1ious urban-renewal program. Newarktoday spends $277 per capita on repair-ing urban blight-the highest annualfigure for the nation's 50 biggest ci-ties. Newark officials claim an overallunemployment figure of 7%-downfrom 14% when Addonizio took overcity hall-and Newark has 125 fed-eral poverty workers who spent $2,000,-000 last year on community-actionprojects. But the funds face a cut be-cause of the war, and the number ofworkers will be scaled down to 30 bySeptember.

Dead-End Street. Newark's Negroesfind plenty wrong with the city. Al-though Newark has two Negroes onits nine-man city council, neither wason hand to fill the ghetto's leadershipvacuum during the riots: CouncilmanIrvine Turner was ill; Councilman Cal-vin West was in Boston for a conven-tion of the National Association forthe Advancement of Colored People.The city has no civilian review board(Mayor Addonizio refers alt chargesof police brutality to the FBI). Nor didit have any Negro police officers abovethe rank of lieutenant before last week(when Addonizio hastily ordered a Ne-gro officer promoted to captain, and

LeROI JONES AFTER ARRESTSmash those jel'y white faces.

the city council later showed itswill by authorizing the move).

To many Negroes, the gravestance is one engendered byidea of an urban improvement.year Addonizio designated 46 acresthe Central Ward as thefor the New Jersey State CollegeMedicine and Dentistry-a move .

would force some 3,500of their homes. Howeverthose dwellings might be, theraised hackles throughout the city.subsequent proposal to extend twoter~tate highways that pass nearark through the downtown areadisplace 20,000 more Negroes. c

lution of these problems is notclear.When displaced, , --.as in other -

ly do they escape into the white :urban communities that ring thenor are they very welcome in mostthe Italian, Ukrainian, Irish andish communities in other parts ofcity itself. For John Smith and Irest of Newark's Negroes, a -"soul music" hit called On "

End Street summarizes theplight all too aptly.

They say this is a big rich town,but I live in the poorest part;

I know I'm on a dead end street,a city without a heart.

" C .. I I t .II R 1rlmlna nsurrec Ion. ea as

grievances may be, last week'!.burst was violently out ofto the provocation-as manyark's Negroes realized. "Oh,said one elderly man to his wife,is a terrible day for our people."young Negro woman with twosons snapped: "They ought toall them rioters. Who do theythey are anyway?" "We need thelice," said another woman. " All

POLICE VAN AFTER STONING IN HARTFORD, CONN.

Reflections of a yawning gap.

TIME, JULY 21,20