By Katy Marquardt
August 13, 2009
Also, see: [Slide Show: 10 Places to Relive the '60s.]
http://www.usnews.com/listings/ten-places-to-relive-the-60s/
Many of the most crucial events of the 1960sincluding the civil
rights victories, antiwar protests, and the sweeping cultural
revolutionleft few physical traces. All but a handful of the
decade's famous counterculture hangouts shuttered their doors long
ago, and you won't find any monuments where major student uprisings
took place. Sure, you can drive up to Woodstock to see where you once
reveled in the mud, but there will be no public intoxication, tents,
fires, or camping.
As the organizers of Woodstock 1994 and 1999 probably learned, that
history can't be recreated. "What's celebrated about the Sixties are
a couple of things," says Bryant Simon, a history professor at Temple
University. "It was a moment when youth ruled, and, secondly, there
was a certain kind of freedom of expression, of dance, of bodies.
Getting high was sort of a third thingthere's a sort of sweetness to
those memories. And it was a moment where it seemed that idealism
ruled, a certain kind of wide-eyed, sweet, and tender idealism."
Maybe we can't go back, but it's still possible to capture the spirit
of the decade by attending festivals like Bonnaroo, strolling through
neighborhoods that invoke fond memories, and reliving landmark events
through engaging exhibits.
On August 15, the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts will observe the
40th anniversary of Woodstock with a concert featuring bands that
performed at the original three-day festival, at the original site
near Bethel, N.Y. The Museum at Bethel Woodswhich is sold out
Saturdaytells the Woodstock story through clips (some of which you
can watch inside a replica of the Merry Pranksters' bus and others in
an immersion theater), memorabilia, and a video booth where you can
hearor sharepersonal stories.
Former flower children who have returned to their old haunts have
found many cornerstones of the counterculture movement
"domesticated," as Thomas Sugrue, a University of Pennsylvania
history and sociology professor, puts it. "A lot of these places have
been remade by their own success, attracted more mainstream and
corporate investors that changed the landscape of these places
dramatically." Take the Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco, once a
hippie mecca and the former stomping grounds of Sixties icons like
the Grateful Dead and Joni Mitchell. "There are still music shops and
radical bookstores and places that sell tie-dyed T-shirts and
marijuana paraphernalia," says Sugrue, who teaches a course on
America in the Sixties. "But there's also a Starbuck's. Berkeley's
very similar. So much of it has been gentrified because of escalating
real estate prices." But as long as you don't let the Gap harsh your
mellow, a stroll down Berkeley's Telegraph Avenue may bring back fond memories.
Another major crossroad for free spirits, New York, still has some
remnants of the decadesuch as the Chelsea Hotel, which hosted many
writers and musicians, including longtime resident Bob Dylan. But the
bohemian vibe of neighborhoods like Greenwich Village has waned (many
say it's long gone). Still, musicians play in Washington Square Park
on warm afternoons, and the people-watching is excellent. You may
even see some tie-dye.
Elements of the Sixties ethos still linger in college towns such as
Ann Arbor, Mich., and Madison, Wis., because of their mix of students
and idealists. "One remnant is in Ann Arbor at the Hash Bash where
people smoke marijuana publicly," Sugrue says. "It's a re-enactment
of a certain element of the Sixties . . . so you do find in college
towns more self-consciousness about the role of 1960s and, on
occasion, attempts to relive that moment."
Summer music concerts and festivals are an obvious place people
attempt to recreate the musicand feelof the Sixties. Expand your
mind beyond Sixties touring acts and experience a new generation of
free-thinking artists at festivals like All Good in Masontown, W.Va.,
the High Sierra Music Festival in Quincy, Calif., and Bonnaroo Music
and Arts Festival, a five-day jam held each year on a farm in
Manchester, Tenn. "You've got bands like Phish and Widespread Panic
taking the vibe of the Dead to recreate, in their own way, the kind
of collectivity that people share in," says Simon. "It's running a
risk of becoming too commercial . . . but it still has a kind of wild
freedom and improvisation. The music is happening right now at this moment."
It may sound mundane, but another way to commemorate the music of the
decadeand explore its evolutionis through museum exhibits. The
thing about documenting music history is that it requires more than
just plaques and heavy text. One of the most engaging examples is the
Jimi Hendrix exhibit at the Experience Music Project in Seattle,
which includes a sound-effects interactive and rare film footage.
There's also a collection of Hendrix's guitars (including shards of
the one he destroyed at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967). Another
point of interest: The museum was designed by Frank Gehry. In
Detroit, the birthplace of Motown Recordsalso known as Hitsville,
U.S.A.beckons visitors with a museum that invites visitors to clap
and sing in an echo chamber that creates reverb sound and other
effects that make the "Motown Sound" unique.
Memphis is not only home to the Rock 'n' Soul Museum, which
chronicles the rise of soul music, it's also a major landmark of the
civil rights movement. Partially located in the Lorraine Motel, where
Martin Luther King Jr., was assassinated, the National Civil Rights
Museum features captivating photography and life-size exhibits that
include a segregated lunch counter and the burned shell of a
Greyhound bus used in the Freedom Rides. Revisit another dark chapter
of the Sixties at Dealey Plaza's Sixth Floor Museum in Dallas, which
houses more than 35,000 items related to the assassination and legacy
of President John F. Kennedy. Looking for a more uplifting way to
relive Sixties history? Mark the 40th anniversary of man's first walk
on the moon at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where a new
exhibit features spacesuits and other gear used by the moonwalkers.
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