Jump to content

Am I the Only One Here Who Was At Woodstock?


thebes

Recommended Posts

I am definitely jealous.  Woodstock was about 15 years before I was born, but I am a huge fan of that music.  Probably 80% of my music collection was recorded between 1965-1975.  I have listened to the Woodstock album countless times and watched the film nearly as many.  Would love to have been there.  I have attended a good many music festivals in my life, but nothing compares to the original!

 

Did you try any of the brown acid?

  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I wasn't old enough for Woodstock.  I did get to drive up to Bull Island not far from here with my parents, but just drove up that way to check out the people. I was only 9 so don't mess with me for being with my parents lol. It was officially called the erie canal soda pop festival, and was going to be in chandler indiana, but was moved shortly before it was to start to Bull Island. It  I was a mess up there, and the hippies got rowdy and burned up a food truck, and the main stage  for charging high prices. My older brother who just passed went. I wish I would have asked him more about it.White duck did a song about it. The Bull Island Boogie. 

 

image.thumb.png.8001b36c43af973b51c0cfc729bc87e1.png

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 minutes ago, mr clean said:

I wasn't old enough for Woodstock.  I did get to drive up to Bull Island not far from here with my parents, but just drove up that way to check out the people. I was only 9 so don't mess with me for being with my parents lol. It was officially called the erie canal soda pop festival, and was going to be in chandler indiana, but was moved shortly before it was to start to Bull Island. It  I was a mess up there, and the hippies got rowdy and burned up a food truck, and the main stage  for charging high prices. My older brother who just passed went. I wish I would have asked him more about it.White duck did a song about it. The Bull Island Boogie. 

 

image.thumb.png.8001b36c43af973b51c0cfc729bc87e1.png

 

That's quite the lineup.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 minutes ago, Ceptorman said:

That's quite the lineup.

It was a big deal with 200 to 300 thousand people there! Check out some of the pics online. It was on the banks of the walbash river so lots of nudity with the water and all.

 

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, polizzio said:

 

Thebes and plebes.....you must be a big fan of Greek and Roman ancient history :)

In one respect it was a plebeian undertaking. Certainly the masses were there.

 

The biggest misconception about Woodstock is that everyone there was a hippie. It was some kind of hippie convention.

The hippies gave it it's gestalt, but it mostly just young kids raised by the WW2 generation starting to find there way in the world .It was high schoolers and college types mostly, Iif a third of the crowd was , or went onto college, I'd be surprised. Except for the decided lack of people of color, it was an economically egalitarian event.

 

Truest phrase was the times are a changin... and they were.  For example, and please don't turn this into a political thread, it's a historical thread.  I was an ardent pro Vietnam War proponent and fairly articulate about it. This event, and it was not pro-war by any stretch, gave me pause. I said to myself (is that a phrase from a song?) while looking around this massive assembly , maybe the other side has a point that I should be more open too, maybe I'm be too rigid in my own viewpoint.

 

In one sense it was a step towards maturity. Ah, there are other points of view! It started me down a path where ultimately I became more critical and then finally adamantly against the war.  I then began to look at other aspects of American life and arriving at other conclusions about our great, but flawed society.

 

There was also this sense of friendliness. The two fingered peace sign was more than a political symbol, it was the tipping of a hat when passing somebody on the street of an earlier generation. It gave me this feeling, that I still hold to today, that people everywhere would rather give you a hug and a smile, then a shaken fist or a shiv in the ribs. I became a hippie of sorts. I wanted that sense of goodwill.  To spread, the community.  To grow. I held on as long as I could but the rest of my generation soon went onto became the Me Generation, got jobs, got kids, got responsibility and became their parents, only worse. Nothing new about that, pretty cool in most respects, but still sad in some ways. Especially when I see that kids no longer play outside, and neighbors are something you see through your car windows while heading down some dog-turd filled suburban landscape.

 

The mud (not really that much of it), the lack of food etc. where minor travails, compared to the cosmic buzz that was Woodstock. People have been tearing it down since the day it began, and will forever more. Eventually their view will dominate and the music will fade.  But hopefully somewhere out there that spark, that warmth, that magic will bide it's time, waiting, and hoping and wishing...

 

 

 

  • Like 6
  • Thanks 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well stated my friend. I was much younger but I remember some of the times and the music of the 60s. And there was unrest in our nation in the hearts of many, mostly younger folks.

I remember a young man climbing high in a Texas university tower and shooting people he didn't even know. (I'm originally from TX)

I remember the murders of JFK, ML King, and Bobby.

I remember most vividly Walter Conkite on the CBS evening news daily talking of a conflict 8000 miles away from home, and how many American soldiers had been killed that day.

I remember the Black Panthers, the social unrest, and a shooting at Kent State University.

I remember flower power, free love, and all the fine young women, some losing their bras and tops in public. (and my padna's older sister Shay, she was a fine hippy and the subject of many of my fantasies at the time)

 

But mostly I remember the music. Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Cream, Bob Dylan, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Who, Santana, and many more. Thank God for the music otherwise we might have just gone completely insane. (Pink Floyd would write of this)  No doubt Woodstock was a temporary escape for many of the younger generation.

I'll leave you with this, one of the great storytellers of the 60s.

 

 

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

25 minutes ago, oldtimer said:

But not Malcolm X?

 

Yes, I do remember him now that you bring it up. Murdered by his own, the Nation of Islam. Shotgun blast to the chest, then 8 or 10 rounds from pistols. One of the more violent assassinations of the time. Saw the docu movie a few years ago.

 

Makes one ponder, so many public assassinations in the 60s. I guess one could attribute it to national unrest and hate. Throw in George Wallace too, they just didn't succeed completely.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_X#Assassination

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...