Born and raised in Zurich’s Heuried/Triemli district, René Hammel became part of the wild youth movement in the early 1970s—seeking community and justice in the city’s basements, such as the first Autonomous Youth Center (AJZ) in the Lindenhof bunker or later in political coops on Wiesenstrasse.

It was during this time that Hammel met Jean-Claude Pelli—jamming with electric bass, guitar, and piano, joining political actions, or secretly transporting chemicals from the Givaudan company, where Hammel trained as an apprentice. Among other things, he distributed liquid ether among leftist radical circles, used in political actions. Hammel wasn’t a leader but a reliable friend, always at Pelli’s side.

To clarify: the group around Hammel wasn’t originally looking for teargas, but for chemicals to make Molotov cocktails like those used during the occupation of the Hegibach houses in 1974. On July 25, 1974, at Hegibachplatz, police didn’t use water cannons but connected fire hoses to hydrants. A generator supplied the pressure to direct water jets onto the rooftops of the occupied houses. During coordinated actions around the buildings, the group managed, in communication with the rooftop occupiers, to throw a Molotov cocktail into the generator—it went up in flames. The bromoacetone was found by chance. At first, no one knew what it was good for, but they thought it might be useful in emergencies—like against neo-Nazis. That it ended up being used at a concert was never the plan nor in line with their political ideals.

Jean-Claude Pelli: “I also remember going to The Who concert in 1972 with René Hammel at the multipurpose hall in Wetzikon. I’m sure he was involved in at least one major militant political action in Zurich: an arson attack against the Spanish tourism office on Seefeldstrasse. Spain was still a fascist dictatorship back then, General Franco was still alive. The action was related to the official visit of a Spanish minister to Switzerland, while in Barcelona, the young anarchist Salvador Puig Antich was sentenced to death and executed. That must have been in 1974. Puig Antich was the last person executed in Spain using the garrote (a strangulation screw; from Spanish “garrote vil,” vile stick).”

René was a person who lived life intensely—including its darker sides. Like many from his generation and scene, he had experiences with drugs. They were a part of his path, but most likely also contributed to his early death.

After the AJZ closed, we saw each other regularly at a youth center in Heuried. René was now quite heavily into drugs. I don’t mean that judgmentally—some people might have said the same about me. We were all caught up in our own stories, in different scenes. Years passed, and one day I learned by chance that René had died. A quiet, lonely death—and a very lonely, anonymous burial.