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Woodstock remembered: my three days of peace, love and mayhem


I was an 18-year-old art student at Central Technical School and music festivals were popping up all over North America in the summer of 1969.

The Toronto Pop Festival had just happened at Varsity Stadium and I was there with my best friend Linda Sabo. A hippie was handing out a flyer promoting a three-day rock festival in upstate New York in August. When I looked at the line-up I turned to Linda and said, “We have to go.”

We mailed $18 along with a discount coupon from Rolling Stone magazine for tickets to Woodstock. On August 14, a day before the festival, Flora, another friend of ours from school, and I headed to Woodstock. Linda was still waiting for her ticket and the plan was for her to meet up with us there.

Flora and I decided to fly standby to New York City for $12 and make our way to the festival from there. I packed a small bag with a couple changes of clothes. Luckily I remembered to bring my Kodak Instamatic.

From New York City, we boarded a train to Monticello where we picked up this cute guy named Michael Sparrow. He took to Flora immediately. There was still a bus ride to go, but we were eventually offered a lift by two guys in a convertible to Bethel, the tiny hamlet where the festival was taking place. The car’s floor got a little too hot for my liking so we got out and walked once we reached the festival grounds. Traffic was bumper-to-bumper and nobody was going anywhere anyway.

We ended up walking like lemmings with a group of others in the dark not knowing where the hell we were going. After what seemed an eternity, there it was, a stage in an empty field at the bottom of a natural amphitheatre. Who would have believed that in about 15 hours thousands of kids would be sitting in that field.

We found a spot and put down our sleeping bags under the stars. We were all too wired to get much sleep. And I smoked way too many cigarettes. We woke up to a light drizzle and Abbie Hoffman. He walked right by us with an American flag draped over his shoulders. Hoffman was part of the Chicago Seven group of anti-Vietnam War activists arrested for allegedly conspiring to start a riot outside the Democratic Convention a year earlier. 

Some hippie girls we later found out were from Hog Farm, the hippie commune that was spreading across the United States, passed out paper plates with raw oats, shredded carrots and raisins for breakfast. Lucky for us. The butter Flora bought in Monticello to spread on bagels and bread had melted in her bag. We headed over to stake out spot on the grass. We sat close to one of the scaffolds. It would become our landmark. Every time I watch the film Woodstock I look at the scaffold and think, “One of those dots is me!”

Linda Goldman Woodstock.jpg


Day 1- Friday, August 15

It was a sunny warm day and I was feeling excited. It felt like being at a camping trip with thousands of others. But things started getting pretty cramped as the day went on and more people began to arrive. Going to the bathroom was an event in itself.

In front of the stage was a wooden fence. Someone painted numbers on the fence so that people could find their way back to their spot in the sea of humanity. Flora and Michael were an item by this time. Michael decided to drop acid but had never done it before. I was not too thrilled.

Richie Havens did not start performing until after 5 pm. He was supposed to start at noon. Melanie sang Beautiful People and everyone lit matches until the field was full of specks of flickering light. It was a magnificent sight to behold.

There were a lot of emergencies to announce on the PA system. “Will Joe Smith from Kansas meet with Susie from Illinois. She left her insulin in your car.” Someone else forgot their heart pills. I remember feeling terrible for those people and others who had taken the bad brown acid that was going around. The announcements were taking up a lot of time so someone had a great idea to put together a flimsy little wooden information booth for people to leave messages.

It’s getting dark when suddenly I heard, “Will Linda Goldman from Toronto meet Linda Sabo at the information booth!” The PA wasn’t supposed to be used for non-emergencies, but unbeknownst to me Linda had managed to get a press pass and so was able to ask for a favour. She made up a story that she wrote for a Toronto music magazine when she sent away for her ticket.

Linda was resplendent in a black one-piece jumpsuit, clutching a suitcase complete with a hairdryer and a short curly wig she planned to wear to emulate her idol Jimi Hendrix. She thought there would be a hotel nearby where we could stay. No such luck. She had hooked up with a guy named Steve.

We all headed back up the hill while Joan Baez’s angelic voice was singing I Dreamed I Saw Joe Hill Last Night. It was about 1 am and rain had started to fall. We eventually found Flora and Michael. I’ll never forget the image of Michael’s head dozing in Flora’s lap, the rain pelting down on his face. Flora and I are still friends. It turns out she and Michael would go back to New York City the next day where she spent a week with him and his mother.

Linda, Steve and I headed over to Hog Farm, the small campground of tents and yurts set up about a quarter mile from the stage. It was far enough that you could not hear the music.

Thanks to Steve, we were welcomed into the tent of Nancy and Eloy Hernandez. They had five daughters. One was named Pilar. The Hog Farmers had set up a small stage of their own to perform. There were lots of little naked kids and babies running around. The next morning Steve was gone, but we were thankful for the shelter provided by his friendship. So began the next step of our adventure.

Woodstock Hog Farm.jpg


Day 2 – Saturday, August 16

Our main objective was food. At Hog Farm, the women had set up kitchens, so we were never hungry. I remember lining up for soup which was pink in colour and had some mysterious veggies in it. It was served in a tin can, warm and tasty. The woman who poured it into the can yelled out to all of us in the line. “Bring back what you don’t eat and it will go back into the pot.” Eloy came into the tent once with a bag of fresh kaiser buns. God knows where they came from, but they were so delicious!

I wore my hair in braids with a little kerchief. A woman called out to me from a distance. “Maria?” She thought I was Maria D’Amato, the folk singer who played with the Jim Kweskin Jug Band. She later became famous as Maria Muldaur singer of the song Midnight At The Oasis. I was thrilled because I loved Maria and had seen her at Yorkville coffeehouse The Riverboat a couple years earlier.

The woman who called out to me was named Connie. We became friends. She looked like a chubby Joan Baez and constantly said “far out” when she talked. She had two kids. One was named Sunshine and the other Rainbow.

Woodstock 1969.jpg


***

We went over to a nearby lake to swim. I changed into bathing trunks and a tank top. Guys and chicks were washing in the nude. I was very skinny and way too self-conscious to ever go swimming naked. For a nice Jewish girl from Bathurst Manor, nothing could prepare me for all the nudity. Women were breastfeeding their kids in the open which is now the norm but not so in 1969.

Also, there were a lot of drugs, I can’t deny it. Every time we went into our tent people were smoking up. I think some were hitting up as well. Luckily I did not witness this but overheard conversations.

Diary entry: Conditions are BAD, BAD AND BAD. There’s mud everywhere, a sea of brown liquid the consistency of soup, mud soup. The place has already been declared a disaster area!!!!!!

No water. You might get a couple swigs and that’s it. In the afternoon, we got some third-rate pop in cans. I had a craving for a glass of ice-cold milk and I never drink milk.

Chicks are walking around with infants, thank g-d for the free food line. Found out traffic isn’t going out till Tuesday. FUCK. I’M SITTING HERE IN THE TENT LISTENING TO THE HELICOPTERS ARRIVE AND DEPART WITH FOOD AND MEDICINE every 15 minutes.

Went for a walk and felt quite hopeless surrounded by masses of people. I was trapped there with no way of getting out and it was frightening. I just had to wait it out.

We were all shattered when we heard a young man had been run over by a tractor while he slept covered up in his sleeping bag. He was crushed to death. Then we were told over the PA system that a baby had been born. Woodstock had become a real city.

Linda R. Goldman Woodstock.jpg


Day 3 – Sunday, August 17

There was an incredible wind storm in the afternoon. Everyone in the tent had to hold down the flaps to keep it from flying away. Helicopters bringing in the performers were dropping flowers in the spirit of love and peace.

Connie came running up to us all excited and out of breath. She had just seen a group dressed in gold lame called Sha Na Na. “They were wild,” she said. We were all surprised and just shook our heads in disbelief.

In the evening, Eloy and Nancy decided to go to the stage area and take some pictures. Rick and Shy, two other friends Linda and I had met, did some speed. Linda left wearing her multi-coloured paisley shirt Hendrix wig and false eyelashes.

Diary entry: Heard Ten Years After and The Band. I just wanted to hear The Weight. I did not care about anything else. On the way to the stage we walked through a little wooded area. People had set up little booths selling candles, incense and street signs that read Groovy Way and Gentle Path. It was so magical.

Walked back to the tent and nobody was there. Rick then came in and we rapped. I told him about Canada and drew a map to show him where Toronto was. He asked me to fix his torn jeans. He stripped them off. He was butt naked. I very calmly looked away and sewed his jeans. He asked if I wanted to “ball” and I politely said “no. ” He was okay with it and left. Linda, Eloy and Nancy got back in the wee hours of the morning. Wonder how many babies were conceived at Woodstock?

Epilogue

I walked over to the stage area with Connie and her husband. Jimi Hendrix had just finished playing to a mostly empty field. The scene looked like something out of a sci-fi movie. There were thousands of sleeping bags and blankets that got too wet to take along, and dozens of pairs of sandals and shoes lying around. Linda and I smoked up with everyone, took some pictures and kissed them all goodbye.

Linda and I walked over to the main road and got a lift with three guys to New York City. They only had room for one but we both managed to squeeze in the car. They kindly drove us right to the door of Linda’s relatives in Long Island where I had a nice long bath and a much needed sleep in a real bed.

Linda’s relatives took us to Greenwhich Village a couple days later and we were so excited when Joni Mitchell and Graham Nash walked by us.

Last August, I got in touch with Lisa Law who I had met at Hog Farm. She was in a documentary on CNN about the 60s. The last episode was about Woodstock. She told me Nancy passed away and Eloy is still alive. She told me their five girls are all married and still living in New Mexico. How is that for a small world my friends?

@nowtoronto

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