40 years ago, on August 15th 1969 a most extraordinary event was taking place in the farm country of upper New York State. Thousands of young people were converging on Max Yaeger’s farm where they were promised three days of peace, love and rock n roll! The town is named Bethel but it will be remembered forever as simply Woodstock. The number of attendees was estimated at half a million young people and yet there were no fights, no vandalism, no injury inflicted by one person onto another. The worst problems were the lack of food, the rain and the bad acid trips.
The traffic situation was insurmountable; the New York Thruway was in gridlock. People were abandoning their vehicles on the sides of the road and hiking in. And what colorful vehicles they were!
All the top names of the music scene were there; Hendrix, Joplin, Havens, Guthrie, Santana, Alvin Bishop…. they were all there making history. So were the attendees, sharing food and blankets, taking care of each other and conducting themselves in a surprisingly peaceful manner (surprising to the older generation anyway).
We were a generation embattled over the Viet Nam War, civil rights and human rights. But in that time and place, it really did seem that we could change the world with our message of peace and love.
It was a time of free love, drug use and spiritual awakening, but in forty years, HIV has curbed enthusiasm for casual sex and the war on drugs has managed to put a boatload of drug users behind bars and the religious enclaves have come front and center. But instead of peace and caring and sharing, we now have hate and death and destruction - a world gone mad.
But I will always hold on to the belief that it is never too late to change the world. So today, I will take a break from all the disturbing violence and disruptive mayhem and simply wish you all…Peace & Love,
Rocky
Rocky
Bless you, Rocky.
ReplyDeleteA much needed respite from a really tough week. And bless you too, Squid, from a fellow cephalopod.
ReplyDeleteWell you far-left extremist, anti-American Liberal Pinko whack jobs sure are full of hate, aren't you?
ReplyDeleteForty years ago I was eleven years old...
ReplyDeleteI missed that period of time but I did try real hard to duplicate those times in the mid to late 70's! We gave it the ol' college try to say the least!
For now the best I can do is turn up the stereo wait for the tubes to warm up and then insert my Summer of Love boxed set of CD's from Time Life...
Peace and Love to everyone!
Thank you, Squid and right back atcha!
ReplyDeleteFogg - sometimes I REALLY miss those days. (sigh)
TAO - I think you would have loved it! But at least you went to Tibet, I never got to do that.
And here's the song that captures that day in 1969
ReplyDeleteFor all flower children everywhere.
I remember...
The sunday paper had an article by a local resident whose photojournalist father claims that his estimate of 500,000 attendees was something he pulled out of his you know where and was subsequently taken up as a real figure by all the other journalists who had no idea how many people were present.
ReplyDeleteWe will never know.