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Quicksilver Times, January 16-26, 1971.

Quicksilver Times was an underground newspaper published in Washington, DC from 1969-71.

See full issue scans at Independent Voices.

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Underground Newspaper ‘The Chicago Seed’. February 12th, 1968. (Cover art by Karl-Heinz Meschbach)

#underground newspaper #street press #hippie #swinging sixties #60s psychedelia #counterculture #60s fashion #the chicago seed #psychedelic art #illustration #flower power

Buddha’s Hip Trotskyite

By Stephen Jay Morris

Wednesday, May 01, 2019

©Scientific Morality

Art Kunkin was born in 1928, a year ahead of my dad. I wish he’d been my dad. It was a dream of some Baby Boomers to have a hip dad. For a short time, though, Art was my mentor.

His most successful endeavor was to found the Los Angeles Free Press. Back in the 60’s, that was the only legitimate media we had. Oh, there were other underground papers, but they were only transitory works of art. You know—psychedelic graphics; Hippie stuff. One was called “Tuesday’s Child.” It was all just novelty. However, the Free Press, or “The Freep” as we patrons called it, was a more sophisticated newspaper. It was filled with political analyses, news about the antiwar movement, culture, and the arts. I was an avid reader and never missed an issue. When the Free Press took over the L.A. Rams ticket office on Beverly Boulevard in the Fairfax District, I would go there every Thursday and sit in the reception area, waiting for the new issue. Before long, a truck would arrive to deliver it. I can still smell the ink! While I waited, occasionally I’d use the restroom. Somebody wrote graffiti on the wall that read: “Lenny Bruce died for your sins!” Indeed.

In the summer of 69, when I was 15, I sold the Free Press on the Sunset Strip. It was fun at first, but then a lot pricks would play pranks on me; like stopping in front of me and then speed off like a NASCAR driver when I approached their window. Most of them did it to impress their girlfriends. Then, there were the cops who’d harass me. One traffic cop gave me a Jaywalking ticket and told me never to return to that spot again. After that, I gave up the gig. Two years prior, at 13, I’d sold the L.A. Times and Harold Examiner. But, I would never sell a paper again.

Sometime in the early 70’s, I first saw Art Kunkin on a panel debating some issues. The event took place at a militant forum in Hollywood, put on by the Trotskyist group, The Socialist Workers Party. Art looked liked he could have been a relative of mine. We shared not only the same ethnicity, but also the same Astrological sign, Aries. I regret that I never had a conversation with him about the subject of Ashkenazi identity. We both were in the same Jewish organization, Hashomer Hatzair. When I saw him there, I was impressed by his polemical temperament. He had a Zen approach to debating politics. He never got emotional or hot under the collar, unlike me. That turned out to be a very positive influence on me.

For a guy his age, he had a cool image. He had a Jewish Fro and friendly blue eyes, and he didn’t dress his age. He wore what most of the kids were wearing and he did so without being oblivious or conspicuous. Instead of being on the other side of the generation gap, it was apparent that Art felt like he was one of us. And he was.

The years went swiftly by. In 1998, I saw an issue of The Free Press at the Sacred Grounds Coffee shop in downtown San Pedro, where I lived. I couldn’t believe it! Art was reviving the paper. I tracked down the location of the paper’s address. Art had set up his operation out of a one-room office in the back of a coffee shop in Santa Monica. That was the first time I spoke to him.

The problem with legends is that they don’t see themselves that way. Art was an historical legend and never recognized it. I was in awe, talking with him.

I offered to donate an article to his newly revived Free Press. I didn’t have an idea about what I was going to write, and then my wife, Pamela, gave me an idea for a story. At the time, she was conducting the local election of her employer city, and was in possession of a list of all the political parties registered in L.A. County. The article practically wrote itself! It was about all of the wild and unbelievable names that identified all of those political parties, which totaled almost 100, and the number of members of each. Some had as few as one member! Art liked the article and published it in a 1999 issue. He was the very first publisher to put me in ink that year! I was floating on air all week.

Ultimately, Art moved his operation to a homeless camp in downtown Los Angeles, run by the homeless activist Ted Hayes. The place was called, “The Village Dome,” so named because homeless people lived within large, dome-shaped structures. They resembled giant dog houses. Art had set up his office to run the paper in one of them. He even had Internet access! I visited the place twice. I walked into his office and found him looking at headlines from the New York Daily News on his computer screen. Why? Maybe he was looking for new ideas. Maybe, he was amused by it, as I often was. I submitted a new article to him, but he didn’t like it. He took the time to give me some constructive criticism on how to craft a better article. After that, we talked for about an hour. He told me many stories about his past. My favorite was when Allen Ginsberg took him to see a Gay porno movie in East Hollywood. Art smiled and said, “I learned a lot that night.”

I returned two weeks later. Art asked me if I wanted to go up to Seattle, Washington to protest the W.T.O. with some union workers. This wasn’t an issue of mine, so I declined. That event turned out to be the historic “Battle of Seattle.” I would never see Art again after that.

I am indebted to Art Kunkin for the rest of my life. I feel a real loss since his passing. He will always be in my memory.

Art Kunkin 1928-2019

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There are several ways to make one's fortune in journalism. I need not say that Combat is not one of them! But the true reward was the respect we had for our readers. And if it so happens that, from time to time, the respect was returned, then that was luxury! Of course we made some mistakes (but then, who did not?) But we never relinquished any of the honor that goes with our profession.

Albert Camus, Between Hell and Reason

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