The Rag

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The Rag
Rag Covers.jpg
The Rag covers
Type Underground
Format Tabloid
Owner Staff-owned and -published
Editor (Founding) Thorne Dreyer and Carol Neiman
Founded October 10, 1966
Ceased publication 1977
Headquarters Austin, Texas
Sister newspapers Member: Underground Press Syndidate (UPS); Liberation News Service (LNS)

The Rag was an underground newspaper published in Austin, Texas from 1966-1977. The sixth member of the Underground Press Syndicate, and the first underground paper in the South, The Rag was one of the most important of the Sixties underground papers, known for its unique blend of radical politics, alternative culture, and humor. According to historian and publisher Paul Buhle, The Rag was "one of the first, the most long-lasting and most influential" of the Sixties underground papers [1] and Laurence Leamer, in his 1972 book The Paper Revolutionaries, called The Rag "one of the few legendary undergrounds.[2]

Contents

[edit] Early history

The Rag first hit the streets in Austin on October 10, 1966.[3] Thorne Dreyer and Carol Neiman were the original editors of the paper. (They were called “funnels” in keeping with the paper’s democratic structure.) The Rag was closely associated with SDS and played a major role in bringing together the anarchist-leaning New Lefties and Austin’s rich countercultural community, helping to merge them into a major political force.

Former staffer Alice Embree recalls that “The Rag covered what was not covered by the ‘straight’ press. The writers participated in the political and cultural uprising and also wrote about it. And they told you where to get a chicken dinner for 35 cents.”[4] The Rag featured the writing of major New Left figures like Gary Thiher, Jeff Shero, Robert Pardun and Greg Calvert. It covered the Austin rock scene which was one of the birthplaces of the psychedelic music phenomenon.

According to John McMillian, author of the 2011 book Smoking Typewriters, The Rag "was a spirited, quirky, and humorous paper, whose founders pushed the New Left's political agenda even as they embraced the counterculture's zeal for rock music, psychedelics, and personal liberation,"[5] and, according to historian Douglas Rossinow, the paper was "enormously important to local activists."[6]

The Rag would become virtually indistinguishable from the community it served, helping to coalesce and mobilize the movement in Austin, both as a news source and as a direct agent of change. Thorne Dreyer and Victoria Smith wrote at Liberation News Service in 1969 that "the people who put The Rag together were the same people who conceived demonstrations and love-ins, who were among the leaders of confrontations with local authorities, and who were at the forefront of local cultural gatherings."[7]

[edit] Featured content

The Rag featured news coverage and commentary on the War in Vietnam and the movement opposing it, the civil rights struggles, the student freedom movement, the development of the New Left and SDS, the psychedelic rock and folk music scenes, and the sixties counterculture movement, of which Austin was a major outpost. It also carried national and world news and opinion from Liberation News Service (LNS) and from other underground newspapers around the country.

The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers, Gilbert Shelton’s iconic sixties comic strip, was born in The Rag and was republished in underground papers and comic books all over the world. Artist Jim Franklin -- whose surrealist armadillos helped to place the ugly little armored critters right up there with the longhorn as a symbol of Texas -- designed many of the paper’s covers, as did noted cartoonist and artist Kerry Awn. God Nose, a strip by the late Jack Jackson (Jaxon), ran in The Rag. (Jaxon is attributed by many with having created the first underground comic book.) Alan Pogue was staff photographer for eight years. Alan Pogue is now acclaimed for his vast body of work as a documentary photographer, marked by striking social commentary.

Over its life span the paper evolved with the times, for a while becoming one of the strongest voices of the women’s liberation movement and later focusing on local politics, covering Austin city government, neighborhood protests and the labor movement. As Glenn Scott recalls about the later Rag, one “could not have imagined a more democratic process than a Rag copy meeting. An all volunteer group of self-taught editors and copy writers debated the sexism and violence in pornography, the corporate influence in utility policies, and the CIA’s involvement in Chile. And how much space went to the Free Clinic benefit and the Freak Brothers.”[8]

Many of the underground newspapers met with establishment opposition, harassment and even legal action. In Austin, the regents at the University of Texas sued The Rag to prevent circulation on campus. David Richards, attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, successfully defended The Rag’s First Amendment rights before the U.S. Supreme Court.[9]

[edit] Impact on alternative media

Rag staffer George Vizard selling The Rag on the drag in Austin in 1966. Seated is Mariann Vizard (now Mariann Wizard).

The Rag was one of the most influential of the early underground papers and, according to historian John McMillian, it served as a model for many papers that followed.[10] The Rag was credited with being the first underground paper to successfully combine the radical politics of the New Left with the spirit of the burgeoning alternative culture. Abe Peck, author of Uncovering the Sixties: The Life and Times of the Underground Press, wrote that "The Rag was the first independent undergrounder to represent... the participatory democracy, community organizing and synthesis of politics and culture that the New Left of the midsixties was trying to develop."[11]

Many of the forces behind the founding of The Rag later played major roles in developing other alternative media. Thorne Dreyer worked with Liberation News Service and, along with The Rag’s Dennis and Judy Fitzgerald, started Space City News (later Space City!) in Houston, one of the most accomplished of the second generation of underground papers. Carol Neiman later edited New Left Notes, the national SDS newspaper. Dreyer, Gary Thiher, and Jeff Shero (later known as Jeff Nightbyrd) worked with KPFT-FM, the Pacifica radio station in Houston. Shero started Rat in New York and Alice Embree joined him there, and later published the alternative Austin Sun.

The Rag held a reunion on Sept. 1-4, 2005. The event was a rousing success, attended by over 70 former staff members who came in from all over the country for Rag art and photography exhibits, a rousing retro-rock concert and a series of group discussions. Many had not been in touch for 35-40 years. The reunion resulted in a renewed alliance among many of the ex-Ragstaffers and birthed a group of websites including The Rag Blog, The Rag archives site, which includes full scans of the early issues, a Rag Reunion site and a Rag Authors’ Page. And several Rag vets have reunited in Austin and are once more involved in political activism through the Movement for a Democratic Society (MDS/Austin), associated with the newly revived SDS.

[edit] The Rag Blog

The Rag Blog is an internet news magazine that has become a force in the progressive blogosphere. With up to 50,000 unique visits a month, it has an international audience. Founded in 2006 by Richard D. Jehn, it is edited by Thorne Dreyer, who was the original "funnel" of The Rag in 1966. Many of The Rag Blog's contributors are veterans of the original Rag, the underground press, and the Sixties counterculture. The Rag Blog is published by the New Journalism Project, a 501(c)(3)Texas non-profit corporation.

[edit] Rag Radio

Rag Radio is a weekly radio program associated with The Rag Blog that airs every Friday from 2-3 p.m. (CST) on KOOP 91.7 FM in Austin, Texas, and is rebroadcast on Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. (EST) on WFTE-FM in Scranton and Mt. Cobb, PA. Rag Radio is produced and hosted by Thorne Dreyer, and Tracey Schulz is co-producer and engineer. It streams live on the internet here, and the shows are archived and can be downloaded here.

[edit] External links

[edit] References

  1. ^ Buhle, Paul, introduction, On the Ground: An Illustrated Anecdotal History of the Sixties Underground Press in the U.S., edited by Sean Stewart (Oakland, CA: PM Press, 2011)
  2. ^ Leamer, Laurence, The Paper Revolutionaries : The Rise of the Underground Press (New York : Simon and Schuster, 1972)
  3. ^ Afterword by Gregg Barrios - The Texas Observer
  4. ^ "[http://www.nuevoanden.com/rag/background.html What Was The Rag?, The Rag Archives
  5. ^ McMillian, John, Smoking Typewriters: The Sixties Underground Press and the Rise of Alternative Media in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011)
  6. ^ Rossinow, Douglas C., Politics of Authenticity: Liberalism, Christianity, and the New Left in America (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998)
  7. ^ Dreyer, Thorne and Victoria Smith (1969), "The Movement and the New Media," Liberation News Service, published at The Rag archives.
  8. ^ "[http://www.nuevoanden.com/rag/background.html What Was The Rag?, The Rag Archives
  9. ^ Harvey, Marti G., [http://dspace.uta.edu/bitstream/handle/10106/4941/Harvey_uta_2502M_10676.pdf?sequence=1%20%20 "The Evolution of The Rag, An Analysis of the Social, Political and Technological Influences on the Birth of One Underground Newspaper in the 1960s," Masters Thesis, May 2010, University of Texas at Arlington
  10. ^ McMillian, John, Smoking Typewriters: The Sixties Underground Press and the Rise of Alternative Media in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011)
  11. ^ Peck, Abe, Uncovering the Sixties: The Life and Times of the Underground Press (New York: Pantheon Books, 1985)/

[edit] Bibliography

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