June 14, 1969: Black Panther Party Calls for East Bay Safeway Boycott

June 14 1969, the Black Panther Party published a call in their party paper to boycott East Bay Safeway grocery stores, which had refused to donate food to the party’s Free Breakfast program, in solidarity with the United Farm Workers boycott of Safeway. The boycott solidified a growing coalition between …

June 17, 1969: Black Panther William Lee Brent Hijacks Trans World Airlines Flight 154

June 17 1969, former Black Panther William Lee Brent hijacked Trans World Airlines flight 154 from Oakland to New York, redirecting it to Cuba. Brent was fleeing prison time stemming from a San Francisco shootout that injured three police in November 1968. Brent, a captain in the Black Panther Party, …

June 25, 1969: The Black Panther Party's First Liberation School Program

June 25 1969, the Black Panther Party held the first Liberation School program at 9th and Hearst St in Berkeley. The party soon established at least nine schools, from Oakland to Omaha, Seattle to the Bronx. The model influenced dozens of schools across the country. The first program was a …

July 20, 1969: 54 years ago, July 20 1969, the Black Panther Party's three-day United [...]

54 years ago, July 20 1969, the Black Panther Party’s three-day United Front Against Fascism Conference concluded in Oakland. The UFAF was an attempt to unite the disparate strands of the American left in order to combat what the Panthers saw as creeping American fascism The Panthers announced the UFAF …

August 9, 1969: Formation of the Bay Area High School Union

August 9 1969, students from thirty-one high schools across the Bay Area met to attend a 3-day long High School Liberation Conference in San Francisco. They established the Bay Area High School Student Union and created a nine-point program to unite student demands. The program listed demands to end the …