Escalation

•For the want of a squirrel, help arrived.

•The lad who was trying to get his pet squirrel that slipped the leash and climbed the tree is arrested, handcuffed, and stuffed in a police car. No mention is made of the whereabouts of the squirrel.

•The help that arrived got mad at the police.

•They staged a "tree-in" and attracted a crowd. A big crowd as can be seen in the photo. I'm sure there was chanting.

•More people climbed into the tree to protest what they felt was rough handling of the poor kid who was just trying to get his squirrel back. (Anything is common in Washington Square Park.)

•Police tried to calm everyone down, but more people formed. Lots of people. It looks like Woodstock.

•People became unruly and several were arrested. 

•It is 11 p.m. before calm is restored.

It was 1968 in Washington Square Park, summer, since people are in shirtsleeves, and my blog of September 26 2018 helped complete an investigation for someone who saw the above photo in a flea market and wanted to know more about the photo.

Imagine my surprise when I checked my blog this morning and saw someone had left a comment on my latest posting: My Favorite Punching Bag. 

It was a posting about my continued dislike for the NYT columnist, Maureen Dowd. And someone commented? I don't get many of those.

The comment had nothing to do with agreeing, or disagreeing about Maureen Dowd. The Alert Reader explained that as they were trying to learn more about the photo, they got a link to my posting of September 28, 2018 which offered enough details that they were grateful. They asked for my email, which I provided, and they sent me the above photo. As I explained in the posting, there were no photos then of event to include with the original posting or the NYT story on page 1. Until now.

Two in fact. There is a photo of a newspaper story about the event from a local newspaper at the time, The Journal Times. Also forwarded by the Alert Reader.

The blog commentator explains in an email how the search was touched off. Several people were involved in the search.

"The photo found its way online just within the last week from a user over on Reddit, they posted it to the 'Unexplained Photos' subreddit asking for information about what was going on in the image. The user had bought the photo at a flea market some years ago - it was a darkroom print and quite large at 14 x 14 inches, but there was no information on the reverse of the print."

In their email to me, they explained that they recognized a section in the photo that told them it was Washington Square Park. After whatever they did, they were lead to my posting of September 28 2018. By some act of providence, all my postings back to 2009 are still retrievable from the blog's website: www.onofframp.blogspot.com. The Internet is a galaxy. 

The commentator further explained what they and their squad of researchers could also glean from the photo. It is impressive, and I suspect they might get their own show: "Unknown Explained." Wait for it,

A few of us set about identifying the location and thanks to the Alexander Lyman Holley Monument seen in the background we confirmed it as Washington Square Park. Next was trying to figure out what event or gathering this was, we estimated it was mid-to-late 1960's based on people's clothing and the pre-1972 NYPD uniforms. We did some digging and another user found a newspaper scan of The Journal Times from August 5th 1968 which included a different photo - albeit a low quality one - of the incident, where the same person with red hair and a plaid shirt can be seen in the tree, here's the clipping: https://imgur.com/a/dtD5uJv

 

We then found your blog with more extensive writing about the incident and our mystery was solved! We initially assumed this was some sort of counterculture gathering or protest, and we were amazed when we found the real story, it's so odd and wonderful.

 

The photo I've attached is great quality. With it being square format I believe it was taken on a 6x6 TLR camera on colour negative medium format film, which was certainly more niche and relatively expensive at the time compared to 35mm photography - so this was taken by a professional photographer or quite a serious hobbyist.

I like to think my postings might someday help solve a murder. We need a police white board to trace how all this got started.

•My posting of September 28, 2018 was a riff on a re-tweet from @sarahlyall.
•She in turn was re-tweeting a young journalist, @emmaesquared, about the attention grabbing headline that appeared in the NYT, page 1, on  August 5, 1968, 4th column, top of the fold. (You'll need a  NYT online subscription to get there.)

                                   22 HELD IN MELEE
                                   IN WASHINGTON SQ. 

                                Disorder Set Off By Arrest
                                of Boy Who Climbed Tree
                                     to Get Pet Squirrel

I had a similar experience of trying to locate the source of a photo I once saw in a storefront gallery. It was of a Chinese laundry as a corner storefront. There was no identifying where the laundry was, but in the photo they were selling there was a beauty salon adjacent to the laundry that displayed their phone number.

I called, got their address, and learned I was looking at a storefront in the West Village, on Charles Street. This was quite a while ago. I don't think there was Google Earth then, but I wanted my own photo of the place rather than spend whatever it was they were asking for it at the gallery. The laundry is no longer there. I've got a piece of old New York.

I took a trip downtown and took a series of photos with my 35mm camera. I got what I wanted, and had one framed and it hangs in my home office.

I've written about Chinese Laundries and shared my unlikely experience in one with a posting on January 23, 2023.

If there is anything to say about all this, it is proof that we live on a Möbius strip.

http://www.onofframp.blogspot.com