August, 1969

"By the time we got to Woodstock
we were half a million strong
and everywhere was a song and celebration

- Joni Mitchell

On Friday morning, August 15, Dave Fisher and I put the top down on his car and headed East and South towards Bethel, NY, site of the Woodstock Music and Arts Festival. We had with us tickets, sleeping bags, a bit of food, cigarettes, and some 8-track tapes Dave had for his car player. Dave had an 8-track of the first Crosby, Stills, & Nash album and we listened to that several times - I particularly remember grooving to Marrakesh Express and we drove along.

It was a bright sunny day, with few clouds and good vibes in the air. Of all my friends, I could only convince Dave to go. And we will always share that bond, though truth be told I don't think I ever saw him again after that weekend. Here's to you, Dave.

We drove south on Interstate 81, then East on Route 17, likely turning off on Route 97 and finally to Route 17B. Luckily for us, we we traveling down from the north, so we totally avoided the major traffic congestion that folks from the New York City area experienced. I think that we arrived in the general area around early afternoon, were able to get within a mile or less of the site, and parked his car in a field along with hundreds of other cars.

We joined others hiking towards the festival. We walked along 17B for some distance, then turned left down a road my memory tells me was dirt, though when I visited the site a few years ago it was paved.

We soon came upon what was left of the fences that were erected to keep non-ticket holders out. Now, there were thousands of people rather than hundreds. Then there were tens of thousands of people, and when we pushed forward out of the woods and into the great open hill, where a stage had been erected at the bottom, there were hundreds of thousands of people. It was sight one likely will never see in a lifetime; I know that I won't see the likes ever again.

My memories of the festival are hazy at best, or more correctly - so deeply personal and visual, that it's hard to express them. We first wandered around, back towards the woods. We came upon the Hog Farm encampment - I remember multi-colored banners and buses. We ran into a child of god - a couple of them, actually. They wanted to know where the music was and we excitedly told them. In thanking us one said "Hey man - do you want some bread?!!. We were hip to the lingo, of course, and said no, no money was necessary. He said, "No, BREAD!" and pulled a loaf from his back sack and shared it to us. That bread was possibly the most delicious thing I have ever eaten. Those guys were immediately brothers to me.

Wandering back to the hillside, we found a place was towards the back and made ourselves at home for the day. The vibes were great, people were friendly, stoned, happy. Looking back, it seems impossible that such a huge gathering could have been as peaceful and happy as Woodstock was that day. But it was. I clearly recall Richie Havens, who I knew nothing about at the time, leading off the music. His version of Freedom that day is well known and featured in the film; but he did several Beatles songs as well - Strawberry Fields Forever and With a Little Help from My Friends I remember and loved. I thought he was terrific and I was forever after a fan.



I of course knew about drugs from television and magazines, but until that day had never seen any or been around them. They were everywhere and available in the spirit of the day - but I was still reluctant and confused about the drug culture, so did not partake. But I wanted to. At one point, a very tripped out guy wandered through our area happily trying to sell acid - in his druggy voice that I so clearly remember and can't reproduce here. It was a bit like an old-time street vendor, updated for the times. But he stumbled or fell and his wares scattered "Ah man, I just spilled all my acid all over." Seemingly unconcerned, he strolled away telling us" If anyone wants some acid, it's all over the ground there."

It was hard to pay close attention to the music with all that was happening around. I kind of remember John Sebastian that day, Sweetwater, Ravi Shankar for sure, Arlo Guthrie, and most definitely Joan Baez singing Swing Low, Sweet Chariot as I tried to go to sleep much later. A light rain had begun to fall late that evening. The rain soon became a big problem. The other was food.

We brought hardly any and the size of the crowd quickly overwhelmed the available food services, though if you were patient and were willing to wait in line for a very long time at one of the food stands at the top of the hill, you could get food - I remember half-cooked hamburgers that tasted wonderful once you finally got your hands on one. We were hungry and had to do what needed to be done. We might also have gotten some free food to the Hog Farm camp, but I could be wrong about that. I was intrigued by the Hog Farm folks and images of them have stuck in my memory.

If the first day was groovy, the second was less so. It was raining lightly when we went to sleep - we'd moved into the woods and found a seemingly good spot on a small hill to lay out our sleeping bags. When we awoke the next morning we were now hungry and wet. It was raining much harder. So much so that we'd slid in our sleep down the hill in the mud. Our sleeping bags were completely useless now. Yes, the famous mud of Woodstock lore was now a reality, made worse, I expect, from the hundreds of thousands of people trampling the ground literally everywhere.

So, my only memories of the second day are of being cold, wet, and hungry. We did hang around for music and I'm pretty sure I remember Janis Joplin, but even though I had not taken any drugs I might have well have done so. I was on a kind of drug free trip that day. Finally, Dave and I both had had enough by the afternoon sometime, or maybe the evening. We struggled back to his car and headed out. Somewhere along the line, we took a detour - he suggested we go to Gettysburg (for some reason), I topped it by offering Washington, DC. So, off we drove towards DC. We arrived, burst in on my sister's and cousin's apartment, stayed the night, then drove back home the next day.

During the night, someone broke into Dave's car and ripped out the 8 track; no Marrakesh Express on the way home. But I had music in my head, and now - in my soul.

In 2007, I made a brief return to the site of the concert. It was raining....

British super-duper group Blind Faith releases its one and only album, which I buy immediately - and am lucky to get a copy with the original, highly-scandalous cover (which I still have).



Actress Sharon Tate and four others are murdered in her home in Los Angeles on August 9 by followers on Charles Manson. Tate, who was married to Polish film director Roman Polanski, was 8 1/2 months pregnant. Manson and most of his followers were arrested for the crime, and others, later in the year.

Category 5 Hurricane Camille slams into the Mississippi Gulf Coast, killing 248 people and causing billions of dollars in damage. The storm has sustained winds of 190 mph.It remains the strongest storm on record to strike the U.S. mainland.

Woody Allen's film Take the Money and Run premiers in New York City on August 18. It is Allen's first film with total creative control - as actor, director, and writer.
On August 14, the Chicago Cubs, winner of the 1908 World Series and winless ever since, held an 8 1/2 game head over the St. Louis Cardinals and a 9 1/2 game lead over the New York Mets. What happened over the next month haunts Cubs fans until this day.

The last weekend of the month I headed north to Potsdam to begin college.