I was about ready to leave for day of distributing literature on a Friday morning in early June when I received a LIFE LINE call from a Fremont woman whose daughter was pregnant. The girl had gone to Kaiser Hospital, and they steered her into an abortion for the following Monday. Her mother was against the abortion, but the daughter resented her mother’s interference and wanted the abortion. After promising to immediately mail her our literature from Modesto, which I told her saved many babies, I decided at the last minute to hand deliver it on the off chance that it would not reach her in time for the Monday abortion. By coincidence I would be driving in Fremont in the late afternoon.

     Alameda was our destination as Adeline Choi and I made our way from her Stockton home to the San Francisco Bay Area. We picked up Anne Potje in Union City on the way and immediately began leafleting the Alameda schools. The first on our list was ALAMEDA HIGH for their 12:00 lunch break. There is a strange insolence on the part of some of these students which never ceases to amaze me. Gone are the days of innocence and respect as they go on the verbal attack. In instances like these, the students who are "on our side" are apparently too timid to speak up. (The city of Alameda is not a rich city, but it isn’t poor either. To the best of my knowledge, there are no real slums in this island city located a stone’s throw away from the large metropolitan city of Oakland. The richer the community, the more hostility to us.)

     Our next stop was ST JOSEPH’S, the last day of school for this Catholic high. Our yearly visits to this school are always a repeat performance of the previous year. One of the teachers, a long and lanky, white-haired man with an almost pleasant expression on his face proceeds to try to undo our efforts by retrieving the packets (although he doesn’t manage to get that many) as he walks up to the kids, smiles and says, "CAN I HOLD THAT FOR YOU?" Intimidated by the fact that he is one of their teachers, the students never refuse him. I asked this man, "WHAT IF ONE OF THE GIRLS WHO NEEDED THIS LITERATURE HAD AN ABORTION BECAUSE OF YOU? DOESN’T THAT BOTHER YOU?" "NO, IT DOESN’T," he said immediately, with no apparent reflection, with a slight grin on his face.

     This time another school official came out and stated, "WE DON’T WANT YOU PEOPLE HERE GIVING THIS MATERIAL TO OUR STUDENTS." I told him I knew that and that I thought he was a hypocrite to be teaching at a Catholic school. One boy stated that his girlfriend was going to have an abortion and took the attitude that it was "her baby" - her responsibility, not his. I began to preach to him about why abortion is wrong, telling him that abortion was breaking the commandment, THOU SHALT NOT KILL. I spoke about Hell and how difficult it was to repent. I talked to him about Jesus. You could cut his hostility with a knife. "WHAT DO YOU EXPECT ME TO DO, DUMP HER?" he said angrily. "MY GIRLFRIEND IS A GOOD GIRL." "A GOOD GIRL?" I questioned. "A GOOD GIRL DOESN’T KILL HER OWN BABY. PLEASE SHOW HER THIS LITERATURE." He kept refusing to take it and finally said to me: "ALL RIGHT, I’LL TAKE IT - JUST TO SHUT YOU UP." I felt at least I had given this boy something to think about - something he wasn’t, apparently, hearing from anyone else.

Our next stop was ALAMEDA COLLEGE. We began putting our literature under the windshield wipers of the cars. I approached one young woman who was parked in the faculty parking lot who was apparently getting ready to provide flowers for the graduation of the students which was to take place that afternoon. A half-minute later after I had handed it to her, she came up to me and said, "I WOULD LIKE TO HELP YOU . CAN YOU GIVE ME SOME MORE OF YOUR LITERATURE? THERE ARE GOING TO BE A LOT OF PEOPLE COMING HERE THIS AFTERNOON, AND I WOULD LIKE TO GIVE IT TO THEM (APPARENTLY WHEN SHE GAVE THEM THE GRADUATION FLOWERS). She was a pretty oriental girl with a sweet smile, and I was completely confident that she was sincere as I emptied my tote bag and gave her about 150 packets to distribute. "GOD BLESS YOU" I said to her as I went back to the car.

     After leafleting a junior high (CHIPMAN) where we passed out several hundred packets to willing recipients (what a difference there is between junior high and high school), we were on our way back. We stopped in Fremont and hand delivered an envelope addressed to the young girl who was planning an abortion on Monday.

Anne Potje and I traveled from her Union City home to FREMONT HIGH SCHOOL in Oakland where we met Bob Powers who arrived on his bike, which we put in the back of our stationwagon as we made our rounds of the schools in the area. Mark Le Fevre joined us for the one school after we had started distributing our packets and was very impressed by the positive reaction of the students.

     FREMONT HIGH had been a steady target for members of VOICE FOR THE UNBORN for several years. The lunch break is an excellent time to distribute literature as the hundreds of students come out the two main entrances to the school, and many of them stand around with nothing to do, which gives us an opportunity to talk to some of them. On occasion the teachers have questioned our presence there but have readily believed our statement that we are exercising our rights of free speech on the public sidewalk.

     FREMONT HIGH has about 99% black students, an easy target for PLANNED PARENTHOOD in this large metropolitan city of Oakland. Each time we distribute literature, I am more than satisfied with the results, as there is usually a large amount of our literature passed out and there is a good exchange of words between us and some of the students.

     Later on in the afternoon we distributed materials at nearby ST. ELIZABETH CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOL and FRICK JR. HIGH. Bob Powers said a teacher at FRICK JR HIGH approached him to say that we "SHOULDN’T BE THERE." After Bob told him it was our Constitutional right, he said nothing and walked back into the school building.

I traveled to Stockton, thirty minutes from my Modesto home, in the early part of December, picking up Adeline Choi, Stockton resident, between 11:00 and 12:00 on a Thursday morning. We headed for DELTA COLLEGE, a few miles away from her home. Lydia Van Steyn said she would meet us there in a parking lot across from the college. When we got there, Lydia hadn’t arrived, so we decided to begin leafleting the cars, realizing that Lydia could easily find us if she followed our paper trail of packets under the windshield wipers of the cars

     As we distributed literature, we kept an eye out for the school security guards who feel they have the authority to stop us even though we have a right under the U. S. Constitution to distribute literature "of any kind, at any time, at any place, and in any manner." (Lovell v. City of Griffin, Ga., 58 S. Ct. 666, 303 U.S. 444, 82 L. Ed. 949, conformed to 197 S.E. 347, 57 Ga. App. 901.) After leafleting several hundred cars, I spotted a woman removing the literature from under the windshield wiper of her van, quickly glancing at it, and then walking briskly toward the school, paper in hand. "SHE HAS ALL THE EARMARKS OF A PRO-DEATHER ABOUT TO TATTLE ON US." I thought to myself. I immediately caught up with Adeline, and as we made our retreat, we passed the charred remains of some of our literature along the way, apparently burned by one or more of the recipients of our literature. We made our way to the nearest exit and walked along the main street to our parked car. We wondered why we hadn’t seen Lydia, our co-worker, but soon forgot about it as we went our way to a nearby lunch place.

     Later that evening Lydia called and gave me an account of what had happened to her: "I SAW YOUR CAR PARKED IN THE SHOPPING CENTER AND PARKED MINE NEXT TO YOURS. I THEN HAPPENED TO NOTICE THAT THE REAR DOOR OF YOUR STATIONWAGON WASN’T COMPLETELY CLOSED, AND I REACHED IN AND GRABBED SOME LITERATURE AND BEGAN TO LEAFLET THE CARS IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION. IT DIDN’T TAKE TOO LONG BEFORE A SCHOOL SECURITY GUARD CAUGHT UP WITH ME. FIRST, WE WENT BACK TO THE PARKING LOT AND FOUND YOU HAD ALREADY LEFT. AT THAT POINT THE SECUFITY GUARD ASKED ME TO COME TO THE SCHOOL OFFICE. I COMPLIED WITH HIS REQUEST TO REMOVE THE LITERATURE FROM THE CARS I HAD LEAFLETED, TAKING MY TIME. I RETRIEVED ABOUT 2 DOZEN PACKETS AND THEN LEFT." Lydia was pleased to learn that we had distributed several hundred which still remained on the cars (obviously not noticed by the school security at the time.)

As I leafleted the parking lot of Cosumnes River College in Sacramento, I noticed a tall, neatly dressed young man talking to a pretty brunette girl who was sitting in the driver’s seat of a car parked in the aisle. I observed them for quite a while as I put our packets of literature under the windshield wipers of the cars. At the end of one of the aisles were three motorcycles. I slipped our literature through the wires leading to the handles and made my way toward the couple. Then I saw the young man go up to one of the motorcycles taking off the literature and glancing through it. As I came near him, he handed the literature to me, muttering something about the population explosion.

     "DO YOU STILL BELIEVE IN THAT OVERPOPULATION MYTH?" I challenged him. "THAT’S NOTHING BUT A BIG LIE. THE POPULATION IS GOING DOWN ALL OVER THE WORLD." ("This young man is typical of the average brainwashed college student" I thought to myself - as he talked about the value of animals as opposed to human life.) "YOU MEAN TO SAY" I said, "THAT YOU THINK YOU ARE NO BETTER THAN AN ANIMAL? DON’T YOU KNOW YOU’RE MADE IN GOD’S IMAGE - AND WHAT REALLY SETTLES THE MATTER IS IN GENESIS WHEN GOD TOLD ADAM HE WAS TO HAVE DOMINION OVER THE ANIMALS, AND THEN HE CLOTHED ADAM AND EVE IN ANIMAL SKINS."

     I asked the student whether or not he believed in God. He said he did. "THEN YOU’D BETTER OBEY HIS RULES. ONE OF THEM IS, ‘THOU SHALT NOT KILL’." I told him if he refused to follow God’s rules, he would end up in Hell. "DO YOU MEAN IF I BELIEVE IN ABORTION, I’M GOING TO HELL?" he asked. I began to witness to him about Jesus Christ telling him he must be born again in order to go to Heaven. I told him I was born again in 1974 and it completely changed my life. All the time I talked to this young man, the pretty brunette sat in the car, apparently listening to the whole conversation but not saying anything. She refused my offer of literature at the end of the conversation. As I left, I told both of them I would say some prayers for them. The young man’s expression had softened from one of defiance to a quiet, thoughtful one as I walked away.

We traveled all the way to Elk Grove located just a few miles south of Sacramento on a 100-degree day. Brenda and her 14-year-old son, Jason and I distributed literature at three schools in this up-and-coming small city. All the while we were there we noticed a patrol car traveling back and forth and up and down the streets as we distributed literature at these three schools. Not once did the policeman seem to be paying any attention to us.

     The high school, ELK GROVE HIGH, was heavily patrolled by school security, which cramped our style a great deal as they kept insisting that we go across the street to distribute literature. I told a young male security guard that we weren’t there to cause trouble and even though we had a legal right to be on the sidewalk adjacent to the school, we would comply with his request as long as we were able to teach the same students across the street. He insisted that we could and I believed him. Unfortunately, I learned a lesson as this was not the case. I missed many students because of the traffic signals and my inability to walk through a red light. Brenda’s son, Jason boldly went up to a school bus driver, handed him our literature and shook hands with him. Later when a teacher came out to tell Jason to move away from the bus as the students were boarding, the bus driver told Jason privately to ignore what the teacher said - to go ahead and do it anyway.

     Later in the day, as we were leaving JOSEPH KERR JUNIOR HIGH, we noticed a group of students around the corner of the school waiting for more busses on the campus. I walked up to two girls and asked them if they were pro life.. One finally consented to distribute the literature to the kids waiting for the busses and took about thirty packets of literature. Almost immediately a teacher showed up on the scene and took the literature out of her hand, telling me I was not allowed to give the students anything on campus. This caused a chain reaction. A young black student (male) took the packets out of the teacher’s hand and said that he wanted it. Then large clusters of kids said they wanted it too. I told them to follow me to the sidewalk where I handed them the literature, despite the opposition from the teacher.

Adeline and I met Lydia and Monna in front of GALT MIDDLE SCHOOL. Galt is a small town north of Stockton, right off the busy 99 Freeway stretching out for miles in central California. Most of the kids were being bussed to the school, the busses arriving in the schoolyard, which made it difficult to reach a large percentage of them.

     As we stood waiting for the kids to make their exit, a small percentage walked out, apparently those who lived in Galt, a short distance away. As the other kids waited for the busses to arrive on campus, curiosity got the better of some of them as they walked out to ask us for packets of information. An irate teacher screamed at one of them, telling him to get back on school property. One student asked Monna for additional literature to pass out. She handed her about 15 packets.

     After the distribution was over and we were getting ready to go to the next school, a police car pulled up and the policeman began to engage Lydia and Monna in conversation. I immediately walked over and showed him the information from the Attorney General’s office spelling out our legal rights. This small town cop was warm and friendly. He said someone from the school had called him over. He left with the parting words, "AS FAR AS THE POLICE DEPARTMENT IS CONCERNED, YOU HAVE A RIGHT TO BE OUT THERE ON THE SIDEWALK DISTRIBUTING LITERATURE."
We distributed a few dozen packets at the next school, ESTRELLITA CONTINUATION HIGH (for wayward students) and ended up the day at GALT HIGH SCHOOL. Three or four busses were already parked on the street when we arrived, and the kids came out in fairly large numbers. We had all we could do to keep up with them as we handed them our literature. When we were almost through, three young girls timidly approached us and told us their friend was pregnant and she didn’t know what to do. "TELL HER TO CALL THIS NUMBER," I answered, as I pointed to the "call collect" number on our LIFE LINE card. "PLEASE BE SURE SHE SEES THIS INFORMATION," I said, as I handed them an additional packet.

DAVIS HIGH and ROOSEVELT JUNIOR HIGH in Modesto were our targets for a Thursday afternoon in mid-October. Tess Showalter and I waited on opposite corners for the students to come out for their 2:10 dismissal at Davis. We noticed that the few students who refused to take the literature gave it a second thought after we opened up the LOVE AND LET LIVE pamphlet and showed them the aborted baby pictures. (AFTER YEARS OF EXPERIENCE IN DISTRIBUTING LITERATURE TO STUDENTS, I WILL SAY FOR A FACT THAT THE PICTURES OF ABORTIONS ARE POWERFUL AND CONVINCING!)

     At 2:36 we were standing in front of ROOSEVELT JUNIOR HIGH. After passing out our packets to the receptive students for about five minutes, we were startled by the sudden appearance of an angry mother clutching a crushed packet of literature in her hand, so disturbed that she didn’t bother to fold it back together. She began her irate epithets, almost to the point of irrationality, and she then said she was going to the principal’s office. She came out a few minutes later as we were going in the direction of our car and then made a smug crack about our leaving because we were afraid to face the principal. We continued to stay as the principal came out. He made the usual remarks about not blocking the entrances, etc.

     Our last stop of the day was a return visit to DAVIS HIGH for their 3:10 dismissal. One girl about seventeen (she had a cleft palate and a slight lisp and the top of her hair was dyed purple) was obviously moved by the abortion pictures. She was close to tears as she asked me about the different methods of abortion pictured in our literature. When I tried to give our material to a young man standing there, he gave me a cold refusal. "WHY DON’T YOU TAKE IT?" she yelled at him. "ARE YOU TOO PROUD? EVERYBODY SHOULD SEE THESE PICTURES" she screamed at him, as he stood there stonefaced ignoring her remarks. The emotion she displayed was honest. This was, apparently, her first look at what an abortion really is.