The graduate

1968: In 1968 I headed down a path that began with low-rent existentialism and took me all the way to Communism | Marvin Olasky

Since I'm one of the older WORLD staff members, and since in 1968 I lived in Boston and New Haven, two centers of the sprouting cultural revolution, I'm the one obliged to write about that revolution not as seen from afar or read about, but lived through.

What was the cultural mood like in those precincts? Exhibit A: my high-school yearbook. I was the editor and turned it weirdly from a standard happy memory book to a study in sophomoric angst. Other students grooved on it. Pages 24-25: photos of students looking bored, with the headline, "What can I do? Where can I go?" Page 26: photos of students stepping in puddles or sitting in trash containers. Page 27: photo of a "Please Keep Off the Grass" sign on an area covered with snow, under a headline, "The absurdity of it all."