Cutting the Hot Lines

Shortly after the assassination of Martin Luther King in 1968, the psychic temperature of the U.S. soared to such heights that many cities across the country hastily put together "rumor centers" to combat wild tales of impending violence. A typical call of those days: a tip that a gang of young blacks was standing on a Seattle street corner, armed with clubs and ready for trouble. The city's rumor center discovered that an out-of-uniform junior baseball team, carrying bats, was waiting for a bus. At its peak, the rumor center in Seattle enlisted the aid of 50 volunteers to handle 600 calls a day.

Of late, however, the center has been receiving as few as 25 calls a day, most of them asking for general information. Now it has finally closed down for lack of business. In Boston, too, the rumor center is being phased out. Is it too optimistic to think that Americans have awakened from their nightmares --or too pessimistic to believe that they would prefer to spread rumors instead of checking them?

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