The Vietnam War prompted tumult and tears among Redwood students – some were drafted at graduation, others had boyfriends who were fighting and some even avoided the draft. But although many students were directly affected, Redwood was not an active protest site.

“I don’t remember much activism on campus because there was no one to really direct it at,” Carl Johnson, Class of 1968, said.  “We didn’t look at the administration as part of the military industrial complex or ‘the man,’ as we might have called them at the time.”

However, students became more concerned after graduation when the possibility of being drafted increased.

Some Redwood alums like Richard Torney, Class of 1966, were drafted and served their time in Vietnam.

“I wasn’t excited about it, but I went and defended my country,” he said.  “I saw things I would hope never to see again in my life.”

Torney said that upon his return, he was horrified by how anti-war protesters treated him.

“I have a very low regard for some of the people who protested,” he said. “To be hostile to people who are complete strangers… I hope it is something they feel bad about.”

College and Career counselor Paula Vantrease, Class of 1971, did not protest the war, because during her time at Redwood, her boyfriend was fighting in Vietnam overseas.

“Weeks and weeks went by without any correspondence,” she said.  “The group that I hung out with was very supportive to me because [he] was overseas.”

Other graduates avoided serving in the war because they were full-time students or their numbers did not get picked in the draft’s lottery system.

Cliff Galli, Class of 1968, also evaded the draft.  He initially joined the National Guard hoping that he would serve his time without having to leave the home front. He was concurrently enrolled at College of Marin and opposed to the war.  When several National Guard members shot and killed student protesters at Kent State University in 1970, Galli became a vehement anti-war activist and quit the Guard.

“It was revolting to me that Guardsmen just like me had killed these people who were just like me, as students, because I was a student and in the military at the same time,” he said.

Soon after, Galli was drafted into the army because he didn’t qualify for student deferment, which required a 3.0 grade point average and 12 credits per semester.

To avoid serving, Galli and several other Redwood alumni fled to Canada.  He was still wanted for duty upon his return, so he contacted a draft-resistance group to help him avert the draft.

“They had a list of shrinks, and I went down this list and picked this one guy’s name and he told me that if I gave him a hundred dollars and went and saw him twice for sessions, he would get me out of the Army,” he said.  “Not long after that, I got a discharge.”

Galli said he still struggles with his decision not to fight in Vietnam.

“Sometimes I wish I had just gone to ‘Nam and just did it, because it was a lot of years of me thinking about the guys that went, friends of mine that went, and then I didn’t go,” he said.  “It stuck with me for a long time, and I know that it was the wrong thing to do to go over there, but at the same time you can’t help but feel some sort of obligation.”

Vantrease said that she is still saddened by the implications of the Vietnam War.

“The veterans that came back… still suffer on a daily basis,” she said.

Galli said he recalled that after one of his friends returned from the battlefield, he was incredibly traumatized.

“When he got out of the service we went to a party and he was absolutely in tears, curled up in a ball, crying,” he said.  “He wouldn’t talk either.”

Galli has not seen his friend since the incident.

“You look back at the Vietnam War and it was the biggest mistake that ever happened,” he said.

However, not everyone at the time agreed that the Vietnam War was wrong.  The pro-war motorcycle gang, The Hells Angels, broke up a San Francisco war protest, according to Ric Kellen, Class of 1968. The gang members were invited to speak at Redwood in a classroom after school.

“My recollection was that the students were arguing with them and [the Hells Angels] were pretty much calling everybody ‘peace creeps,’” he said.  “When [the Hells Angels] walked out, one of them lit a cigarette.  Smoking was forbidden, but he basically could have cared less about being in a school.”

Another incident in which the Vietnam War hit home was when former students returned, or didn’t return, from duty.  According to Johnson, one of his former classmates who played trombone with Johnson in the school band, was killed fighting with Marine Corps after mere weeks of duty in Vietnam.

“It was one of the rare days when we didn’t have rehearsal, we just put our instruments away and sat and thought about it,” Johnson said.  “It was more or less a day of remembering.”

According to Marc Fine, Class of 1968, there was tension between students who were in favor or against the war – the “hippies,” who were against the war and the “conservatives,” who favored it. 

However, “hippies” comprised only a small group on campus, according to Kellen.  Most students were somewhere in the middle.

“We talked about politics and things like that, but not actively,” Johnson said.

Johnson said that if a draft was instituted today, he believes students would be more involved with an anti-war effort against the Iraq War.  Fine and Galli agreed that lessons from the Vietnam War still hold true today.

“War is about people dying, so many brothers, so many sons, so many uncles,” Galli said.  “It’s really real.  When you look at TV, every week they show everyone who was killed.  Every one of them is under 30 years old.  They all have people who love them.”