I joined YAF in 1970 when I was at Occidental College, but that college was—and is—so liberal that there were hardly any conservatives there. The few YAF members on campus were libertarians, so my involvement didn’t last long. But at the University of Southern California, where I did graduate work, the YAF chapter was more robust. These were the years when Craig Shirley, now a renowned author on political history was a mover and shaker in YAF. I met with him many times in the YAF office on Wilshire Blvd., just west of downtown LA.
I did know YAF National Directors Bill “Vito the Bump” Saracino, Pat Nolan, Gary Kreep and another fellow who was well enough off to acquire land claims on Wrangell Island to obtain standing to sue Henry Kissinger and the accommodationist Nixon Administration for turning Wrangell Island over to the soviets.