Stonewalk

Road of protests runs through town

By Martin B. Cassidy
Staff Writer

August 24, 2004

Using the Democratic and Republican national conventions as symbolic bookends to their journeys, two groups of activists marching from Boston to New York are passing through town on the Post Road this week -- one yesterday protesting the status quo of American politics, and one tomorrow honoring civilian casualties of war, including family members of Sept. 11 victims.

Yesterday's march, dubbed DNC2RNC, is a monthlong, 258-mile trek that started the day the Democratic National Convention ended and is scheduled to arrive in New York City for the Republican National Convention on Thursday.

Yesterday, Kristine "Thistle" Pettersen, 36, of Austin, Texas, and about 40 other protesters walked along the Post Road demonstrating against what the group sees as the interchangability of the Democratic and Republican parties in American democracy.

"Both the Republican and Democratic parties are working in the interests of big money," Pettersen said. "We need to work on our problems as a society through grassroots groups and community organizing."

Along the way, the group dragged an "art tree" topped with a sign with the word "Greed" crossed out with a line, working its way through Cos Cob with motorists occasionally honking approval.

Another marcher, Natski Kikuya, 22, a member of the Next Step Collective, the Olympia, Wash.-based activist group organizing the event, said the pervasiveness of American culture in her native Japan angers her.

"My plan is to return to my country and talk to my people and tell them America is not the dreamy dreamy country they think it is," Kikuya said.

Police Capt. David Ridberg said several police cruisers kept watch over the marchers and reminded them to keep to the sidewalk at the risk of being struck by drivers whizzing by.

DNC2RNC marchers lodged at the First Presbyterian Church in Greenwich last night.

Tomorrow, marchers taking part in the 39-day Stonewalk will carry a 1,400-pound granite stone along the 7-mile stretch of the Post Road from Stamford to Port Chester, N.Y. The march is scheduled to conclude Sept. 2 in New York City.

The march is organized by the September Eleventh Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, a group founded by family members of Sept. 11 victims to bring focus to the often downplayed civilian deaths of war, said Beverly Eckert, a Stamford resident whose husband, Sean Rooney, died in the south tower of the World Trade Center.

Eckert, 53, said she hoped marches such as the Stonewalk will spur reforms of domestic intelligence agencies and other branches of government to provide better alternatives to war.

"We're just trying to deliver a message to as many people as possible that military response includes civilian casualties that are many times unmentioned," Eckert said. "If we look at the entire human toll, it might motivate a different response."