In 2007 it was just as good an excuse as any to take a look back at our deep-dark past in search of answers. And 2007 was significant as it marked 40 years since the fabled and highly romanticized “Summer Of Love” took place.
At its epicenter were the cross-streets of Haight and Ashbury – to many considered to be Ground Zero for the dawn of the Counter-Culture as it took form and spread throughout America and the rest of the world.
Gathering for a look back during this panel discussion for The Commonwealth Club of California and broadcast locally over KFOG-FM in the Bay Area, were several figures; some well known, some notorious and some witnesses during a week in July 1967.
On hand to give insights and observations on this program are Paul Krassner, Wavy Gravy, Dr.David E. Smith – founder of the Haight-Ashbury Free Clinic, Wes “Scoop” Nisker, and moderator by Peter Finch, KFOG-FM News Director.
A goodly amount of nostalgia for a time long-past, the discussion vacillates between good-natured and somber – it epitomizes for many what the period of time was all about – that with the wonderful nonsense came the painful reality and things gone very wrong in their quest to make them very right.
Attempts were made to compare The Summer Of Love with Burning Man; the recent Desert gatherings that take place each year with a toe dipped in Counter Culture ideals. For the most part it’s not viewed as a companion to the same thing but a different thing – a different set of ideals and a different set of goals.
The one point that was universal among the panel was that Drugs became the turning point where things started to go very wrong. The addiction took over and ruined the idealism – that the addictions led to overdoses and how drug related deaths skyrocketed right after the summer of 1967. How the “Hippie ideal” was already a thing of the past by the time July rolled around and that many of the participants in this discussion had already moved away.
Still, it’s a fascinating account of a complicated time – a war in Vietnam – the peace movement – the deliberate disruption on the parts of law enforcement to dismantle the movements – the entry of organized crime. All against a backdrop of people looking out for each other – coming together and sharing common goals. It led several on the panel the question how something with so much good and positive go so badly wrong?
Human nature – where ever more than three are gathered there are going to be problems – just happens.
But here we are now in 2024, seventeen years after this broadcast and 57 years since the Summer Of Love and nothing remains the same.
A little over an hour with a lot of insights –
