Name: Susan Chevlowe
E-mail address: schevlowe [at] msn [dot] com
Location: Queens, New York

Comment (Thu Jan 25, 2007):
To Marcia and all of Oliver's family we send you our condolences. This is a tremendous loss.
Oliver was a dear, dear man. I met him sometime in the 1990s when he did framing for us at the
Jewish Museum. Aside from the utmost care and professionialism that went into his work, what was
great about working with Oliver was his warmth and his humanity. I did not know the extent of
Oliver's activism, but one could sense his dedication to justice. I know that Oliver was a
dedicated father and grandfather, too. I hadn't seen him in quite some time. We had last run
into each other at the Jewish Theological Seminary where Oliver was working on an installation. It
was good to catch up for a quick moment then. I am so saddened by Oliver's passing and wish
that I had had the chance to say goodbye.

Susan Chevlowe and family

Name: Frances Wagner and Family
E-mail address: ffm17 [at] msn [dot] com
Location: washington heights

Comment (Wed Jan 24, 2007):
The Wagner Family; are deeply saddened by his loss; we have been honored to know Mr. Oliver since
his daugther Jennifer came to leave in the heigths, my mother is the nanny for both grandchildren
and we will miss him...Great personality, respectful gentleman and a great person.

Name: Billy C. and family(the seed)
E-mail address: wmculpepper [at] yahoo [dot] com
Location: NYC

Comment (Wed Jan 24, 2007):
It must be a good six or seven years since I last spoke to Oliver and I will remember him as a
beacon of light in my life. He was my big brother a true warrior and hero that taught me courage,
strength and compassion.

To Jennifer and Annie I send my condolences at this difficult time and if I can pitch in, in any
way please let me know it would be an a honor to me. The last time I saw you girls you were very
young and I am not sure if you remember me but personally I am taking solace in the fact that your
dad left this world a better place, for sure. He loved you girls unconditionally. Bless you both.

Billy

Name: Connie Julian
E-mail address: conniejulian22 [at] yahoo [dot] com
Location: Brooklyn

Comment (Tue Jan 23, 2007):
I remember Oliver for many things– but especially his detailed and loving attention to the beautiful
unexpected objects, and relationships, created by people often regarded as unworthy of attention.
Like the ritual of All Saints Day in Mexico– I first learned about it up at El Museo in an
overflowing exhibit that invited the neighbors to take part. Or the secrets of the Taino, a people
forgotten after being almost entirely wiped out by European conquest; he designed an exhibition of
the astonishing objects they left behind that showed off how funny and practical and imaginative
they were.

In the last couple years, when Oliver found out about the giant messy collection of political and
music posters I’ve stowed under my bed for 3 decades, he thought let’s create some kind of
exhibition. He had ideas and a lot of enthusiasm based on knowing who would be interested, how it
might be done, how it could matter now.

Oliver tackled big things that required the collective efforts of many thinking people-- and often
talked about how what he brought into the world was never his alone.

He wrote songs that told you what it felt like hunched away in the quiet hollows of West Virginia
where if you did not come out in public and fight for what you knew was right, you faded into a sad
private death. There were many nights back in the 80s when I played those songs over and over
again.

Years ago, Oliver offered me an extra ticket to a new play by Julie Taymor. It was a magic realist
saga of a peasant boy who took on the forces of evil in the mountains of Latin America– enacted by
miniature puppets in a jewel-like set laid out on this big table on a stage at Lincoln Center.
Oliver loved that piece. We were both enchanted. I don’t remember if there was a happy ending but
the characters learned a lot about what it will take to stop the powers that prey on them, and what
kind of people they must become. As the tiny lights went out on the gorgeous green mountains and the
curtain went down, he and I sat for a long time talking about this. I will miss Oliver a lot.

Name: Page Dougherty Delano
E-mail address: paged1 [at] earthlink [dot] net
Location: Brooklyn

Comment (Tue Jan 23, 2007):
Having been a coal miner's wife, a leafletter at mines, a writer of leaflets like OV and Joan,
an admirer of the way he could letter headlines (Mike E reminded me of this), an espouser
ofrevolutionary thought and deed, I look to the ways OV morphed into a man of so many talents and
grace. Oliver remade himself in remarkable ways, yet held to much dear and fundamental to him,
and it is clear that he gathered people who loved him as he moved through his changes -- a man of
remarkable self-control, astounding energy, creative powers, and, I think, ever-expanding love.
This last is a great gift he possessed, and it is clearly evident in the many tributes I've
read.
I never saw him without his offering that mutual affection and admiration --although certainly
far too seldom in these past decades.

Oliver was both heroic and intentional -- he was not heroic by accident, but by design. This did
not mean selfish heroism, but a heroism dedicated to serving the people, an in-your-face
sensibility, to create substantial, meaningful change in a very politically-open way. The only
thing underground about OV was that he worked in a coal mine.

I first met him c. 1975 (although we might have been at the same Beatles concert in DC as well). I
figured, the first time I laid eyes on him, at a strike rally in Kanawha County, W. Va., that a man
wearing Levis jeans was probably not from around here, and indeed, I was glad to find out that he
had, with Joan and their baby Jenny, come to join our organizing efforts. A few years later, Annie
was born. OV took to snuff and the W. Va. drawl and a pickup truck as if he'd been born to
them, but most impressive was his clear, cold eye, coupled with his sense of humor and his hungry
energy. My children had the great joy of being friends of Jenny and Annie's, and of being
nurtured by Joan and Ollie as well as by my husband Skip and me. And disciplined by Ollie, I might
add. Heroic, selfless, hungry, eager, funny, artistically rich and imaginative, sweet voiced
("Bloody Ludlow, a miners' victory, 'cause they fought back," and the Moody Park
song he wrote with Gina, our dear departed sweet Gina, long before "Sturm and Drang"),
cutting, at times pissed off, affectionate, charming (yes, close to gallant), certainly sexy,
worldly, decisive, guy-oriented, even macho, woman-loving, political -- these are some of
Oliver's traits. I'm vastly lucky to have known him in a time of intense imagination,
community, family, optimism, and much pluck -- and he is still with me.