Chapter Text
The year is 1976.
The year is 1976. It is a presidential election year. Republican Gerald Ford holds the office of President, but he was never elected. He had been appointed by the Senate to replace Spiro Agnew as Vice President. When Richard Nixon resigned, Ford ascended to the presidency. Ford is so unpopular among his own party that he will not even win the Republican primary.
The year is 1976. The United Nations begins discussions about declaring a year to be the “Year of the Child.” A year of the child? Why do we need a year for children? Every god-damned day is a year for children. Nothing good comes from focusing too much on children. Brown v. Board of Education, then PARC and just last year Mills. Every day we take resources from good people and give them to kids that will never amount to much.
The year is 1976. The last of the moon landings happened four years before, but the imagination of the world turns to a new program: the space shuttle. It looks and flies like an airplane and so it seems the era of cheap space travel, of vacations on the moon, can’t possibly be far away. In retrospect, we all know what became of that dream.
The year is 1976 and the first Happy Meal is served at McDonalds. A hamburger, fries, a drink, a cheap plastic toy all packaged in a cardboard box would become one of the most successful marketing techniques in history.
The year is 1976. Four years ago, a 7.3 magnitude earthquake in Sacramento triggered a fire at FBI’s fingerprint warehouse. Most of the original fingerprint cards for the southwest were stored there. An unknown number of cards were lost. Duplicates exist in other places, of course, but the Bureau is understaffed. Two clerks come to work each day and work long hours to curate the fingerprints. They cross check lists from the facilities in Madison, Topeka and D.C. They figure out what was lost and what can be replaced. Despite their hard work, they can barely keep up with the new cards that arrive, much less make much progress on the backlog.
The year is 1976. Five years ago, Montrey-by-the-Sea was a city that had lost its way. The textile factory that had employed a generation of workers went bankrupt in the early sixties. In the years that followed, the business owners and executives, anyone with white skin and money, moved away. Some went to Lexington Hills and others Los Gatos and still more went further afield. Just the Mexicans and blacks were left. A generation ne’er do-wells grew up in the decaying town where the economy dwindled to liquor stores and laundromats.
The year is 1976 and four years ago, word filtered through the city that someone was buying the old factory. What bat-shit crazy would do that, they asked? But then came the jobs. First it was construction workers to refurb the interior and clerical workers to handle the permits and payroll. Hope began to flicker among the residents. Would there be more jobs? Or was this just one more urban blight campaign? After months of waiting, there was an announcement. Seeking men and women of good moral fiber to work at Sandalphon Industries, the announcement read. Must be willing to work hard and participate in the job training program. Sandalphon industries does not discriminate based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. Veterans are encouraged to apply. Good moral fiber? What did that mean? Job training? But there were jobs and the Sandalphon found itself buried in applications. The jobs paid good money and soon the factory was turning away applicants. For the first time in years, the city had reason to hope.
The year is 1976 and the owner of the factory is a man who calls himself Madeleine. He lives in a tiny apartment over a pizza place called Sweet Tomato. Each morning, he walks the half mile to the factory in a suit that does not quite fit. It pulls across the shoulders and hangs loose on his hips. Each day when he leaves the house, he has a pocket full of small bills and coins. On his way, he gives something to each panhandler and child he passes. The children call him Yoyo Malena and they chase him down the street, laughing and shouting to each other in Spanglish.
The year is 1976 and things are looking up in Montray. The new factory has brought jobs and money and hope. Following the money, came other businesses: a McDonalds, a brand new A&P, and a Marshalls. The schools got a new coat of paint and more teachers. An intensive care unit in the hospital got completely renovated, thanks to an anonymous gift to Catholic Charities. It is a good time.
And so, here we are, in the late afternoon on a Saturday in March, about a month before Easter. Eleanor and Damien Morin have brought their eight year old daughter into the Sweet Tomato for a quick lunch before her piano recital. Damien, a patent lawyer who works for the newly incorporated Apple Computers, is dressed in a suit and his wife is wearing a pale blue dress that contrasts in a startling way with her dark skin. She likes the effect and Damien, who likes it when she is happy, encourages her to wear the dress often. Their daughter, Julie, is wearing a pink taffetta Easter dress which is scratchy, and freshly braided cornrows that are too tight.