August 28th will be the 50th anniversary of THE MARCH ON WASHINGTON and Dr. Martin Luther King's famous "I Have a Dream" speech. In a recent post, John Hightower, (who with 250,000 other people attended the 1963 march) mentioned my dad’s 1963 Twilight Zone episode “He’s Alive.” Although about neo-nazism, his message could just as easily apply to the egregious conditions prompting the original march.

This episode was the only one that makes no reference to “The Twilight Zone” in its closing narration and when it aired, my father and the network were flooded with hate mail.

Tragically, Dr. King's dream is yet to be realized and the message is as relevant today as it was fifty years ago:

“Where will he go next, this phantom from another time, this resurrected ghost of a previous nightmare - Chicago? Los Angeles? Miami? Florida; Vincennes, Indiana; Syracuse, New York? Anyplace, everyplace, where there's hate, where there's prejudice, where there's bigotry. He's alive. He's alive so long as these evils exist. Remember that when he comes to your town. Remember it when you hear his voice speaking out through others. Remember it when you hear a name called, a minority attacked, any blind, unreasoning assault on a people or any human being. He's alive because through these things we keep him alive.” Rod Serling

“He heard the sound of voices . . . and laughter—and hellos and goodbyes—and all the jumbled language of the past—so sweet, so unbearably sweet.”
They’re Tearing Down Tim Riley’s Bar