
So this morning I had gone early to the Saint Paul Farmer's Market to take some pictures. The light wasn't quite right, but I got to chat with a very nice woman about organic baby food, ran into someone who knew several colleagues at Trinity School and sampled Thai eggplant.




On the way home I stopped on Smith Avenue to take some pictures of the
RNC Welcoming Committee's headquarters, which
were raided last night.

The local FOX affiliate was taping a brief morning update so I stayed to watch.
Then this older tie-dyed fellow came riding up on a bicycle and said he was with the
Seeds of Peace, a group who were in town for the convention as well, feeding protesters and supporting non-violence.

He spoke a little ramblingly of his days in Dinkytown before he left for San Francisco and of his close association with the young Bob Dylan. He introduced himself as "Diamond Dave." Hmmm ... I thought. Riiiiiiiggghhht.

As the FOX 9 News reporter was leaving she asked Diamond Dave if he was going to be at the news conference on Harriet Island. He really wanted to go, so I told him I could give him a ride but that I needed to run home first. When I got home, I googled him ... just in case. Here's what I found.
San Francisco Bay Guardian,
"2007 Local Heroes"The Haight-Ashbury Beat,
"Diamond Dave Still Sparkling"From the SFB Guardian piece:
"Whitaker's initial involvement entailed witnessing the scene and spreading it; one of his claims to fame was passing along a copy of Woody Guthrie's Bound for Glory to a young Bob Dylan during a brief return to Minneapolis in 1961."The guy was
legit!!!
So of course when I told Dietrich that I met the guy who gave Bob Dylan a copy of Woodie Guthrie's biography, Dietrich wanted to come along and meet him. The Seeds of Peace are set up about a block and half from us on Smith and Wyoming! So I swung over to their camp, a little three bus set-up in a vacant lot, to pick up Dave and take him to the press conference on Harriet Island.
Because we were with Dave, I became a part of some 'inner circle' conversation about houses being raided, code names, etc. -- real black-ops stuff. At one point, one woman turned to me, eyed my camera and said, "Are you press?" I said, "No. I'm Dave's driver." Then she was cool. We stayed for the news conference, which was
very interesting because the media were extremely hostile -- not at all what I expected. And when the RNC Welcoming Committee people spoke they used names other than those they had been using in the inner circle meeting I had been a part of! I shot a lot of photos and someone from
Twin Cities Indymedia asked me for my contact information.
Here's a mini-slide show.
8 comments:
No way! What a day! What an experience for your kids. I hope they never forget it either!
Wow. Diamond Dave sounds like quite the guy. I'm a bit jealous. Sounds like an awesome day. I would have loved to have joined you. Wow.
And all this started from just being willing to give an old hippie a ride home.
I googled Diamond Dave and it sounds like Diamond Dave was also the lead singer for Van Halen...? Look at Google Images, maybe you'll find true confirmation there. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamond_Dave
Diamond Dave was Diamond Dave before David Lee Roth was Diamond Dave :-)
If you google Diamond Dave Whitaker you'll get better results!
I wish I could experience that as a kid! What a great time.
Diamond Dave sounds like a hoot.
From the second article:
"It was just that handful of people who were brought together to change history, herstory and hipstory"
"Beatnik plus LSD equals hippie"
Hilarious, youll have to introduce me.
guess what! I MET Diamond Dave today!!!
Earth Fairy -- look for him on an upcoming post of the slideshow from the March on the RNC. :-)
Did you meet him at Mac, or at the march?
Neat story:)
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