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Republican, one of the highest per income areas in the country. There were two families there who were sympathetic to the strikers. One was the Richardsons, and the other, the Turners. John Richardson, Jr., was a very successful lawyer who was also very active in public affairs. He was the president of Radio Free Europe. His family had adopted a Hungarian refugee. They were a typical American family -- Bonnie, his wife. Harold Turner was at Columbia in the library. They were close friends, very, very devoutly religious people, and very much affected by the civil rights movement, by King. When this thing broke out in their community, they approached Henry Nicholas. Henry told me about them, and I started a contact with them where we became very, very close friends. The wives would come to the picket line every day. They would come to the strike headquarters with food, they would walk on the picket line. I remember telling Bonnie Richardson, “Look, Bonnie. Please do me a favor. Don't wear your mink coat on the picket line. It doesn't look good.”

She says, “Why? I wear it all the time.” They'd come with their children, and their children were being harassed in the schools, nobody would talk to them. There were threats, and rocks thrown in their windows. They insisted they would stand pat. They would not move. They put their own money, and every week they would run ads in the Bronxville paper on the citizens' committee for the Lawrence strikers. They would march on our picket line on the weekends. I got them interviewed by Jimmy Wechsler. They were way beyond the call of duty. I remember when it was all over, I said to John Richardson, I said, “John, you know, why did you really do it? You know who I am.”

He said, “I knew. All the FBI files are mine, but I was not interested in that. I was only interested in this issue.” And that was the story. So it was a very, very unique story.

We had our salute to freedom right after the settlement of the strike, and we honored them by giving them plaques and also a message I arranged from King to send to them. I mounted it as a plaque for them. Strangely enough, a few years ago, I met Gerda Lerner at a party where Bella Abzug was at-- hosted by Amy Swerdlow, she's just written a book, her Ph.D., she teaches at Sarah Lawrence. The students at Sarah Lawrence marched in support of the strikers. The students at Iona -- and a student at Iona College, at that time, was a guy named Jerry Brown. That was his baptism into the hospital union. But who is the professor, the teacher, at Sarah Lawrence? He's dead. Harvey Swados, Elizabeth Swados' uncle. I remember I asked her, “Is Harvey your --”