Students organized teach-ins to educate each other on current events. They discussed the rle of the United States in the Vietnam War.  Even though the war was coming to a close, it remained a significant part of their lives. They addressed racial injustices by protesting and going to rallies downtown. As David Farber ‘74 remembers it, Parker students were deeply engaged in the social issues of the time.

Nearly 44 years after graduating, Farber returned to Parker on Monday, March 19 in a dark sports jacket and gray pants to discuss 1968 and some of what he’s learned since then. Now an author and a distinguished history professor at the University of Kansas, Farber has dedicated much of his career to researching the ‘60s. on the 50th anniversary of its events, he spoke about his book, “Chicago ‘68” during a Morning Ex, with two Upper School history classes, and in an evening lecture entitled “50 Years after ‘Chicago ‘68.”  Farber’s visit was part of the Nightviews Speaker Series.

To his nighttime audience of about 175 almost entirely made up of adults, Farber spoke about the 1968 presidential election, the Democratic National Convention held here, and the assassinations of Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Because I’m not from Chicago, it was really nice for me to learn how Chicago was at the center of 1968,” history teacher Susan Elliott, who attended the lecture, said. “As a world historian, I’ve often thought about 1968 as an international phenomenon, but to think of it as a local one is really exciting.”

When Farber took the stage at 10:40 a.m. to address a Morning Ex audience comprised of third graders through seniors, he focused more on the importance of activism. Armed with a slideshow sub-headed by the line, “History of the Future,” Farber emphasized the parallels between the student-led protests of the ‘60s and current events, mentioning Parker’s March 14 walkout in response to the school shooting in Parkland, Florida.

“The 60s was one of those times in history when so many people challenged the basic conventional wisdom of their time,” Farber said. “I think for students–young kids especially–to understand that it’s necessary to challenge the conventional wisdom they’re inheriting…I think the 60s is a nice window into that process of how to challenge conventional wisdom.”

Junior Jade Rasmussen saw the comparison. She said, “He showed that the civil rights movement was a template for other protests today.”

For Principal Dan Frank, who was in the same class at Parker as Farber and has been a friend since, it was valuable that students were able to hear from him. “He came to visit what is an outgrowth of what started when we first met when we were in seventh grade,” Frank said.  “We grew up at a time when the opening for citizen voice was expanding, and that’s when we came of age. We were aware of this, and it became a part of who we are as people–and we’ve been talking about it all these years.”

While a student at Parker, Farber was unsure of his career path. The love of writing that he developed in high school, though, was what led him to pursue a career as a historian. While earning his PhD from The University of Chicago, his leftover questions from childhood directed his interest towards the ‘60s.

“It dawned on me that I was really curious about the history I just managed not to live through,” Farber said. “I was just a little kid in the 1960s, and I became really fascinated–what was that all about? I decided to see if I could write a 300 page dissertation about it to make sense of it.”

Frank remembers Farber’s getting hooked on history long before graduate school. “We’d go in to our history class, and because we both loved it, we talked a lot,” Frank said, smiling. “After class, we’d go to lunch, and we’d still be talking about it, even if we went on the field with our baseball mitts or to kick a soccer ball back and forth–we’d still talk about the themes, the issues, what we’d read, with a combination of humor and intensity.”

After returning to two Parker history classes and talking with Civil Rights and U.S. History students, as well as listening to students’ questions following his MX, Farber was impressed with the insights and engagement. “It was funny to see the school’s building looking so different,” Farber said, “and yet the students felt really similar.”