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Mom and Pop remember a “Summer of Love”

By LINDSAY BIANCHI
lbianchi@thecitizennews.com

Thirty six years ago today, one of the swinging 60’s penultimate events came to a close after three days of musical celebration.

Woodstock, a name that has become synonymous with the free spirit of the decade it capped off, provided hundreds of thousands of young people with a lifetime of memories. Two of those free spirits, who reside in Peachtree City today, are Jack and Harriet Boylan. Although they didn’t know each other, Jack and Harriet each ventured forth and became a part of rock and roll history.

“You’d see an ad for it in the Sunday Boston Globe or the Sunday New York Times, but you’d also see it the underground alternative papers as well. That started in April or May even before they had permits. When it got down to July 15, they (the authorities) basically said, ‘No. You’re not having it here at all.’ And I think the buzz at that point went from loud to extremely loud. There were probably another couple hundred thousand people who decided to go then.” Jack recalls.

The concert itself ran from Friday through Sunday, on what turned out to be a very rainy August weekend in upstate New York.

“I was living in Brooklyn.” Harriet remembers. “Actually at first we weren’t gonna go, but we all decided to go in July when they had said that they were banning the concert. And then everybody just got really ticked off and said, ‘Who the heck are you to tell us where we can and can’t go?’ So we were gonna go even if there wasn’t a concert. We were gonna make our presence felt, you know…and we ended up going. We were fairly lucky to get there a little bit earlier than the bulk of the crowd.”

With a line-up featuring many of the era’s biggest names in rock, including Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Santana and Jefferson Airplane, the fact that over 500,000 people eventually made their way to Max Yasgar’s farm seems, in hindsight, rational.

“We had driven Thursday night into Friday morning. We had come from the Boston area, so we had gone about 300 miles. We got within about 10 or so miles from where the festival was and everything was bogged down. People were just pulling their cars off the road, locking them up and leaving them and walking.” Jack explains. ”By the time we had walked up to what was the festival grounds, the farm, there were no ticket booths. The fences that had been put up had basically been taken down or knocked down. And so it was just, you know, ‘Come on in.’”

“Yeah, they took them down. I was already there, but then the crowd of people started coming and they took down a fairly large section. I mean they deliberately, the promoters, whoever was doing it, took down a portion of the fence. And after that it was just getting trampled into the ground.” Harriet adds.

Seeing the massive crowds assembling before them, the promoters made an executive decision. The concert was now free and those backing it basically lost their shirts. Regardless, the event was seen as a phenomenal example of how people from across the country could survive in harmony.

“There was tremendous amount of consideration and respect for other people. People helped other people. People had food and said, ‘Here, you want to share this?’ Everybody was there for a good time. There were two deaths and several births either there or off the site, but there was no petty crime, no pick-pocketing. There were no fights.” Jack points out.

“It was just to prove that so many people, such a huge diversity of culture and beliefs could actually get together and be really closely confined and have a wonderful time,” Harriet chimed in.

During the weekend, thunderstorms threatened to put a damper on the optimistic vibe. By Saturday afternoon, the fields had turned into a giant mudhole.

“You couldn’t avoid it because even though it was farm fields, all these feet that were just walking. It started raining Friday night about midnight. There were a lot of thunder showers. It rained a good part of the day Saturday and then again Saturday evening. You couldn’t keep yourself clean. You couldn’t wipe it all off. You couldn’t wash it all off. So it was just, live with it, you’ll clean up later.” Jack responds.

“You have to understand it poured and poured and poured. And after a while there were so many people and there’s no place for the water to go and you are constantly churning up mud. Sunday it started to get hot and it started to bake up a little bit, but then it rained again. You were playing in the mud.” Harriet fondly remembers.

Aside from the mud, other basic questions like sleep had to be addressed. “You slept leaning up against somebody. You’d try to walk off to the edge. I mean, there were some tents and lean-tos. It wasn’t like you could say, ‘Oh, OK, Fine, I’m getting tired. Let’s go back to the motel because that was not an option.” Harriet adds

“You could walk a mile or so away and sleep in a farm field. A lot of people slept on people’s front lawns. Originally, if you bought a ticket you were also granted a camping space, so it was designed to be ‘come there and camp’ as opposed to come there and then drive into a city and spend the night in a hotel and come back the next day. So a lot of people arrived knowing they were going to be on the ground for three straight days.” Jack makes clear.

With all of it’s inconveniences, Woodstock turned out, in the end, to be more than just a big, messy music festival. ‘Maybe my generation was very naïve, but we really believed that we could change things, and that stayed with me. Granted, do I think my generation copped out? Yes, for the most part, we did. But I think that some of those ideals remain with you. Maybe we were afraid that if we really did try to change things, the only way we’d be able to accomplish it was by turning into what we were against.” Harriet says “I think it gave a me greater respect just for people in general, even after growing up in New York with the amazing diversity. You were in a place where there were no divisions, there were no separations.”

“Well, a lot of our conventions were dropped there for a very short period of time and we were just people. You had something in common with anybody that was around you. It didn’t matter where you were from or what your religion was, what your race was. You were there for a very wonderful purpose and that was to listen to music and get along with people. There was idealism, but there was also a conviction that what our ideals were for a greater human good.” Jack answers.

Woodstock was something that came and went so quickly that it took a while before those who witnessed it could absorb its impact. “I don’t think it was until years later that I really thought about it in any other context than that I had a very good time. I think when it was happening, and even after it happened, for most of us it was like, ‘OK now. We just went to the best damn concert the world will ever know.’ That’s great, but that was it. We didn’t start digging into the details of the whys and the wherefores or anything” Harriet recalls.

Ultimately it was about the music. “I think the kids today, that a lot of their feeling is reflected in their music. I think that when grunge came in in the early 90s, it certainly reflected the times. And I think rap and hip hop now really reflects a lot of what they’re feeling. With our music, there was a lot of political sentiment, especially in the folk side of it. It was certainly a music that you could get into and enjoy and it didn’t always have a message in it. It’s like any generation. Music becomes very personalized. With our parents, it was Perry Como, Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra. And we hated it. That was the music of THEIR time.” Jack said.

Jack and Harriet eventually joined the establishment, grew up, got jobs, got married, and had kids. Somehow they managed to hold onto a small part of what that weekend stood for. Peace, love and music.

“I don’t think a lot of people had the expectation that they were going to go there and that basically all of the services that would come to depend upon were gone. I mean, you were on you own with 500,000 other people. And I’m sure there were people who said, ‘I’m turning around and going home.’ There were other people who kind of reveled in that and it would be nice to know that if that situation came again that people could adapt to it. I’m not sure our culture these days could do that. It seems to be more an “I” culture than a “we” culture.” Jack explains

Harriet thinks back once more. “Being there and enjoying the music was just amazing…that would be my idea of Heaven. When I die, I want my Heaven to be Woodstock.”