McCormick Freedom Express Makes Stop in Glencoe

What do Elvis Presley, the Beatles, R.E.M. and 2 Live Crew and Ice-T have in common?

Answer: They all have songs that have been banned or kept off the radio, sometime in the past 60 years.

The McCormick Foundation's Freedom Bus rolled into Glencoe on Thursday and Friday, educating adults and students alike about what's protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. An education on banned songs was part of the exhibit.

Before Ice-T started playing a policeman on TV, his song “Cop Killer” was considered so outrageous that the albums were pulled off the shelves. The Beatles' “The Ballad of John and Yoko” became a number one hit in the U.K., but many U.S. radio stations kept it off the air as John Lennon compared himself to Christ.

And Elvis, well, the gyrations of his pelvis were such that even innocent-sounding songs like his rendition of “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” were banned from some radio stations in the late 1950s.

“He was very controversial at the time because I guess all that sexual energy he put out,” said Neelam Noorani, the Freedom Bus's educational director, explaining one of the bus's most popular exhibits, the multimedia banned songs display.

Step aboard the bus and interactive exhibits allow you to hear censored songs over time, play the role of the Supreme Court justice and vote on what expression should be protected and learn just what each clause of the First Amendment protects.

“Students are surprised to learn the First Amendment protects burning the flag,” said Noorani. “They usually don't agree with it.”

The bus travels around to communities and neighborhoods across the Chicago metropolitan area. Last week, it parked in front of the Glencoe Historical Society, easy walking distance from Glencoe Central School, where two bands of seventh graders took the tour on Friday.

“The main message of the exhibit is this entire exhibit is that the way we interpret the first amendment is never the same, it's always changing,” Noorani said.

The exhibit also points out that other countries don't have the same protections on free expression that the United States enjoys. Nazi Germany banned “Bambi,” because the children's book author was Jewish. Malaysia banned “Schindler's List” as “Zionist propaganda,” and documentaries critical of the state of Israel have been banned in that country.

In the United States, it's often private organizations that censor material, preventing films from being released or kept off the radio.

“It goes well with the curriculum in the seventh grade,” said Mark Barry, a social studies teacher at Glencoe Central School. “I think it was something we could keep doing over the years.”

A pair of boys in Barry's class were most excited about the banned songs, and said they were surprised that they got to learn about Eminem — and his censored music — during class.

“We don't really listen to 2 Live Crew at Central School,” Barry said.