Lost Film Flashes Back to Dallas' Forgotten 1969 Vietnam War Protest — Starring the Velvet Underground!

The anniversary of Dallas Peace Day fast approaches, yet another milestone moment turning 50 this year. Like Stonewall, Woodstock, the moon landing, the Miracle Mets, the Manson murders. This newspaper featured dozens of stories leading up to the October 15, 1969, event. Even more followed in its wake, as the moment became a movement. And on the day, several articles ran on the front page, including one headlined "1,500 Stay Orderly Here."But were it not for the very accidental discovery made by Jeremy Spracklen, the Moving Image curator at Southern Methodist University's G. William Jones Film & Video Collection, the golden anniversary of a significant day in Dallas history would have passed without remark. This year, like all others before it, we would have ignored the gathering at White Rock Lake's Winfrey Point — our homegrown piece of the nationwide Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam.On a shelf in a chilly, windowless basement beneath the Hilltop sat — for God knows how long — a reel of film shot on Oct. 15, 1969. The 12-minute-17-second video looks and sounds too good to have someone's crude keepsake. Spracklen has no idea where the film came from; it was just perched there, among some 900 reels that are unidentified, mislabeled or in need of repair.  Continue reading...