The 60s

by The New Yorker Magazine

  The first witness, the chairman of the Governor’s commission on abortion reform, began enumerating the commission’s recommendations. Suddenly, a young, neatly dressed woman seated near the front stood up. “O.K., folks,” she said. “Now it’s time to hear from the real experts. I don’t mean the public opinion you’re so uninterested in. I mean concrete evidence from the people who really know—women. I can tell you the psychological and sociological effect the law has had on me—it’s made me angry! It’s made me think about things like forcing doctors to operate at gunpoint.”

  It took several minutes for Senator Lent to collect himself and try to restore order. By that time, several other women were on their feet, shouting.

  “Where are the women on your panel?” one woman said.

  “I had an abortion when I was seventeen. You don’t know what that’s like,” another said.

  “Men don’t get pregnant. Men don’t rear children. They just make the laws,” said a third.

  Senator Lent began, “If you girls can organize yourselves and select a spokesman—”

  “We don’t want a spokesman! We all want to testify!” a woman cried.

  “But wait a minute, dear—” the Senator began.

  “Don’t call me ‘dear’! Would you call a black person ‘boy’?” the woman shouted.

  The committee quickly adjourned the hearing and announced that there would be a closed executive session in an upstairs room.

  Senator Seymour Thaler, who has been long associated with hospital reform, and who is himself a proponent of the Cook bill, was furious with the women. “What have you accomplished?” he called out. “There are people here who want to do something for you!”

  “We’re tired of being done for! We want to do, for a change!” one of the women replied.

  Upstairs, police barred the door, and the women stood outside shouting, “We are the experts!” Women’s Liberation sent in a formal request to testify, and the committee replied that two women might speak after the other witnesses had finished. The women were not satisfied (“It’s a back-of-the-bus compromise!” “They just want to stall us till the newspapermen go home”), but half a dozen members of Women’s Liberation decided to stick it out. All of them were under thirty, and half were married. Two had had illegal abortions; one had had a child and given it up for adoption; one had a friend who had nearly died because she hesitated to go to the hospital after a badly done seven-hundred-dollar operation.

  As it turned out, the women waited for seven hours, sitting on the floor in the corridor, because the authorities, afraid of further disruption, would not let them into the hearing room. Finally, three women were permitted to speak. They talked about their experiences and demanded a public hearing that would be devoted entirely to the expert testimony of women.

  The legislators would not agree to this. “Why do you assume we’re against you?” one senator asked. “Four of the witnesses were for repeal. They said the same things you’ve been saying.”

  “There’s a political problem you’re overlooking,” said the last of the women to speak. “In this society, there is an imbalance in power between men and women, just as there is between whites and blacks. You and your experts may have the right ideas, but you’re still men talking to each other. We want to be consulted. Even if we accepted your definition of expert—and we don’t—couldn’t you find any female doctors or lawyers?”

  “I agree with you about the law,” Senator Thaler said. “But you’re just acting out your personal pique against men.”

  “Not personal pique—political grievance!” the final speaker replied.

  “All I can say,” Senator Thaler declared, in conclusion, “is that you’re the rudest bunch of people I’ve ever met.”

  The meeting broke up, and everyone began drifting out. “Well, we’re probably the first women ever to talk about our abortions in public,” one woman said. “That’s something, anyway.”

  James Stevenson and Faith McNulty

  AUGUST 30, 1969 (WOODSTOCK)

  ED, A PORTLY, middle-aged parent, appeared in our doorway one afternoon last week, his shoes caked with dried mud, a bit of corn tassel sticking out of a trouser cuff, and a glazed look behind his glasses. “Woodstock,” he gasped, leaning against the door. “I mean Walkill…I mean Bethel…I mean White Lake…”

  “The Festival?” we asked.

  Ed nodded, and handed us an unfolded, dirty cardboard box labelled “Howard Johnson’s Salt Water Taffy,” on which there was a lot of small, sloppy handwriting running in various directions. Then he limped away down the hall. Ed’s notes seemed to begin under the word “Taffy”:

  “I had not planned to attend any festivals—rock, art, folk, or Aquarian—this weekend, or any other weekend, for that matter. I had not planned to do much of anything beyond catching an afternoon nap, actually, when my son Jimmy, aged twelve, approached me on Friday noon, suggesting that we drive up to the Catskills and attend the three-day Woodstock Festival at White Lake. We could take sleeping bags, he explained, and sleep on the ground. Jimmy was prepared to leave at a moment’s notice; he was wearing a pair of blue-and-white striped bell-bottoms, a Navy work shirt, and an ‘electric’ hairdo. (He had spent the last of his savings to buy a Toni Home Permanent, which his mother had generously consented to apply to his hair.) I told him that going to the Festival was out of the question.

  “By midafternoon, we were driving up the New York State Thruway, with two sleeping bags in the back seat and a box of Howard Johnson’s Salt Water Taffy in the front. (I had consented to attend for one night, and one night only.) Frightening reports were coming in over the radio: traffic in the Bethel area backed up for twenty miles, eight-hour delay, no food, no water, etc. A quarter of a million people on the scene, and more arriving. As we turned off the Thruway for Route 17, we hit a large, ominous traffic jam—although we were still fifty miles from Bethel, or White Lake—and a fierce downpour. Turned off onto a minor road as soon as possible, and the skies cleared. Had a nice, fast ride through rolling farmland and sunshine for the next hour or so. Stopped for supplies in a village delicatessen. Jimmy did the marketing: 1 bag of pretzels, 1 bag of potato chips, 1 large jelly roll, 4 raisin cakes, six-pack of Coca-Cola, 1 box of peppermints, 2 chewing gum, 1 red gumballs. Resumed trip, and sailed along Route 52, down steep mountainsides, past lakes, big hotels, small hotels, hills, camps, farms, past Grossinger’s, and through Liberty, and there the traffic slowed down. The final ten miles or so, going down toward Bethel, or White Lake, took us until near sundown—stopping and starting, starting and stopping. It was comparable to, say, the Long Island Expressway on a Friday night, except that it was devoid of car honkings and anger. Every so often, the traffic would come to a total halt, and young people in bare feet and long hair and interesting clothes would wander back along the cavalcade, greeting other people, passing along the news (‘Somebody says it’s eight miles to the Festival’), giving the peace sign, or whatever. Often, there would be a boarding house nearby, and as the Festival-goers walked or drove by, the guests—some in long black coats and hats and Chassidic sideburns—would cheerfully raise their hands to them in the peace sign. ‘Hey, Weinstein!’ an old man by the road called to another old man, who was emerging from a farmhouse. Weinstein glanced over in time to see his friend, beaming, flash him the peace sign, and Weinstein, with a smile, returned the sign with a sweeping gesture. At one point, children were stationed along the road with a large sheet on which was lettered ‘peace.’ There was an easy, serene give-and-take between the people on the road and the people on the roadside.

  “Then, abruptly, the traffic would begin to move again—cars that had been abandoned in the grass would be started up, barefoot people would run by, and the procession would resume. Slowly, behind us, a small lake would recede into the distance; a field with large hills beyond would appear, then a valley, a turn in the road—and just when we felt we were on our way again a solid line of stopped cars would come into vi
ew, and progress would halt for another half hour. There were a few police on hand, but generally they were from somewhere else and were unable to give much information about how far down the road the Festival might be. Nobody was upset, however; everybody was cheerful.

  “About an hour and a half before sunset, I lost Jimmy. He had walked on ahead several times, saying he’d see how far he could get before the traffic got moving again and I picked him up. There had been a great deal of wandering around by everybody, so I paid little attention, and assumed that I’d encounter him soon, but the traffic did not move for a long time. Finally, I set out on foot to look for him, leaving our car in line, and walked up a series of rises—a quarter or half mile, perhaps—but I couldn’t find him. As I reached the highest point, and the road fell away in front of me, the traffic slowly began to move. I ran back downhill to the car, and the procession drove for several miles—but still no sign of Jimmy. Then another long halt, and I set out on foot again. I was very anxious now, because time was running out. Soon it would be night, and there were no street lights, almost no police, and where would I find him, how would I find him, among all the people? Well, Jimmy’s account of what happened when he was ‘lost’ is on the other side of this cardboard.”

  We turned the box of taffy over and encountered a larger, messier writing:

  “I got out of the car because I didn’t want to sit in the hot sun, and I wanted to walk because we had been driving for a long time. We had just gone by Swan Lake and were in bumper-to-bumper traffic. I started up the hill past cars filled with all sorts of people, many of them sitting on bumpers, roofs, and hoods. I kept walking up the hill. People in jeeps, smashed-up buggies, and rented trucks. I came to a fork in the road, with a sign on one of the poles saying ‘Festival.’ I walked by girls, boys, and grownups waving and making peace signs at the slowly moving traffic. There was an air of happiness and gaiety, even though there was a traffic jam. I started down a hill with grassy fields on both sides filled with the loud noise of crickets chirping. I looked for the crickets but couldn’t find any. People were hitchhiking and getting rides, sitting and lying on the cars, which zoomed by in the empty lane occasionally. I didn’t think I should hitchhike, but I stuck out my thumb once or twice, and didn’t get a ride. On the side of the road, I found a pamphlet announcing the name of the show and three days of Peace and Music and the names of the performers at the Festival. I went up a slight hill with a barn and a house on one side. You could see chickens, which were squawking. I walked a little more, and a dark-olive-green Mustang stopped with a man with a mustache and a lady, and they asked how far it was to the Festival. I said I didn’t know, and they asked if I wanted a ride. I was getting tired, so I said yes. We drove along and talked about the Festival and things. When we hit more traffic, I said goodbye and thank you, and started walking again. Down the road, there were two teen-agers in a Carnival ice-cream truck. Nobody seemed to know how far it was to the place, but there was a lot of guessing. Farther along, there was a yellow school bus, which I was to see often during the time I was there. It had a big red banner with a yellow ‘Peace’ sign and the words ‘New Orleans’ on it. I kept walking and saw these men—two white, one Negro—playing with a Frisbee. The Negro had an Afro cut and a weird pipe, and a leather pouch on his belt. He smiled, and when I saw him later he remembered me and smiled again. The next ride I got was in a red car full of guys, which took me for about half a mile. I got out on a dirt road with woods on both sides, and was getting thirsty when I came in sight of a house with a little girl on the steps spraying water with a hose, so some other people and I asked her for a drink. She let us. My last ride was up a hill with a girl driving a white convertible and a man sitting on top of the back seat. I got out, finally, and walked the rest of the way to the parking lot, where there was a guy who was giving directions and looked hot and tired. I waited awhile, looking at the people, and saw a couple of choppers. I started back down the hill to look for my father, and a man was throwing leaves and flowers in the air. A few minutes after that, I found my father.”

  We turned the box over and returned to Ed’s handwriting:

  “I was so relieved to see Jimmy—even his Toni Home Permanent—that nothing else mattered. I jumped out of the car, yelling jubilantly—nobody paid any attention to that—and then we got back in the car and were directed to a parking area, which was in a vast meadow. Thousands of cars were already parked, tents were being erected in the twilight, and as we got out the ground was squishy underfoot. It occurred to me that we might be here to stay. Somebody told us the Festival was that way about a mile and a half, and we set off. We walked and walked—across fields and down narrow country lanes, past more and more fields filled with cars, and always accompanied by a stream of people. After perhaps an hour, it seemed we were almost there—a lot of people were sitting in a meadow, as if within earshot of a concert—so we limped into the field and looked around. We asked some reclining youths where the Festival was, and they pointed across a vast valley to some tiny lights on a distant hilltop. ‘You’re kidding!’ said Jimmy. We sank to the grass and stared at the lights. ‘What’ll we do?’ I asked. ‘Shall we go back?’ Jimmy thought for a while. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. We just sat there. Finally, we decided we’d try to make the Festival. We cut through a muddy cornfield—Jimmy broke off an ear of corn to eat—and sank into water that was ankle-deep. We wallowed through that and reached another road. This road was really choked: cars three deep—on both shoulders as well as in the middle—almost all empty, none moving, just people streaming around them. It was pitch-dark when we climbed the final hill and found the Festival. There were no ticket-takers, or sellers—people simply poured in, free. The area was packed with people, sitting, lying down, or walking around; helicopters gargled overhead. Tim Hardin was singing—a tiny figure in a blue spotlight—but he was about as audible as a radio in a distant apartment over street noises. From time to time, a flare went up and dimly revealed the vastness of the crowd. There was no food in the area, and, apparently, no water. We sat. Somebody stepped on my hand. The people flooded in—more and more and more. I felt we would be buried any moment. Jimmy and I agreed to leave, and, using a sweater to keep us from getting separated—Jimmy holding one sleeve, I holding the other—we made our way against the oncoming tide. We retraced our steps, frequently flopping down in the grass on the roadside to rest. Jimmy never complained, although he was exhausted. But that was the spirit of the occasion. Not once did we hear anyone angry or rude or complaining—the universal attitude was one of stoicism, courtesy, good will. The benevolence was awesome. If Jimmy had been a little older or I had been a little younger, we probably would have stayed. As it was, when we reached the area where we had parked, some cars were already mired. When I stepped on the gas, the wheels of our car—for a horrible moment—spun. Then they caught, and I drove as fast as I could over the muddy field. I was sure that if I slowed down at all the car would sink in and we’d be there for a week. Jimmy went to sleep on a sleeping bag, and I drove on, stopping and starting again (the road was blocked in many places), until, about an hour later, we were in the clear. But in the opposite lane the headlights of the cars heading toward the Festival continued—on and on. I estimate we spent about fifteen minutes at the actual concert, but the next day, at home, Jimmy told everybody that the Festival was great, and he meant it, and, as a matter of fact, I think it was.”

  · · ·

  Shortly after Ed handed us his notes, we talked with a younger friend of ours—a nineteen-year-old—who had been to the Festival, and he told us he was indignant and discouraged by what the Times had had to say about the event. In an editorial headed “Nightmare in the Catskills,” the Times said, “The dreams of marijuana and rock music that drew 300,000 fans and hippies to the Catskills had little more sanity than the impulses that drive the lemmings to march to their deaths in the sea. They ended in a nightmare of mud and stagnation….What kind of culture is it that can produce so c
olossal a mess?” “It wasn’t a nightmare,” our friend told us. “The mud didn’t matter, and it was one of the most remarkable experiences I’ve ever had. The big point was not that pot was passed around openly but that because there was a minimum of force and restriction—the cops were few, and they were friendly—a huge crowd of people handled itself decently. There were no fights, no hassles, no pushing, no stealing. Everybody shared everything he had, and I’ve never seen such consideration for others. People volunteered for all kinds of jobs—picking up trash, carrying stuff, doing whatever was needed. It was the most extraordinary demonstration of how good people can be—really want to be, if they are let alone. It was an ethic shared by a huge mass of people. The Times wants to know what kind of culture produces this. In a broad sense, Christian culture produced it.”

  We asked our young friend, who attends the University of Chicago and has hair neither very short nor very long, to jot down some further notes on his experience, so that, for the record, we could append them to what Ed and Jimmy had written.

  “I went rather casually,” he wrote, “partly because I wanted to hear the music, and partly because I knew, by word of mouth, that there would be a tremendous mass of people my age, and I wanted to be part of it. Of course, there was going to be a terrific assemblage of artists—the best this kind of event has to offer—but the main thing was that by listening to the grapevine you could tell the Festival was going to be above and beyond that. We heard it wasn’t going to be like Newport, with high fences, high prices, cops shoving and cursing you. We heard that there wouldn’t be any reserved seats, that we’d be free to wander, and that the townspeople weren’t calling out the militia in advance. I went, like the others, to meet people, to sit on the grass and play guitars, and to be together. I also knew that people were coming from thousands of miles away, but I had no idea how tremendous the event would be. We’re a car culture now, and people will travel vast distances to get something they want.