Yippie Girl: Exploits in Protest and Defeating the FBI
HONORABLE MENTION, Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award, Autobiography & Memoir!
Lifelong activist Judy Gumbo, an original member of The Yippies, a 1960s anti-war satirical protest group, offers an insider feminist memoir of her involvement with the Yippies, Black Panthers, women's rights, environmental actions, and a life of activism.
In 1968, a 24-year-old woman moved to Berkeley, California and immediately became enmeshed in the Youth International Party, aka The Yippies, an anti-war satirical protest group. In the next few years, Judy Gumbo (a nickname given her by Eldridge Cleaver), was soon at the center of counter-cultural activity-from protests in People's Park, to meetings at Black Panther headquarters, to running a pig for President at the raucous Democratic National Convention in Chicago, a protest that devolved into violent attacks by the police and arrests that led to the notorious Chicago Conspiracy Trial.
In this historical account, Gumbo reveals intimate details of--and struggles with--her fellow radicals Jerry Rubin, Anita & Abbie Hoffman, Eldridge Cleaver, Paul Krassner, Stew Albert, and more, detailing their experiences in radical protests. This deep dive into her activism includes details of her organization of a national women's rights group, her visit to North Vietnam during the war, her travels around the globe to promote women's liberation and anti-war protest, and her environmental activism. It also includes extensive excerpts from illegal wiretaps and surveillance by the FBI.
"A welcome addition to the literature of radical activism." --Kirkus Reviews "A fun read and a valuable political document, long overdue." --Counterpunch
Yippie Girl explores Gumbo's life as a protester to show that, while circumstances always change, protesters can stay loyal to the causes they believe in and remain true to themselves. She also reveals how dogmatism, authoritarianism, and interpersonal conflict can damage those same just causes, offering a timeless and strategic guide for activists today protesting against injustice in all its forms.
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Judy Gumbo is one of the few female members of the original Yippies, a satirical protest group founded in the 1960s that levitated the Pentagon to stop the Vietnam War, brought the New York Stock Exchange to a halt to ridicule greed and ran a pig named Pigasus for President at the 1968 Democratic Convention, resulting in police violence, arrests, and the notorious "Chicago 7" conspiracy trial. As part of her activism, Judy founded a national women's rights organization, helped organize the world's first Earth Day, visited North Vietnam during the war, and travelled the globe agitating against the war and for the liberation of women. Her activism led to unwarranted surveillance by the FBI; she later successfully sued to obtain copies of their extensive records on her. Judy has a Ph.D. in Sociology and spent the majority of her professional career as an award-winning fundraiser for Planned Parenthood. She currently lives in Berkeley, California.
"Whether you lived through the Sixties or afterwards, this book is a fun read. Informative, thoughtful and entertaining." -Senior Women Web
"Yippie Girl is a REALLY GOOD, thought-provoking pleasure to read, both for eclipsed histories, present encouragement and future inventiveness. Buy this book, SAVOR IT, loan it to your book club, social action, food shelf, men's group, voting rights and Indivisible co-members; daughters, Mother, in-laws, spouse, lover, sorority sisters and best friends." -Wyndy Knox Carr, Berkeley Times
"A superb and delightful book. Intimate and comprehensive in its telling, Yippie Girl stays true to the politics of the radical left of the sixties while reflecting on its mistakes, successes and tragedies." -Morning Star
"There is no better guide to the mood and tumult of the counterculture revolution of that time than Judy Gumbo's memoir, Yippie Girl. In an often amusing account of her years as a would-be revolutionary, she opens a window on a time that has passed into legend." -Berkeleyside
"Candid, informative, fascinating, detailed, impressively organized. .... An extraordinary memoir of an extraordinary woman in extraordinary times. Timely in that contemporary political activists can draw inspiration from this member of a previous general of protestors, and timeless in that much of what was being protested about remains in controversial issues relevant today." -Midwest Book Review
"A brilliant memoir of an important period in American history" -OPED News
"Gumbo delivers a sharp-edged memoir of years of protest and resistance . . . A welcome addition to the literature of radical activism in the age of Johnson, Nixon, and beyond." -Kirkus Reviews
"Yippie Girl is a marvelous memoir by the continually evolving woman known variously as Judith Lee Clavir, Judith Lee Hemblen, Judy Gumbo and just Gumbo. No one has recreated the Sixties more vividly than she, more compassionately or with a more delicious sense of humor. Buy Yippie Girl and let it blow your mind as it did mine. Just Do It!" -Jonah Raskin, author, For the Hell of It: The Life and Times of Abbie Hoffman
"In Judy Gumbo's Yippie Girl, she shares her adventures as one of very few Yippie girls with her fellow travelers including my father Phil Ochs. The Yippies' unending creativity and courage provided the sardonic wit, wisdom, insight, and brutal honesty in the form of political music and theater needed for the revolution of the 60s. Judy's stories effortlessly dance between playful and profound and always deeply personal. With the world fractured by orchestrated divisiveness, Yippie Girl is a healing balm." -Meegan Lee Ochs, daughter of Phil Ochs, Artist Relations Manager, ACLU of Southern California
"Judy Gumbo was a friend and ally of the Black Panther Party back in the day-she is my friend and ally now. Like me, Judy believes in All Power to the People-Black people, white people, brown people, yellow people, blue, red, green and polka dot people. The theater that Yippies and the left radical protest groups pulled-it was great. To be satirical about everything! I loved it. People's Park was about land equity against the power structure. It was democratic and socialized. Then I was put on trial at the great Chicago ConspiracyTrial of which I was the eighth defendant. I heard Bill Kunstler tell the other defendants: if you're not going to rise for Judge Hoffman you're going to jail. I told the defendants-You're my buddies. I don't want you dudes in jail. I want you out on the streets speaking up-saying Free Bobby! But the FBI repressed all those great moments that we were involved in. We have to get our history right. So
