American Experience

ANNOUNCER

This program contains content which may not be suitable for all audiences. Viewer discretion is advised. (crowd murmuring) It looks like we're going to get a little bit of rain, so you better cover up. (wind rumbling) Everybody who's in the back, please move back! Please move back. We have to get away from these towers. (wind blowing) Put the mic stands down on the floor. Cover all the equipment.

JOEL ROSENMAN

We were all in our mid-20s. We had created something that was much bigger than we had anticipated. I see it. (over

speakers)

All of you up on the towers, please come down. You're making it very, very dangerous. (wind blowing) All right, everybody, just sit down, wrap yourself up. We're going to have to ride it out.

JOHN MORRIS

Everything that could possibly go wrong was happening. I mean, it was all hell breaking loose.

MORRIS (over speaker)

Hold on to your neighbor, man. And let's think hard to get rid of it, please. (shouting): No rain! No rain! No rain! (crowd chanting "No rain!")

SUSAN REYNOLDS

When you think about it, it could have been an absolute disaster. (thunder rumbling, rain pouring)

BARON WOLMAN

And I just kept thinking, "Which direction is this thing going to go?"

MAN (over speaker)

Try to keep yourself comfortable. It's gonna blow through. ("Something in the Air" by Thunderclap Newman playing) Call out the instigator Because there's something in the air We got to get together sooner or later Because the revolution's here And you know it's right

REYNOLDS

We did not plan ahead, we did not plan where we were going to stay, we didn't think about food. It was just, like, "Hey, this sounds like fun. Let's get in the car and go." We have got to get it together We have got to get it together now

PETER BEREN

We would pack as many hitchhikers as we could in the car, sitting on top of each other. And as we got closer, there would be people walking on foot like pilgrims. It looked like a pilgrimage.

LAUREEN STAROBIN

We were looking for answers. We were looking for other people that felt the same way as we did. ...and houses Because there's something in the air

JON JABOOLIAN

No matter where you looked, you saw people. It was like a field with people growing in it. I had never, never seen that many people in my life in one place at one time. And you know it's right

PAUL GEORGE

My feeling was, "This is what we've been talking about, "this is what we've been aiming for, this kind of freedom."

STAROBIN

If 400,000 people could get together and have absolutely no violence, absolutely no conflict, I felt like, if we could bring all that love back into society, we could change the world. We have got to get it together (cheering) We have got to get it together now ("I'll Take Manhattan" by Bobby Hackett playing) (horns honking)

JOHN ROBERTS

I grew up in New York City, and I came from a wealthy family. My mother died when I was young, so when I was 21, I inherited about a quarter of a million dollars. That was quite a bit of money in those days. I had a-a job down on Wall Street doing research.

ROSENMAN

When I met John, I had just gotten out of law school and was playing with a band down in the Village and at the clubs on Second and Third Avenue, but I was starting to get a little frayed at the edges. Neither one of us, I think, was really on a career path that we knew was the right one.

ROBERTS

Joel and I met playing golf. We hit it off. And, uh, we thought we'd go into business together, investing this money that I had.

AD ANNOUNCER

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JOEL MAKOWER

John's grandfather founded the Block Drug Company, the maker of Poligrip and Polident. That fortune was the source of the seed money for a recording studio in Midtown Manhattan, Media Sound, which for John and Joel, actually turned into their first successful venture. It was because of Media Sound that John and Joel met Michael Lang and Artie Kornfeld.

MAN

How much do those matches sell for? 65 cents for the roll.

MAKOWER

Michael had a head shop in Miami, in Coconut Grove, the center of the hippie culture down there. Right there, is that a pipe? Yeah, it's a Turkish water pipe. With two hoses. In 1968 he moved to Woodstock, New York, about 100 miles north of New York City, and was introduced to Artie Kornfeld, who was a vice president at Capitol Records.

ROBERTS

They called us in early 1969, and said, "We're very interested in building a recording studio "in Woodstock, New York. "We know that you and Joel were involved in-in building one "in New York City. Would you meet with us?" We said, "Sure!"

ROSENMAN

When we met them, they were quite different from us, meaning a lot of fringe, a lot of buckskin, and a great deal of hair. John and I were making an effort to look like businessmen at the time. (laughing): So we, we couldn't have represented more distant ends of the spectrum.

ROBERTS

What Artie said was, basically, Woodstock was a center for artists, and that a recording studio there would have a natural constituency, and it would be a success.

ROSENMAN

As we were looking through the proposal that they'd given us, we noticed an idea for an opening-day party, where musicians who lived in the area-- Tim Hardin, John Sebastian, Bob Dylan-- would perform. I said, "The idea of having a concert with those stars, "I mean, why don't we skip the studio idea "and just do a big concert? We could make a fortune." So in late January 1969, the four of us shook hands and started brainstorming what Woodstock could be.

REPORTER

To the hippie youth of today, this is part of their real world. This is the atmosphere at the Monterey Pop Festival. The music is frantic, the sounds are wild, and the mind is free.

BOB HITE

I rolled and I tumbled I cried the whole night long

BOB SPITZ

Outdoor rock festivals were a pretty new concept at the time. They had begun in 1967 with Monterey Pop. And by 1968, '69, there had been a few festivals scattered around the country. Michael Lang was the only one of the four that had any experience in the concert business. In 1968 he had helped produce a festival in Miami that was a huge disaster. It was held at a racetrack, had very little atmosphere, it rained, there were a lot of lawsuits afterwards; the festival never really came off. But Michael knew that this is what he wanted to do. And he had this idea of taking the festival out of the racetrack and putting it in a bucolic place.

LANG

I had been thinking about doing a series of concerts in Woodstock. And I always thought if you could dream it up, you could put it together. And this was a chance to make, you know, a dream come true.

ROSENMAN

Michael and Artie had optioned a property in Woodstock, but it was far too small-- it was just ten acres. So that didn't work out. A property in Saugerties didn't work out. And then John and I found a piece of property that was in Wallkill that was being turned into an industrial park. It-it didn't knock you out visually, but it was available.

MAKOWER

Michael hated it. It was everything he didn't want-- just a flat, barren piece of land that had no trees, no soul.

LANG

You know how some pastoral scenes are beautiful and calming and make you feel comfortable, at peace? This was completely the opposite. But we needed to get going, we needed a site, and I felt that we could transform it into something more spiritual and special. ("Embryonic Journey" by Jefferson Airplane playing)

SPITZ

The town signed off on the festival as a, kind of a music and arts fair where kids would walk around and look at art and hear some music in the background. And "An Aquarian Exposition," which is what they called Woodstock, had some kind of mystical feel to it.

ROSENMAN

Michael suggested that, like Monterey, we should have a crafts village and an art exhibition alongside the music. We all loved it. It was such a natural add-on to what we were thinking about. We wanted to make it like visiting another world, like visiting the world you were dreaming about if you were a young person. This shining place that you could go to and feel that you weren't a misfit, or that you weren't on the wrong side of a debate, or that you weren't under the suspicious eye of the authorities.

MAKOWER

For the generation that was coming of age in the late '60s, everything was up for grabs. Young people were rejecting the status quo, whether it was your parents or whether it was your community or-or the business establishment. This counterculture, as it was called, influenced music, it influenced art, and it certainly influenced the way people dressed. But clearly, politics was at the center of the counterculture, because the one thing that affected everybody was the war in Vietnam. Last week's casualty figures in the Vietnam War, released today, showed 299 Americans killed, 355...

GEORGE

I remember watching the news in, you know, 1968 and asking my father, "Why are we fighting in Vietnam?" And his answer was always, "Because they're communists." I didn't find that satisfactory. (artillery fires) My father had been in World War II in Europe, in the Signal Corps. He always made clear that he thought the Army was a great experience, and everybody should do it. He just had a very positive view of serving one's country that way. And he did support the war in Vietnam. ("The Pusher" by Steppenwolf playing) (gun firing, people talking on radio)

REYNOLDS

The men of World War II just assumed that their sons would also be soldiers. That's how you became a man. You grew up, you served your country. So my older brother Jim signed up for the Naval Reserves. I remember the day that he went to Vietnam and being terrified.

MICHAEL LINDSEY

When I was 18, I had to register for the draft. I was in college, so I got a deferment. But there was always that thing in the back of your mind. You knew that they were just one step behind you. If you were in college, you-you'd better hope that you had all your money straightened out and grades were good and everything else, because if you dropped out, you were going to Vietnam. ("The Pusher" continues)

BEREN

When I was 20 years old, I was faced with a draft physical. I'm putting down that I'm a bedwetter, that I'm a homosexual, that I'm a communist. I think there were 14 things in all that I had written down. So they escorted me over to the psychiatrist. He just said, "Kid, I'm gonna give you one year to straighten yourself out," and he gave me a deferment for 12 months. ("The Pusher" continues)

RICK DILLS

There's no way to describe how terrifying it was to be a 17-year-old, knowing that the Vietnam War was your fate. I wasn't alone in any way in transitioning from being personally afraid of the war to being politically opposed to it.

CROWD (chanting)

You kill people! You kill people! You kill people! (chanting continues) (shouting, clapping)

BEREN

I participated in a couple of marches on Washington, anti-war rallies. The war was insane. You know, an insane conflict that, um... made everybody crazy, whether you were fighting the war or fighting against it.

CROWD (chanting)

Hell, no, we won't go! ("Volunteers" by Jefferson Airplane playing) Look what's happening out in the streets Got a revolution Got to revolution Hey, I'm dancing down the street Got a revolution Got to revolution Oh, ain't it amazing, all the people that I meet? Got a revolution (shouting)

REPORTER

This is a CBS News Special Report...

BEREN

And then, on top of everything else, Martin Luther King was assassinated. The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. was shot to death by an assassin late today as he stood on a balcony in Memphis, Tennessee.

LINDSEY

When Martin Luther King was killed, I knew a lot of people who just felt, "We have to do things differently, "because the way the establishment have done things has led to this."

GEORGE

By the time I got to be 16, I was really questioning the way society is structured. I objected to racism. I objected to inequality, consumerism, and poverty. I objected to the war in Vietnam.

ROBERT KENNEDY

One thing is clear in this year of 1968, and that is that the American people want no more Vietnams. (audience applauds)

LINDSEY

Of course, we had hope for Bobby Kennedy. He seemed to be one of us in a lot of ways. We really felt that he was finally going to be able to change things.

REYNOLDS

I mean, he was out there espousing peace, and, you know, fighting against poverty and racism, and all the things that we believed in and wanted so deeply. He was our voice.

BEREN

In June of 1968, I was leaving a bar in my hometown. I turned on the radio.

REPORTER

The senator is lying with his eyes closed, absolutely unmoving, blood underneath his head.

BEREN

I heard the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy as it unfolded in real time. And it just completely undid me.

FRANK MANKIEWICZ

Senator Robert Francis Kennedy

died at 1

44 a.m. today, June 6, 1968.

STAROBIN

The shock of it was... It was just devastating, absolutely devastating. Martin Luther King and then Bobby Kennedy. You know, all these peacemakers.

JABOOLIAN

It was, like, "Oh, this is what we do. "This is what we do. "You know, as soon as somebody tries to speak out, "and they're too forceful, "this big machine, whatever the hell it is, is gonna shut them up." The only thing that we took solace in was music, and there was a lot of politically conscious music we were listening to. You know, like Buffalo Springfield. There's something happening here What it is ain't exactly clear There's a man with a gun over there Telling me I got to beware I think it's time we stop Children, what's that sound Everybody look what's going down

STAROBIN

When I was so disillusioned with everybody's else's thinking, I could escape into my music. It was such a comfort to me. You know, I hadn't met a lot of people at that time that felt like I did. But when I listened to music, those people were there. Young people speaking their minds Getting so much resistance from behind

REYNOLDS

We couldn't wait for Saturdays, when we could go buy the latest record and then come home and literally lay on the floor and play it over and over and over. My father hated the music. (laughing): He was always clapping his hands over his ears and just... Would say, "Damn hippies!" Come gather 'round, people, wherever you roam And admit that the waters around you have grown And accept it that soon...

LINDSEY

Dylan's song "The Times They Are A-Changin'" basically said to our parents' generation, "Get out of the new way if you can't lend a hand." You better start swimming or you'll sink like a stone For the times they are a-changin' Music had our ideas. For my generation, that was the thing. Especially our political views. It ain't me, it ain't me I ain't no military son It ain't me, it ain't me I ain't no fortunate one (song ending)

DONALD GOLDMACHER

Music was terribly important to us. I came to the San Francisco Bay Area in June '67, and there was music everywhere. There were free concerts going on in Golden Gate Park with all of these bands. I got to see Janis Joplin, the Jefferson Airplane, and the Dead, free. It really was amazing. (playing in background)

BEREN

Music and lyrics became our tribal drum. So we had a, kind of a secret communication going in the river of music that flowed through us. ("Dear Mr. Fantasy" playing) You know, it was a... wild liberation. It was Dionysian. And drugs played a big part in that.

STEVE WINWOOD

Something to make us all happy

GEORGE

We smoked a lot of pot and did a fair amount of acid. You know, the society that we're rebelling against, they don't want us smoking pot. (laughing): Must be a good reason to smoke pot.

KATHERINE DAYE

The more that we as a generation saw that what had been rammed down our throats was false-- it was false, it was a lie-- the more it freed us up to experiment. ("Dear Mr. Fantasy" continues) I mean, we had free love. (song continues) The pill allowed us to just go to a party and be with somebody. We just reveled in having that much freedom and that much ability to piss off your old man.

RONALD REAGAN

Movies were shown on two screens at the opposite ends of the gymnasium. They consisted of color sequences that gave the appearance of different-colored liquids spreading across the screen. Sexual misconduct was blatant. The smell of marijuana was prevalent all over the entire building. ("Dear Mr. Fantasy" continues)

LINDSEY

By 1969 it really did feel like we were finally winning some kind of culture war against the establishment. You know, this is how we lived, and if you didn't like it, too bad. We were seeing that America wasn't what we were taught it was, and when you stop looking at it that way and you start trying to figure it out for yourself, then, uh... it changes your life forever. ("Grazing in the Grass" by Willie Mitchell playing)

MAKOWER

Once they got the permits they needed from the town of Wallkill, the first thing that John and Joel and Michael and Artie did was to assemble a core team to help produce the festival. There was Stan Goldstein who had worked with Michael on Miami Pop. There was John Morris, who had experience booking acts; Chip Monck, whose role was stage design and lighting; Bill Hanley, one of the pioneers of event production sound. These were guys who knew how to put together an event. Stan called his friend Mel Lawrence to be the director of operations.

LAWRENCE

My mission was to, um, plan for all of the functions of the festival aside from the actual show. Everything from fences to food to transportation to fire access, lines of communication, security, water, sewerage-- you know this, that. I made a checklist that blew everybody's minds.

GOLDSTEIN

One specific thing was toilets. We knew we'd have to have a lot of them. No one knew how many. So I began going to events with a stopwatch and clipboard. Madison Square Garden, baseball stadiums-- anyplace that there were a lot of people. And I timed them, going in and coming out and going in and coming out. And I took all the information I gathered, multiplied by the size of the crowd we thought we might have, and came up with outrageous numbers of johns. Tens of thousands, just... Impossible numbers. So we lined up as many as we could get. ("Grazing in the Grass" continues)

MORRIS

I was in charge of the booking, and Creedence was the first band that we booked. And then we got Jefferson Airplane, Joe Cocker, and Ten Years After. We didn't get the Stones or Dylan or the Doors, but we booked a lot of the acts we wanted to, including the Who and Jimi Hendrix. ("Carry On" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young playing)

DAVID CROSBY

We had just started planning our first tour as Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young when we heard that Hendrix was going to play it, and the Who, and Sly, and Airplane, the Band, the Grateful Dead-- you know, everybody that we thought was cool. ("Carry On" continues)

SPITZ

They needed to get the word out about the festival. They had a channel to do that, through the alternative press. There was the "Berkeley Barb" and the "Rat" and the "Village Voice," and word about the festival poured out, not just to New York, where they thought they would draw the most people from, but all across the United States. Woodstock was on everybody's lips. Carry on Love is coming Love is coming to us all

DAYE

Tom and I subscribed to "Rolling Stone" magazine, and long about, oh, early May, I started seeing these ads for a three-day festival with all these bands that we loved. And I said, "Tom! You wanna go to this?"

RADIO ANNOUNCER

For tickets and information, write to Woodstock Music and Art Fair...

GOLDMACHER

We heard it on the radio. They were describing this happening-to-be and that people were coming from all corners of the United States, and apparently abroad, as well.

BRUNO ELIARD (speaking French)

(speaking

SUSIE KAUFMAN

I was hanging out at the fountain in, in Washington Square, with my guys, who were all musicians, and then all of the sudden, tickets were being made available. You could buy one day, two days, or three. And jeez, three days! "Wow! That means staying there over... "Wow, what an adventure that would be! We gotta do this!"

SPITZ

It was early June, so they started to build at the Wallkill site. They brought in electricity, they started to lay the groundwork for a stage, and they hired a couple of hundred kids to help out. And these kids, they didn't look like anybody else in this town.

ROSENMAN

They were a little suspicious about us, but we just forged ahead. All that did was, I guess, sound the rallying cry for what called itself the Concerned Citizens Committee of Wallkill.

ROBERTS

They didn't like the looks of the people who were working on the site. They didn't like long hair, rock music, and all that that implied to them. We really tried to practice good community relations, but the Concerned Citizens had the wind up.

SPITZ

Wallkill was a pretty conservative place. The way they saw it, these were kids who smoked dope, who had casual sex... They didn't want these hippies in their town.

ROSENMAN

John and I were having dinner in New York City when the town of Wallkill passed an ordinance saying, "You can't have a gathering of more than 5,000 people." Essentially, it just legislated the possibility of a festival on this property out of existence. But we had already sold so many tickets and hired so many bands, we couldn't turn back at that point.

ROBERTS

It was like being on a rollercoaster that had just crested the rise, you know, before that first enormous plunge. I contemplated the abyss of a total wipeout and thought, "Let's not declare bankruptcy-- let's throw this festival." I'm going up the country, baby, don't you wanna go? I'm going up the country, baby, don't you wanna go? I'm going to someplace...

MAKOWER

It was the first week of July, about five weeks out, so there was a mad scramble to find a new site. They drove around upstate New York talking to local people, real estate brokers-- anyone who would listen.

LAWRENCE

Michael and I, we must have looked for a week or maybe ten days, renting helicopters and going here and going there. And then we meet Max Yasgur.

SPITZ

Max was a farmer. And he was very successful. His dairy supplied almost everybody in that area with milk. Everybody knew Max Yasgur.

JOHN CONWAY

Yasgur was a, you know, he was a law-and-order Republican, but, you know, he also believed in personal freedom and freedom of expression, and that's what he hung his hat on.

LANG

We went to see Max, and we just hit it off. I think he liked the fact that we were doing something in the face of a lot of adversity and that we believed in.

LAWRENCE

Max takes us to the top of this hill, and there it is! A natural amphitheater.

Michael and I looked at each other

"This is it!"

SPITZ

This was exactly what they were looking for, and they made a deal with Max right there on the spot.

ROBERTS

Joel and I went up to get some kind of a-a handle on the town politics. (chuckles): We sure didn't want to get into the same problem there as we had in Wallkill.

ROSENMAN

We were asked to fill out our attendance expectations on the permit application. We used Monterey Pop's record, 28,000 people a day, or something like that, as the baseline. We multiplied it times two, and said, you know, "In our wildest dreams, this is what we're hoping for." And within a couple of days, we got our permits.

MIRIAM YASGUR

A sign was erected near our house, and it said something like, "Don't buy Yasgur's milk, he loves the hippies." And I thought to myself, "You don't know Max, because we're going to have a festival."

RADIO ANNOUNCER

The Woodstock Music and Art Fair, the three-day Aquarian Exposition, will be held at White Lake, in the town of Bethel, Sullivan County, New York. And on Friday, August 15,

you will hear and see

Joan Baez, Arlo Guthrie, Tim Hardin, Richie Havens, the Incredible String Band... ("Wasn't Born to Follow" by the Byrds playing)

ROBERTS

Everyone felt excited about the possibilities of the new site, but there was a lot to be done.

ROSENMAN

We had to start all over again to construct what we had built in several months in Wallkill in less than four weeks.

ROBERTS

The half a million at the old site was all down the drain, right? And we have to put another $800,000 into this one. Building a stage, getting the lights and the sound system up, fences. Food concessions. Portable toilets-- I mean, it was extraordinary. And Joel and I had never done any of this before.

ROSENMAN

But because of ticket sales, we actually felt that we were gonna turn a profit.

SPITZ

They knew by this time that there were going to be more than just 50,000 people. Ticket sales looked like it was going to be closer to 100,000. And with 100,000 stoned-out kids, they knew that there could be some difficulties.

REPORTER

There's been some trouble at a few of the pop festivals. What do you think brings that about? Why will it happen at one place and not another?

PAUL BUTTERFIELD

You know, I, I really don't know. Like, in Miami, they broke down the fence, and they had a lot of fights.

REPORTER

Do you think it has anything to do with the size of the audience? I think it has to do a little bit to do with the size. It has more to do with the way the festival is organized.

WES POMEROY

To see what was really happening, we sent people to almost all the major rock festivals that summer. They went to Atlanta, they went to Denver, and they went to Newport. And every one, there were problems. They had tear gas used in Denver, they had violence in Los Angeles County. So back in New York, they kept insisting that they needed to have security people for safety. I told John that all the cops in the world weren't going to prevent violence. It had to depend upon building the kind of expectation and the feeling of this event we're gonna have so that people didn't want to hurt each other.

GOLDSTEIN

We also knew that there would be a lot of drugs around and there would be a lot of people who couldn't handle whatever it was that they were going to take, and that that had to be dealt with as well. (gong rings) Hi, there. Uh, my name is Hugh Romney, and I'm going through a series of changes in this fur room at the Electric Circus store. What is essentially on the front of my brain is this Hog Farm poster, which we're gonna be moving all around the country-- "we" being a-a commune.

ROSENMAN

Stanley Goldstein suggested that we look to this... (laughing): This commune called the Hog Farm, and that we should bring as many of these folks to the festival as we can, and have them handle our security. So he went and met with a fellow named Hugh Romney, also known as Wavy Gravy.

WAVY GRAVY

We'd been driving around the country, putting on these shows. We had a certain skill with working with large crowds. We were a happening. (guitar playing, bell clanging) So Stan Goldstein showed up and says, "How would you guys like to do this music festival in New York state?" And we said, "Well, "it sounds like a good time, but we're gonna be in New Mexico." And he says, "That's all right, we'll fly you in in an Astrojet." And indeed, 85 of us boarded this American Airlines Astrojet going to Woodstock.

TOM LAW

We all arrived at the Albuquerque airport and loaded up a couple of sets of teepee poles and flew off to New York.

WAVY GRAVY (laughing)

The stewardesses locked themself in a little room, and we just took over the plane. ("Apricot Brandy" by Rhinoceros playing) We got to New York City, piled off the aircraft, and there was the press. What is the Hog Farm going to be doing in Woodstock? Well, the Hog Farm is a many-sided, multi... We're a kind of a family, a huge expanded family. And we could do any number of things, because each one of us is gonna do a different thing. But mostly we're just gonna try and be groovy, and spread that grooviness through everybody. Well, the Hog Farm has been hassled by security people, and they're calling you security people, so how do you feel about the, you know, the name? Well, I feel secure. I don't know what "security people" means. I never was called a security person before. It's, like, you're the first person that's ever called me that-- how do you feel? (laughs) Well, I feel.. Do you feel secure? (all laughing)

ROBERTS

There was a picture in the "Post" the next day. My father called and said, "Nice cops you've hired." He thought that I was really out of my mind, to be involved in this thing. ("Sally and George Theme" by Alec Puro playing) (kids shouting)

MARION VASSMER

We're a small town, we'll never have all those people here. They'll never... they'll never be here, you know. I didn't believe it. ("Sally and George Theme" continues)

ARTHUR VASSMER

That's all you heard on the radio. "Woodstock, town of Bethel, Woodstock," you know? And ha-ha, we're all laughing, you know? And a guy come to me, he says, "Look out, this might be something bigger than you thought." I've been here all my life, you know? They're talking about hundreds of thousands of people, and so on and so forth. We never saw that in this town. ("Sally and George Theme" continues)

DEBRA CONWAY

There was a certain backlash, but mostly, you know, it was kind of a daily little buzz from the locals.

LOUIS RATNER

We started to hear rumors that this thing was more or less out of hand because no one knew the amount of tickets that were sold. One time they said 25,000, and then it was, all of a sudden, it's 50,000, then they don't know, and it got to a point where, uh, you started to get a little worried about it. ("Sally and George Theme" ends)

MORRIS

It was early August, and we were about a week out from the beginning of the festival, when, all of a sudden, people started showing up. (people talking in background)

MIRIAM YASGUR

About a week before, they started showing up in small groups and camping and so on, and the thing that Max and I were trying to figure out is, they hadn't gotten the fence around the field. And we thought, "Boy, they'd better rush and do that if they want to sell tickets to this thing."

ROSENMAN

In the last week, if you saw what was going on, you were immediately aware that it couldn't possibly be finished in time. On Monday, everything was in a state of preparation roughly on target for a festival to be thrown some time in November and not for one that was supposed to begin in four days. Let's clear the road, please!

BEREN

We showed up three days before the festival opened, because that's what we were supposed to do as food handlers. It was thrown together at the last minute, so we had to build our own food stands before we manned them.

ROBERTS

We have spoken to a lot of different food concession people, and all of them, the legitimate guys, went by the wayside when we lost Wallkill. What was left was an outfit called Food for Love. There were three of them-- three guys. I think one of them had some kind of food catering experience. I don't think the other two did. But we didn't have any alternative.

ROSENMAN

I think it was Tuesday, the construction foreman tells us, "We just don't have enough time to finish everything. "So which would you like to have us finish, "the gates and the fences, or the stage? We don't have enough men and material to do both." I remember thinking, "If we don't have gates and fences, "then we're not gonna collect tickets. "We'll be bankrupt. "And if we don't have a stage, we'll be in jail. (laughing): "Because there will be 100,000 kids running around "with nothing to do. For three days." So that was the answer. The answer was, "Build the stage." (welding torch buzzing)

TICIA AGRI

I'd go there in the middle of the night, and people were building the stage. It was going 24 hours.

MONCK

There was obviously so much to do, and so little time in which to do it, we had all come to-to realize that all of our individual jobs were going to be left somewhat undone. So we all kind of banded together into one sort of SWAT team trying to run around and finish. ("You Ain't Goin' Nowhere" by the Byrds playing)

GEORGE

I quit my job at the restaurant in Ocean City with no notice. (laughs) I just told them that I wouldn't be in anymore. And they said, "Why?" And I said, "Well, I'm going to Woodstock." ("You Ain't Goin' Nowhere" continues)

DAYE

We didn't get on the road till around noon, and by the time we got to within, I don't know, miles of Bethel, the traffic was just, you know, crawling. The folks on the-the road, the people who lived there, one would think that they would throw things at us. No! They just welcomed us. The morning came, the morning went

KAUFMAN

Never before in my life did I feel so much anticipation. (laughing): This is going to be so cool! My bride's gonna come Oh, ho, are we gonna fly Down in the easy chair? (speaking

STAROBIN

We were at a dead standstill for hours. People just got out and sat on their cars and started talking to each other, getting to know each other. You know, starting long conversations about politics and about music. Before long, we felt like we had hundreds of best friends. My bride's gonna come...

ARTHUR VASSMER

We were sitting on the back porch and my God, the traffic, all of a sudden, it started. And I'm telling you, it never let up. We just opened the one door. But you couldn't let them in. It was impossible. And we let 40 or 50 people at a time, they'd get their groceries or whatever they needed, let them out the back, and then open up the door, let another 50 in. And these people, some of them walked four and five, six miles. "Where's the Woodstock? Where's the Woodstock?" All his kings supplied with sleep We'll climb that hill...

REPORTER

This sight is hard to believe. We're over White Lake, in the midst of this music festival encampment. We're up over the trees now, we're coming in over...

JOE TINKELMAN

We were on the state highway, and cars were stopping. And we realized that this was parking for the concert, so we got out of the car and started walking, and we saw people setting up lawn chairs to watch this spectacle. (laughing): It looked like this whole part of New York state was just being turned upside down by this event.

REPORTER

The traffic is terrible. It is backed up from White Lake right back through on the Quickway past Monticello, and there's no place to park-- everything is full.

REYNOLDS

They were announcing on the radio that you couldn't get there, and, you know, "Don't go." (laughing): They were saying, "Don't go, don't go! "You can't get in, it's already overcrowded, and they're shutting it down, and turn around and go home." (laughing): Nobody was turning around. It sort of increased our desire, more than anything. Like, "One way or another, we'll get there." ("Get Together" by the Youngbloods playing) (people talking in background) Love is but a song to sing Fear's the way we die

LINDSEY

As you walked in, it hit you. Suddenly, it just all came into view at once. You can make the mountains ring This whole enormous bowl full of people. It was mind-boggling.

ROSENMAN

Coming over the hill and feeling the energy of that crowd is something I'll never forget. There was so much power in it. Come on people now Smile on your brother Everybody get together Try to love one another right now

STAROBIN

It was indescribable, the feeling that came over me of warmth, and, "Oh, my God, there are this many people in the world that think like I think." (laughing): "There are all these people here!" I never knew there were that many people in the world. ("Get Together" continues)

REYNOLDS

Once we got there, the fences were just trampled. We walked up that hill, and we saw, you know, all these people-- our age, looked like us, dressed like us. You know, us. I mean, it was just... it was... It was like, you know, meeting your brothers and sisters. It was really beautiful. Come on people now Smile on your brother Everybody get together Try to love one another right now Right now Right now ("Get Together" ends)

MORRIS (on speaker)

We'll be getting our show on in about five minutes. Just keep cool and relax. We'll be with you as soon as we can. Thank you. Do you realize that half of these people don't have tickets, and there are people five miles away sitting on a highway with tickets who have driven 2,000 or 3,000 miles?

MAN

Right. Whatever has to be done to make it right, this is wrong. Yeah, yeah.

ROBERTS

It was obvious we were in deep (no audio). After having worked that afternoon, trying to organize people to put the fences up, and actually pounding in posts myself, I realized it wasn't going to happen. We weren't going to be able to ring about a mile of perimeter.

MORRIS

What are you going to tell a few hundred thousand people who are sitting in your field when you're supposed to be collecting money from them? "Go back out and come back in when we get the tickets and we finish the fences and the rest of it"? You are now giving the world's greatest three-day freebie. Okay, there's only one way to do it. That's what it is. No, there's a way to do it. There is no way. Artie came up with, "Can't we get a whole bunch of girls, "and put them in diaphanous gowns "and give them collection baskets, and send them out into the audience?" It was the most ludicrous thing I had ever heard in my life.

ROBERTS

As a business venture, it was dead. And I don't know why, but sort of a curious calm overcame us, and it seemed like the gates just weren't really what was important here anymore.

MORRIS (on speaker)

It's a free concert from now on. (crowd cheering) That doesn't mean that anything goes. What that means is, we're gonna put the music up here for free. What it means is that the people who are backing this thing, who put up the money for it, are gonna take a bit of a bath. A big bath. That's no hype. That's truth-- they're gonna get hurt. But what it means is that these people have it in their heads that your welfare is a hell of a lot more important-- and the music is-- than a dollar. (crowd cheering and applauding)

BEREN

The roar that went up from that crowd was incredible. Despite its roots in trying to be a capitalist enterprise, the concert was liberated. (coins clinking, people talking in background) You don't even have to bother bringing your tickets or anything, because they aren't going to collect them. There's no way they can. They got a fence that's, like, half up, and there are people just sitting in that field. It's really beautiful.

MAN (on speaker)

We're still waiting for the arrival of group one. Now, please bear with us. Due to the traffic problems, we're going to have to start a little later.

MORRIS

The bands were all in different hotels, and if you tried to drive down to the site, it would take you six hours to do it. It became obvious that we needed helicopters. But then Richie Havens showed up, and it was, like, "Richie, please go on now." And he said, "I'm not scheduled to go on till later." I said, "Richie, we don't have anybody else."

HAVENS

I actually was afraid to go on first, basically because I knew the concert was late, and I didn't want to get beer cans thrown at me. You know, "Don't do this to me. Don't put me in front of your problem like this," you know? "My bass player isn't even here." But I went on, you know, and it was beautiful. Hey, look yonder, tell me what's that you see Marching to the fields of Concord? Looks like Handsome Johnny with his flintlock in his hand Marching to the Concord war Hey, marching to the Concord war

BEREN

Once the festival started, we opened the food stands. And a throng of people came running up the hill. There were too many people, too many arms reaching out, so we just started handing out hamburgers. And people began to shower us with joints. I had one in each pocket, one in my ear, and I was smoking two at a time. I got really high. (audience cheering)

HAVENS

I was onstage for something like two hours because nobody else was there to go on. (chuckles): I did about four or five encores, you know, until I had nothing else to sing. And then "Freedom" was created right there on the stage. That's how "Freedom" was created, onstage. It was the last thing I could think of to sing. I made it up. (playing opening to "Freedom")

CAROL GREEN

I remember hearing Richie Havens playing "Freedom." I was way up on the hill, and I heard it, and I was transported.

HAVENS

Freedom, freedom Freedom, freedom

GEORGE

It's a good word to use. And it wasn't just the freedom of being able to smoke a joint, it was the freedom of being able to be who you were. Not feeling that somebody was going to judge you or threaten you. So, yeah, freedom on a lot of levels. ("Freedom" continues, audience clapping to rhythm)

AGRI

I left the backstage area, and I went into the crowd, and I went up, and I got in the middle of the crowd, and that was, like, "Wow, look what we've done. We actually pulled it off, and it's happening."

MORRIS (on speaker)

What better way to start than with the beautiful Richie Havens?

MORRIS

The audience reaction was just wonderful. It just brought the spirit right up and you felt, "Okay, this is going to work. We're going to be okay." And then, thank God, we got the helicopter rotation working, and started to get people in.

MAN (on speaker)

We apologize for the noise of the choppity-choppity, but it seems there are a few cars blocking the road, so we're flying everybody in.

SPITZ

Once the artists started arriving, the first band to go on was Sweetwater, followed by the acoustic acts. (Sweetwater playing "What's Wrong") (strumming opening to "Joe Hill," crowd cheering) I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night Alive as you and me

BARNARD COLLIER

It was after midnight, and, in fact, it was starting to rain. All through the crowd, there were matches and cigarette lighters and candles, it looked like fireflies.

BAEZ

"I never died," says he

CHRIS MOORE

The field was illuminated. Not as bright as the blue light on Joan Baez on the stage, but the immediate impact was the size of that crowd. ("Joe Hill" continues)

MOORE

There was nothing in that field but human beings. (song ends, crowd cheers)

MORRIS

Joan Baez was just wonderful. She ended that night in a drizzle. I looked out in the field and saw all these people, and it was, like, "Let's go to sleep."

MORRIS (on speaker)

Maybe the best thing for everybody to do, unless you have a tent or someplace specific to go to, is carve yourself out a piece of territory, say goodnight to your neighbor, and say thank you to yourself for making this the most peaceful, most pleasant day anybody's ever had with this kind of music. (motorcycle engines revving)

ROBERTS

Joel and I got on the Hondas. And we rode up to a hill that was, you know, maybe a mile away from the stage. And in the distance, you could see hundreds, thousands of little campfires. It was like an army at rest before an enormous battle the next day. It was really beautiful. That moment will stay with me forever. (crowd cheering)

MORRIS (on microphone)

I guess the reason we're here is music. So let's have some music. Ladies and gentlemen, Quill! (playing "Waiting for You") (band vocalizing)

LINDSEY

The first day of the festival, there were a lot of people there. Maybe 250,000, 300,000 people. That was the folk day. The second day of the concert was the rock-'n'-roll day. That's when everyone showed up. They wanted to see the Who, Airplane, the Dead, later that night. So the crowd grew by about a hundred thousand.

DILLS

"Holy (no audio), this thing is way beyond what we ever could've imagined." We just felt like we were going to get crushed up against the stage, and we didn't really want that. So like a lot of people, we just decided to go out exploring, walking around to see what was going on.

BEREN

On the periphery of the crowd was a two-lane highway of people, and it never stopped moving for the entire festival. People were going to the food stands, they were coming from the bathroom. They were going God knows where.

GEORGE

If you just started wandering, you'd come across all kinds of stuff. ("Buzzin' Fly" by Tim Buckley playing) A lot of it was like just walking the boardwalk and seeing the sights and taking in the scene. ("Buzzin' Fly" continues)

DILLS

Walking around, I remember thinking, "Holy (no audio), there are a lot of breasts here." Most of the nudity I'd seen previously was in "Playboy," and small bits on a hot date, but, you know, really not much. And there were a lot of people, girls and guys, who were very, very open with their lack of clothing. Especially down by the water.

STAROBIN

The good thing about skinny dipping is, we all went in. Fat, skinny, it didn't matter. Nobody looked, nobody cared. It was just plain fun.

GEORGE

I was 17. Normally, my jaw would be on the floor, staring, but when everything, to a certain extent, is beyond belief to begin with, nothing surprises you.

BUCKLEY

And sometimes, honey, in the mornin'

GEORGE

There was kind of a, a path in the, in the woods where people had all kinds of different shops set up. They were selling, you know, musical stuff, things like beads and crafts that they had made. Hand-tie-dyed clothing, blown-glass pipes, and stuff like that. Kind of head shops in the woods, that sort of thing. There was one table set up where they were just selling pot. (chuckles) We were well supplied. ("Buzzin' Fly" continues)

STAROBIN

Saturday was kind of a day where, you know, we walked, like, a couple of miles, checking things out. There was so much happening, (chuckling): that that was almost as interesting as seeing the music.

JABOOLIAN

Just to the other side, it was a wooded area. Well, that's where the Hog Farm was set up. This was commune life. You know, I-I had heard about it, but I had never seen it in action.

JAHANARA ROMNEY

We'd been living in a group for years by then, and it was quite an amazing experiment. You know, the understanding that the people around me are all part of the same spirit.

HENRY DILTZ

There was, like, a couple hundred of them with all these kids running around. They had teepees and yurts, you know, and all these various little, you know, dwellings.

DAYE

A whole bunch of them came on all these exotic buses that they had painted up. It was magical. (music playing in distance)

JABOOLIAN

And the Hog Farm had built a small stage. And there was music there as well. I didn't realize that at first.

GEORGE

There was always some kind of musical jam going on over there. (playing blues tune) Away from the, the actual concert, the Hog Farm was kind of a center of gravity for the festival.

ROSENMAN

The Hog Farm turned out to be an interesting choice for security. They didn't call themselves a police force; they called themselves a please force. They substituted, "Hey, you, do this," with, "Would you please do this?" Or, "Would it be all right with you if..." and so forth. Keep back, keep back now, let them through. Everything's got room to flow here. (plays "Que Sera Sera" on kazoo)

WAVY GRAVY

The please chiefs were myself and-and Tom Law. We turned it into fun. Oh, yes. (hums through kazoo)

ROBERTS

They gave a nice flavor to the festival. We paid them $18,000. I remember that.

ROSENMAN

I don't remember paying them anything. I thought we just chartered the jet.

ROBERTS

Maybe that's what that cost. Maybe that's where the 18 grand went.

ROSENMAN

They did it just because they wanted to be there, and because they felt that they could be useful. They were really nice people.

COUNTRY JOE MCDONALD

One, two, three, what are we fighting for? Don't ask me, I don't give a damn The next stop is Viet Nam

STAROBIN

In the afternoon, I kind of wandered back to the concert. I was determined I was not going to miss all these incredible people.

McDONALD

Now come on, mothers, throughout the land Pack your boys off to Viet Nam

DEBRA CONWAY

My boyfriend was draft age. And, you know, we had this future planned out, and it certainly didn't include him coming home in a body bag. And so, you know, when Country Joe McDonald got up on Saturday afternoon, we were right there with him. And it's five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates Well, I ain't no time to wonder why Whoopee, we're all goin' to die! All right! (crowd cheering)

REYNOLDS

We were 400,000 kids on a hillside who all were vehemently against the war. And, you know, for me, it was like, "These are our people!" (chuckles) "We found our people!" (cheering continues)

REPORTER

Are you enjoying the festival? Yeah, it's out of sight-- it's beautiful. Why did you come to the festival? To see the best music in the world, man. ("Soul Sacrifice" by Santana playing)

MOORE

The only bored moment I had that weekend was when Santana was about to appear, and I didn't know who Santana was. And Santana woke me up. ("Soul Sacrifice" continues)

JABOOLIAN

You got... you got drawn into this music. The song was "Soul Sacrifice," which most of us had never heard before. ("Soul Sacrifice" continues, Santana plays guitar solo)

BEREN

Listening to it, I felt like we had gone from civilization to someplace where there was no rules. And some people took the freedom to extreme places. ("Soul Sacrifice" continues)

GOLDMACHER

People were there to have a good time and they were doing it. Now, it meant a lot of drugs. It was mostly marijuana, hashish, and LSD. ("Soul Sacrifice" continues)

COLLIER

One girl told me that just standing still, she was getting stoned. And my guess was that within a thousand feet of the stage, everybody was stoned. ("Soul Sacrifice" fades)

GOLDSTEIN

There were a lot of people who took a lot of drugs in very strenuous circumstances and were incapable of dealing with that. The freak-out tents were oases.

GOLDMACHER

Wavy Gravy and the Hog Farm were taking care of bad trips. Freak-out tents had been set up where people could lie down, and folks from the Hog Farm were in there, you know, just holding people's hands and just really being able to guide them through it.

WAVY GRAVY

We're telling them, "You know, it's, "it's going to be cool, man, it's going to wear off. You took a little acid, and it's gonna wear off." And then when somebody was near normal to rock 'n' roll, we said, "Hold it. "Now, you see that brother coming through the door? "That was you three hours ago. Now you go and help them out." And that's the way the scene regenerated itself.

SPITZ

They always knew that there were going to be medical problems, and they had prepared themselves as best they could. But like everything else at the festival, they were woefully understaffed, and an emergency situation was developing.

MAN (on speaker)

We need a doctor or a medic, please, over on this side of the stage, please, at your earliest convenience.

GOLDMACHER

One of our people came rushing up to me and said, "We're out of medical supplies." And I said, "You've got to be kidding." All the panoply of medical situations you could encounter will happen during the course of 72 hours. It's just what happens in a city of 400,000 people. This is a medical disaster in the making. (siren blaring)

GOLDSTEIN

Leaving aside for the moment those people who were diabetics who needed insulin and so forth, the casualties were mounting.

MORRIS

We got a call from the governor's chief of staff telling us that Rockefeller was considering sending in the National Guard.

SPITZ

Nelson Rockefeller's office-- he was the governor at the time-- was in pretty constant communication with the festival people, and Rockefeller was always threatening to send in the troops.

MORRIS

They said it was a danger to the community, it was a danger to public health, it was a danger to any damn thing they could think of. They wanted to get rid of it. And they were stupid enough to believe they could mobilize the National Guard and move these kids out. And I kept saying, "There's only one way to do this, and that's play it through." In the end, there was an assistant to the governor who got it, and he said, "What can we do?"

ERSKINE MILLER

Why are there Army helicopters flying overhead? You know, it looked like what I saw on the news every night in, you know, the pictures from Vietnam.

DILLS

Seeing that they were military helicopters was very disconcerting. We didn't know really why they were flying in. You know, is this the start of a militarization to close this thing down?

MORRIS

I was standing onstage, and I could see these Hueys coming in. There were three or four of them in a row. And all I said was, "Ladies and gentlemen, the United States Army."

MORRIS (on speaker)

The United States Army has lent us some medical teams. There are 45 doctors who are here without pay because they dig what this is into. They are with us, man. They are not against us, they are with us. They're here to give us all a hand and help us.

MORRIS

That sound system was the only source of communication we had with the audience.

MAN (on speaker)

Elliot from Harvard, the hitchhikers you picked up need the pills from your car. Please go to the information station right away.

MORRIS

What started happening was, people would bring messages to backstage. And we did as many of them as we could in between performances.

MAN (on speaker)

Sidney McGee, please come immediately to backstage right. I understand your wife is having a baby. Congratulations. Wheat Germ, Holly has your bag with your medicine. Please meet at the information booth as soon as you can, please.

MORRIS

The information booth became a center. And we just said to people, "If you're looking for somebody, you got to go up there."

JABOOLIAN

Everybody would put messages on it. So if you're looking for somebody, or you're trying to get a ride home, or, or whatever, you could stick stuff up on there.

MAN 2 (on speaker)

Larry Alexander, Cousin Al is sick. Meet near the information center.

ROBERTS

We took a lot of phone calls from worried parents, wondering what was happening up there. And, you know, if it was, like, "Call home," we'd relay it to the stage.

MAN 1 (on speaker)

Helen Savage, please call your father at the Motel Glory in Woodridge.

DILLS

I definitely wondered if my parents were watching and what they thought. Because after Friday, I'd had no contact with anybody from the outside world.

MAN (on speaker)

The "Daily News," in rather large headlines, "Traffic Uptight at Hippiefest."

GEORGE

The stage announcements really became our news radio. How we found out what the outside world was paying attention to. And they would've thought it was an utter disaster, from what they were seeing in the news and stuff.

ROSENMAN

The world expects this to explode. And I remember thinking to myself, "This is perfect." Because there's nothing kids like better than to disappoint what the world thinks they're going to do.

MAN (on speaker)

Ladies and gentlemen, Keef Hartley. ("Spanish Fly" by Keef Hartley Band playing) ("Spanish Fly" continues)

REYNOLDS

Late afternoon, the sun came out, and it was hot. And we walked around a bit, because we got hungry. And we quickly discovered there was no food. All the booths were out of food. There was nothing.

BEREN

We ran out of food. Delivery trucks could not get through the traffic jams, so there was no more food. No soda, no burgers, no hot dogs, no nothing. And then word spread very fast.

SPITZ

Sure, there was a sanitation crisis, and there was a medical crisis, but when the food started to go, the producers knew that this could turn into an even more immense problem. But something really incredible happened. The people of White Lake and Bethel literally went in their pantries. Anything that was in the refrigerator, anything that was in the freezer, anything that was in the house, they contributed.

MAN

We got word over WVOS that a lot of kids didn't have anything to eat. Stuff was taken over to the school, and they flew it to the, to the site. I have a 19-year-old myself, I felt that we got to give them a, a fair shake here. Kids are hungry, you got to feed them.

JOHN CONWAY

Those helicopters were going over constantly. And also a lot of the neighbors were involved in efforts to make sandwiches and get them to the, to the helicopters.

GORDON WINARICK

It was on the radio, "Bring whatever you can." And I decided, we'll just send eggs, because it's an egg area. I tapped people for donations. I said, "Look, give me cases of eggs." So we hard-boiled hundreds of thousands of eggs.

LENI BINDER

We would never have said, "We don't want any part of you, leave. I don't care if you're hungry or starving." That was not our communities. Maybe we were hicks, but we did go, as the Bible says, welcome the stranger. They were hungry. We fed them.

ROMNEY

Helicopters came in with anything people wanted to donate. Like little bags of picnic supplies or green beans-- even a tiny can of olives. (chuckling): You know, I just, "Yes! "Bring it on! We can take it and make it into food for the masses."

DAYE

The Hog Farm had set up this huge kitchen, and they were boiling brown rice and frying up vegetables, and it was fabulous.

JABOOLIAN

I found out about the Hog Farm serving food from the guy that sat next to me. He says, "Yeah, man, they got free food up there. You just, just go up there and get in line."

DILLS

I and one of my friends offer to help, and they just put us on a pot, and we, we scooped it for people. It was kind of cool to feel like, "Wow, "I'm helpless here, as are most of these people, "but there are people who are taking care of us, and in a sense, we're taking care of each other."

BILL WARD

People were good to one another. I would see, I would see people passing around a Coke or something; other people were sharing their food.

STAROBIN

Everybody around us had something, and we just passed everything around. It was like the loaves and the fishes, it really was.

GEORGE

This was actually kind of a functioning city out in the middle of nowhere, and we realized that it was functioning because of people pulling together. It just had this feeling that, "This was ours. "This was the new city. This was the alternative city, and it worked." ("Woodstock Boogie" by Canned Heat playing)

MORRIS

Saturday afternoon, the show was good. But Saturday night, we really came up to speed when the sun went down. Well, the little red rooster told the little brown hen "Meet you at the barn about a half past ten" Sing a last little boogie... I guess we got to a point where we felt more comfortable, and maybe we were proving to the press and the outside world that we knew what we were doing, and that this was special, that there was some kind of magic here. And I would say that probably gave us the second wind. ("Woodstock Boogie" continues)

GEORGE

I was sort of in a daze. You'd been listening, watching music starting in the afternoon and going pretty much all through the night. There's no way you couldn't get oversaturated with the stimulus. I want to take you higher

CROWD

Higher I want to take you higher

GEORGE

For me, the most memorable performance that night was Sly and the Family Stone.

SLY

I want to take you higher

GEORGE

The music, yes, but the, the crowd and just feeling this incredible electricity. I mean, it was the middle of the night, and everybody was up dancing. It was just a pulsing hillside of hundreds of thousands of people. ("I Want to Take You Higher" continues) I want to take you higher Higher I want to take you higher Higher ("My Generation" by the Who playing)

DILTZ

I was in front of the stage, shooting it, you know, taking pictures. Roger Daltrey, up there, with fringe on his cape flying around. And he'd twirl that microphone around, and, you know, he would just miss the floor, and then it would come arcing through the air, and he'd grab it just in time, you know, to get into, "Talkin' 'bout my generation." And then there was Townshend leaping in the air, and doing his splits, and landing on stage.

DALTREY

And don't try to dig what, what, what we all say Talking 'bout my generation

GREEN

"Talkin' 'bout my generation," and that was my generation. When they sang that song, they, you know, elicited this clarion call, and we went, "Rock and roll!" This is my generation, baby ("My Generation" concludes) (crowd cheers and applauds)

DILTZ

The Who was absolutely fantastic, and they were still playing as the dawn came up. ("Naked Eye" playing) ("Naked Eye" fades) All right, friends, you have seen the heavy groups. Now you will see morning maniac music. Believe me, yeah. It's the new dawn. ("The Other Side of Life" by Jefferson Airplane playing) The regular guys and Nicky Hopkins. ("The Other Side of Life" continues)

PAUL KANTNER

I could barely remember our performance,

because it was 6

30 in the morning. We just went out and played as best we could. We were pretty burned, though, by the time we got onstage. Good morning, people!

KANTNER

And we could see there was a lot of people just asleep. And the fires were starting to go out, and people were crashing.

LAWRENCE

I was walking around, and everybody was sleeping. I mean, people were horizontal all over the place, you know? It looked like after a big party. ("Sunday Morning" by the Velvet Underground playing) Sunday morning Brings the dawn in It's just a restless feeling By my side Watch out, the world's behind you

WAVY GRAVY (on speaker)

Good morning. What we have in mind is breakfast in bed for 400,000. Now, it's not going to be steak and eggs or anything, but it's gonna be good food, and we're gonna get it to you. We're all feeding each other. (crowd cheering) We must be in heaven, man!

ROMNEY

What we served was plain raw oats with honey and powdered milk mixed up, 'cause it wasn't any time to toast oats. (chuckling): And, you know, it was just, we threw nuts and seeds and raisins in it. And I think we had ten serving stations, and the lines of people in front of each of the serving stations were as long as you could see. ("Sunday Morning" continues) The Yasgurs supplied us with milk and yogurt. And it was just like a gift from an angel. Sunday morning Sunday morning ("Sunday Morning" fades)

MORRIS (on speaker)

We have a gentleman with us. It's the gentleman upon whose farm we are, Mr. Max Yasgur. (crowd cheers and applauds)

MORRIS

In the early afternoon, Max came down to the stage, and he said, "I'd like to speak to the crowd." And I said, "I think the crowd would very much like to meet you."

MAX YASGUR

Is this on? I'm a farmer, I don't know... (crowd cheering and applauding) I don't know how to speak to 20 people at one time, let alone a crowd like this. But I think you people have proven something to the world. Not only to town of Bethel, or Sullivan County, or New York state, you've proven something to the world. The important thing that you've proven to the world is that a half a million kids-- and I call you kids, because I have children that are older than you are-- a half a million young people can get together and have three days of fun and music, and have nothing but fun and music. And I God bless you for it. (crowd cheering and applauding)

DILLS

It was an affirmation, you know, that instead of being angry, that he was that positive about us. And I'm sure that his fields were just destroyed. But if a conservative upstate New York farmer could feel that way, well, that was pretty cool. In that moment, I realized, being in the middle of it, that not only was Woodstock bigger than we ever could have imagined, but it was symbolically even bigger. (crowd cheering, clapping rhythmically)

MAN (on speaker)

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Joe Cocker. Let's go for Sunday! Yes, yes, well, good afternoon. And this title just about puts this all into focus. It's called "With a Little Help From My Friends." ("With a Little Help From My Friends" playing) What would you do if I sang out of tune Would you stand up and walk out on me Lend me your ears and I'll sing you a song I will try not to sing out of key Oh, baby, I get by

DILLS

I really liked what Joe Cocker was singing about, because in one sense, I had 450,000 friends. ("With a Little Help From My Friends" continues)

COCKER

When we got into "Little Help," I just felt that we'd really caught a massive consciousness in the crowd. It was a powerful feeling. (crowd cheering and applauding)

MAN (on speaker)

That's Joe Cocker!

COCKER

And then somebody yelled at me, "Joe, look over your shoulder."

MORRIS

It was hot as could be. And you look up in the sky behind the audience, and you can see these black clouds like Armageddon coming at you. It looks like we're going to get a bit of rain, so you better cover up. All of you up in the towers, please come down. You're making it very, very dangerous.

COLLIER

Hanging on these big light stands were a bunch of kids who had used them to get a better perch to watch the show from. People screamed, "Come down, get down from there!"

MORRIS (on speaker)

All right, everybody, just sit down, wrap yourself up. We're gonna have to ride it out. Jody, get off the stage. Get off the stage. (wind gusting)

MORRIS

I mean, all hell started breaking loose. And then, Barry Melton of Country Joe and the Fish grabbed a mic. No rain, no rain, no rain!

MELTON AND CROWD

No rain, no rain, no rain, no rain! No rain, no rain, no rain, no rain, no rain! (thunder rumbles)

LAW

And then it hit. It hit like a major, you know, country storm. It was not a tornado, but it had that kind of feel to it. (thunder rumbling) Everyone scrambled to cover equipment. I mean, there was a billion volts of equipment. You wouldn't believe the amount of electrical energy on the stage and in those towers.

ROSENMAN

During the storm, I learned that 50,000-volt cables had become unearthed. Then we could have a mass electrocution. Fortunately, that didn't happen. (rain pattering, thunder rumbling)

VIC WELLS

There were a lot of people who had plastic and blankets. Of course, the blankets got soaked. You know, you either just covered up, or you just held your head up and enjoyed it.

STAROBIN

The outside world thought it was a disaster area. Well, that's not what we thought. And so people started playing in the mud like children. It was like they were six years old, going down a waterslide in their front yard.

JAMES SALZER

After the rain, the crowd really thinned out. I guess a lot of people just wanted to get back home.

DEBRA CONWAY

I had to go to work the next day. So, you know, like a lot of people, we hiked back to where the car was and went home.

SPITZ

For everybody at the festival, battling the elements was a constant struggle. They were plagued by weather from the get-go. Then after the Sunday storm, the site was a mess. But the festival went on. (Country Joe and the Fish playing "Rock and Soul Music") Marijuana! Country Joe and the Fish was first up. ("Rock and Soul Music" continues and fades) There were a lot of great performances that night. But I think the one that really stood out for most people was Crosby, Stills, and Nash, because it was their first time they had ever performed together.

MAN (on speaker)

...Stills, and Nash. (playing "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes")

CROSBY

I remember being terrified. Nobody had seen us get up and sing harmony together. Nobody had seen it, this was it. This was the first time. It's getting to the point Where I'm no fun anymore

DAYE

There were moments where the music was so mesmerizing, so internalized, that I became the music I was listening to. I remember sitting in the mud listening to Crosby, Stills, and Nash, looking at the sheer beauty of the night sky, wrapped in a blanket of music. It was the feeling of oneness with it all. ("Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" ends) ("Star-Spangled Banner" by Jimi Hendrix playing)

WAVY GRAVY

The last morning of the festival, I'm wandering through people rising up out of the mud. And this amazing music, suddenly... (makes explosion sound) It was Jimi Hendrix just filling my ears with the wonder of the national anthem. ("Star-Spangled Banner" continues) (playing improvisational riff)

COLLIER

I was backstage writing up some notes, when suddenly, into my head stabbed this sound. (continuing riff) It sounded exactly like rockets, missiles, and bombs bursting in air. (Hendrix continuing riff) I'd never heard anything like that in my life. (Hendrix resumes melody of "The Star-Spangled Banner")

LAW

We're at the most peaceful gathering that was probably happening on the planet at the time. And he hooked us up with Vietnam. It was the devastation and the brutality and the insanity. (riff continuing) That was a quintessential piece of art. (playing pedal effects and whammy bar) ("Star-Spangled Banner" melody resumes) (holding chord, chord feeding back)

GREEN

There was an essence that is indescribable. You can feel it in your body, you can feel it right here in your heart, when you know that this is life. This is the essence of life. He had it, and he gave it to us. (modulating tone with whammy bar) (playing pedal effects) (song pausing) (concluding "Star-Spangled Banner")

DILTZ

Everybody was so still. Most of the crowd had left. I was onstage. I was shooting right next to him. Just, God, it was just a moment, you know, that was just wonderful. It's his guitar ringing out. (Hendrix playing riff, pedal effects) And then suddenly, it was all over. ("Star-Spangled Banner" fades)

MORRIS

The site looked like Civil War pictures of battlefields. I was terrified I might find somebody dead. And so I walked all of the site. And it stank, it really stank. There were just a few people wandering around. Nobody injured, nobody dead. A great relief. And then we started the cleanup.

DILTZ

What was left behind was this incredible sea of soggy, wet sleeping bags and cardboard boxes and tents that were all, you know, knocked down and trampled on. All this flotsam and jetsam. ("Highway Anxiety" by William Taylor playing)

GEORGE

We stayed for a while, helping clean up trash. There were a lot of people out there helping clean up. ("Highway Anxiety" continues)

STAROBIN

We so did not want to leave. We kind of sensed that, you know, we could change the world for three days, but the rest of the world wasn't with us, and we knew that it was going to be a real culture shock coming back into society.

REPORTER

More than 350,000 people came looking for peace and music. Many said they learned a lot about themselves and learned a lot about getting along together and priorities. And for most, that alone makes it all worthwhile. ("Highway Anxiety" continues)

WAVY GRAVY

We realized that we were part of this amazing event that nothing like it ever was before.

LAW

The festival became a symbol of intelligence and humanity and cooperation and love and affection. It was the start of a phenomenal change in a lot of people's lives.

MAX YASGUR

When I realized, Friday night and Saturday morning, that we were getting up close to the half-a-million mark, and there was a sea of people here, I became quite apprehensive. Uh... Thoughts flashed through my mind of some other problems that they have had throughout the country. And these kids, these young people made me feel guilty today, because there were no problems. They proved to me, and they proved to the whole world, that they didn't come up for any problems. They came up for exactly what they said they were coming up for, for three days of music and peace.

DAYE

It was a mark in cosmic time. I have no doubt about that. I'm not saying it never happened before or that it couldn't happen in the future. But that, that stopped the clocks for three days.

GEORGE

I felt like I had finally gotten to fully experience what I was hoping the counterculture meant. Woodstock was a very powerful confirmation that, "Yeah, this is what you're looking for, and that you're headed in the right direction." ("Highway Anxiety" continues)

STAROBIN

Everyone looking after one another, everybody caring about one another. I mean, once I experienced that, I made it the basis for the whole rest of my life. ("Highway Anxiety" continues)

ROSENMAN

At Woodstock, we tried to let the audience know, in every way that we could, that we believed in them. That inside them was a loving nature, a decency, and a fineness of spirit. You can forget it sometimes, but very few of us want to be other than that. You just need the opportunity. (cheering and applauding) ("Highway Anxiety" continues) (song ends)

ANNOUNCER

"American

Experience

"Woodstock: Three Days That Defined a Generation" is available on DVD. To order, visit ShopPBS or call 1-800-PLAY-PBS. "American Experience" is also available on Amazon Prime Video.