Woodstock 69 – “Looking for America”

On Aug. 15 to 17, 1969, (and into the 18^th) hundreds of thousands of people, me among them, gathered in a lovely natural amphitheater in Bethel (not Woodstock), New York. It was the Woodstock Music & Art Fair in upstate New York officially billed as “Aquarian Exposition” in White Lake, NY.

New York was foreign to me at the time, worlds away from a typical southern boy’s existence growing up in Atlanta during the 60’s civil rights movement and all of the national chaos going on around the country during those times. I was just a funny kid with places to see and things to do in what I now, years later have jokingly called the series of my travels, “Looking for America”.

Gasoline was cheap back then at fifty cents a gallon so three boyhood friends were going to make the trek from Atlanta, Georgia to a farm in New York State. Steve Nash, Stuart Morris and I planned to leave three days before the concert started so we could make our journey north into the unknown, a true adventure worthy of our idealistic views of the world. As we prepared to leave Stuart bailed out at the last minute knowing his parents would not let him go on such an ill conceived plan. To be honest, I lied to my mom and said I was going to Charlotte, NC to see friends there and would be away for a week. I had a haphazard approach to things so it made perfect sense from my limited viewpoint at the time.

Steve and I set out after meeting at our high school, Cross Keys where we packed up my 65 Mustang and loaded it with our sleeping bags, coolers, and food (more snacks really than real food). It was a small car with no room so we left the spare tire from the trunk leaning up against a tree in front of the principal’s office to have enough room for the smaller cooler in the back. (And yes, the tire was still there when I remembered to go back for it several weeks later)

The drive north was familiar to Charlotte as I had driven that stretch of road many times and the conversation with Steve resonated with the innocence of youth and hope for our generation. The times were turbulent with the ongoing war in Vietnam, the aftermath of the assassinations of the two Kennedy’s and our own hometown boy, Martin Luther King Jr. (no inference intended with the word boy). There were the race riots around the country and the bloody chaos at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago which made our country’s youth long for something out of the ordinary. This was our time to look for it before I left for the military in October.

We made our way through Richmond, Washington D.C., and stopped just outside Baltimore to “camp out” in small truck stop where we half slept with the sounds of mosquitoes buzzing around our heads all night long. We awoke in Yankee country so we wanted to be on our best behavior with the “Yes maam, and thank you’s” for everyone we met.

Two crazy kids like us – Getty Images.

As we drove north into the larger cities it felt like the cleanliness of the south had somehow not been kept up and we noticed more trash and debris strewn about. Past Philadelphia and Trenton we drove up highway 206 into New York State. We had the idea to bypass New York City staying on the back roads where America is truly found. Driving up Hwy 42 approaching Monticello late Friday night we hit the traffic jam and slept in the car along side the road. Saturday morning we finally decided we would never make it if we continued to drive so as more and more people were walking faster than we ‘drove’ so after several hours we ditched the mustang off Kaughman Road and grabbed only snacks and headed into the multicolor sea of hippies walking, and cars stalled along the way. We figured we would buy food as we naively believed the festival advertisement that promised campgrounds, food, drink stands and supplies. It was no yellow brick road but we walked miles into the unknown.

They came by the VW busloads, nearly a half million strong, to the little burg of Bethel, N.Y., to sit in a pasture, smoke a little weed, drink a little ripple, and groove to the music. By the time we closed in on the festival, the roads were closed and we had parked miles away. It took three hours to walk to the festival site. Was Max Yasgur's farm our pied piper drawing a multitude of the country’s youth to some holy ground? For me it was quite a shock for a 17 year old middle class kid. It was a culture shock to see that sea of humanity, free to express, happy in the moment.

The only food we could find at the crowded little stores and supermarkets were two small jars of peanut butter, a can of apple sauce and a loaf of bread. The walk through the little neighborhoods of Bethel might be one of the most memorable parts of the experience as the people who lived in that area came out, set up tables and passed out sandwiches and drinks for free to anybody who needed them. It was one of the most amazing and loving things I have ever seen. There were middle-class and middle-aged people who saw a need to do the right thing. They were so kind and giving. It did not matter the ‘freaks’ and ‘free spirits’ who danced their way in front of their houses. It was basically the America we were looking for and we had no idea of what we would find over the next hill once we made it into the venue. We had no clue what we were doing only an inner search for something undefined.

Steve and I took a right turn off 17B and onto Hurd Road. About a quarter mile up, we broached the top of a hill and there it was. We crested the hill to the main concert site we could see a huge stage and light towers off in the distance . . . as well as more people and blankets than I had ever seen in one place. Lines and color . . . the horizon . . . the sky . . . the Earth . . . the past . . . the present and the future all converged at the intersection of West Shore and Hurd roads on a 600 acre farm in the middle of nowhere America. It took the better part of an hour to make our way to the stage. I touched the fence at the foot of the stage just to make sure it was real. We stood for awhile, listened to some announcements, watched the activity on the stage, grooved to the music but didn't want to block the view of the seated masses so we started back up the hill, still looking for enough space to stop and sit.

The land that has become part of American popular culture, has a historic mystique, draws visitors from around the world and towers above all the incredible things that happened at Woodstock.

It can humble you . . . as only nature can.

This is no Grand Canyon, no Rocky Mountain majesty, nor Great Lake or Mississippi River. There is no obvious grandeur here. But the power of this parcel infiltrates, assimilates, hangs in the air . . . it is more of a presence than a point of interest.

This land is what we call God's country.

The late dairy farmer Max Yasgur, who owned this land in 1969, and without whose cooperation Woodstock never would have occurred, farmed this land as men had farmed fields around the world for centuries upon centuries. But from Aug. 15-18, 1969, a different type of harvest came forth . . .

hope . . . peace . . . cooperation . . . and optimism.

There was power to this place.

For a few days nothing like it had ever been seen nor will be again. The likelihood of music, people, counterculture, and oddly . . . government assistance coming together again is almost unthinkable today.

It was cosmic in a sea of uncertainty coming together for a magical experience. Bethel may mean "House of God," but there is more to this landscape of the Lord than words and meaning. The mud, the rain, the sunrise at Woodstock shaped those days as much as any guitar solo or bass line. Forty years after the crowds left . . . the concert ended, the legacy of that land lives on, with Music still at the center of our universe.

To really appreciate Woodstock, you have to understand that it was, in many ways, incredibly awful . . . the rock concert in the middle of nowhere that attracted so many young fans became a nation unto itself, surrounded by a ring of stalled traffic.

The weather was terrible. The lines at the concession stands were endless. The smell from the Port-o-Sans was ferocious. I remember one girl saying, “It was the most horrific stench I have ever smelled in my life.” “And once I got done with what I had to do there, I literally had to walk around to clear my head a little bit because I thought I was going to fall down.” Not the overpowering drugs but the smell of the crappers. It was great!

It was drizzling and very cold, but everyone was so happy in the mud; they were all stoned, of course, but they were enjoying it. It reminded me of the water buffaloes you see in India, submerged in the mud.

Not the most flattering description of those of us who were there. But it does put the event into better perspective. Woodstock was unique not because 500,000 people . . . give or take a hundred thousand or so . . . refrained from murder, rape and robbery. The point was that they treated one another very kindly under extreme circumstances. They shared food . . . or drugs, which seemed to be in much more plentiful supply. As they walked back to their campsites in the crowded dark, they refrained from pushing or shoving. And almost every adult they encountered said everyone was remarkably polite.

The biggest danger was not crime but the weather, which dumped so much rain that the staff was worried the water, would seep down to the power cables that ran right under the crowd. John Roberts, the major financial backer, said later that he had been terrified of a mass electrocution and that he had decided if it happened, he would commit suicide rather than live with the guilt. Meanwhile, the wind was so heavy that the production manager was worried that the light towers would either fall or drop their massive spotlights on the crowd.

There was some great music at the muddied, storied festival. But not all of it was so memorable. We listened to standout performances by the Who, Canned Heat, Santana, The Band, Country Joe McDonald and Mountain.

Levon Helm, who played with The Band at Woodstock, still stokes the fire when it comes to live music in Woodstock. Helm's "Midnight Ramble" house concerts are held regularly and are anchored by classic Band tunes and tunes from "Dirt Farmer," Helm's Grammy-winning CD. I have always liked Helm who has done some acting over the years in movies like The Right Stuff and lately Shooter. His music has always been there for me over the years.

But for every great performance, there were less memorable ones like the six-song set by the Keef Hartley Band or the 40-minute, four-song set by a forgotten band called Quill or the 10-song set by someone called Bert Sommer. Woodstock isn’t remembered for Melanie’s performance, or Ravi Shankar’s sitar tinkering, so it wasn’t just the music that makes Woodstock a part of the modern American experience.

It was the experience itself that set it apart.

The crowd, which arrived with more drugs than camping supplies, got itself a free concert, and when the people responsible could no longer handle the logistics, the government bailed them out. Some people took it upon themselves to help others; many like me just freeloaded for the great time.

Still, Woodstock gave virtually everyone involved — ticket holders, gate crashers, musicians, doctors, the police . . . a sense of shared humanity and cooperation. Trying to get through the weekend, people played nice with one another, which was only sensible. Musicians performed for the biggest audience of their lives while townspeople and the National Guard pitched in to keep people fed and healthy. No one, The New York Times later reported, called the cops “pigs.”

One lunatic with a gun could have changed everything. The Altamont Festival, marred all day by violence, took place only four months later. Miraculously, at Woodstock, there was none.

Woodstock was different. It was, particularly for a sheltered teenager, an adventure: sloppy, chaotic, bewildering, drenched, uncertain, sometimes excruciating, and sometimes ecstatic. Although I was drug free, I had the feeling that the crowd was more than just an audience at a show that something major was at stake, that Woodstock would prove something to the world. What it proved . . . that for at least one weekend, hippies meant what they said about peace and love . . . was fleeting and all too innocent.

The thing that still sticks with me to this day of that weekend was Saturday night we wandered far from the main stage and happened upon a tiny empty stage somewhere through the "magic forest." While Steve and I were sitting by the stage, Joan Baez just walked out, unannounced, by herself, and started singing. It blew away the 20 or so people sitting there and just as she walked in she said nothing and got up and walked off. She was beautiful and her fingers were so delicate playing her two songs.

Another somewhat odd memory was the classic moment when we were on blankets listening to the concert and these Army helicopters come overhead and about half of us are thinking that this was just too much for the state police, they have decided to respond in force and we will be gassed or something. And the next thing I know there are flowers dropping from the helicopter. Surreal does not do justice to the feeling that swept over the crowd. At one moment we are just partying, the next there are helicopters overhead whipping up fear with every turn of the rotor blade and then peace, flowers and warm blankets dropped from Heaven. In a few months I would be in the Army learning to fly helicopters. Young kids without food sharing what they had with strangers, middle aged townspeople, the so-called “squares,’’ feeding and caring for the so-called “freaks.’’ Young men and women frolicking naked in nearby ponds, either unaware or not caring, that they were supposed to be ashamed. Maybe we remember Woodstock and celebrate its legacy only because it couldn’t happen today.

The summer of 1969 was, of course, long before the age of the cell phone and laptops. Except for a few extremely overworked pay phones, the kids at the concert were totally cut off from the outside world. A nation of worried parents saw helicopters flying over miles of abandoned cars and listened to reports about doctors treating one drug-overdose case after another. While the concert was under way, the rest of the country presumed the worst. It was only after the music ended on Monday morning and the last of the revelers made their treks home that a consensus began to form that the whole thing had been pretty neat after all.

And speaking of Monday, waking up that morning to what appeared to be a Civil War battlefield, with bodies strewn all over the muddy landscape, fires smoldering white ghosts up into the low-lying rain clouds above. It was an eerie sight, until Sha Na Na came running out onto the stage in their gold jumpsuits and started singing 'Teen Angel.' That woke the crowd up and put a great big smile on everyone's face. To this day I cannot figure out why Sha Na Na was performing there.

I stayed through Monday (was a huge Hendrix fan, so had to stay that morning). Yes, Woodstock gave us Jimi Hendrix’s war-ravaged electric version of the Star-Spangled Banner, complete with the maestro coaxing sounds of “bombs bursting in air’’ out of his guitar. Many had left to places unknown but for those still there it was awesome. I came home with only the clothes on my back when I arrived on Wednesday . . . three days late.

There have been stories of the baby being born at Woodstock so welcome to middle age, Woodstock Baby . . . if you're really out there. The babies reportedly born at the Woodstock festival 40 years ago remain the most enduring mystery from that chaotic weekend that defined a generation. Depending on the source, there was one birth on that patch of farmland between Aug. 15-18, 1969. Or two. Or three. Or none.

There is some tantalizing evidence. Singer John Sebastian is captured on film announcing that some cat's old lady just had a baby, a kid destined to be far out.

But no one has come forward with a credible public claim of giving birth to a Woodstock baby or being born there. No one has produced proof that it happened. If babies were born at Woodstock, they have lived their lives ignoring . . . or unaware of . . . the fact that reporters and researchers have been on their trail for decades, or possibly not wanting to be a symbol of an outrageous time.

Most “Baby Boomers” who attended (or claim they did) are now into their mid-fifties to mid-sixties. Aging has changed us across 40 more years of living. That fervent sense of shared mission has dissolved with the years. Getting “back to the garden” now means growing vegetables in the backyard, maybe to reduce household expenses in a recessionary economy.

Yet, some of the values associated with Woodstock persist within the heart of this generation. These include a belief in the perfectibility of the human condition, yearning for a healthier planet unscathed by industrial and consumer waste, belief in inherent equality across races and cultures, and an atavistic love of rock ‘n’ roll music that remains forever youthful in spirit despite our aging bodies.

Three days of peace and music have become frozen in time, thawing only partially every five or ten years to remind us of how much a nation needed to change in 1969.

40 years later, it is as much a part of American history as the Apollo 11 moon landing that was just a month earlier. In fact, more young people born after the fact probably can name three Woodstock performers . . . maybe Crosby, Stills & Nash . . . before they can name the three Apollo 11 astronauts . . . Armstrong, Aldrin & Collins. And that is a shame too as our instant access to information has lost the nostalgia of times past.

While many people believe Woodstock was the ultimate anarchic, “do your own thing” festival, I actually think it was the opposite. With so many people and so little food, no police presence, people had to be responsible to share what they had, to help out when they could, and to look out for each other in the midst of most trying circumstances . . . incessant rain, lack of food and restroom facilities and any kind of shelter. I think we all came through pretty well. Try to imagine another city of 500,000 residents in a similar situation for three days and nights with no crime, only musical heaven. New Orleans did not fare too well after Katrina but that is another story.

Woodstock's hippies turned on, tuned in, dropped out, and tried changing the world . . . then got haircuts and jobs.

US troops are again fighting unpopular wars, I don’t see my daughter’s generation taking to the streets, or penning songs in protest. Now it does not seem to be a big a deal anymore. People say what they think, but they don't want to demonstrate or put it into an art form. Our kids have lost that spark of imagination in the age of instant gratification.

The kids today . . . They might just send a mass email and hope they have not lost someone’s new email address.

We didn't know back then that we were witness to, and part of, magical musical history. When the slogan: “Sex Drugs and Rock and Roll” became so much more than words, as did “Peace and Love”.

It was as if the rain had washed away all that was dark and depressing in our lives during that turbulent decade; the assassinations, Vietnam, the racial hatred, and the music united us in the hope and promise of a future where everyone would live in peaceful harmony.

What happened?

When exactly did we become the very establishment we were so adamantly protesting against? When did universal hate in our world replace our dreams of universal peace?

I guess we became old farts . . . such is the life of a baby boomer reaching senior status according to AARP. I have been looking for America over the years in my travels and in the summer of 1969 found a small piece of it which makes on want to continue to search out those back road places where America’s greatness shines brightly for all to see.

Ice

* A footnote to this story, Steve Nash was murdered in an Atlanta restaurant in the 1980’s while eating with his wife and daughter . . . having lived a life of adventure, love and kindness to all. Steve has been sorely missed in my life.