Author Description

Back of BookOn June 14, 1967, the United States launched the Mariner 5 spacecraft and the People's Republic of China tested its first hydrogen bomb. On the same day, William Lewis entered the United States Army. This is his account of that time and its history. In the weeks and months that followed, war protests and race riots embattled police in Detroit, Buffalo, and Los Angeles. Riots spread to Washington, D.C., where tens of thousands of protesters marched while Allen Ginsberg tried to levitate The Pentagon in protest of the Vietnam War. A military policeman, Lewis tells his insider's story of that protest and the nature of its violence.Overseas, an explosion and fire aboard the U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS Forrestal in the Gulf of Tonkin left 134 dead, while in Vietnam, the United States Marines launched a search and destroy mission in Quang Nam that killed 114 Americans. At the same time, millions of viewers watched "Our World," the first live, international, satellite television production. It featured the live debut of The Beatles singing "All You Need is Love."This is one man's empathetic story of those times. A veteran of the "Forgotten War," the U.S. occupation of Korea, Lewis provides his readers with an empathetic look into one soldier's life during those tumultuous times. Told with humor, sadness, nostalgia, and pluck, Lewis recounts the music, excitement, and disappointment of that world-defining era.