The concert started with Dawna Hammers Graham performing on stage and an exhibition of martial arts on the far side of the park. People of every size, shape, and color came to the call of the music. As the reggae band One People rocked, people danced and had a great time. Lost Time Inity Anni Loui and Company, and Jane Albert all performed. By the time the Art of Black Dance and Music was to perform at the end of the day, it had become cloudy and started to rain, but it was still a tremendous success for all involved: a peaceful concert at which thousands of neighbors danced and had fun, with plenty to eat, all for free from Food Not Bombs
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In the days following this concert, our organizing focused toward building momentum for a giant disarmament rally on June 12, 1982, in New York City's Central Park. On May 12, we served food on the Rainbow Warrior at a press conference related to this upcoming event. (This was the same Rainbow Warrior the French government bombed and sank when Greenpeace protested nuclear testing in the South Seas.) Much of the food for the New Englanders For Peace Rally in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on May 16 was shipped by the Rainbow Warrior, and at this rally, outside the fence at Pease Air Force Base, we prepared and cooked food in the middle of a big field with only a hose for running water. We served an incredible number of meals, and we brought so much food that at the end of the day, we gave out bags of left-over fresh produce. During the last song, people danced holding carrots to the sun. The whole week before the June 12 International March For Nuclear Disarmament in New York, Food Not Bombs staffed tables on the Avenue of the Americas from mid-morning to 2 A.M. the next morning. We met activists from all over the world, and as everybody knows, over one million people attended that rally to protest nuclear weapons. When asked by a reporter if this large demonstration would make a difference on U.S. policy, Alexander Haig, Secretary of Defense at the time, responded: "Let them protest all they want, as long as they pay their taxes!"

In the spring of 1988, the San Francisco Food Not Bombs which had just started, and the Boston Food Not Bombs met in the dark of night under the desert sky in Nevada. We were at an encampment called Peace Camp, and activists from all over the world were meeting here to take nonviolent direct action against the nuclear weapons testing going on across the desert. Sponsored by the American Peace Test, this would bethe first joint action by Food Not Bombs groups from across the country.