Part history, part biography, this book describes the issues that produced the passionate activism of the 1960s and the campaigns waged at Princeton University by Students for a Democratic Society, the most important radical organization on campuses at the time.

The author traces the lives of nine leaders of the Princeton SDS chapter, examining the effect of their participation in the radical movement on their career choices and subsequent political opinions. A number of these former activists are still involved in efforts to create a more egalitarian society, the same goal that motivated them half a century ago.