A friend I went to MOJUCO, Moberly, MO with in '69 or so asked me what I did the summer before and I said I worked on the old N&WRR Traveling Tie Gang to support me and my wife so's we could go back to Jr. College that fall. I asked him what he did and he said he went to Woodstock, nevermind that I didn't have a F** clue! He and his wife, the last time I heard were child-less "DINK" liberals!! pdq67
I was at the shore all summer ! We had a beach house in RI on the shore . Would have a blast fishing and girl watching . Made a few good friends back then and a couple girlfriends for the summer too . Loved the great music , the wild clothes , super kool hotrods , kustom cars and jalopy's . The mean muscle cars were in full force and life was very good . drag racing was a good thing too . Wanted to go to NY. for Woodstock but parents wouldn't let me go . Was a really great year for many things ! On the downside , Viet Nam was really going strong and lost many friends and people I new to that damn worthless war ! I also was wondering if my number would be coming up in the next two nears as I was 16 then . It's always easy to remember the good and the bad but that war sucked ! Retro Jim
12 hr days operating a furnance and pouring steel for the war effort. Hot, dirty, miserable work with a great paycheck. Watched the guys pulling lifer time, then die six months later. So along with the paycheck came a great education. Got to kick the hours to 100 a week, spent two years in that foundry, saved the money, walked out and never looked back.
Right before I went to basic training, I was working in D.C. Three of us drove down to Florida to see the launch. I actually have some 8MM film of it somewhere. The other highlights were see Tricky Dick coming out of a restaurant & loosing the car keys in the ocean...the two A-holes I was with were playing catch with 'em. That's a pretty scary thought because we were working for the D.I.A. Then, again, it was the 60's.
We were living in Australia at the time and I spent most of the summer at Port Kembla beach in Warrawong N.S.W. I think it was in '67 that a shit load of Spanish man-o-war (blue bottles) drifted towards the shore.. I seen the signs posted to not go in the water.. I ended walking in about ankle deep and a wave with a bunch of those "blue bottles" wrapped around my ankles...AAAAAAAAAHH !! My ankles burned for a couple of weeks after that.
Nobody mentioned Woodstock yet. I wasn't in the drug culture and learned about it by watching film clips on TV. At first I wondered why didn't I hear about it when it happened and the I remembered I was in the Navy on the west coast. I won the lottery that year. Nixon said that anybody with a discharge date prior to Sept 1 1970 was eligible for an early out. My discharge date from the Navy was August 31. I had the easiest tour of duty in the military of anyone in history but I went and I'm glad that I did. I spent that summer in Oxnard Calif. I watched the moon landing with my Navy buddies in our apartment. I was expecting to see hotrods on every street corner but I can only remember seeing one 26-27 phaeton hotrod drive down the street. They seemed to be everywhere in the magazines. They all hid when I was there. I was driving a 63 Pontiac 421 SD 4spd Catalina, Crower 80R roller cam, Crane roller rockers, Edelbrock high rise and an AFB... 10 MPG on the open highway. I sold it to a guy out there who bought it for the the engine. The Beatles, Credence Clear Water Revival and Blood sweat and tears were big. Rollin on the river was probably released earlier but on the plane ride home from Viet Nam the whole plane would spontaneously break out singing it.... several times. (it was a long trip) We were so happy to be going home. For some reason the song "Poke salad Annie" is a song that I recall liking then. Probably not on many peoples top 1000 list but it brings back good memories for me. I remember the nightly news keeping track of the people killed in Nam. Always more Charlies killed than Americans so we felt like we were winning.
Summer of 69? I was 14, and just moved from N. Y. to SoCal. Very exciting for a 14 year old car nut! A song for you from that Summer= In the year 2525 by Zager and Evans
I was 19 - building my 61 Vette in my driveway! Dropped in a fresh long block LT1 from the General - Dem were the days?
Is that Stephen Stills from Buffalo Springfield on the right,there? '69 I was 12 years old.I wanted to hitch hike to Woodstock,150 miles away,but the old man was not going for it....CCR was huge back then.
I was 12. Favorite song from that summer was Crystal Blue Persuasion. I've been telling my kids for the last 20 years that the world peaked in 1969 and it's been all downhill ever since. The best cars, best music, man on the moon, etc., I truly believe we will never be that great again and it's kinda sad.
No matter what was good about that year, the memories will always have the cloud of Viet Nam over it. It was a great time for us who were not in the service, but enjoying the good stuff was was never fully enjoyed knowing that friends and people that you'd never meet were "over there". It wasn't a feeling of guilt as much as it was a real deep down wanting to have everyone of my age to be able to experience what was going on stateside. I worried about the well-being of my friends and also was so sorry that they were missing the fun stuff. I had friends who joined and had friends who were drafted. All wanted to do what was right and all knew of the perils ahead. Many came home bigger and better men for their experiences yet, some had a tough time adjusting to life again due to physical or other challenges. So, we had the beach, the music, the joy of being 18, the young ladies and all of what made that year so great, but it wasn't quite "right" enjoying it all when so many of the guys my age were unable to join in. The year of 1969 was like a huge party but the laughter wasn't as loud as it should have been. I'd love to have 1969 back for one more run, but this time with all the guys my age in attendance.
I have to admit that I am the only person of that generation that did not go to Woodstock! Apparently every young person alive at that time attended except me.....
In the summer of '69 I was driving a 31 ft, flat green boat with 3 fifty cal guns. I was at Cua Viet, just 3 or 4 Klicks from the DMZ. We had two 6v53 gmc diesels, we would use a Vienamese coin, 5 Dong, to shim the governors to run above 2850rpm. Hot roddin' in the best of circumstances
I was in my first third world shithole of many that my 35 year military career would take me to..... Smoked a ton of weed..listened to a lot of counter culture music.....through vacuum tube amps...miss them...Tried to be a hippie on active duty...got away with it until I returned to CONUS. Used $3400.00 of my tax-free re-enlistment bonus to buy a brand new 1970 Plymouth Duster 340. Ordered it through the PX and picked it up in Kansas.
I was in Alaska Summer of '69 ,,Drag Racing at Polar Dragway ,,read about Woodstock in the paper ,,wishing i coulda went ,,but ,,when i moved back to Iowa that winter ,,there was ads n commercials about the so called "Woodstock Of The MidWest" at a farm by Wadena Iowa ,,i went to it ,,wasn't as big as Woodstock ,only a couple hundred thousand of us ,,,but had the same singers n groups ,,Joe Cocker was amazing ,,it was mind blowing ,,drugs & booze everywhere ,,it was a really hot day ,so the "Honeys" & "Flower Childs" weren't wearing much ,,
The Summer of '69 was far out, man! I'd just come back to "the world" from overseas...wanted nothin more than a good American beer and a loaded-up hamburger to eat while listening to Led Zepplin on AM while sitting in my 57 Pontiac. It had been sitting quietly in my parent's backyard for 2 years while my little brother washed it weekly and fired it up occasionally. We, in Portland, Oregon, were planning our own version of Woodstock. Most of us missed woodstock because it was so far away so our version was called Vortec 1...came complete with a OD tent, "Ball" tent for those intimate moments with your hippy chick girlfriend and 100 degree temps. I'll never forget it. Hells Angels and Outlaws we there in the same place but I didn't see any fights...naked chicks riding on the back of raked harleys in the heat...everybody was drinking wine and smokin wacky tobacky. Shade was at a premium and we [my "ol lady" and I] found a spot of shade next to a psysedelic painted school bus. Creme was there as were a few other name bands....Jerry Garcia and his Grateful Dead, can't remember any more...Oh, Donavan was there I think. There was also a stream about 50 yards behind the stage where nude bathing was the norm.. You grew your hair long and the skirts were short. I don't remember anybody weighing over 150 lbs. VW busses were in demand and when they ran out we went for any kind of old van, panel or delivery, painted up like a vision in a LSD induced dream. And there was plenty of LSD kiddies! And Cylocybin [sp], mescaline, [my favorite] and PCP. The popular call was "LSD for you and me!"....You flipped the peace sign at all your buddies instead of the tired old 50s handshake. Shaving was optional but giant beards diin't become popular 'till later...however if your hair was curly or kinky, a giant afro was expected...whether you were black or white. NOthing quite so wild as a flaming red afro on a skinny 17 year old white kid. Parties were constant..keg parties that always included your favorite drug of choice. Deep purple, Mamas and papas, Zepplin...all came a round to the closest big cities with outrageous concerts...I personally saw Zipplin twice in Portland Or. I still loved my hotrods and in '69 the muscle car craze was in full swing. I wasn't gonna commit myself to a full time job to pay the payments [lots did] on a new GTO, so I made my own while working spot-jobs to pay rent. My "GTO" was a 57 Pontiac tudor sedan with a '59 Chieftian 389 and a junkyard 68 GTO muncie 4 speed but money was tight. I paid my boss at the gas station 20 bucks a day to use the company hoist to do the engine/trans]driveshaft swap in '69..took me 2 days of chasing parts and bolting together. I ran outta money when it came to the shifter...so I used a Hurst competition-plus syncro-loc 3 speed shifter for the 4 forward gears and a separate rod sticking up through the floor next to the big shifter for reverse. I "borrowed" the T-handle off the hot water faucet in the mens room [we didn't have hot water anyway] to top off the little reverse shifter. We drank a lotta beer those days and leather wine bags hanging off your belt were common..and usually full. 1970 blended in '69 with no changes except my hair was even longer and I quit shaving..fun times.
After seeing the Woodstock movie for the first time, I always wondered why the Doors never made the show. Then I found out why some years down the road.
start of 69 i was kicked out of public school in Oregon. Got shipped to military school for 2 years. Nam was ragin and i was the kid in the military unifrm with the buzz cut. Insence & Peppermints Strawberry Wine. Love beads under my uniform and a Macrame wrist band some sweet young girl made for me. marched around with InnaGodda Da Vidda playin in my mind. Picking Strawberrys in Hillsboro Oregon and chasing Shannon Jones in her Daisy Dukes.
The Jalopy Journal
