On June 8, 1998 I turned 50.- I know this doesn't mean that "I'm getting old" and I've never been much affected by such milestones.- But the fact remains that I often feel weary with age; I think this is because I have been swimming against currents for a long time, and I have no intention of quitting and no reasonable expectation that the currents will change anytime soon.

In determining what information to put here to give visitors an idea about who I am, I have the good fortune to be commencing composition of this page during the weekend of Martin Luther King Day; this coincidence jogs some meaningful memories for me.

The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was a hero to me in my adolescence (and still is, for that matter). This was an unusual phenomenon in the communities of my youth; it can be explained, in part, by the fact that both of my parents, though they came from rock-ribbed Republican backgrounds and became nervous when Stokely Carmichael, H. Rap Brown, and Black Power initiatives came along, nevertheless staunchly supported the civil rights movement of the sixties.

I was nineteen years old when MLK died.- I was on spring break from my sophomore year at Denison University in Granville, Ohio, visiting my girlfriend, Jane, at her college in Oneonta, New York.- It was Jane who first broke the news about the assassination to me; this was ronic because my admiration for Dr. King was something she never really understood.

For me, that awful moment helped to mark a grim turning point in recent American history.- It was not simply that everything changed because Dr. King was gone; in fact the American people had already begun to tire of their commitment to (or tolerance of) the long struggle to realize Dr. King's vision for the nation and for mankind.- Before his death, it was also becoming clear that some of the people who followed Dr. King on the civil rights trail were not willing to take up other issues, such as economic justice and opposition to U.S. imperialism, to which he had been led by his growing comprehension of the implications of the civil rights mandate.

The King assassination was followed shortly by the murder of Robert Francis Kennedy and the election of Richard Milhous Nixon (with his secret plan to end the war) to the presidency of the United States of America.- The black community in this country has never again found a leader of such recognized authority; the Kennedy dynasty was set firmly on the descending slope of its arc; and the fuse was lit on the time bomb which came to be known as Watergate and which eventually shattered American political innocence and left in its place a permafrost of cynicism upon the public landscape.

I am one of those now aging romantic fools who believe that our society, which was traveling on an upward (though not always smooth) journey until 1968, has been reeling morally and spiritually ever since from the triple tragedy of that fateful year.

In other words, I remain in attitude, if not entirely in thought pattern, an unreconstructed '60's radical, still searching for a heart of gold...

Of course, someboby might observe that I found my heart of gold when I married the lovely Gayle, and I certainly wouldn't debate the point; but, for as long as I can remember, my consciousness has benn centered to a great (arguably unhealthy) extent on the public life of the society in which I live; and this life has failed miserably to measure up to the promise it seemed to hold in my formative years.

Having made this defining statement, I must add that there are other concerns, interests, and dimensions in my repertoire which will be manifested on the Whitt's End website.- For some personal information about me, click here.- Visitors may be interested as well in my wife's homepage; don't be confused by the fact that she has at least two identities, Janet and Gayle.- Also, please check below and on the right-hand side of this page for some of my favorite places on the web.

THE DEMOCRATICC UNDERGROUND

THE UNREPENTANT LIBERAL  

MOVE ON

It is commonly held, particularly among those with little or no direct experience of the internet, that the world wide web is a cesspool of obscenity and pornography. -It's true that there is a lot of raunchy stuff on the net, but any clear thinking person who has wandered the web for more than nine minutes knows that, measured by sheer offensiveness and volume of material, the grand prize for cesspoolery in cyberspace belongs unquestionably to the vast array of right-wing propaganda out there.- This noisome refuse is all the harder to endure because it is all too often taken for conventional wisdom in these dark times.- Matt Drudge recently said, "I go where the stink is," in a pathetic effort to explain the odor which is his constant companion.- Here are links to selected websites offered as a modest counterbalance to the foul amalgam of neofascist and pseudoconservative sludge clogging the web today.

DRUDGE RETORT Read Meat for Yellow Dogs, Green Giants, and True Blues.

NOAM CHOMSKY, libertarian socialist, sheds light and turns up the heat on oppressors

SOJOURNERS MAGAZINE, a comfort to the afflicted and an affliction to the comfortable (as it should be),  publishes God's Word in our time

MOLLY IVINS will make you think and chuckle as you read her Star Telegram columns, published twice wekly

THE SMUDGE REPORT an occasionally updated spoof of the dreadful Drudge Report with links to many useful news and opinion sources

THE BUSH WATCH keeping a wary eye on the nefarious doings of Dubya and the family's soldiers. It's a depressing job, but somebody has to do  it

ENDING CORPORATE GOVERNANCE "We The People Revoking Our Plutocracy"

GUARDIAN UNLIMITED contemporary affairs get a progressive treatment with a British accent

I was a history major in college. Luckily I went to school when getting a real (i.e. liberal arts) education, instead of simply preparing for a career, was still permitted.- It has been one of the great blessings of my life that the history department at Denison at that time was loaded with really top-notch teachers.- I loved history, both as entertainment and as aan academic discipline, and still do.- The following group sites reflects this range of interestsh.

THE HISTORY PLACE

THE HISTORY NET presented by the National Historical Society

EXPLORING ANCIENT WORLD CULTURES

THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE a site based on the PBS documentary series presenting episodes of American history

REAL HISTORY ARCHIVES

ESSAYS IN HISTORY (1990-2000) fom the University of Virginia

NATIONAL WOMEN'S HISTORY PROJECT

LEST WE FORGET a website of black history, culture, and current events

The internet and literature need not be mutually exclusive interests.- In fact, there are many fine websites which promote literary pursuits.- Here are a few of them.

SHORT STORIES AT EAST OF THE WEB

ONLINE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEXTS  from the  University of Virginia

BANNED BOOKS ONLINE

POSTCOLONIAL AND POSTIMPERIAL LITERATURE a project developed by George P. Landow, Professor of English and Art History, Brown University

WILLIAM GADDIS

SHAKESPEARE the bard's complete works

EDGAR ALLAN POE PAGES

THE CASTLE a Kafkaesque website

AMERICA'S #1 POPULIST Jim Hightower

TED RALL COLUMS  from which it is possible to get to drivel by idiots like Bill Buckley and Ann Coulter

IMAGES FROM WIZAED OF WHIMSY