Rodney King riots remembered at San Jose State
It was the night of the Rodney King riots.
It was just after 10:30 p.m., and all the reporters on the Spartan Daily staff, San Jose State’s campus paper, had left hours before. Just a few of us editors were still dawdling around our Dwight Bentel Hall newsroom like we usually did, surrounded by crushed Pepsi cans, backpacks, unfinished homework and Macs the size of overstuffed chairs.
We had just put the paper to bed — sent the pages for the next day’s issue off with the courier for delivery to the printer. Thursday’s paper would be rather routine, with stories on the campus Club Day and Arts Week. And there was a short front-page piece on student reactions to the acquittal of the four white LAPD officers who had beaten King, who was black. We figured such coverage was enough, since the main turmoil was going on in L.A. Just then, someone called the newsroom — a protest was forming in front of Joe West Hall. Surely, it would be like one of our usual fairly weak campus demonstrations that wouldn’t last long, but we knew we should cover it anyway. So we left a couple of messages with reporters and photographers (this was before the days of cell phones in every pocket — you were super high-tech if you had a pager). Unable to reach anyone, a few of us set out.
And within a half an hour, we found ourselves in the middle of the first full-blown riot we fledgling journalists would cover.
Big news
The protest went from a handful to hundreds of people, spilling out into the streets of downtown San Jose. It was what has now become the typical scenario — a peaceful demonstration gone awry in the dark, with groups peeling off and rampaging.
One by one, our staff members showed up. With notebooks or cameras in hand, we ran through the streets, keep-
ing up with the angry people who chanted and marched. We watched rocks thrown and windows shattering, saw police lines form. Three of our photographers had to fight off people in the crowd who tried to take their cameras. One sprained an ankle.
Our city editor, Tony, was jumped by a group of guys who punched and kicked him. He came out with only a bloody nose, got up, picked up his notebook, staggered back into the crowd and kept reporting. What a Spartan! He later wrote about his experience, much of which I just pilfered from his old article because I’d forgotten some of the details. Oh, and he saved his bloodied press pass as a badge of honor.
Ah, good times
Now, 25 years later (how did that happen?) six members of our group, plus one of our old advisers, reminisced over cheese and pepperoni last weekend at Grande’s Pizzeria, our go-to hangout back in the day because it’s right across from campus. We talked about our big story, the Rodney King riots, our first taste of real news. Even here in San Jose, it was a turbulent, emotional event that jolted the campus and the city. Our screaming, 72-point headline in our May 1, 1992, issue read: “RIOTS ROCK SAN JOSE.” It seems wrong to think fondly of such an experience, yet it sealed the bond of our small band of journalists. For our minireunion, I brought my big bound volume of all the Daily issues from that semester, the 10-pound book the department would give every executive editor at end of term. We flipped through the pages.
In our first issue, Jan. 23, 1992, the lead story above the fold was, “CSU, UC fee increases approved: Students storm Capitol, stage sit-ins at UC Davis.” Wow, not much has changed. Lower down on the page, a story noted the 40 percent boost would raise annual fees to a mere $1,308 per year. Wow, a lot has changed.
We skimmed over stories about thefts in the women’s locker rooms, the Tet festival, a report on a fire hazard at Duncan Hall, a story titled, “Service cart goes astray, crashes art doors.” I read some of the letters to the editor, and got angry all over again at one that called out one of our reporters. And I turned a little red at my purple prose in my weekly column. Even the column title, “World on my shoulder pads,” made me cringe, not to mention my puffy hairstyle in my mugshot. I looked like the Flying Nun.
And of course, we read through our coverage of the riot. Not bad, if I do say so myself.
We had a great team. Several of us are still the best of friends. Not just Facebook friends. We get together for birthdays and just to hang out. Some have gone on to big things. Several have lucrative careers as tech writers. One, our computer guru, made it big as a technology blogger — he’s oft quoted in publications like Wired. One is a pharmacist. Another works with a nonprofit foundation in India. Some are parents. Some are still finding their way. Some are working freelance. A couple of our photogs are still in the biz.
As far as I know, I’m the only journalist at an organization that actually prints a daily newspaper. Fortunately, the tech writers paid for pizza.