The Cavalier daily :: Thursday, October 5, 1967 :: University of Virginia Library

Last summer Cavalier Daily staff writer Paul Larsen visited
the Haight-Ashbury section of San Francisco, home have for
the "hippie" culture in this country. The following in the
first in a series of articles in which Mr. Larsen records his
impressions of the hippie life.

By Paul Larsen

It is the melting pot of youth. A world created
out of disdain for the old, the traditional, the accepted.
A city with no country, a people with no
heritage. It is an alluring world, an exciting one. It
has been termed "the society of tomorrow," yet it
borrows heavily from the past. It is a world for the
young, the new, the experimental. It was not unexpected
that its appeal would spread and the inquisitive
would come.

They came from New York, Washington, Chicago,
Denver. There were delegates from Harvard, Antioch,
Oberlin, Michigan State. They came to look, to
see, to learn; most to return home with the commencement
of another school year. A few would
linger on, having been caught up in the tempting
and appealing way of life.

Gathering Of The Curious

The summer in Haight-Ashbury, the hippie capital
of the world, was a gathering of the curious.
With the semester ended and time an abundant
quantity, thousands of "tourists" by-passed a week
at the beach or summer camp to join the exodus
to the West, specifically San Francisco. Many spent
a night or two in the Panhandle and then moved on.
Some stayed longer, establishing friends, and thus,
a floor to sleep on. And some merely wandered
aimlessly about, trying to soak up the atmosphere,
bumping elbows with the hordes of news photographers
who cluttered the streets, and giving interviews
to national magazines on what it is really like
to be a hippie.

College Field Trip

It seemed to be the summer of the college field
trip. Day after day the influx increased. By the final
weeks of August, it was difficult to distinguish
Haight-Ashbury, the Mecca of Hippiedom, from any
college campus across the nation.

But aside from the new population and the new
faces, life went on in Haight-Ashbury this summer
much like it did last winter and fall. It is not difficult
to assess the hippie life, although most magazines
seem to have trouble. It is a life of excitement
and boredom, of uniqueness and routine, of pleasure
and discomfort, of invention and conformity.

The hippie is not so unlike your roommate, nor
is the Haight so unlike the college campus it appeared
to be.

No Longer 'Straight'

The first impression one receives of Haight-Ashbury
is that most of the images and conceptions of
the district and its inhabitants visualized from the
publicity the area has received can be discarded. It
is not the drug-infested, sex-oriented, draft-dodging,
corrupt jungle many publications would lead one
to believe. It is a community in which its residents
believe, act, dress, and think differently from the
"straights" from whom they have broken away.

The hippies' older brothers and sisters were the
beatniks. But there is a definite distinction between
the two bohemias. The hippies want no association
with their elders. As a hippie girl said, "The beatniks
represented a very negative attitude. They were
anti-everything. They hid in dark and dingy coffee
houses and preached militant anarchy. We're positive.
We believe in good and love and peace. We
don't hide and we worship sunshine and the flowers
it brings."

Heights At Haight

The heroes come and go. Jimi Hendrix, Ken
Kesey, Emmet Grogan, and The Switchboard are
currently enjoying heights of popularity. Although
there are a few negative positions in the Haight,
Vietnam tops everyone's list. President Johnson also
is the subject of much wrath, while Governor Reagan
is considered a joke.

The hippies have established a way of life. Their
appeal is not solely to the young, although it is
primarily from youth that the cult receives its contingent
of followers. The basic credo of "allow all,
demand nothing," is loosely followed.

The hippies were created out of a society in which
to disrupt the norm is not forgiven. And for their
punishment the hippies have been harassed, exploited,
and publicized to such a great extent that
the majority of the American public holds in its
mind numerous misconceptions of this new society.