Photo © by Janine Wiedel, printed without permission.For two weeks in 1969, the National Guard barricaded Berkeley streets with barbed wire on which protesters pin flowers during protests and riots in People's Park.
Against the backdrop of the conviction and sentencing of the killers of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Kennedy, the Black Panthers vs. police, and people attacked by the National Guard, I start commuting to work on a three-speed Raleigh bicycle.
In March, James Earl Ray got 99 years for killing MLK, Jr. A few weeks later, Sirhan was sentenced to death for the murder of Robert Kennedy; and the troops in Vietnam number 543,000. Student strikes and anti-war protests grow. That same year, the Oakland Police ambushed the Black Panthers, and hippies in Berkeley's Peoples’ Park were attacked by police and the National Guard.
Over the years, I had given my kids bikes for Christmas and Lynn bought me a classic three-speed Raleigh with a back-rack (See picture). Now that the boys were older and went to Douglass Elementary (now Harvey Milk Academy) just down the hill and my sister and brother- in-law moved in next door, we no longer had to bus it downtown to school and back. After sch
ool, they’d be home for an hour, looked after by Sis till Lynn and I got home. So I started riding my Raleigh to work. This was pre-helmet 1969. I believe I was the only commuter riding down busy Market or Mission Streets with bike messengers. I soon upgraded myself to a 10-speed Gitane, which I bought at the newly established Valencia Cyclery on Valencia Street near 24th.
There were few if any bike racks close to the buildings I worked in, so I’d lock up to a parking sign pole. I finally found one a block away. One night after work, I couldn’t believe my eyes. The space in the rack where I'd left my bike was empty; someone had ripped it off. I felt sick and angry; I rode the bus home almost in tears. As soon as the insurance claim was paid, I bought a Peugeot. Paul , the owner of the shop, suggested I secure my new bike with a U-bar lock when I told him about the Gitane. I’d been using a cable with a padlock. Ignorantly, I went on using a cable until I lost a couple more bikes. I finally bought a U-bar lock. Later, when we moved further out in the Mission, whenever I visited his store, Paul would tell me that opening up in the morning, he’d see me whizzing down Valencia.
It took me about twenty minutes to get to work, a little less time than on the bus. I rode from 20th St. down Collingwood to 18th Street, then down 18th to Mission, then cut over to Market to Sansome. The Bay Area Rapid Transit system was being built. Construction crews were tearing up Market Street from the Ferry Building to Van Ness, and Mission Street from where it meets Valencia all the way to Daly City, to dig the tunnels that would carry the BART trains and SF’s light rail streetcar: MUNI Metro. Normal bus and streetcar schedules and routes were completely disrupted. On my bike, I sped past all the mess and gloatingly waved at crowds of commuters abandoned on street corners when construction caused a power failure, stopping trolley busses and streetcars; and when diesel buses were delayed by break-downs or altered routes.
Continental Insurance had no showers for its employees. I never brought a change of clothes. After a while, using meditation and bio-feedback, I psyched myself out not to sweat. Also, since I rode every day, my body adjusted to the physical exercise. Mini-skirts and dresses were a slight problem, but mini-skorts came in handy. Gradually, I started wearing all-natural fabrics that could breathe: loose skirts, dresses, and short jackets. I stitched up for myself a series of what my friends called a coat of many colors, made up of quarter yards of various, brightly-colored corduroy fabric, in order to be visible to drivers.
My coat of many colors, modeled by Dino Petrucci, a friend who bartended at Rosa Pistola's (which became the famous Washington Square Bar and Grill, or "the Wash Bag" thanks to Herb Caen) in North Beach. He ended up having me make him one to wear to a Frank Sinatra concert.
I knew that by wearing such outfits to work would ruin any chance for promotion since I eschewed tight-fitting skirt suits and polyester or silk blouses, nor did I wear “heels” but flats, the easier to slip in and out of toe-clips; at times, dress shoes with a short heel. Panty-hose and tights were just coming on the market. Lynn hated them, saying they made women look like sexless Barbie Dolls. Still, some women, myself included, wore nylons with- or without seams up the back- and garter belts. Wearing them with mini-skirts, I believe I may have caused a few car crashes, because, as I passed on my bike, I heard screeching tires and shouts. I know I once caused a bus to lose its trolleys. Still, I rode on, mindful of what was going on in front and to each side.
Not only were there few places to lock up outside the office, companies provided no accommodations for bike storage during working hours. One day, I read an article in Time Magazine by a New Yorker whose boss let him bring his bicycle into the office when it rained. I sat down in front of a typewriter and, using Continental letterhead, wrote a letter to Time saying that I commuted to work by bicycle as well and how nice it would be if companies would allow its bike-riding employees that privilege, especially if it was raining, and also to keep their bikes from getting stolen. I typed my name, left the standard two spaces for my signature, then typed "Senior Underwriter" (which I was), signed it, Xeroxed a copy for myself , stuffed the original in a company envelope addressed to Time, and threw it in the mail pick-up bin. Time wouldn’t print it, I reasoned, they get tons of letters every day and my letter is about bicycles and rain. I totally forgot about it.
A week later, I got a call from Marion, the vice-president Mr. B-'s secretary, asking me to come to his office immediately. I had no idea why. So I hopped on the elevator to the executive suites on the seventh floor, and announced myself.
“Take a seat,” Marion said, “Mr. B- will see you in a moment.” Her console buzzed, she picked up a receiver, murmured something, looked at me and said, “Go right in, dear, he’s expecting you.” I walked in, sinking into the carpet; noticed he was holding a torn Western Union envelope, but though nothing of it. He gestured to a chair in front of his desk. I sat.
“I’m impressed that you got a letter published in Time,” he said, waving the telegram.
“I did?!”
“You might want to read this.” He held out the telegram, leaving me to stand, lean over his massive desk, and take it. (It would be beneath him to do the standing and leaning.) “I took the liberty of opening it,” Mr. B- droned on, “since it was addressed to you at Continental. I assume you wrote your letter on our stationary.” All the while, I was thinking: isn’t it a felony to open other people’s mail let alone a telegram? I should say something. But I was too excited about a major newsweekly accepting my letter. The telegram stated that my letter would appear in the next week’s issue.
“Yes,” I admitted, “I thought it would have a better chance of being published.”
“And so it was. Well, please let me see the magazine when it comes out. And, next time you ride your bike to work and it’s raining, just come to my office and I’ll see that you can leave it here overnight. It’s dangerous riding a bike in the rain, especially at night.” Mr. B- walked me to his door and said goodbye, patting me on the shoulder.
“Thank you, sir. I’ll take you up on that.”
“Please do.”
The skies were clear the morning I left for work on my bike a month or so later, but by early afternoon, it was pouring rain. I hoped it would stop around quitting time, but no such luck. I went up to the executive suite and approached Marion.
“Hi Marion, is Mr. B- in?”
“No, dear, he’s on vacation and won’t be back for a couple of weeks, why?”
“Well, he said I could leave my bike here whenever it rained."
"Yes? and . . .?"
"It's raining really hard, so can I leave it in the supply room overnight?”
“I’m sorry, he never said anything to me about that. You certainly can’t leave it here.”
“Why not? He said I could.”
“I know nothing about that,” she said, testily, getting her purse from her desk and pulling her coat from the rack. “I said you can't. You certainly can’t leave it here because of liability issues. I’m sorry.”
I ended up drenched, wheeling my bike down Sansome St. I spotted a parking garage on Pine and pushed my bike in. The guy in the booth said I could leave it overnight and charged me five bucks.
Next up: CHAPTER 9, Part One: A man on the moon, Stonewall riots in New York, the Manson Family massacre, and more, as honchos from Continental’s head office take over the SF branch, demote me, relegate me to a windowless room in the basement and restrict me from leaving the “floor” except for lunch. Time to move on.
