Two articles about the 1960s Counterculture, art, and social revolution, published in The Drop City Newsletter and Inner Space magazine under my Dropper name, Ishmael. (1967) Drop-City-two-articlesDownload
Drop City and the New Society
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Articles
Art, Work, and Class
The conundrum of work and survival for creative people. Published in Toward Revolutionary Art (TRA) magazine. (1974) Art, Work & Class - TRA_1974 compDownload
Worker Cooperatives and Collectives
Two articles published by the Bay Area Directory of Collectives in 1977 and 1980. The first discusses how the structural innovation of the collective led to a resurgence of the cooperative movement in the 1970s. The other article examines the history of Heartwood...
Living in the UXA
At the height of the Great Depression, a group of unemployed Oakland workers decided to take matters into their own hands. The system wasn’t working, so they set up their own system. Money was nearly worthless, so they decided to live by barter. They called themselves...
The Rise and Fall of the Berkeley Co-op 1939-1988
In the 1970s and ‘80s, the Berkeley Co-op was the largest and most successful consumer cooperative in the US. The ranks of people who were active in the Co-op and went on to make other important contributions to the community, reads like a who’s who of the Berkeley...
The Cooperative Movement in Century 21
This is a pamphlet I put out in connection with the publication of my book, For All The People: Uncovering the Hidden History of Cooperation, Cooperative Movements, and Communalism in America. (2009) CO-OP MOVEMENT CENTURY 21Download
Food for People, Not for Profit
The revolution in the food movement of the 1970s in San Francisco and Minneapolis: the rise and fall of the People’s Food System and the People’s Warehouse. This investigative article was included in the 2nd edition of For All The People, Uncovering the Hidden History...
Worker Coops in Crisis
Has human society today ever really been on track? Or has it always been a train wreck? Most students of history can probably agree that there have been eras of greater and lesser social justice and accomplishments, highs and lows. Particular times and places that we...
Market Socialism in Yugoslavia and its Relevance to Cuba Today
The destruction of Yugoslavian socialism by the World Bank in the late 20th century is a cautionary tale as Cuba joins today’s globalized corporate economy. This is my paper, “Market Socialism in Yugoslavia and its Relevance to Cuba”, which I read on June 28, 2016, at...
Reclaiming the American Commons
A quiet upsurge of cooperative activity has been taking place throughout the US, where people are turning to mutual aid, collectivity and the commons. (ROAR magazine, 2016) Reclaiming the American CommonsDownload
Dance of the Condor and Eagle
Oral history of my trip to the Indigenous conference in Quito, Ecuador in 1990, which initiated the movement to celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day in place of Columbus, the first European colonizer in the Americas. (1991) The Dance of the Condor and the EagleDownload
Becoming Indigenous
We all descend from Indigenous people. Our ancestors, if we go far enough back, were all indigenous to somewhere. But over the centuries there have been great population movements, resulting in large numbers of people residing in areas where their ethnic groups have...
Indigenous Peoples’ Day and the Pow Wow Highway
Where the pow wow tradition intersects with the new holiday, continuing the struggle today in honor of all of our ancestors and future generations. By Millie Ketcheschawno and John Curl. Published in The Terrain. (1997) Pow Wow HighwayDownload
Estanislao’s Revolt
California Native people lived sustainably and peacefully as far back as history and traditions record, until the Spanish forced them into missions in the late 18th century. Cucunuchi, also known as Estanislao, led the most successful of all California Indian revolts....
Pow Wow Now
Origins and history of pow wows, the meaning of the pow wow circle, the drums and dancers, the styles of dance and dance contests. This article appeared in the Berkeley Daily Planet in four parts. (2010) Pow Wow NowDownload
Twenty Years Later: The Origins of Indigenous Peoples’ Day
Reflections and remembrances by Dennis Jennings and John Curl about their participation in the movement to celebrate Indigenous resistance and revival. This article appeared in the Berkeley Daily Planet (2012) 20 Years of Indigenous Peoples DayDownload
Indigenous Peoples Day
Around 1980 I stumbled upon the truth about Columbus in an old National Geographic magazine: “His greed awakened, Columbus demanded of each adult an annual tribute: enough gold dust to fill four hawkbells. Pay or perish. Many Indians fled, but the Spaniards tracked...
The Drop City Newsletter Archive
1966-1967 Drop City started out as an artist colony in 1965 near Trinidad, Colorado, and at the same time as a social experiment in living the Revolution, then quickly became the first hippie commune of the 1960s, the original countercultural community to use domes as...
Fragments of My Life
FAMILY ANECDOTES THE DROP CITY NEWSLETTERS THE WALL POEMS OF NJ POETRY IN THE STREETS REVIEWS OF MY POETRY THE WEST BERKELEY PLAN THE TRIAL OF COLUMBUS MY BOOKS JUSTICE FOR TYRONE ANCIENT AMERICAN POETS INDIGENOUS PEOPLES DAY WORKER CO-OPS vs WAGE SLAVERY MY...
The West Berkeley Plan
INDUSTRIAL COUNTERCULTURE I arrived Berkeley in 1971, and found a small place in a housing co-op on Channing Way, in a little addition behind the main house. It was perfect for us, a family of three. I made contact with a construction collective called Build, and...
My Near-Death Experiences
The idea for my novel, The Outlaws of Maroon, just came to me out of the blue. I had sat down to write something else, when a childhood memory flashed into my mind. The memory of a place we used to call The Little Woods, something I hadn’t thought about for many...
Family Anecdotes
I simply want to tell the story of my numerous experiments with truth. — Mahatma GandhiIf a fool persists in his folly, he would become wise. — William Blake I BECOME A POET Since my grandpa was a communist, you’d think we’d have subversive literature all around the...
Radio Interviews about The Outlaws of Maroon
J.C. at Bird and Beckett Bookstore Interview with Avotcja on KPFA Mutual Interview with Jack Foley Interview with Mary Jane Poppoff on KAHI Sacramento www.kahi.com Interview with Roy Richards on WebTalkRadio
Cuba
Reading my paper at the U. of Havana Here's my paper, "Market Socialism in Yugoslavia and its Relevance to Cuba", which I read on June 28, 2016, at the Universidad de Habana. DOWNLOADABLE PDF HERE: Market Socialism Curl Article In 2016 I spent two weeks in...
Tom Bates and the Secret Government of Berkeley
Tom Bates and the Secret Government of Berkeley by John Curl An article about the domination of developers over the once-radically innovative city of Berkeley, California and the role of Mayor Tom Bates, a career politician, in bringing that about. The article follows...
Market Socialism In Yugoslavia and its Relevance to Cuba Today
The destruction of Yugoslavian socialism by the World Bank in the late 20th century is a cautionary tale as Cuba joins today’s globalized corporate economy. Here's my paper, "Market Socialism in Yugoslavia and its Relevance to Cuba", which I read on June 28, 2016, at...
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