One month in 1969

This nation needs the passion and social commitment that marked the 1960s – maybe the most volatile, certainly the most inspiring decade of my lifetime.

With a level of selflessness and dedication not seen since, Americans supported those who fought and died in Vietnam, fought against that same war, fought and died for civil rights.

Our collective heart stood still for four days as we mourned a slain president who had promised to put an American on the moon by decade’s end.

In a few years, more assassinations caught our collective conscience.

By the ‘80s we had evolved into the “Me Generation,” a self-absorbed lot with runaway consumerism and a cultural and educational dumbing-down – a “don’t give a damn” attitude toward environmental issues, workers’ rights, education and integrity in government.

There was a flicker of hope in the early 70s when hard-hitting investigative reporters uncovered the Republican “ratf*cking” of Watergate – the flicker rose to a fiery crescendo and just as rapidly faded out.

A new century, a new millennium and an undoing of the struggle, an unraveling of the nation’s soul.

Looking back on this date in 1969, possibly the last great decade of my lifetime was winding down. A month of headlines mark that it did not go quietly:

July 21: “Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.” Neil Armstrong becomes the first person to walk on the moon.

July 25: Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts pleads guilty to leaving the scene of the Chappaquiddick car accident which took the life of Mary Jo Kopechne

August 9 – 10: The Tate-LaBianca murders occur in California, the culmination of Charles Manson’s “Helter Skelter.”

August 16 – 18: In a muddy field near the village of Bethel, New York, 400,000 young people celebrate drugs, sex and rock ‘n’ roll at “Woodstock.”

August 17 – 18: Hurricane Camille, the second category 5 hurricane to hit the U.S., wiped out the Mississippi Gulf Coast. (After riding out 160 mph winds at Monticello, Miss., the first news I got the next morning was “The Coast is gone.”)

August 20: Camille moves into the Atlantic and regains strength after crossing Mississippi, western Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia and Virginia. Torrential rains and flooding claimed more lives. Total damage: $1.5 billion, total dead: 248.

One month in 1969. One American decade that never let up.