Peace Activists Paul Kabat, 67, and Larry Cloud-Morgan, 61, Pass On

The peace movement lost two respected, long-term peace activists in the span of a single week this spring.  Paul Kabat, 67, died May 31 at a Nashville, IL nursing home from the consequences of diabetes and a serious stroke suffered April 30. Then June 6, Larry Cloud-Morgan, 61, died at a Minneapolis hospital from complications caused by diabetes.

Both men were thrust into the headlines in 1984 when a federal judge sentenced them to prison for 10 and 8 years respectively, some of the longest sentences ever imposed for a Plowshares disarmament action.  The Pruning Hooks used sledgehammers, blood and a compressor-driven jack hammer in the Plowshares action against a Minuteman 2 ICBM on Armistice Day in 1984.  The story is partly retold in the Nukewatch book, Nuclear Heartland.

Besides his anti-war activism, Kabat was a Catholic Priest and a life-long family farm advocate.  Cloud-Morgan was an Anishinabe spiritual leader, a linguist of the Ojibwe language and an Indian treaty rights activist.

Left to right: Paul Kabat, Helen Woodson, Larry Cloud-Morgan and Carl Kabat, Nov 11 1984, at their Minuteman missile 'Silo Pruning Hooks' action in Missouri.