Woodstock Generation

Fifty years ago, this month, nearly half a million people collected on Max Yasgur’s 600-acre dairy farm near Woodstock, New York to witness 32 acts perform outdoors at a rock festival considered a key benchmark in popular music history. But Woodstock was not the apex of the 1960s, but the genesis of the 1970s.

The moon landing by three U.S. astronauts was actually the climax of the ‘60s. Hippies before 1970 were largely an urban phenomenon. But Woodstock’s “get back to the country” motif led many hipsters to move to the country, where they were not exactly greeted warmly by some rural communities. Witness Easy Rider to learn more.

Well, you know what they say, if you remember the ‘60s, you weren’t really there. Me? I was a 17-year-old high school junior at Lincoln High School in Portland, Oregon at the time of the seminal event known as Woodstock. Inspired by The Beatles and other up and coming rock bands, we all started growing our hair long.

When my mother asked, “Are you a hippy?” I quickly replied, “Well, no, not exactly,” which was the truth. More accurately, I was a hippy sympathizer. True, my hair was long, I opposed the Vietnam War (a cousin of mine stepped on a landmine in Vietnam, thereby terminating his very existence), and I marched in moratoriums.

But was I a hippie in the classic sense? No. I enjoyed working for a living, and indeed, toiled my way through college at the University of Oregon School of Journalism. I also enjoyed athletics, and especially backcountry excursions into wilderness areas, which led to jobs at Crater Lake National Park and the U.S. Forest Service.

But despite the long odds, the hippy sentimentality prevailed in the face of opposition from “the establishment,” and the movement continues to survive today at events like the “Oregon Country Fair” and similar gatherings around the country, where tie dyes, a Japanese invention, still rule the day.