The birth of the hippie movement can't really be pinpointed as there have always been groups of people who separate themselves from the status quo, and when they evolved into what we'd call hippies is debatable (assuming that you even want to assign a label to them) but 1965 sounds about right. LBJ had put the 1964 election behind him and was starting to escalate the war in Vietnam, the anti-war movement was slowly growing, the Beatles' US tour the previous year encouraged young men to start growing their hair longer, drug use was rising and a sense of rebellion was beginning to be felt in the air, in the music and in the spirit of the times. You may not agree with my assessment, but I say what the hell, Happy 40th birthday hippies!!
There were German Immigrants living on the west cost of the United States in the 1890s who for the most part likely started many of the trends that became hip in the mid to late 1960s. Including organic gardening,recycling,communal living and nudism.
I remember when I was a little girl in the mid-60's,sitting in the yard with my Mom in the tye died dashiki she made me. making clover laurels and macrame barefoot sandals. Knowing that this was the way things are supposed to be and that this is what I am.. Those are the fondest memories I have of my mother.. well I still live in the mountains in the same house, growing in the same garden and fishing on the same river.. Still reading Gibran, and listening to Mason Profitt and John Prine.. Happy 40 Years Peace LOve
That sounds about right to me. It was in 1965 that I first heard of using sugar cubes (other than the Sabin oral polio vaccine that superseded the Salk injections). It was 1967 that I first smoked and 1968 that I first tripped, and by that time, sugar cubes were already a thing of the past, except on Firesign Theatre ("Give the nice horsey some sugar cubes!")
By 1965 I had one more year to serve in the military and I knew something was not right with the information that we were getting from the media back home about the war in Nam or the protest that were starting to crop up all around the country. The Flower Child movement was underway in California but that movement only lasted a year or two by most accounts. It morfed into the hippie movement, a movement that had two different camps, one love and peace, the other protest and social change. While there are protest and attempts at social change going on today it is not as vocal or out in the open as it was 40 years ago....and love and peace have been reduced to just a cute saying to be printed on childrens t-shirts. Jimmi Hendrex said it best I think, When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace. Happy 40th all you old Hippies out there from a fellow Hippie
May onehundred flowers fall upon your lives and fill your days with happiness. Keep the faith and happy birthday everyone.
Someone on HipForums posted this last year. I don't remember who. I think it was part of his or her term paper in school. " From Hip to YIP: The American Counterculture The decade that changed the United States the most was the 1960’s. It brought about civil rights, women’s rights, the 26th amendment, and so much more. Much of this was to due to the counterculture. The most well-known title for most of these radicals is hippie. It is a common term, but one must ask what exactly makes a hippie a hippie and where they come from. There has never been an official rule on what a hippie is exactly, but many definitions have conjured up throughout the past few decades. Webster’s dictionary defines it as “any of the young people of the 1960’s who, in their alienation from conventional society, have turned variously to mysticism, psychedelic drugs, communal living, experimental arts, etc.” But this definition only provides one viewpoint. There are several different ones. Some of the most widely accepted definitions are best stated by Lisa Law, Larry Caffo, and Skip Stone. Law says it is a lifestyle involving “peace, love harmony, music, mysticism, and religions outside the Judeo-Christian tradition. Meditation, yoga, and psychedelic drugs were embraced as routes to expanding one’s consciousness” and having “a willingness to challenge authority, greater social tolerance, the sense that politics is personal, environmental awareness, and changes in attitudes about gender roles, marriage, and child rearing”. Stone has a similar view and states, “Being a hippie is not a matter of dress, behavior, economic status, or social milieu. It is a philosophical approach to life that emphasizes freedom, peace, love, and a respect for others and the earth”. Probably the most common viewpoint is held by Caffo, who played with The 13th Floor Elevators and occasionally with Janis Joplin. He says a hippie was any person who smoked marijuana and took LSD. While the definition of “hippie” is uncertain, its origins are practically unknown. It is thought to have been originated in Harlem, New York. In Malcolm X’s autobiography he discussed being seventeen in 1939 and observing “A few of the white men around Harlem, younger ones whom we called ‘hippies,’ acted more Negro than the Negroes”. The more publicized use of the word was first applied in September of 1965 by the San Francisco writer Michael Fallon. The lifestyle hippies led predates the term. The group evolved from ancient times, some even say as far back as Julius Ceasar and Jesus Christ. But the beginning of the modern hippie began in Germany near the end of the nineteenth century. Many youth movements were formed in reaction to a more industrialized, technocratic society. Adolf Just opened a retreat in 1896 that inspired Gandhi to begin a Nature Cure sanitarium in India. Just spoke against pollution, meat, traditional education, and many other things. These were just a few of the social trends termed as “Lebensreform” (life reform). Others included nudism, natural medicine, commune movement, sexual reform, and liberty for women, children and animals. In Ascona, Switzerland, counterculture resurgence started in 1900 and lasted twenty years. Some of their approaches to life were surrealism, pacifism, Paganism, and dada. Many famous people, who inspired the hippies, went to Ascona. Hermann Hesse, D.H. Lawrence, and Carl Jung were just a few. In 1903, a San Francisco newspaper ran an article telling about the people and thinking of Ascona. This was one of the first times California was exposed to the European counterculture. Also at this same time, several thousands of Germans moved to America because of the domineering political powers taking over their country- ones that led them into both World Wars. America has always been a melting pot and the Germans melted right in. They brought in their suitcases their radical views of life and their imaginings of what America could be. Closer to the Age of Aquarius, was the Nature Boys. This was during the 1940’s. They were Americans who had taken up the Lebensreform lifestyle and were living mostly in the Southern California mountain ranges. They slept in caves and trees. They ate natural foods, such as fig, which was how they got their “high,” in opposition to the illegal drugs used by the hippies of the sixties. One of the most known Nature Boys was Gypsy Boots. He lived in Tahquitz Canyon with the other boys until his marriage in 1953. Five years later, he opened a health food store in Hollywood and became a health teacher. He became such a well known figure that he was a guest over 25 times on the Steve Allen show. He also performed at the Monterey and Newport Pop festivals in the late 1960’s alongside groups like The Grateful Dead and The Jefferson Airplane. Boots and the rest of the Nature Boys were an inspiration to many through more than their relaxed way of living; they started a trend in fashion. Though The Beatles’s haircut is known as having been obscene, it was domestic compared to les known bands from Southern California, like The Seeds. They wore their hair down to their shoulders from the influence of the Nature Boys. Jimi Hendrix and The Doors, two of the most idolized music producers of the flower child era, both were fans of The Seeds. On the east coast at the same time were the beatniks. Men like Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs, and Alan Ginsberg could be found in New York City. Beatniks celebrated the arts in free form. Such inspirational writings as On The Road, Dharma Bums, and “The Howl” were read by many hippies. Alan Ginsberg even took place in the San Francisco Be-In, anti-war protests, and the demonstrations in Chicago during the Democratic National Convention in 1968. Acid started becoming common in the early 1960’s. Harvard professors Timothy Leary, Ralph Metzer, and Richard Alpert (Ram Dass) studied the drug and almost instantly found a correlation between it and the German scientists, writers, and artists of the Lebensreform era. These professors made books like “Steppenwolf” popular to read among the rising hippie culture. They also wrote their own book called “The Psychedelic Experience,” which became known as the hippie’s “bible”. In general, the hippies of the 1960’s were a-political. The innumerable protests and demonstrations were held by such groups as the Black Panthers, Students for a Democratic Society and the Weathermen. In 1968, Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin coined the name Yippie or also called the Youth International Party. This was originally for the flower children going to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago that year. They did such high jinks as trying to run a pig for President. This ended in the Chicago Seven Conspiracy Trial accusing the Yippies and the others involved for trying to incite riots. The Yippies outlasted the election year and became the “political party” of hippies. They never were a registered party or took a traditional platform, but still existed. There were common stands of pro-drugs, anti-war, pro-sex, and environmentalism throughout the group, for they were hippies after all. Their core beliefs were in absolute freedom of speech and freedom of expression. Their group outlasted many of the fellow radical groups, but became weaker when Abbie Hoffman went underground for drug charges in the 1970’s. Much do to the media, people see the hippies as a group from the 1960’s that no longer exist. This is not so. Being a hippie is a lifestyle choice that was made before the 1960’s and is still made by many today. According to Aron “Pieman” Kay, who famously threw a pie in Richard Nixon’s face, the hippies “are still everywhere- whether it be the streets of Haight, the Rainbow gatherings, the web or just when I least expect it, I will meet an old timer on a New York City subway.” Furthermore, another hippie from the 1960’s added, “Protests are still going on for more or less the same things. And as far as clothing, there is still the Salvation Army clothing store. About the only major changes here are satellite TV, microwaves, and the computer”. Hippies are more than a part of a counterculture movement, they are a recurrent subculture. All in all what being a hippie means was best stated by Abbie Hoffman when he said: “We are here to make a better world. No amount of rationalization or blaming can preempt the moment of choice each of us brings to our situation here on this planet. The lesson of the 60’s is that people who cared enough to do right could change history… The big battles that we won cannot be reversed. We were young, self-righteous, reckless, hypocritical, brave, silly, headstrong, and scared half to death. And we were right”. "
wow.. that was cool Shaggie.. I'm glad you saved that.. I think if you're a Hippie, you know it. Other Hippies can feel it in their spirit.. So it doesn't really mattter if you fall into somebody elses "definition" of Hippy.. It's all about being happy with who you are, whether you're a Hippy or not.. ((((Group Hug))))
WOOHOO..forty yrs....may the legacy live on in us, and in the hearts of all the young folk coming up behind us...it's not too late for peace...
