Miles From Nowhere…

Fall River, Massachusetts, November, 1978

In October of 1978 I began working for the Clamshell Alliance Blockade Project. The collective that hired me advised me that I was walking into a delicate situation. The acting Blockade Coordinator, Miles Ehrlich from Wesleyan College was suspected by some of being an undercover agent, as was his girlfriend Joyce Clark a.k.a as Joyce Sun a.k.a as “Sunny. Miles had been sleeping on the floor of the recently opened store front office for the blockade. I had to put a stop to that. Miles had friends within the Fall River Safe Energy Alliance who saw him as a self-sacrificing dedicated kid who had been working without pay to help the blockade.

I was moving to Fall River without knowing the majority of the members of the Safe Energy Alliance. I had one friend in Fall River, Kathe Camara who I had met that June on our way to the Seabrook Natural Guard occupation of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Consequently I had to assume authority, monitor Miles, & get everyone focused on the blockade. It was a slow process. Kathe introduced me to Doug Johnson & Janet Durfee, the organizers of the Fall River S.E.A.

Over the next few weeks I was able to establish myself with the local organization while continuing our New England wide organizing & developing a nationwide fundraising effort. Miles continued to hang around, “volunteering”,  but Joyce left the week I arrived, much to my relief. I didn’t know what to think of Miles, but I knew she was bad news. Slowly but surely work in Fall River began to focus again on gaining support for our planned blockade. I watched Miles apprehensively, and assumed responsibilities to minimize his impact. Clamshell hadn’t figured out how to ask him to leave so I just worked around him.