The Education Blog

Organizer of the Free Speech Movement at the University of California, Berkley, Michael Rossman, died aged 68 at his home in Berkley on 12 May. Rossman is better known to the whole world for his books on politics, society and education.

Rossman was a graduate student at University of California, Berkley, when the Free Speech Movement emerged on 1 October, 1964 when he was among hundreds of students who massed around a police car when police officers attempted to detain civil rights organizer, Jack Weinberg.

The New York Times reports that Rossman was arrested at that time for violating a longstanding university ban on political advocacy on campus.

A close friend of Mario Savio, the movement’s best-known leader, Mr. Rossman left graduate school in 1966 to devote himself to activism, lecturing on campuses around the country. The Free Speech Movement, which quickly spread to other universities, made political discourse a basic right on college campuses throughout the nation.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the cause of his death was leukemia.

Michael Rossman, a key planner of UC Berkeley’s historic Free Speech Movement in 1964 and a renaissance man with interests ranging from science to collecting political posters to playing the flute, died Monday at his home in Berkeley.

Rossman is survived by two sons; Lorca, of Olema, California, and Jaime Kaszynski of Olympia, Washington, a brother, Jared, of Redway, California, a sister, Devora Rossman of Mendocino, California and one grandchild. The Education Blog expresses its sympathies to Rossman’s family. We regret the loss of this great activist and scientist.

Photo: © amayzun

No related posts.