Tom Dresser
I drive a school bus, bringing students from West Tisbury and Tisbury to the high school.
For years my daughter Jill lived a private, single, independent life in New Orleans, the city she fell in love with during her college years at Tulane.
This past Saturday my wife Joyce and I flew to Ohio to spend a few days campaigning for President Obama. Our friends Tom and Lynn King had agreed to house, feed and provide us with a car. The campaign prepared an aggressive work schedule for us in the town of Bryan, Ohio, located in the northwest corner of the state.
Sunday morning we arrived at the local headquarters in Bryan. Our assignment: canvass as many as 70 houses along the tree-lined streets of the town, speaking only with Democrats or independents. The route was mapped out and well defined.
Speeding down the roadway of life, warning signs posted along the way give us an indication of what lies ahead. One signpost in particular lies so far ahead, way off over the horizon, that we hardly pay it any heed. But it’s moving up fast, this speed bump on the highway of life.
So there I was, hurtling along the West-Tisbury-Edgartown Road in my 1948 red Willys Jeepster convertible, the wind blowing in my hair, sun shining on my face and 200 pounds of patty-pan squash riding comfortably along with me in my open-air vehicle. Was this a dream, had I robbed a farm stand or was I planning to feed famished friends? No, no, and well, maybe, sort of. Let me put on the brakes and explain. (Don’t worry, the squash are securely boxed. I installed seat belts. And the Jeepster is not that fast.)
Oprah Winfrey’s show on May 4 honored the Freedom Riders on the 50th anniversary of their historic bus ride to desegregate public areas in the South.
Thirteen young people, many students, both black and white, boarded two Greyhound buses in Washington, D.C., on May 4, 1961 with the goal of riding to New Orleans. They were organized by the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE).