[Peace-discuss] Antiwar yard signs

Thu Jan 16 17:14:04 CST 2003

[A cautionary tale from Minneapolis.  --CGE]

	Antiwar sign replaced, ending Minneapolis whodunit
	Doug Grow 
	Star Tribune 
	Published 01/16/2003 

A Minneapolis whodunit apparently has ended with the city buying and
delivering a new antiwar sign to the home of Gary Hendlin.

About a month ago, Hendlin's two "Say no to war with Iraq" signs were
taken from in front of his home near West River Parkway in south
Minneapolis.

The disappearance of such signs has become pretty common since they began
proliferating across the metro area in recent months. From Wayzata to
Stillwater, there have been increasing reports of the antiwar signs being
stolen or defaced.

For example, the sign Nancy Berneking has in her front yard in Wayzata was
knocked down and damaged for a second time earlier this week. She's taped
the sign back together and put it back in her yard, but she's angry.

"We need to make a big deal of this," she said. "It's like seeing the
Constitution being kicked down in your front yard. . . . Why do these
people want to silence all dissent?"

Berneking said that a number of her friends from St. Luke's Presbyterian
Church in Minnetonka have reported destruction of their antiwar signs.

But what's unique about the disappearance of Hendlin's signs in
Minneapolis is that they apparently were taken Dec. 27 by city workers --
in broad daylight, in front of a witness who confronted them.

The witness, a neighbor of Hendlin's, and the city employees had a
head-scratching conversation that went something like this:

"Why are you taking the signs?" the neighbor asked.

"The war started a year ago," one of the workers responded.

There was a little more conversation, then the workers, both women, tossed
the signs in the back of a blue city pickup truck and left.

If the workers thought they were going to simply drive away from
controversy, they were in for a surprise. Hendlin, members of his family,
his friends and his neighbors were outraged that city employees felt free
to walk off with signs making a political statement.

Hendlin and friends fired up phones and computers. City Council Member
Gary Schiff was contacted, as was the mayor's office. Those calls led to
both the Public Works Department and the Parks Department making an effort
to track down the light-fingered, light-thinking public employees.

Brian Lokkesmoe, interim head of the Public Works Department, sent a memo
to public works employees, reading in part: ". . . At this moment, we are
not yet able to determine who may have removed this sign. This alleged
behavior is inappropriate and will not be tolerated. . . ."

The Parks Department, too, made at least an effort to see if the Dim Duo
might have been parks workers.

The official search for the culprits has ended.

"We had a partial description of the vehicle, a partial probable license
plate number and a description of the individuals," Lokkesmo said, "but we
couldn't specifically tie it down. The city has 94 blue pickup trucks, the
Park Board has some of those, other entities do, too. We've just kind of
run into a wall."

But Lokkesmoe said he's convinced of the truthfulness of the story.

"Clearly, someone for the government came and took their sign," Lokkesmoe
said. "We're not sure who it was, but we thought it was right to go to him
and say, 'Here, we bought you a sign.' "

The bottom line in all of this is that vandals can't keep up with the
spread of the signs.

Remember, a Minneapolis couple, Gene and Mary Lou Ott, started the
phenomenon with a single sign for their yard last September. The simple
message is: "Say no to war with Iraq. Call your congresspeople."

Since then, Women Against Military Madness has sold thousands of the
signs.

And recently a smaller version of the sign has taken root in New Mexico.
That began when Anne Engelhardt, an Albuquerque businesswoman, visited her
family in Minneapolis recently and was impressed by the sign in her
parents' yard.

"I figured I have some money I can invest in this," she said. "I had a
thousand signs printed and called around to see if I could set up tables
outside some businesses in Albuquerque. The only places that agreed to
have our tables were a couple of co-ops. The first day we handed out 800
of the signs, asking for a $5 donation. I had another 2,200 printed and
we're out of those. We can't keep up with the demand."

Even the fact that the signs were stolen by the Minneapolis workers seems
to have led to ever more signs.

"With all the e-mails going back and forth about this in our
neighborhood," Hendlin said, "there were a number of people who said,
'Where can I get one of those signs?' "

-- Doug Grow is at dgrow at startribune.com.

  ==============================================================
  C. G. Estabrook, Ph.D., Visiting Scholar
  University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign [MC-190]
  109 Observatory, 901 South Mathews Avenue, Urbana IL 61801 USA
  office: 217.244.4105 mobile: 217.369.5471 home: 217.359.9466
  <www.carlforcongress.org>
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