Nov. 6, 1963 - A hundred civil rights pickets clashed with the police in New York City early today outside a television studio where Governor George Wallace of Alabama (pictured speaking at a White Citizens Council meeting earlier this year) was being interviewed. The Governor appeared on “The Les Crane Show” at the WABC-TV studio at 6 West 66th Street, replying to questions telephoned in by viewers. Several callers made bomb threats, but the program was not interrupted. After waiting in the rain for hours for Wallace’s arrival, the pickets were caught off guard. Wallace swept into the studio driveway in a car before they realized it. The pickets, Negro and white followers of the Congress of Racial Equality, moved from behind police barriers into the street at 1:10 a.m. and began singing. When they refused to disperse, the police slowly pushed them, still singing, to Lincoln Square, where they disbanded. The disorder prompted 40 telephone calls to the West 68th St. stationhouse by residents who complained they could not sleep. They demanded arrests be made. At a news conference before the show, Governor Wallace repeated his prediction that President Kennedy would lose the election next year and that a Dixiecrat party might hold the balance of power.
Comments