The first Quaker House, on Ray Avenue in Fayetteville.

A Poster for a Fayetteville show by Jane Fonda and the troupe of insurgent entertainers.

An issue of Bragg Briefs from 1971.

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YES To The Troops. NO To The Wars. The Story of Quaker House:

3. 1970: Jane Fonda and the Fire this Time


     Ask anyone who lived in Fayetteville during the Vietnam era what happened here then and the first thing they’ll say is, “Well, Jane Fonda came.”
     The May 16, 1970 rally was planned to coincide with, and challenge Fort Bragg’s observance of Armed Forces Day, and was coordinated with similar protests around the country. The momentum of the plans increased after May 4, when four white college students were killed by National Guardsmen at Kent State University in Ohio, and two black students were killed a few days later at Jackson State University in Mississippi. A wave of outrage and mass protest welled up across the nation among the young and restless. And the stars came out to join them.
     In Fayetteville, this meant actress Jane Fonda, who accepted an invitation to join the May 16 march and rally, along with Rennie Davis, a member of the Chicago Eight, a group of activists facing trial for notorious protests at the 1968 Chicago Democratic National Convention.
      In the face of the looming protest, post commanders canceled their Armed Forces Day ceremonies and confined most of the troops to their barracks. Even so, hundreds of GIs somehow evaded the ban and gathered with several thousand others in Rowan Park. Fonda and others then took their protest right on to the un-gated turf of Fort Bragg, where they engaged soldiers in “rap sessions” about war and dissent. They were promptly evicted from the post, but then the soldiers, released from their confinement at nightfall, flooded into town, and according to one observer, Quaker House was completely swamped with visitors.
     “When we came back we heard there had been the usual threats,” Honeycutt remembers. Quaker House staff had become jaded about anonymous callers who threatened to “come over there and kill you” which usually followed high profile events. It had gotten to the point where Honeycutt would reply merely, “Yeah, yeah, we’ll be lookin’ for you” and hang up.
     In the past the threats had always proven meaningless. This time would be different.
     One such threatening phone call had come the previous week, in the days leading up to the big protest and action at Fort Bragg. The call was answered by Private John Vail, one of the lead organizers of GIs United ,who happened to be at Quaker House at the time. The caller had asked Vail if the insurance on the house had been paid up and then said ominously, “It had better be” and hung up.
     The next Tuesday night, GIs United had their regular weekly meeting at Quaker House, and reported the largest attendance ever. Afterward, soldiers hung around to talk until late, and one of them, Michael Ralston, who had been discharged from the Air Force that same day, decided to crash for the night on a couch in the entertainment room, while Gary Horvitz and J.C. Honeycutt slept upstairs as usual.
     The serendipity of Ralston’s presence may well have saved the staffers’ lives. He could have gotten a lot closer to his hometown of Salinas, California if he had wanted to, but he ended up at Quaker House instead. Presumably because it was a place that felt safe to him. He was awakened at 2:30 am by fire and smoke so threatening and unbearable that instead of heading for the door of the room, he leaped through the first-floor window.
      George Goodman, a neighbor who lived at 319 Mason St., looked out a window and saw the rear of Quaker House engulfed in flames. He saw Ralston running up and down the street and quickly headed outside and pulled a fire alarm.
     “Gary [Horvitz] ran into my room and he screamed ‘JC GET OUT!’ Honeycutt remembered. “I thought he had ... just gone psychotic, but I wasn’t about to argue with him in that mood.” She raced to the stairs and halfway down smelled the smoke.
     “I got out the side door and when I got out I saw that the back of the house was on fire.” According to Honeycutt, Horvitz ended up stranded on the sloping roof above the front door until the firemen came.                                                              
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