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The marchers are definitely coming -- and they need your help.
It all began May 21 in San Francisco and has slowly but surely moved across the nation -- from California to Nevada to Utah to Colorado and, currently, to Nebraska. This weekend, March for Peace is expected to cross from Nebraska into Iowa.
As with most grassroots activism, this journey began as an idea last fall for now 19-year-old Ashley Casale. She was a freshman at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn. and thought a march across the nation would bring attention to the peace movement. She developed the web site and distributed fliers. Many people showed interest, but it has only been Casale and 18-year-old Michael Isreal doing the vast majority of the marching.
Earlier this month the pair did an interview with Colleen Mastrony of the Chicago Tribune:
...Their packs leave bruises on their backs, and their shoes have worn holes. Their skin has darkened to a chestnut hue and their bodies have grown lean. Over seven weeks they have traversed four states, more than 1,400 miles.
They make an unlikely pair. Israel is quiet and soft-spoken, and wears a floppy fishing hat. Casale is vivacious and outgoing, wearing outlandish orange sunglasses and carrying a cell phone that constantly rings with calls from activists and family checking the marchers’ progress. They had not met in person before the march began.
As they travel the highways, they have glimpsed the nation’s conflicting and complex feelings on the war. One woman working on a road crew in Colorado choked back emotion as she told them her son was shipping out to Iraq. “I don’t like war either,” she said before handing them her last few dollar bills. A Vietnam veteran selling produce at a roadside stand offered the travelers a free bag of cherries. “The government is sending those boys to die just like they did in Vietnam,” he said.
But the marchers also have faced the nation’s anger. An Army recruiter said American soldiers were making the real “march for peace” over in Iraq. And a farmer who initially had agreed to let them stay on his land abruptly asked them to leave after they told him they were protesting. At the entrance of Rocky Mountain National Park, rangers refused to let the pair enter until they put away the signs that read “March for Peace.” And on July 4, a driver in a passing car yelled: “Bunch of hippies! Bomb Iraq!”
Their anticipated route is posted and they are planning to pass through Council Bluffs, Treynor, Carson, Griswold, Massena, Fontanelle, Greenfield, Nanito, Stanzel, Winterset, Patterson, Bevington, Martensdale, Prole, Norwalk, Lakewood, Des Moines, Ivy, Prairie City, Reasnor, Sully, Lynnville, Montezuma, Deep River, Williamsburg, Unviersity Heights, Iowa City, West Liberty and Muscatine between the July 15 and July 26.
There are many things you can do to help: provide a place for them to sleep for a night, bring cool drinks, walk along for a few miles, say hello, write a letter to the editor of your local paper, hand them a few bucks or organize a rally.
I realize that not all readers will agree with the thinking behind this march. I am hopeful, however, that each of you will applaud two very young, motivated and determined people.
