Through the magic of radio, I am able to spend three days at Woodstock, circa 1969. You can hear our broadcasts on the Daybreak USA and iHeartRadio websites. AM thought you, our loyal readers, would be excited about the live coverage, and so, here are the transcripts are from Day 1 at the Aquarian Exposition:
R.J. Stowell - Dateline August 15, 1969 - I hope you can here me. I'm here on Happy Avenue, not making
that up, just outside the town of Bethel Woods, New York. We parked the AM
Econoline van about a half-mile down the road in a motor lodge parking lot and
as you can probably hear, traffic is backing up, no one is getting through.
Festival attendees are essentially leaving their cars in the middle of the
road. It looks almost like something from a sci-fi horror flick.
There are hundreds of people walking alongside me through
the abandoned vehicles. These are the flower children you've read about in the
papers. Next to me is a young girl in overalls, a daisy-chain in her hair.
She's not wearing any shoes. The young man she's with is far more conservative
in his dress in tan chinos and a paisley shirt. There are families with
children. There are a boy and girl who could be Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher.
It's quite the spectacle…
...Sorry, we lost our audio there for a moment. I'm passing
some houses now, what you'd expect in a country town. "Hey, how are you. How's
business?"
"It's good." A teenaged girl is selling peanut butter and jelly
sandwiches.
"How much are they?"
"A quarter."
"How many did you make?"
"'Bout a hundred."
...Sorry about
that. I can see the venue down the hill. An estimated 25,000 or so are expected
but there has to be more like a hundred thousand up ahead of me, maybe more.
It's the largest swell of humanity that I've ever seen. It looks like an old
patchwork quilt, or like a shantytown of makeshift campsites. The festival was
set to begin with Sweetwater, but traffic has delayed them. If the bands aren't
already here, they're not making it through. Ritchie Havens is scheduled to go
on in their place. I'm hearing something over the PA, some kind of
announcement. And now there's music; maybe you can hear it,
Ritchie Havens' distinctive guitar patter and his raspy, truly soulful voice.
Scheduled today and into the evening are Ravi Shankar, Arlo Guthrie and Joan
Baez, who isn't scheduled till 9pm.
...Okay. I'm entering the festival grounds now. You can hear
the music in the background. Let me describe this as best I can; I've never
seen a spectacle like this, almost like a medieval fair. There's a line of
booths selling jewelry and handmade goods, incense and patchouli oil. Someone
tells me they're calling it the Bindy Bazaar, and here, this is different, a crude
medical facility that looks like something out of a MASH unit, but it's a drug
treatment facility for those who may be having a negative LSD experience. While
they seem to have their bases covered, I'm not really seeing anything to speak
of in regard to sanitation facilities. From here, I'm now estimating well over
200,000, I could be wrong, still, I've seen only about a dozen Johnny on the
Spots.
The weather is deteriorating, by the way. I'm feeling a bit
of a drizzle, but we're under complete cloud cover now. Yes, it's raining. What
you're hearing in the background may certainly be recognizable; that’s Ravi
Shankar, the Indian instrumentalist who taught George Harrison to play the
sitar on Norwegian Wood.
Well, folks, I am going to meander my way a bit closer and
enjoy the opening night festivities. I hope to be back with you tomorrow which
promises Country Joe, Santana, the Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin, The Who and The
Jefferson Airplane. Reporting live from Woodstock, I’m R.J. Stowell.
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