UC Santa Cruz alumnus and writer Lincoln Mitchell and Rabbi Neal Gold will discuss Dr. Mitchell’s latest book,  San Francisco Year Zero: Political Upheaval, Punk Rock, and a Third Place Baseball Team (Rutgers University Press, 2019). The book focuses on San Francisco in the pivotal year 1978 and tells the extraordinary story of the assassinations of Mayor George Moscone and Harvey Milk, the massacre at Jonestown, the role of the nascent punk rock movement, as well as the San Francisco Giants’ 1978 season. The book also explores themes about Jewish San Francisco, including the role of Harvey Milk’s Judaism in his political development and the impact of the changing demographic of San Francisco Jewry on politics and culture.

Dr. Mitchell’s book also draws on his own personal story as a Jewish New Yorker who moved to San Francisco as a boy in 1971. Baseball and music writer Dan Epstein wrote of San Francisco Year Zero, “If you love San Francisco, urban history, baseball and/or punk rock, this is an essential read.” Art Agnos, the former mayor of San Francisco, called the book “a new and brilliant understanding of San Francisco.”

Please join us for an exciting discussion of politics and Jewish history, punk rock, baseball and more.