Mark Rudd
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Mark William Rudd (born June 2, 1947) is an American political organizer, mathematics instructor,
anti-war activist An anti-war movement (also ''antiwar'') is a social movement, usually in opposition to a particular nation's decision to start or carry on an armed conflict, unconditional of a maybe-existing just cause. The term anti-war can also refer to ...
and
counterculture A counterculture is a culture whose values and norms of behavior differ substantially from those of mainstream society, sometimes diametrically opposed to mainstream cultural mores.Eric Donald Hirsch. ''The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy''. Hou ...
icon who got involved with the
Weather Underground The Weather Underground was a Far-left politics, far-left militant organization first active in 1969, founded on the Ann Arbor, Michigan, Ann Arbor campus of the University of Michigan. Originally known as the Weathermen, the group was organiz ...
in the 1960s. Rudd became a member of the
Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
chapter of
Students for a Democratic Society Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) was a national student activist organization in the United States during the 1960s, and was one of the principal representations of the New Left. Disdaining permanent leaders, hierarchical relationships ...
(SDS) in 1963. By 1968, he had emerged as a leader for Columbia's SDS chapter. During the 1968 Columbia University Protests, he served as spokesperson for dissident students protesting a variety of issues, particularly the
Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
. As the war escalated, Mark Rudd worked with other youth movement leaders to take SDS in a more militant direction. While much of the general membership of SDS refused to countenance violence, Rudd together with some other prominent SDS members formed a
paramilitary A paramilitary is an organization whose structure, tactics, training, subculture, and (often) function are similar to those of a professional military, but is not part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. Paramilitary units carr ...
organization inspired by the
Red Guard Red Guards () were a mass student-led paramilitary social movement mobilized and guided by Chairman Mao Zedong in 1966 through 1967, during the first phase of the Cultural Revolution, which he had instituted.Teiwes According to a Red Guard le ...
, referring to themselves collectively as "Weatherman" after the lyrics from a famous
Bob Dylan Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan, born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Often regarded as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture during a career sp ...
song A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetitio ...
. Rudd went "underground" in 1970, hiding from law enforcement following the
Greenwich Village townhouse explosion The Greenwich Village townhouse explosion occurred on March 6, 1970, in New York, New York, United States. Members of the Weather Underground (Weathermen), an American leftist militant group, were making bombs in the basement of 18 West 11th ...
that killed three of his Weather Underground peers. He surrendered to authorities in 1977 and served a short jail sentence. He taught mathematics at
Central New Mexico Community College Central New Mexico Community College (CNM), formerly Technical Vocational Institute (TVI), is a public community college based in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Founded in 1964, CNM offers associate degrees, professional certificates, and training opt ...
, and retired in
Albuquerque Albuquerque ( ; ), ; kee, Arawageeki; tow, Vakêêke; zun, Alo:ke:k'ya; apj, Gołgéeki'yé. abbreviated ABQ, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Mexico. Its nicknames, The Duke City and Burque, both reference its founding in ...
, New Mexico. Rudd has since expressed regret for his role in the Weather Underground, and advocates for nonviolence and electoral change.


Early life

Rudd was born in
Irvington, New Jersey Irvington is a Township (New Jersey), township in Essex County, New Jersey, Essex County, New Jersey, United States. Per the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 61,176. The township had the ninth-highest property tax rate ...
. His father, Jacob S. Rudd (1909–1995), was born Jacob Shmuel Rudnitsky in Stanislower (Yiddish fo
Stanisławów
, Poland; he was a former army officer who sold real estate in
Maplewood, New Jersey Maplewood is a township in Essex County in the U.S. state of New Jersey. The township is an inner-ring suburban bedroom community of New York City in the New York metropolitan area. As of the 2020 United States census, the township's populatio ...
. His mother, Bertha Bass (1912–2009), was born in Elizabeth, New Jersey, the year after her parents emigrated from Lithuania. Rudd had a brother, David R. Rudd (1939–2009), who became an attorney. His family was Jewish. Rudd attended
Columbia High School Columbia High School may refer to: *Columbia High School (Huntsville, Alabama) *Columbia High School (Georgia) *Columbia High School (Florida) *Columbia High School (Idaho) *Columbia High School (Illinois) *Columbia High School (Mississippi), a Mis ...
in his hometown of
Maplewood, New Jersey Maplewood is a township in Essex County in the U.S. state of New Jersey. The township is an inner-ring suburban bedroom community of New York City in the New York metropolitan area. As of the 2020 United States census, the township's populatio ...
, and later Columbia University in New York.


Campus activism

Mark Rudd's website says that his commitment to "fighting U.S imperialism" was inspired by the revolutionary movement in Cuba, which at that time was in its ninth year. In 1968, Rudd and Bernardine Dohrn and other leaders of SDS were invited to Cuba to meet with Cuban, Soviet, and North Vietnamese delegates. His experiences in Cuba strengthened Rudd's anti-war and pro-Communist sentiments. Rudd had described the life of Cuba as "extremely humanistic" and he idealized
Ernesto "Che" Guevara Ernesto Che Guevara (; 14 June 1928The date of birth recorded on /upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/78/Ernesto_Guevara_Acta_de_Nacimiento.jpg his birth certificatewas 14 June 1928, although one tertiary source, (Julia Constenla, quoted ...
, referring to him as the "Heroic Guerrilla." Once he returned from Cuba, Rudd was elected President of the Columbia chapter of SDS. In 1968, during his junior year, Rudd was expelled from Columbia after a series of sit-ins and riots that disrupted campus life and attracted nationwide attention. These events culminated in the dramatic occupation of several campus buildings, including the Administration building,
Low Memorial Library The Low Memorial Library (nicknamed Low) is a building at the center of Columbia University's Morningside Heights campus in Manhattan, New York City, United States. The building, located near 116th Street between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenu ...
, and which ended only after violent clashes between students and the
New York Police Department The New York City Police Department (NYPD), officially the City of New York Police Department, established on May 23, 1845, is the primary municipal law enforcement agency within the City of New York, the largest and one of the oldest in ...
. The Columbia protest was not the first student revolt on an American campus, but as it occurred at a relatively conservative Ivy League school located just up the street from the headquarters of the nation's news media, it received considerable press coverage and drew many supporters. The protests produced the slogan "Create Two, Three, Many Columbias!" The
Doonesbury ''Doonesbury'' is a comic strip by American cartoonist Garry Trudeau that chronicles the adventures and lives of an array of characters of various ages, professions, and backgrounds, from the President of the United States The president ...
character
Mark Slackmeyer Mark Sheldon Slackmeyer is a character in the comic strip ''Doonesbury''. Character biography Mark starts out as a Radicalization, radical at Walden College, and leads several peace rallies (in his first appearance, he referred to himself as "'M ...
was inspired by Rudd.


Revolutionary Youth Movement and Weather Underground

In 1969, as SDS membership grew rapidly, members' views concerning both goals and methods began to diverge widely. Rudd felt that SDS was not doing enough to protest the war in Vietnam. He was a leader of the
Revolutionary Youth Movement In the United States, the Revolutionary Youth Movement (RYM) is the section of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) that opposed the Worker Student Alliance of the Progressive Labor Party (PLP). Most of the national leadership of SDS joined th ...
(RYM), a faction of SDS, which advocated a more militant course of action while other factions within SDS were becoming concerned about Rudd's increasingly vocal calls for violent confrontation and hardline Communist sentiments. The 1969 SDS convention effectively splintered and ended the organization. Rudd and other former RYM members ultimately formed Weatherman, a self-proclaimed "organization of communist women and men." The new organization was intent on overthrowing the government through violent actions. Spreading communism was a priority for the members of Weather, as when Rudd told other members of SDS, " Don't be timid about telling people we're Communist. Don't deny it, be proud of it."


Years underground

Rudd and other members of Weatherman participated in an SDS National Action on October 8–11, 1969, an event which became known as the
Days of Rage The Days of Rage were a series of protests during three days in October 1969 in Chicago, organized by the emerging Weatherman faction of Students for a Democratic Society. The group planned the October 8–11 event as a "National Action" ...
. Charges filed against demonstrators following this action threatened the movement and its supporters. Rudd was demoted within the organization in January 1970. Rudd, along with other prominent members of Weather, went underground in March 1970 following the
Greenwich Village townhouse explosion The Greenwich Village townhouse explosion occurred on March 6, 1970, in New York, New York, United States. Members of the Weather Underground (Weathermen), an American leftist militant group, were making bombs in the basement of 18 West 11th ...
, an incident in which three members of the organization died when an explosive device, intended for a servicemen's ball, detonated prematurely. The dead were
Terry Robbins Terry Robbins (October 4, 1947 – March 6, 1970) was an American far left activist, a key member of the Ohio Students for a Democratic Society (The S.D.S.), and one of the three Weathermen who died in the Greenwich Village townhouse explosi ...
,
Diana Oughton Diana Oughton (January 26, 1942 – March 6, 1970) was an American member of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) Michigan Chapter and later, a member of the 1960s radical group Weather Underground. Oughton received her B.A. from Bryn Mawr ...
, and
Ted Gold Theodore "Ted" Gold (December 13, 1947 – March 6, 1970)Jacobs, H. 275 was a member of Weather Underground who died in the 1970 Greenwich Village townhouse explosion. Early years and education Gold, a red diaper baby, was the son of Hyman G ...
, who was Rudd's friend and partner in RYM and the Columbia sit-ins. Weatherman had already come to the attention of the FBI, but this explosion caused the members of Weatherman to take further precautions and to engage in more clandestine operations and according to some Weatherman members like Bill Ayers, build an underground revolutionary movement. According to
Kirkpatrick Sale Kirkpatrick Sale (born June 27, 1937) is an American author who has written prolifically about political decentralism, environmentalism, luddism and technology. He has been described as having a "philosophy unified by decentralism" and as being " ...
, Rudd was regarded as arrogant and politically ignorant by the other leaders, and was further demoted in the organization by the end of the year. After the townhouse explosion, the government actively sought to apprehend Mark Rudd and twelve other members of the Weather Underground Organization (WUO). For seven years Rudd lived underground, although he was disengaged from the WUO for most of that time.


Reappearance

On September 14, 1977, Rudd turned himself in to authorities, tired of life as a fugitive. He had been living and working under an assumed name just a few miles from the Columbia campus in
Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
and was increasingly frustrated over his lifestyle which included his inability to see his family as well as working in manual labor jobs beneath his education. Due to FBI abuses against Vietnam protestors and others during the
COINTELPRO COINTELPRO ( syllabic abbreviation derived from Counter Intelligence Program; 1956–1971) was a series of covert and illegal projects actively conducted by the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) aimed at surveilling, infiltrati ...
program, Rudd could not be convicted of many of the crimes alleged in the original government complaint against him that led to his fugitive status. He received a small fine and ultimately spent less than one year in jail for all his crimes. His first public appearance was on campus, where he spoke to a crowd of hundreds of admiring students. He was not the firebrand the crowd expected, but he did participate in a march around the campus after the speech.


Later developments

In the summer of 1978, Mark and his then-girlfriend, Sue LeGrand, moved to
Albuquerque Albuquerque ( ; ), ; kee, Arawageeki; tow, Vakêêke; zun, Alo:ke:k'ya; apj, Gołgéeki'yé. abbreviated ABQ, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Mexico. Its nicknames, The Duke City and Burque, both reference its founding in ...
,
New Mexico ) , population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano) , seat = Santa Fe , LargestCity = Albuquerque , LargestMetro = Tiguex , OfficialLang = None , Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ker ...
. During his time there he became an instructor of
mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...
at
Central New Mexico Community College Central New Mexico Community College (CNM), formerly Technical Vocational Institute (TVI), is a public community college based in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Founded in 1964, CNM offers associate degrees, professional certificates, and training opt ...
(then known as the Albuquerque Technical Vocational Institute, or TVI). At the time he was hired and during his early employment at the college, Rudd's years as a student radical and Federal fugitive were almost unknown to his students and other faculty members who seldom asked if he was "that" Mark Rudd. Most of these individuals were of a different generation and the name "Mark Rudd" had ceased to be a household word. Rudd regarded this lack of critical attention with some disdain. In 1990, he published a memoir called ''Truth and Consequences: The Education of Mark Rudd'', which detailed his life with SDS, the Columbia University riots, and his time as a fugitive. Rudd was interviewed for the 2002 documentary, ''
The Weather Underground The Weather Underground was a Far-left politics, far-left militant organization first active in 1969, founded on the Ann Arbor, Michigan, Ann Arbor campus of the University of Michigan. Originally known as the Weathermen, the group was organiz ...
'', in which he stated that although the group's motivations, to end the Vietnam War and to oppose
US imperialism American imperialism refers to the expansion of American political, economic, cultural, and media influence beyond the boundaries of the United States. Depending on the commentator, it may include imperialism through outright military conquest ...
, were justified, the violent actions performed in pursuit of those beliefs were questionable. He was the only former Weather member featured in the film that regretted his involvement in the group. Today Rudd lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, with his wife, Marla (Painter). Rudd maintains a website called MarkRudd.com where he frequently posts essays and other writings, including his opinions on contemporary issues, and a personal appearance schedule.Rudd, www.markrudd.com. Official website of Mark Rudd He travels around the country in support of the newly reborn Students for a Democratic Society. Rudd, along with Brian Kelly of Pace SDS, have helped establish ties between the new SDS and the Kent State University movement. He recently published another book on his time with SDS and The Weathermen called "Underground: My Life with the SDS and the Weathermen," which was published by Harper Collins in 2009 and is more a personal memoir on his life and times rather than a political statement as was his first book. Documentary filmmaker
Sam Green Sam Green is an American documentary filmmaker. His most recent projects are “live documentaries” in which he narrates a film in-person while musicians perform a live soundtrack. His 2018 project ''A Thousand Thoughts'' features a live score ...
made a 2008 short entitled ''Clear Glasses'', which focuses on a pair of glasses Rudd sent him. In 2008, Rudd spoke about the Vietnam War era activities of SDS and his involvement in them for the award-winning documentary film ''Superpower'' by Barbara-Anne Steegmuller.


Works

*Mark Rudd, ''Truth and Consequences: The Education of Mark Rudd'', Grove Press, 1990, *Mark Rudd, ''Underground: My Life with SDS and the Weathermen'', William Morrow, 2009,


Notes


References

* Perkins,Robin, "The Days of Rage in Perspective", Commentary, May 2001, p. 23-24. * Jacobs, Ron, "The Way the Wind Blew: A History of the Weather Underground. Verso Publishing, 1997, p.233. * Willis, Margaret, Revolutionalry Violence in America, Green Mountain Press, 1993, p.43-44. * Rudd, Mark, ''Truth and Consequences: The Education of Mark Rudd'', Grove Press, 1990. * Unidentified author, "Who is Mark Rudd". Markrudd.com, http://www.markrudd.com/ * Ninety Fourth Congress (1975) ''The Weather Underground: Report of the Subcommittee to investigate the administration of the internal security act and other internal security laws of the committee on the judiciary United States Senate.'' (Stock No. 052-070-02727-4) Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, Pgs 95-102. * ''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
''; September 26, 1977;
Aging Radical Comes Home
* Rudd, Mark, ''Columbia''. New York: SDS, 1969. * "Why Were There So Many Jews in SDS? (or, the Ordeal of Civility)" by Mark Rud


External links


Mark Rudd's website




by Stephanie Lee, ''New York Press'', March 24, 2009

by Annette John-Hall, ''Philadelphia Inquirer'', May 11, 2009 *

by Barbara-Anne Steegmuller, 2008
Interview with Mark Rudd
by Stephen McKiernan, Binghamton University Libraries Center for the Study of the 1960s, February 2, 2010 {{DEFAULTSORT:Rudd, Mark 1947 births American anti–Vietnam War activists American people of Polish-Jewish descent American people of Lithuanian-Jewish descent COINTELPRO targets Columbia College (New York) alumni Living people Jewish activists Members of Students for a Democratic Society People from Irvington, New Jersey People from Albuquerque, New Mexico Members of the Weather Underground People from Maplewood, New Jersey