Biography
Bernard Meyer, a Roman Catholic priest associated with Cleveland, was one of the D.C. Nine who entered Dow Chemical’s Washington offices in March 1969 to protest napalm manufacture. A contemporary report names all nine participants and says they fasted in jail for a week before posting bond. His later disposition and any additional imprisonment are recorded separately.
Calculated release date for the stay beginning March 22, 1969: March 29, 1969, adding the recorded 7-day equivalent of the reported completed weeks in custody with elapsed-calendar-day counting. This is a calculated date from the recorded admission and duration, not a separately documented physical-discharge date.
Calculated release date
Calculated release date for the stay beginning March 22, 1969: March 29, 1969, adding the recorded 7-day equivalent of the reported completed weeks in custody with elapsed-calendar-day counting. This is a calculated date from the recorded admission and duration, not a separately documented physical-discharge date.
Photo credit
The April 22, 1969 Daily Iowan reproduced a College Press Service report identifying all nine Dow Chemical protesters individually, including Catherine Melville and Bernard Meyer. It states that the nine began a fast in jail rather than post bond, ended the fast a week later, and then posted bond. This documents a one-week pretrial stay for the whole named group; it contradicts a blanket claim that only two participants ever spent time in jail. The week is a known pretrial subtotal, not a measure of any later sentence. The article gives no exact release day; no release date is inferred by adding seven days to the existing arrest date.
The account individually names Bernie Meyer among the demonstrators removed from the roadway by Washington State Patrol officers at Bangor on 2023-05-13. The reported citation was Pedestrians on roadways (RCW 46.61.250). The account explicitly reports release at the scene or after citation on that date. No jail admission, imposed prison term or full day of imprisonment is established by this report.
Bernie Meyer’s own statement identifies the Washington activist with the Cleveland-priest/DC Nine history and subsequent Bangor work described in the existing biography. Bernie Meyer, personal statement.
