Abbie Hoffman, political and social activist who co-founded the Youth International Party ("Yippies"), was born 86 years ago today.
Hoffman was arrested and tried for conspiracy and inciting to riot as a result of his role in protests that led to violent confrontations with police during the 1968 Democratic National Convention, along with Jerry Rubin, David Dellinger, Tom Hayden, Rennie Davis, John Froines, Lee Weiner and Bobby Seale.
The group was known collectively as the "Chicago Eight." When Seale's prosecution was separated from the others, they became known as the “Chicago Seven.” While the defendants were initially convicted of intent to incite a riot, the verdicts were overturned on appeal.
Hoffman came to prominence in the 1960s, and continued practicing his activism in the 1970s, and has remained a symbol of the youth rebellion of the counterculture era.
Hoffman was 52 at the time of his death on April 12, 1989, which was caused by swallowing 150 phenobarbital tablets and liquor. He had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 1980. At the time, he had recently changed treatment medications and was reportedly depressed when his 83-year-old mother was diagnosed with cancer. She died in 1996 at the age of 90.
Some close to Hoffman claimed that as a natural prankster who valued youth, he was also unhappy about reaching middle age, combined with the fact that the ideas of the 1960s had given way to a conservative backlash in the 1980s. In 1984, he had expressed dismay that the current generation of young people were not as interested in protesting and social activism as youth had been during the 1960s.
Hoffman's body was found in his apartment in a converted turkey coop on Sugan Road in Solebury Township, near New Hope, Pennsylvania. At the time of his death, he was surrounded by about 200 pages of his own handwritten notes, many about his own moods.
His death was officially ruled as suicide. As reported by the New York Times, "Among the more vocal doubters at the service today was Mr. Dellinger, who said, “I don't believe for one moment the suicide thing.”
He said he had been in fairly frequent touch with Mr. Hoffman, who had “numerous plans for the future.” Yet the same New York Times article reported that the coroner found the residue of about 150 pills and quoted the coroner in a telephone interview saying, “There is no way to take that amount of phenobarbital without intent. It was intentional and self-inflicted.”
Here, Hoffman discussed the tactics of the Yippies before the Democratic National Convention in 1968