A Time Where San Francisco’s Underground Art And Music Scene Was Booming, Protests Broke Out, And LSD Was Readily Available
“The world rushes into San Francisco,” Adam Hirschfelder, director of strategic initiatives for the California Historical Society, says. “It’s been the same since 1848.”
Hirschfelder describes San Francisco’s history as a series of changes that began with the Gold Rush and hasn’t let up since. Along the way, the city has experienced earthquakes, devastating fires, epidemics, and a continuous series of cultural upheavals, including the Summer of Love, as people from across the United States and around the world flooded into the city by the bay.
“San Francisco has always been in a state of flux,” Hirschfelder tells The Buzz. “People come looking to get rich - whether financially or spiritually. In a lot of ways, the Summer of Love was a lot like the Gold Rush 120 years earlier. People came looking to find something different, to be different, to think differently, to change the world, to change themselves… or attempt to.”
The historian says it’s all part of the California mystique: “People have been going west to find a new life throughout our country’s history. In 1967, it was the young people of America who felt dispossessed by society and the war. What happened here changed the world, for good, and for bad. Some say it changed the fabric and moral character of America.”
According to Hirschfelder, the Summer of Love was like a perfect storm, a vortex where events collided to create something bigger than the individual parts. He identifies three key contributing factors: San Francisco’s underground art and music scene, the protest movement, and the government's LSD tests at nearby Stanford University, a situation that made the still-legal psychedelic readily available.
“The city always had an arts underground and pop art community from the days of the Beats,” he explains. “Beginning in 1964, the Free Speech and anti-Vietnam protests were underway across the bay in Berkeley. Add in a drug to make it all crazy, and you’ve got the perfect storm.”
Things didn’t get really crazy, he says, until the fall of 1966, when the government banned LSD. “The first large public events in the Haight were to protest the ban. Then, in January, 1967, the Human Be-In, held in Golden Gate Park, grabbed national attention. The East Coast media created scary news reports about the drugged out hippies practicing free love in San Francisco. It scared the adults, but the young people decided that’s where they wanted to be. And they headed west.”
By the late summer of ‘67, Haight Ashbury had turned into a mess. “People came to the Haight thinking it was a paradise, a wonderland, but they soon found out that hanging out all day wasn’t all that great,” Hirschfelder says. “A lot of kids got involved in serious drugs and were getting sexually transmitted diseases. Several nonprofits sprang up to help them. That spirit has stayed part of the San Francisco story ever since.”
Some of the nonprofits founded during the Summer of Love continue to operate today, including the Huckleberry Home for Runaways and the Haight-Ashbury Free Clinic. In fact, it’s not hard to find reminders of the hippie era on the streets of SF. According to Hirschfelder, the city hasn’t changed much physically since the 1960s.
Golden Gate Park was the center of the Summer of Love action, and remains the city’s favorite playground. Spontaneous drum circles still form at Hippie Hill. The San Francisco Mime Troupe continues its satirical shows. You can picnic in the Panhandle, site of the Love Pageant Rally on October 6, 1966, the day LSD was outlawed, where thousands dropped acid and listened to the transformative vocals of Janis Joplin, or visit the Polo Fields, site of the Human Be-In. The city’s Botanical Gardens and Conservatory of Flowers, both in Golden Gate, are great spots to (re-)connect with Flower Power.
Hirschfelder suggests visitors wander down Haight to Golden Gate, checking out the shops selling vintage clothing, vinyl records and psychedelic tie-dye. Those who want to delve deeper can check out the Psychedelic History Museum at 525 Haight or the Beat Museum in North Beach.
A pilgrimage to the Fillmore, legendary music hall that launched the careers of the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Jimi Hendrix and many others, is a must for any music lover. For avid fans of ‘60s music, San Francisco Travel has put together walking tours that take you to spots frequented by Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and The Grateful Dead early in their careers. Its website also has a list of 50 restaurants that have been around since the Summer of Love, ranging from a bar founded during the Gold Rush to Aub Zam Zam, known as the “Holy Shrine of the Dry Martini,” surely an anomaly along hippie Haight Street.
Lots of special concerts and exhibits are planned this summer as part of the 50th Anniversary of the Summer of Love. The deYoung Museum in Golden Gate Park offers a cultural be-in encompassing music, posters, fashion, light shows, and photos drawn from the Haight’s heyday. Another standout is the exhibit at Hirschfelder’s own California Historical Society, which traces the roots of the Summer of Love to the Beatniks of North Beach and the protests in Berkeley.
For Adam Hirschfelder, the forces that gave birth to the Summer of Love are still at work today. “People are still drawn by the allure of going west,” he says. “Now we have a wave of hi-tech rebels creating technology and apps and websites to change the world. People are still coming to the Bay area to make a revolution.”
Renee Wright
A graduate of Franconia College in Social Psychology, Renee has worked as Travel Editor for Charlotte Magazine and has written three travel guidebooks for Countryman Press among other writing assignments. She enjoys food and camping.
Make Sure To Stay At:
Olema Campground, located next to the Point Reyes National Seashore, just north of San Francisco. The ideal place to enjoy different outdoor activities like bird watching, hiking, kayaking or just relaxing on the beach.