Morning sunlight in the round room at home

Upcoming events for the 50th Anniversary of the Summer of Love

http://summerof.love

http://www.50thsummeroflove.com

The morning sunlight in the round room

Be sure to wear flowers in your hair in San Francisco as the city celebrates the 50th anniversary of Summer of Love. The counterculture movement changed rock ‘n’ roll, Haight-Ashbury and more. But despite its name, the phenomenon was not contained to just one season in 1967. Discover – or rediscover – this radical era in Bay Area and American history with The Chronicle.

http://www.sfchronicle.com/summer-of-love/

https://deyoung.famsf.org/summer-love-art-fashion-and-rock-roll

In the mid-1960s, artists, activists, writers, and musicians converged on Haight-Ashbury with hopes of creating a new social paradigm. By 1967, the neighborhood would attract as many as 100,000 young people from all over the nation. The neighborhood became ground zero for their activities, and nearby Golden Gate Park their playground.

The period is marked by groundbreaking developments in art, fashion, music, and politics. Local bands such as Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead were the progenitors of what would become known as the “San Francisco Sound,” music that found its visual counterpart in creative industries that sprang up throughout the region. Rock-poster artists such as Rick Griffin, Alton Kelley, Victor Moscoso, Stanley Mouse, and Wes Wilson generated an exciting array of distinctive works featuring distorted hand-lettering and vibrating colors, while wildly creative light shows, such as those by Bill Ham and Ben Van Meter, served as expressions of the new psychedelic impulse.

 

Distinctive codes of dress also set members of the Bay Area counterculture apart from mainstream America. Local designers began to create fantastic looks using a range of techniques and materials, including leatherwork, hand-painting, knitting and crotchet, embroidery, repurposed denim, and tie-dye. These innovators included Birgitta Bjerke, aka 100% Birgitta; Mickey McGowan, aka the Apple Cobbler; Burray Olson; and Jeanne Rose.

It began with a simple four-letter word
LOVE!
In the 1960s this word became synonymous with a generation and city called San Francisco. It was a concept, a belief deep in the hearts of all who were there (and those who wished they were).

http://www.50thsummeroflove.com

 

The Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll commemorates an “only in San Francisco” social and aesthetic movement, and will remind museum visitors that in a time of international upheaval, the city played a vital role in changing society and amplifying the pulse of the nation.

https://deyoung.famsf.org/summer-love-art-fashion-and-rock-roll

2017 marks the 50th Anniversary of the Summer of Love, when nearly 100,000 young people travelled to San Francisco and changed the world.

 

 

 

Snore, 1960

by Bruce Conner

Humbead's Map of the World

by Earl Crabb and Rick Schubb

http://summerof.love

 

 

Ken Kesey talks about the meaning of the Acid Tests

http://www.openculture.com/2013/01/ken_kesey_talks_about_the_meaning_of_the_acid_tests_in_a_classic_interview.html

Rainbow Jumpsuit for Wavy Gravy (early 1970's)

 

FURTHER, the Merry Pranksters' Bus, 1966 Photo by Ted Streshinsky

It began with Ken Kesey, the Merry Pranksters and their bus “Furthur”, Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and the Beat Generation. They gathered in places like North Beach, Haight Ashbury, and in cities like Palo Alto, Berkeley, Seattle, Portland, New York and L.A. These pockets of counter-cultural, anti-establishment individuals questioned authority and their surroundings while searching for the real meaning of life and deeper truths. These small communities of like-minded individuals and their “families” of communal creativity focused on poetry, art, folk music, jazz, and rock ’n roll, demanding to be free of societal restrictions, restraints and hang-ups.

http://www.50thsummeroflove.com

 

"Can You Pass the Acid Test" 1965

by Paul Foster

Trips? 1966

"Can You Pass the Acid Test" 1966

by Wes Wilson

Mandala, cover of Trips Festival program, 1966

by Bruce Conner

 

 

 

Soundboard mixer Ken Babbs and crowd in background, Longshoremen's Hall, January 21, 1966

photo by Gene Anthony

The Trips Festival staged in January 1966 at the Longshoresmen's Hall on Beach Street near Fisherman's Wharf--a cavernous space that could accommodate more than three thousand people---ran for three consecutive days. Gene Anthony's photographs conjure the dynamism and intensity of the spectacle, with airborne experimental performers, a bulky sound-light console installed on a tower in the middle of the hall, and a dizzying mix of projections and liquid light and slide shows flashing over the crowd and covering every available surface.

Wide-angle view of center stage and crowd, Trips Festival at Longshoremen's Hall, January 21, 1966

photo by Gene Anthony

Man with arms spread open being lifted up, Trips Festival at Longshoremen's Hall, January 21, 1966

photo by Gene Anthony

San Francisco sung by Scott McKenzie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7I0vkKy504U

 

 

WE WERE EVERYWHERE! The pureness of thought exploded exponentially and there were now millions of us. This event, this historical moment, which included most of 1967, became known as:
THE SUMMER OF LOVE

http://www.50thsummeroflove.com/index.php/press/proc

SUMMER OF LOVE PROCLAMATION
There are moments in time when a word or thought has such power it changes history; a generation so involved in the moment it becomes unstoppable; a spiritual awakening so profound that its very conception shatters perceptions, halts the world and makes people from all nations take notice.

http://www.50thsummeroflove.com

 

 

 

The message was clear – the world was uniting behind one principle and one thought 
LOVE! 
and its affirmation of 
PEACE, COMPASSION and UNDERSTANDING. 
The word was brought forth by musicians such as Peter Paul & Mary, Donovan, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, The Grateful Dead, and Jefferson Airplane and then carried on by many English musicians like Eric Clapton, The Beatles, and The Rolling Stones.

http://www.50thsummeroflove.com/index.php/press/proc

During this period the Peace Movement was born, with the “Human Be-In” in San Francisco and then the “Love-Ins” in New York. Anti-war demonstrations everywhere and college campuses erupted with thousands of people protesting the draft. The American Indians took Alcatraz, the Black Panthers took Sacramento and the Brown movement demanded social change. Even the Olympic athletes stood up with fist raised to show solidarity with the winds of change. This startled our government, a president was impeached and a war was stopped. An entire generation stood up and shouted: HELL NO, WE WON’T GO!

During this period change was occurring on multiple levels, giving birth to a variety of social movements:

• The Free Speech Movement

• The Free Love Movement

• The Women’s Movement

• The Gay Rights Movement

• The Sexual Revolution

• The Spiritual Movement

• The Farm Workers Movement

• The Environmental Movement

• The Ecology Movement

• The Animal Rights Movement

• The Student Movements

• The Civil Rights Movement

• The Anti-War Movement.

http://www.50thsummeroflove.com/index.php/press/proc

 

 

 

In the midst of this freethinking environment a renaissance of gifted geniuses emerged with the likes of 
John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and Jim Morrison 
New concepts and inventions touched every segment of society: the transistor silicon wafer, the calculator, the personal computer and the internet. The international community was in awe of this explosion of creativity. All this started with a simple word, a simple thought: 
LOVE! 
And, a generation of freethinking people who were willing to stand up and be counted while proudly proclaiming their willingness to be different.

This period of change is commemorated by celebrating the SUMMER OF LOVE

http://www.50thsummeroflove.com/index.php/press/proc

San Francisco sung by Scott McKenzie at the Monterary Pop Festival in 1967

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bch1_Ep5M1s

"San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)" is a song, written by John Phillips of The Mamas & the Papas, and sung by Scott McKenzie. It was written and released in June 1967 to promote the Monterey Pop Festival. McKenzie's song became an instant hit. The lyrics tell the listeners, "If you're going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair". Due to the difference between the lyrics and the actual title, the title is often quoted as "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Some Flowers in Your Hair)". "San Francisco" reached number four on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States, and was number one in the United Kingdom and most of Europe. The single is purported to have sold over 5 million copies worldwide. The song is credited with bringing thousands of young people to San Francisco, California during the late 1960s. In Central Europe, young people adopted "San Francisco" as an anthem for freedom, and it was widely played during Czechoslovakia's 1968 Prague Spring uprising against Soviet rule.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

California Dreamin' - The Mamas & The Papas

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-aK6JnyFmk

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

http://summerof.love

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Grace Slick and Janis Joplin

The Grateful Dead

1967

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

http://summerof.love

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This period of change is commemorated by celebrating the SUMMER OF LOVE

It Stands For:

• Truth and individual freedom.  Freedom of expression.

• Freedom to make a choice – sexually, spiritually and socially.

• Our right to be different.

• Our right to refuse to fight without judging those who did.

• Creativity, love and respect for all things.  Our right to make a difference.

• Our right to think independently.  Our willingness to share with others.

http://www.50thsummeroflove.com/index.php/press/proc

 

Ron Henggeler in Colorado 1969 or 1970

Ron Henggeler in Colorado 1969 or 1970

Ron Henggeler in Colorado 1969 or 1970

Ron Henggeler in Colorado 1969 or 1970

Ron Henggeler in Colorado 1969 or 1970

Ron Henggeler in Arkansas 1971

My tipi in Arkansas 1971