ETS! readers recognize Jean Buskin's name from her Peace Calendar, which since our first week we've used as a primary source for our weekly activist calendar. But who is Jean? Well, since long before her web site, she's been one of Seattle's more dedicated local peace and social justice activists. We sat down with her recently to find out more:

ETS!: How did the Peace Calendar start?

Jean: I started compiling a list of anti-intervention events when I was active in the Pledge of Resistance, about 1987 or 1988. I was writing letters to people who were monthly pledgers, and to go along with the letters that said, "Please give us your monthly donation," I started making this list. So it was usually once a month and usually had one or two events on it.

ETS!: Why did it keep going? Why you?

Jean: Why me? Sometimes I ask myself that! I started being the liaison from the Pledge to the Fellowship of Reconciliation, and eventually I became a member of FOR and was appointed the Anti-Intervention Coordinator. I didn't know what an Anti-Intervention Coordinator did, so I continued compiling this list and called it "Anti-Intervention Events." And then I just became aware of more and more events. I guess the largest it's been is about 15 pages.

ETS!: You were distributing it just by typed print?

Jean: I got dragged kicking and screaming into the electronic age. I started e-mailing it to just a few people. I didn't even know how to use an e-mail list to send to people, but I learned that. And then after a while a few people asked if I'd ever considered putting it on the Web, and I said, "What's that?" A very nice person showed me how to set up a web page. Then some very nice people from the Seattle Community Network approached me about putting a calendar up, so they arranged a way for me to transfer the files without having to learn anything about computers.

ETS!: You're working with a bunch of groups: FOR, Seattle Women Act for Peace, African-American-Jewish Coalition for Justice, Peace Between People, the Martin Luther King Organizing Committee working against I-200. You also have a day job. What do you actually do for a living?

Jean: I work as a biochemist at University of Washington, and I do research on muscle gene regulation. I cut back to 80 percent work so I have more time for activism.

ETS!: Why does someone who's involved in muscle gene research get involved in this kind of activism? What do you get out of it?

Jean: I was involved in the activism before I was involved in the muscle gene regulation. The activism is just an important part of being a person for me, responding to injustice and violence, trying to make the world a better place.

ETS!: How did you get started?

Jean: My first activism was when I was about three, my father was on strike and took my sister and me into New York City with him to help picket and leaflet. We passed out leaflets, and I don't remember it too well, but my father said that the strikers were having a hard time, most of the people were refusing the leaflets, but when they saw a three-year-old, most of the people took it. Later I was active opposing the Vietnam War. I lived in a very conservative community, Woodbridge, New Jersey, a pretty conservative suburb. For a long time I was the only person I knew in high school that was at all critical of the Vietnam War, I spoke out in history classes and had debates with my history teacher in 11th grade. He told me that I'd been duped by the Communists. He was a nice guy and he was concerned for me. He thought that eventually I would see the light and because of my past I would be discriminated against. This guy, that thought the United States was this wonderful democracy, still thought that this wonderful democracy would hold some political activity against me when we're supposed to have freedom of speech. But, in any case, I never did see the light.

ETS!: How do your co-workers respond to your activism? Do you broach it at all in the workplace?

Jean: I do, I sometimes put up flyers and posters, I'm very fortunate to be with a good group of people who either agree or are tolerant of my putting things up. My supervisor has been very supportive. He doesn't approve of some of my tactics, but he does approve of my goals.

ETS!: What kind of tactics?

Jean: Getting arrested and going to jail kind of tactics.

ETS!: You've been arrested?

Jean: Yeah, a few times, for "not following the lawful order of a police officer." I was at the Federal Building sitting on the floor of the lobby. The police officer told me I should leave and I didn't. My early arrests were with regard to U.S. policy in Central America, and the later ones have been with regard to U.S. policy in Iraq. I feel an obligation to protest that.

ETS!: What do you think that accomplishes?

Jean: It draws attention to the issue, and the main thing that going to jail specifically accomplishes is that it shocks people, it makes people think about the issue because they realize how important it is to someone. Particularly for the people that I know that I don't know through political activism, people who remark to me things like, "I've never even known anybody who's been in jail." Being in jail was a real education for me. There's a lot of people that were in jail just because they were poor, a lot of times literally because they were broke, they couldn't raise money for bail or pay a fine. And they're in jail because they're committing crimes because they're poor.

ETS!: Who are your heroes? Who inspires you?

Jean: I have a lot of them locally. They're largely the elders. I work with a lot of older women. I'm 50 now, some of them have been peace activists longer than I've been alive. People like Anci Koppel. There are a lot of people in Seattle. Not only the older people. I guess some of my heroes are the people who are the professional activists, because they're doing a job that's difficult and not getting much financial reward for it. People like Geov Parrish, Nan McMurry, people who are generally speaking working way more than 40 hours a week and not getting paid very well. That's another whole class of heroes.

ETS!: What are you proudest of having done as an activist?

Jean: I think I'm proudest of continuing to grow and learn and keeping an open mind to new ways of thinking.