37 Facts About Bill Ayers

William Charles Ayers is an American retired professor and activist.

In 1969, Bill Ayers co-founded the Weather Underground, a revolutionary group modeled on the Red Guards in China active at the same time, that sought to overthrow "American imperialism".

The bombings, which caused no fatalities, except for three members killed when one of the group's own devices accidentally exploded, resulted in Bill Ayers being hunted as a fugitive for several years, until charges were dropped due to illegal actions by the FBI agents pursuing him and others.

Bill Ayers is a retired professor in the College of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago, formerly holding the titles of Distinguished Professor of Education and Senior University Scholar.

Bill Ayers is married to lawyer and Clinical Law Professor Bernardine Dohrn, who was a leader in the Weather Underground.

Bill Ayers grew up in Glen Ellyn, a suburb of Chicago, Illinois.

Bill Ayers's parents were Mary and Thomas G Ayers, who was later chairman and chief executive officer of Commonwealth Edison, and for whom Northwestern's Thomas G Ayers College of Commerce and Industry was named.

Bill Ayers attended public schools until his second year in high school, when he transferred to Lake Forest Academy, a small prep school.

Bill Ayers earned a Bachelor of Arts in American Studies from the University of Michigan in 1968.

In 1965, Bill Ayers joined a picket line protesting an Ann Arbor, Michigan pizzeria for refusing to seat African Americans.

Bill Ayers's first teaching job came shortly afterward at the Children's Community School, a preschool with a very small enrollment operating in a church basement, founded by a group of students in emulation of the Summerhill method of education.

Bill Ayers became involved in the New Left and the Students for a Democratic Society.

Bill Ayers rose to national prominence as an SDS leader in 1968 and 1969 as head of an SDS regional group, the "Jesse James Gang".

The group Bill Ayers headed in Detroit, Michigan, became one of the earliest gatherings of what became the Weathermen.

Bill Ayers had previously been a roommate of Terry Robbins, a fellow militant who was killed in 1970 along with Bill Ayers's girlfriend Oughton and one other member in the Greenwich Village townhouse explosion, while constructing anti-personnel bombs intended for a non-commissioned officer dance at Fort Dix, New Jersey.

In June 1969, the Weathermen took control of the SDS at its national convention, where Bill Ayers was elected Education Secretary.

Later in 1969, Bill Ayers participated in planting a bomb at a statue dedicated to police casualties in the 1886 Haymarket affair confrontation between labor supporters and the Chicago police.

Bill Ayers participated in the Days of Rage riot in Chicago in October 1969, and in December was at the "War Council" meeting in Flint, Michigan.

Bill Ayers was not facing criminal charges at the time, but the federal government later filed charges against him.

Bill Ayers participated in the bombings of New York City Police Department headquarters in 1970, the United States Capitol building in 1971, and the Pentagon in 1972, as he noted in his 2001 book, Fugitive Days.

In 1973, Bill Ayers co-authored the book Prairie Fire with other members of the Weather Underground.

Bill Ayers was fined $1,500 and given three years probation.

In 2001, Bill Ayers published Fugitive Days: A Memoir, which he explained in part as an attempt to answer the questions of Kathy Boudin's son, and his speculation that Diana Oughton died trying to stop the Greenwich Village bomb-makers.

Bill Ayers has maintained that the two statements were not intended to imply a wish they had set more bombs.

Bill Ayers says Ayers and his Weathermen cohorts made "the antiwar movement look like the enemy of ordinary people" during the Vietnam War era.

Bill Ayers reiterated his rebuttal to the description of his actions as terrorism despite the use of shrapnel devices:.

Bill Ayers is a retired professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, College of Education.

Bill Ayers's interests include teaching for social justice, urban educational reform, narrative and interpretive research, children in trouble with the law, and related issues.

Bill Ayers began his career in primary education while an undergraduate, teaching at the Children's Community School, a project founded by a group of students and based on the Summerhill method of education.

Bill Ayers was elected vice president for curriculum studies by the American Educational Research Association in 2008.

Bill Ayers has edited and written many books and articles on education theory, policy and practice, and has received several honors for his work.

Bill Ayers denied having ever dedicated a book to Sirhan Sirhan and accused right-wing bloggers of having started a rumor to that effect.

Radical bomber and feminist Jane Alpert criticized the Weatherman group in 1974 for still being dominated by men, including Bill Ayers, and referred to his "callous treatment and abandonment of Diana Oughton before her death, and for his generally fickle and high-handed treatment of women".

Larry Grathwohl, an undercover FBI agent who infiltrated The Weather Underground, says Bill Ayers told him where to plant bombs.

Bill Ayers says Ayers was bent on overthrowing the government.

On June 18,2013, Bill Ayers gave an interview to RealClearPolitics' Morning Commute in which he stated that every president in this century should be tried for war crimes, including President Obama for his use of drone attacks, which Bill Ayers considers an act of terror.

Bill Ayers is married to Bernardine Dohrn, a fellow former leader of the Weather Underground.