Baby Boomer DUers--I want to pick your brains

[Mythsaje]

My current project involves a young teenager traveling back in time to the late sixties--arriving at the Monterey Pop Festival, of all things. I'm looking for slang and current affairs jargon from that time. I remember some of it, like "groovy," "dig it," "the fuzz," and "the man," but I'm blanking on the rest of it. I'm not talking about slogans like "make peace, not war," but the everyday slang sort of stuff, words and phrases with which to pepper my dialog to make it seem more real.

And not only slang, but some of the types of things people were discussing on the streets--what your average hippie might have been chatting about--not only the war, but everything else. Yes, I realize this was a long time ago, but I hope that some of you remember it well enough to share a few details. I was a mere babe in 1967 and my memories of the time are reflected from years later.

The kid is from far in the future, and another world entirely, and, because of an early lack of interest, he doesn't know a lot about American history. One of the supporting characters is currently telling him about the history of slavery, the civil war, and Jim Crow, all as an introduction to the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, JR.

Chances are that Rune will act to save Dr. King in this universe, though that particular decision has yet to be made. Rune doesn't have easy access to his world's history data banks at the moment, so he's still ignorant of the upcoming assassination.

I'll admit this might have been more suited to the Lounge, but I think I'll get a lot more responses here in GD, and the more input, in my opinion, the better. I ask the Mods to leave it in place for that reason alone. At least it's not an obnoxious piece of drivel that would be best off in GDP, after all.

:D

Any and all help in this regard would be much appreciated.

[SoCalDem]

1. cool..sharp..happening

dork


just a few words I remember using a lot:)

18 in '67

[Mythsaje]

5. Cool is pretty universal, isn't it?

It's STILL in use. It never seems to go out of style.

"Happening" is a good one to remember.

[SoCalDem]

15. Here's a bunch of slang..

http://www.cougartown.com/slang-dict2.html

http://www.cougartown.com/slang.html

[panzerfaust]

56. This is mellow,

and off the wall.

Peace

[Matariki]

107. The only people who use "cool" these days are marketing something to children.

and i bet the kids aren't buying it. LOL

[Mythsaje]

118. I wouldn't know about that.

But I hear it often enough just in conversation. Hell, I still USE it.

[pnwmom]

148. Plenty of us more mature people still use the word cool. n/t

[Chase And Dash]

149. you are so NOT cool nt

[pnwmom]

165. But you are SO welcome to DU! n/t

[TrogL]

129. it's "kewl" now

It used to be coooooooooooooooooooooooollll.

[Bandit]

187. What's your bag dude?

<`})))><

[Turbineguy]

2. Right On!

Crouton.

Heavy! That was another one.

[Mythsaje]

6. Right on! I use that one still. LOL

And "heavy" is a good one too. Thanks.

[orleans]

144. right on, sister. right on, brother. bummer. that's a real drag.

hey man, do you want another hit? you can crash at my pad--it'll be beautiful. like my posters are so for real, very psychedelic. just don't drink the bong water. and don't bogart that J. my old man and i were balling when he took that hit of sunshine. we were still balling when he was peaking.

[alfredo]

207. I'm having a flash back. Can I crash at your place? Have you seen my

water pipe? I think that guy is a narc.

Will I go to hell if I sucker punch that Hare Krishna?

[gateley]

10. Ha! Forgot about 'heavy'! nt

[rzemanfl]

39. Bummer. n/t

[Turbineguy]

60. You reminded me

the stray dog somebody picked up at my college was named "Bummer"

[gateley]

3. I said "outtasight" a lot.

:blush:

AND, more embarrassing - I called all guys 'cats' and all women 'chicks'.

Narc was a popular word.

"balling" instead of "fucking"

I'll think of some more.

My friends and I mostly talked about music and getting high.

[Mythsaje]

12. Well, it's a Young Adult fantasy, so "balling" is out. LOL

"Cats" and "Chicks." Hmmm. I'll consider those. Not sure if any of the male supporting characters will use "chicks," since one of the women among them seems like a pretty staunch feminist to me.

I doubt "Narc" will come up for similar reasons. I'm going to have to be very wary of drug references.

[gateley]

23. I'm a feminist, and a "chicks" wasn't derogatory - just a hip thing to say. nt

[rzemanfl]

35. Remember "chics up front" at demonstrations? n/t

[kimmylavin]

80. I still say it...

And I'm a feminist, as well.
Mostly in a jokey, "chicks and dudes" kind of way.
But I DO live in California... its kinda required. :)

[Why Syzygy]

196. I'm a feminist too and still say "chicks" in casual conversation.

Not in the workplace so much.

[Blue_In_AK]

47. I forgot about "balling,"

The word, not the act, of which there was a lot going on.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

4. One quick snippet.

"Play Misty For Me" has a scene from the Montery Pop Festival, where the festival is prominent background.

A snapshot in time. And, I'm suspecting you're already aware of the scene.

:toast:

[Mythsaje]

13. I've never watched that movie...

Though I've watched the video of the festival from time to time, I believe.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

46. Since you're a fan of the festival,

it might be interesting to see it portrayed in a 70's "Law and Order" episode. Sheesh.

[barbtries]

29. i don't know if it's on dvd,

but a movie was made of it. i saw it at the movies.
i forgot about "heavy" too. things were so fucking heavy back in the day.

[Oeditpus Rex]

114. I'm pretty sure that was the Monterey Jazz Festival

since Dave Garber (Eastwood) worked at KRML, which was a jazz station in the film as well as IRL.

The Jazz Festival is an annual thing, held in September at the Monterey County Fairgrounds, the same place where Monterey Pop was held. The main stage, where Hendrix, Joplin et al performed, is in the Alan G. Pattee Arena, named for a long-time state Assemblyman from the area who died in 1969.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

119. Um. Oh.

:blush: Shit.

thanks for the heads up.

being wrong sucks, dammit. Fortunately, it's a rare occurrence in humankind. :-)

[Oeditpus Rex]

122. Meh

I probably wouldn't have known the difference if I hadn't grown up 20 miles from Monterey and actually gone to a few Jazz Festivals. :)

[Fredda Weinberg]

7. Well, the scene was where it's at ... it was the Age of Aquarius n/t

[angrycarpenter]

8. The long version of the woodstock movie will tell you all you need.

[Mythsaje]

14. That's not a bad suggestion.

I've watched it a few times over the years. Part of it a few weeks ago. I had to laugh when I remembered that most people forget that Sha-Na-Na played it.

[stellanoir]

9. dude

hey what's happening?

Who's zooming who?

[msedano]

126. Soupy Sales...Zooom... Moooz

white fang and black tooth.
the soupy shuffle.

stop it, damn it! too late.

meeska
mooska
mouseketeer
who's the coolest mouse of all...

steve alaimo v. james brown on the dance programs.

batman, da da da da da bat-man, batmaaan!

college bowl. oh man, check it out, college bowl was the ultimate egghead trip.

the NBC peacock, the fanfare...presented to you in living color... the first color teevees.

record changers. 33 1/3 rpm long play records. .99 cent specials. 45s for fifty cents.

fifty cent pieces. that big disc of silver, made a musical note when properly flipped. we called it dos reales and you were rich, i tell you, rich, if you had a couple of fifty cent coins. you could put in a dollar's worth of regular and drive for a week.

enough! damn you all.

the smothers brothers...

star trek. space. the final frontier. these are the voyages of the starship...enterprise, whose five year mission...

playing risk all night...

stop it!!

[pnwmom]

You can google for practically anything these days -- here's what I got,

when I googled "slang '60's" Over 100,000 hits.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=slang+%2260%27s%22&btnG=Google+Search

[Mythsaje]

20. Well, like I said...I'm looking for more than just slang.

I want to get a feel for the time from people who were THERE.

I wonder how many people remember the phrase "Freaking out the straights." I learned that from someone who was in the Haight back in the day.

[pnwmom]

The thing is, not everyone who was there used all that slang.

And some of it was regional.

I think a little slang in fiction goes a long way . . . you don't want this to sound like a parody.

[Mythsaje]

31. That's true too.

I want to throw in a little, and not necessarily the same bits over and over again.

Regional is good too, considering that people came from all over to go to the festival. And I'll most likely be jumping to Dallas in 68 sometime within the story.

[smoogatz]

194. Rod McKuen

Worst American poet of the 20th century, yet incredibly popular. He captured the late 60s mainstream ethos in all its nauseatingly saccharine platitudinousness.

[polichick]

22. Lol - Lay it on me!

That 6Os Official site is a good one.

[DearAbby]

11. Everything was Boss, man....= Awesome

Cops = Pigs
split = leave
in the groove
Bookin' gonna book = also leaving or going somewhere, ie "book to the store"
cop an attitude
copping out - cop out

Generation gap - the establishment - anyone over 30

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

16. Far out.

[BeatleBoot]

21. Far Out and Freaky, man!

[China_cat]

17. Far fuckin' out will stand you in good stead.

Dope was anything ingested, smoked, illegal mostly. Most often reffered to marijuana. 'Grass' was only used by narcs and wannbes.

Acid was dropped, people of the counter culture were 'freaks'. Sex was 'balling'. Coming down off a high or being dog tired was 'crashing'. People who did drugs and dope at the same time woke up 'strung over' (combo of strung out and hung over) 'The fuzz' went out pretty quickly and was replaced by 'pigs, oinkers, and/or blue meanies'.

There's more, but it's rather hazy. :hippie:

[Mythsaje]

27. Oh, I KNOW the drug lingo...LOL

Probably better than the rest of it. Of course, considering the genre I'm working with, it's not a lot of use to me. I have to gloss over that part of it.

I like the "Blue Meanies" reference. That's cool. I hesitate to use "pigs" for the cops, though it's correct for the times. This particularly story is going to be a bit of a tightrope walk, I think.

[China_cat]

50. You know, if you gloss over too much

you lose the tenor of the times. And if it's just somebody LEARNING about what was happening then, then you need to include what was really going on...you don't have to have him take part in it, you can even have him be dismayed about it from his position of knowing more about what's going to happen later and disapproving.

It would be like him learning about slavery but only from the white plantation owner's viewpoints...which is what was pc in the early 60's

[Mythsaje]

58. I'm not sure I want to wrestle with that whole can of worms...

I don't necessarily want to IGNORE it, but he's not going to have any cultural prejudices about it. Such things aren't illegal where he comes from. It would be very difficult not to put a positive spin on it, which is definitely something to avoid.

I'm going to have to consider that aspect very carefully before addressing it.

[China_cat]

140. I also had another thought on the civil rights aspect.

You'll definitely want to include the Freedom Riders.

[notadmblnd]

54. Refer to them as the Fuzz

you don;t have to call them pigs

[PhiBetaCretin1]

202. And don't forget "smokey" - - CB radio talk was all the rage

"Smokey" was "hidin' in the bushes" -- i.e., speed traps on the highway, pre radar-detectors!

"breaker, breaker -- smokey in the bushes at mile-marker 280. Best to keep to 'double-nickels' around there!" ("double-nickels" was 55 mph, maximum speed limit then)

[Kat45]

219. That wasn't until the seventies. n/t

[pnwmom]

18. The hit musicals HAIR, and JESUS CHRIST, SUPERSTAR.

Also, WESTSIDE STORY.

[Mythsaje]

32. LOVED JC Superstar.

I grew up listening to the soundtrack to the movie.

[pnwmom]

51. Makes me want to go out and buy the CD. n/t

[polichick]

34. OMG - I used to sing the Superstar songs endlessly! nt

[Mythsaje]

44. "Why waste your breath, moaning at the crowd?

Nothing can be done to stop the shouting.
If every tongue were still the noise would still continue
the rocks and stones themselves--would start to sing."

;)

[polichick]

64. Lol - such great lyrics...

Funny, you could say the same about Obama supporters! (That verse I mean.)

[bdamomma]

123. Hair was great, great songs came out of that play.

[cloudbase]

19. nickel bag

dime bag
lid
Uncle Ho

[Mythsaje]

33. Yup. Knew those VERY early on. n/t

[12string]

81. lid

don't forget a three or four finger bag.

[proud2BlibKansan]

24. We used to talk about freaking out

when something upset us or was scary.

Getting high was pretty popular. EVERYONE I knew got high. Everyone. And hardly anyone drank. That was uncool in my crowd.

[barbtries]

25. right on!

far out. cool project. drop acid, smoke weed, get high, dig it.

[SalmonChantedEvening]

26. The Space Race

And how much of the $$ wasted on it could have been spent on feeding the poor here on Earth.

I was only 9 in '67, but I heard it often from my older brother's friends.

:hi:

[pnwmom]

28. Good one. n/t

[Mythsaje]

37. I might throw that in, if only to argue the point.

:evilgrin:

I, personally, support the space race and the space program. And I'm pretty sure Rune would too.

[SalmonChantedEvening]

43. Laugh In reference too!

;)

:hi: :pals:

[Mythsaje]

53. Laugh In. Good idea! n/t

[bdamomma]

124. god, Sonny and Cher Show. Am I Right or was that after.

[rzemanfl]

30. First of all it was "make love, not war." I think people didn't

swear as much then, but maybe it's just my attitude towards * that makes me so profane this decade.
Ball was used instead of the f word. Money was bread. Marijuana was pot, dope or boo. Probably a good thing to do would be to take out "Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me" by Joan Baez's dead brother-in-law Richard Farina and read it to get a feel for the times.

[Mythsaje]

38. "Bread." Good one. I haven't heard it called that since the seventies.

I'd forgotten about that.

[rzemanfl]

42. Shit, I haven't HAD any since the seventies. n/t

[pnwmom]

146. People who didn't want to say "fuck" or even "damn" said "darn." Or "rats!" n/t

[qwertyMike]

36. This is my old lady

referring to girlfriend

[Mythsaje]

41. Oh, yeah.

My dad used to refer to my stepmom that way.

It became biker slang that hung on for a LONG time.

[MzNov]

40. Shotgun!

:-)

[Blue_In_AK]

Right on, man...

:hippie: This is a good project.

People were buying lids (ounces) of weed for $15-20, the Acapulco Gold and the Panama Red (at least in Texas where I was).
They were dropping acid, of course, and eating peyote blended with orange juice.

(Or at least speaking for myself, which is probably why I don't remember much of what we were "discussing" in those days. :rofl: )

[rzemanfl]

45. Stuff wasn't stolen it was boosted. n/t

[The_Casual_Observer]

48. McCain got busted. They like, creamed him.

[Stinky The Clown]

49. I think 'Boss' was used then ..... meaning really nice .....

.... Those are some boss shoes! Where'd you get that boss car? .... etc ......

[Raksha]

180. "Boss" was surfer slang, or at least it started out that way.

I heard it a lot during my high school years in Redondo Beach in the early 1960s, not so much later on in Hollywood when the hippie thing was really getting off the ground (1964-1965).

[VP505]

52. You mentioned Monterey Pop Festival,

I didn't make that one but I did attend this one:

Newport '69
Devonshire Downs,
Northridge, CA
20th-22th June 1969
150,000 attended
Acts included: Ike & Tina Turner, The Rascals, Johnny Winter, The Byrds, Booker T. & the MG's, Eric Burdon, Taj Mahal, Jimi Hendrix, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Jethro Tull, Spirit, Joe Cocker

If I can help feel free to ask!

[cally]

55. I was 11, but had older sisters

Free speech was constantly discussed and used whenever we wanted to be heard. We constantly worried about war, the draft, and the environmental movement was growing. We talked about mother earth, war, race, and feminism. Many of our mother's were attending women consciousness raising groups. There were race riots in my middle school and my future high school. It was dangerous for a black girl to date a white boy but the reverse was tolerated. Latino/as were beginning to be heard.

[Mythsaje]

63. This is really useful stuff.

I want to give the women in the story some important things to say. The two males he's encountered are a History major and a "Jesus Freak," but one of the "cool" ones. He's really big on the liberal aspects of the Jesus story--"God is love and so on."

I'm still putting together where the two young women might be coming from. One's a feminist--She reminds the History major that Dr. King is standing up for "Black men AND Black women," for example.

[pnwmom]

73. Some of us were being taught to dive under our desks in case of nuclear attack.

The fear of nuclear war was always there in the background.

I think you should include references to Ghandi -- he was a giant influence of the 60's, even though he died in 1948.

[Mythsaje]

75. Oooh. Good advice. I'll see what I can do. n/t

[pnwmom]

79. I hope you noticed my correction. Ghandi was a huge influence of the 60's

even though he died in 1948.

[Blue_In_AK]

106. I remember that desk-diving from earlier

like around 1960 when I was in jr. high. Was it still going on in '67?

[pnwmom]

130. I'm not sure. But it was a significant memory, at least, of many kids in 1967.

I thought it went on for several years at my elementary school, which I finished in 1966.

[pnwmom]

And how could I forget "tricky Dick"?

[Perry Logan]

57. African Americans were called "spades," intended as a term of approbation.

[PhiBetaCretin1]

203. SHAFT!

Need I say any more?!

"He's a bad mother-f...." "Shut yo mouth!"

(People were always talking about "getting the shaft" too, as in gettin' screwed by bad luck, or the like.)

[riverwalker]

59. for authenticity

listen to Animals with Eric Burdon "Down at Monteray". Sings about the "scene" in sixties at Moneray Jazz Festival at the time ) Here are the lyrics.



The people came and listened
Some of them came and played
Others gave flowers away
Yes they did
Down in Monterey
Down in Monterey

Young gods smiled upon the crowd
Their music being born of love
Children danced night and day
Religion was being born
Down in Monterey

The Byrds and the Airplane
Did fly
Oh, Ravi Shankar's
Music made me cry

The Who exploded
Into fired light (yeah)
Hugh Masekelas music
Was black as night

The Grateful Dead
Who everybody thanked
Jimi Hendrix, baby
Believe me
Set the world on fire, yeah!

His majesty
Prince Jones smiled as he
Moved among the crowd
Ten thousand electric guitars
Were groovin' real loud, yeah

If you wanna find the truth in life
Don't pass music by
And you know
I would not lie
No, I would not lie
No, I would not lie
Down in Monterey

Hu! huh-huh!

Alright!

<Instrumental>

Three days of understanding
Of moving with one another
Even the cops grooved with us
Do you believe me?
Yeah!

Down in Monterey
Down in Monterey, yeah
Down in Monterey
Down in Monterey, yeah

I think that maybe I'm dreamin'!

Monterey!

Monterey-yeah!

Down in Monterey

Did you hear what I said?

Down in Monterey

That some music

Monterey
FADES-
I said
Monterey, Monterey, Monterey
Yeah-yeah, hey-hey-hey
A-ay, a-ay, a-ay-a-ay

[Mythsaje]

66. I remember the song, actually.

One of the things that set me on this particular path at this point was VH1's "History of Rock," which served as a reminder of such things for me. I've watched four or five episodes so far and enjoyed them all.

[BrotherBuzz]

61. Check out Zap Comix and the other underground comics from that time

R Crumb el al. had a big influence on the slang middle American white bread teenagers picked up.

Freak Brothers
Mickey Rat
Fritz The Cat

[Mythsaje]

68. Believe it or not, I grew up reading Freak Brothers comics.

How many people do you know who can say THAT?

[abq e streeter]

101. I'm still on a quest for Tree Frog beer

The colors, the colors....

[annabanana]

105. EEEK. . "Fat Freddy's Cat"!!

I lo-o-o-oved that nasty cat!

[Usrename]

178. Lord Gawd Billy Bob, that's the meanest hippy you ever picked!

:rofl:

the fabulous furry freak brothers

[pnwmom]

62. JFK's reign was often called "Camelot" (which was a popular musical then)

From Wikipedia:

The King of Camelot<65> Two weeks after Kennedy’s assassination, his wife, Jacqueline, revealed that the score from the 1960 musical Camelot, had been one of her husband’s favorites to listen to. Parallels were then drawn between the “one brief shining moment” of King Arthur’s reign (in the musical) and the mood of idealism and optimism that had characterized Kennedy’s presidency

[KayLaw]

65. Hoping for the best for you.

I was was of the youngest Hippies, I guess. We joked about people who said "Far out" , "Right On", "Groovy." We said none of those things. We said "Farm out", "Right Arm" and "Gravy." I feel honest Hippies were overrun by people who had their own sinister agenda.

[Mythsaje]

72. I knew a lot of former hippies as a kid.

Some really great people. Some became yuppies, others just vanished into the woodwork, or lived their dream of returning to the land--at least to some extent. The last half of my childhood involved a lot of former hippies and some great memories to boot.

I've heard a lot of those satirical bits of slang over the years. Amusing, but also a bit sad.

[KayLaw]

89. Maybe sad.

But please don't be sad for us. My husband and I are looking forward to many great adventures. We hope the best for you, Mythseje. :hi:

[Contrary1]

67. "Pad" and not the feminine type...

God bless our pad. :hippie:

[Mythsaje]

74. I'd forgot about that one. It's like "crib" today. n/t

[MiniMe]

69. Can you dig it?

[patrice]

70. Cool, Sharp, Heavy, Right on . . . nt

[GreatCaesarsGhost]

71. a turn on

turn on, tune in, drop out. - timothy leary.

[Mythsaje]

76. Timothy Leary's dead.

No, he's outside, looking in.

:)

[Blue_In_AK]

109. One of my favorite albums...

Long live the Moodies.

[Mythsaje]

115. I was a huge Moody Blues fan from an early age...

My dad had a friend with a reel-to-reel that used to play their albums for hours at a time. He says that it's probably the reason I enjoy classical music as much as I do now. I was infected early on. LOL

[Sarah Ibarruri]

77. Hey man nt

[12string]

78. psychedelic

I still say it and never tire of the looks it can generate.

[Wizard777]

82. That was bad! Meant it was good.

[stevedeshazer]

83. Sock it to me!

Laugh-In had it going on.

[Contrary1]

84. "Hang ten"

[AnotherMother4Peace]

85. This is a bitchin' thread - meaning a good thread.

[Nay]

86. Black is beautiful. What's happenin,' man? Far out.. And don't forget

that the very first male centerfold was Burt Reynolds, in Playgirl magazine! That was a new mag, by the way, and Burt had his hand strategically placed so you couldn't see THAT -- but it was still a big deal.

In 1969 during my first year of college,my best friend and I were the first in our area to wear backless long dresses. No bra. Don't forget the general bralessness! This was a BIG DEAL back then, if you can imagine. Bell bottom pants were big, as were peasant blouses.
Lots of people did macrame, potterymaking, and the back to the earth movement was big.

Mother Earth News mags and the Whole Earth Catalog were bibles.

Easy Rider is a good movie to capture the paranoia of the times.

A friend from college was a long-distance bicyclist and every summer he would cycle home (Florida to Ohio!). The first year he did that, the fuzz hassled him all the way home because he had long hair. The second year he cut it all off to go home, and no hassle.

Mood rings were cool.

Simon & Garfunkel.

[pnwmom]

87. Another point of view about slang

My fifteen year old son was asking me what I thought about the movie JUNO. I had liked it a lot, and thought the writing was awfully clever -- I even remember thinking - "I could never write like that. I could never write dialogue for a teenager."

Anyway, I just told my son I liked it a lot. He replied that he did too -- except that he thought "the dialogue was cheezy. No teen really talks like that, Mom."

So the snappy, slang-filled dialogue that all of us adults thought was so clever -- my real life teen son thought was cheezy and fake. Interesting.

[Mythsaje]

97. What's funny is that I'm not sure they always HEAR themselves

or others when they DO speak like that.

Lately I've noticed Buffyisms finding their way into other tv shows and movies...not necessarily phrases they'd actually used, but the very style of them. "Love makes you do the wacky," for example. I actually HEARD this one on another show--or in a movie. That's a direct quote from Willow.

Slang is weird. I know for a fact that people used a lot of these 60s terms because I grew up with them in everyday use.

[pnwmom]

158. You're certainly right that a lot of people used them -- just not everybody,

and some people used a lot of slang, some not as much.

I've noticed the Buffy effect, too! I think that show will turn out to have been extremely influential.

[Mythsaje]

161. Yeah, my dad used a lot of that slang...

"Far Out," "outasight," "pig" and "fuzz," (pig was more common) "blew my mind," "funky," "righteous," and even "groovy" on occasion. And most of their friends used those phrases at least through the seventies, though by the end of that decade, the use of most of those words seemed to have died out. Then again, by the time the early eighties rolled around, I was already involved in whatever counter-culture MY generation had (and we did have one, strange as it was) and we had our OWN slang.

[pnwmom]

163. By the time I got old enough, the true hippie days were over.

(But it was interesting watching the group that came just before mine.) Hope your parents had fun then!

[Mythsaje]

164. I assume they did...

If they didn't have at least much fun as I did coming of age in the eighties, they were doing something wrong.

LOL

On edit: Of course, my dad served in Vietnam from around 1960 or 61 to 63 or 64, so he had a lot of baggage too. He EARNED some of that fun he might have had, I'd think.

[pnwmom]

166. One thing smart that happened in the early 70's or so

was that they made alcohol legal for 18 year olds. So instead of binging in college, we had wine and cheese parties with the faculty. It's a little different now . . . .

[Mythsaje]

169. Yeah...they changed the laws back.

I know it was all tied into highway funds, the Reagan administration refused to give funds to the states until they restored the drinking age to 21. It's funny, since I did most of my drinking BEFORE I turned twenty one except for a few notable years around my early thirties.

[lumberjack_jeff]

205. Exactly. It's the way I felt when watching Starsky and Hutch. n/t

[NJCher]

88. reefer

As in the movie "Reefer Madness."

That's one of those words that's still around, or at least still recognized as such by the current generation of college students. The other day I said "refer" in class but mangled the word and it came out "reefer." They had a good time sniggering.



Cher

[AnotherMother4Peace]

90. Righteous - Uptight, outta sight

[InkAddict]

91. Leather jackets versus baja shirts and peasant blouses

of course, tie dye.
Fringed sueded jackets
Short A-line skirts with wide belts and narrow Empire dresses
Wing-tip shoes versus sandals.
Mohair suits and "alpaca" style sweaters.
Chelsea collars: deep low V-necks w/sort of sailor lapels

From the military:
"OFS"="out F*(&*G standing"
"short" = less than 180 days left (then one couldn't be shipped out).
"Jody" = individual who steals a soldier's wife or girlfriend while he is deployed

Don't "mock me out;" I was barely allowed to participate.

[End Of The Road]

92. As far as what people were chatting about

I hope it doesn't disappoint you, but daily conversation topics weren't all that different than today. Sex. Music. Money. Problems with parents. Girlfriends. Boyfriends. Marriage. Pregnancy. Men in college worried about staying in, else they'd lose their deferrment (and every guy knew their classification number). Men not in college worried about their draft lottery number (though this didn't happen until Dec. '69, so it may be beyond your time frame).

[bemildred]

93. I suggest digging up current literature from that time.

Old Rolling Stone magazines, novels, etc.

[annabanana]

111. The earliest National Lampoon magazines... (I think I still have them)

[rzemanfl]

185. Do you have the one with the "Men's Heterosexual Development

Questionnaire?" The one that asked "List all the women you have ever slept with?" followed by about a hundred blank lines, the last of which said "attach additional sheets if necessary."

That was a misogynist classic.

[Warren Stupidity]

136. Fritz the Cat or any early Crumb Comics would do it.

He had the dialect down perfectly.

[msedano]

94. pray for sharks

if you didn't like surfer assholes, who plastered college dorm windows (UCSB) with pray for surf. surfers wore white shoes (white bucks, hush puppies) and madras shirts. three mutually distinctive groups included the GDI, god damned independents, the soshes, fratboys, sallies (sorority and fraternity types), and the bridge players. they occupied/staked out different tables in the student union.

human be-in, became the 'love in' when the eastern media caught wind of what was happening. the hippies, love children, flower children, straights, crooked.

drug lingo proliferated: mota, weed, grass, lid, dime bag, matchbox, joint (intially a joint function between men's dorms and women's dorms), bogart (don't bogart that joint, my friend, pass it over to me) yerba buena, maryjane, toke, do up, get high, get stoned, stuff (heroin), needle freaks, burned (robbed or cheated), ripped off, bummed, bummer, bad trip, trippy, high. the two fingered "v" sign initially mean "I'm high, are you?" speed, speed freaks, abcesses and filthy smelly bodies. snorting. shooting up. "doing" as in "doing up" meaning fire up a joint, or pushing a needle in the arm. tying off. red mountain, a cheap red wine sold/bought in gallon jugs. akadama plum wine.

music: acid rock and stuff you remember. the fugs. the blues, viz paul butterfield blues band, people knew the names of the players. folk music held sway also. 13th floor elevator, an early acid rock band. simon and garfunkle parsley sage. dylan. electric dylan. country joe. jazz, dave brubeck. mose allison. indian ragas.

research: richard fariña, "been down so long it looks like up to me" will give you a taste and some conversational ploys. "stranger in a strange land" captivated a readership, as did the hobbit and the trilogy.

running away from home was a big deal, the high school kids would come up to isla vista and see who they could "crash" with.

spades, black is beautiful, brown is beautiful, in 'frisco (aka "the city") was a dealer named superspade.

VW bus, beetles, plymouth valiant, hatchback vehicles.

hitchhiking was a great mode of transportation and rich source for rapists who got away with it. "gas, grass, or ass, no one rides free".

i personally invented "guru-vy" blending "groovy" with the east indian craze that erupted with ravi shankar and the maharishi.

"wow" "busted" "heat, the heat, the man" "like" as an interjection "like, wow, man, can you dig it?"

ça sufit?

[Hepburn]

100. LOL....

....UCSB....in the 60s! I remember it well. Isla Vista...a bit hazy...but I think I remember it well!

:hippie:

[madrchsod]

95. mr natural says

keep on trucking!

[ConcernedCanuk]

96. I'm surprised no-one mentioned that DU has a Baby Boomers Group!

.
.
.

Baby Boomers Group

Maybe even reading some of the poster's contributions might give you some insight

Old habits die hard ya know . . .

[Blue_In_AK]

112. I didn't know that.

[madrchsod]

98. where`d ya score that shit....

[Hepburn]

99. Well.....

....that is my era.

How about:

Boss
Bitchin'
Far out
Blast
Gnarly
Groovy
Hacked (does NOT refer to computers)
Kybo
Right on
So fine

That's all I can think off. I am woogied right now. :hi:

[Canuckistanian]

102. "Rapping", I remember "rapping"

That was to be involved in ANY kind of serious conversation, usually in a small group or a one-on-one.

It was actually more like a ritual. If you asked to "rap" with someone or a group, it meant a stylized, sit-down-in-a-circle kind of meeting.

Maybe others had a different experience.

[annabanana]

110. how about "t- groups".. remember those?

[Canuckistanian]

128. "t-groups", no, I don't remember

Therapy groups? Think-groups? I remember "consciousness-raising groups", but not "t-groups"

[Individualist]

103. a drag: boring

Mary Jane - marijuana
bummed out or simply bummed: depressed
Hell no, we won't go: anti-war chant
funky: stylish, cool

What was in: Haight-Ashbury, anti-war movement, civil rights marches, peace symbol, lava lamps, bean bag chairs, love beads, flowers in the hair, Birkenstocks, bellbottoms, Laugh-In, The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.

[seemslikeadream]

104. TEEN MAGAZINE

[Matariki]

108. Don't forget the 'jesus freak' 'one way' finger

[Cerridwen]

113. Not dialogue or slang, but I still can't believe no one mentioned

mini-skirts and micro-minis.

Girls lining up in the school gym, bending hands on knees, so the girl's Dean could make sure none of the skirts were too short; too indecent. Or lining up at attention while the girl's dean took a ruler down the row to make sure they're weren't more than 3 (or 4) inches from the knee. Girls rolling up their skirts after inspection. LOL

Girls not allowed to wear pants to school; freezing our backsides walking to school. Girls wearing pants under their skirts (so as not to freeze our backsides) then taking them off and storing them in our lockers.

Our mothers telling us to "get your hair out of your face". Wearing our hair in pony-tails and buns to school and taking them down to walk into the building. Then putting it back up before going home.

Putting on makeup after arriving at school and taking it off before going home.

Knee high socks.

Stupid pamphlets about "The Joys of being a Girl!" handed out in "health" class or during PE. Separate "health" classes taught by embarrassed PE teachers to embarrassed and uncomfortable students who didn't want "that teacher, ewwwww" talking about "that!"

There may be more; but since this went on a tangent...

oof! Thanks for the trip down memory lane.

[pnwmom]

152. Yes! In 1968, the sixth grade girls had a "sit down strike" at our school --

they sat down in a hall, protesting the fact that girls weren't allowed to wear pants in school. (And yes, on cold days we did wear snow pants under our skirts.)

A couple of the girls had fathers who were lawyers, so that was the end of that rule.

[seemslikeadream]

116. TEEN LIFE

[Oeditpus Rex]

117. If you need any particulars about the area, PM me

I grew up in Salinas, about 20 miles from Monterey. We went there often to shop and stuff, and I've been to the Monterey County Fairgrounds, where Monterey Pop was held, many times.

[TahitiNut]

120. The "late sixties" we tend to remember were actually the early 70s.

Almost all the language we actually used in the transition period of 1965-1969 (post-Sandra-Dee) was pretty much established by the "beatsters" and came into general (generational) use in the actual late 60s.

I'd recommend getting a copy of "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis" TV series ... the repartee between Dwayne Hickman and Bob Denver is awfully damned close to what folks in their late teens and early twenties used.

http://www.amazon.com/Many-Loves-Dobie-Gillis-Set/dp/B000WQ6VB4/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1203733479&sr=8-1

So far, a LOT of what I read in this thread mixes "surfer slang" and "Valley Girl" slang with terms we used in the early 70s - words used for humor's sake, mostly.

The period between 1965-1969 was a time to get your mellow on ... chill out and get groovie. It was a time when language focused on ATTITUDE - honest and laid back - not style for style's sake.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

121. Swift, chick, cat, neat. Being the pain in the ass I can be, I was often retro and used nifty. :)

[scarletwoman]

125. There was a sizeable component of Eastern philosophy as an aspect of the 60s counterculture.

Speaking as a Boomer (born 1949) who went in that direction.

Baba Ram Dass (formerly Richard Alpert) was a colleague of Timothy Leary who moved from the LSD world to Hindu/Yoga teachings as a means of expanding the consciousness. For some of us, his book Be Here Now (published in 1971) was as singular an event as Woodstock.

I first read it at at friend's apartment while high on acid with the Moody Blues album "Days of Future Passed" playing in the background. It literally changed my entire worldview.

There were so many different streams that fed into the 60s counterculture (which actually stretched into the early 70s), that it's difficult to enumerate them all.

I remember the influences of the Beat generation looming large in certain quarters -- Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Gary Snyder, etc. There was Buckminster Fuller and his geodesic dome. There was Foucalt and Warhol and Zen and the Esalon Institute. Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters. The American Indian Movement.

Ya know -- just thinking back and trying to remember all the myriad influences feeding into what we now refer to as the 60s is mind-blowing. There's another phrase for you: "mind-blowing". Also, "blow your mind".



What I mean is; what an amazing cultural ferment! Art! Music! Poetry! Philosophy! Spirituality! Intellectualism! Civil Rights! Popular culture! Academia! Literally EVERYTHING was getting blown open by the prevailing zeitgeist of those years!

People were being exposed to new ways of perceiving the world around them on every front. EVERYTHING was being questioned, examined, challenged, tested.

The most compelling lesson of the 60s, imho, is how the authoritarians of the Ruling Class effectively organized themselves by 1973 to quash/mock/marginalize/attack all these amazing streams of change and people power -- to ultimately triumph in 1980 with the election of Reagan.

I will be eternally grateful that I was of an age to live through those years. The conventional narrative is that the hippies "grew up" and became yuppie suburbanites, Wall Street acolytes and materialists.

I don't believe it. Every old hippie I know has never changed their mind about the "Establishment", the "System". We just went underground as a matter of survival.

sw

[Mythsaje]

131. Oh, I doubt they "changed their minds" so much as they changed their approach to it all...

I have known several former hippies in my life. Some have gone back to the land, as they always wanted, others have slid into middle-class lifestyles while retaining at least some of their beliefs, others have become icons in the neo-pagan movement.

:shrug:

[scarletwoman]

132. Just giving you my take on this stuff, like you asked for... (nt)

[Mythsaje]

143. I understand...

And the eastern religions are a good starting point for some.

[immoderate]

127. Cops were "the man" and we were against "the establishment"

A lot of hippies escaped to communes and we hated "plastic."

--IMM

[Warren Stupidity]

134. Cops were the pigs and we apparently were going to 'off' them.

However it was mostly us who got off'd. Totally delusional.

[Warren Stupidity]

133. You just blew my mind man

I'm like having flashbacks and seeing trails. I need to crash before I totally freak out.

[B Calm]

135. Orange Sunshine, Blotter

[Warren Stupidity]

137. This is some heavy shit.

Oddly now a days when a boomer has a heavy shit he or she just feels relieved.

[Warren Stupidity]

138. Are you laying a trip on me? Is this some sort of MindFuck?

I could go on, it is all bubbling up.

[saged52]

139. we called people freaks -

and jesus freaks - and it was complimentary
black lights and posters
reading album covers
incense - patchouli and sandalwood
"today is the first day of the rest of your life"
back to school shopping at the army surplus store
sitting around in a circle passing a joint by candlelight and rapping
suede bags tied w/leather
making necklaces/bracelets out of leather and beads
John Lennon/grannie glasses
peace signs - always peace signs
communes
flavored rolling papers
so many wonderful home town bands
$2. concert tickets - lots and lots of concerts
I don't recall ever watching TV
news by word of mouth and the underground newspapers/magazines and impromptu campus speeches/protests/sit-ins/moratoriums
we talked about the war and politics and religion and the environment
and how to make the world a better place
and the music was great!

[jasmine621]

141. Ketty Lester: :"Love Letters Straight From the Heart. " nt

[BigBearJohn]

142. Friends and I who thought something was really cool, we would call it "bitchen"

Also used to say, "far out!" a lot. (means outstanding!)

[pnwmom]

145. But if you have a philosophical character or two, bookworm types,

who read for fun -- they might use comparatively little slang. Their vocabularies may come more from what they read than from popular culture. The word "neat" (meaning "cool") got incorporated into my vocabulary in the 60's, but very little else. I didn't even get comfortable saying "cool!" until years after everyone else did.

And now, judging by my parental eavesdropping, my own children and their friends don't use a great deal of slang either. (But my then 14 yr. old son and four of his friends were all reading and discussing an Al Franken book last year -- which I think is definitely cool!)

[pnwmom]

147. Pigs (police), male chauvinist pigs, women's libbers, bra burners, WASPs

(white Anglo Saxon Protestants -- the privileged class)

People still had "record players" on which they played their singles, their LP's or their albums but the luckier ones had "hi fi's" or "stereos"

[pnwmom]

150. Southern expression, meaning "I had a good time"

"It's been real!"

[Mythsaje]

155. By the eighties, this had morphed into

"It's been real, it's been fun, but it hasn't been real fun."

[pnwmom]

157. LOL. I definitely missed that one. n/t

[Mythsaje]

168. My graduating class had a reputation for being an odd bunch...

With teachers and administrators all over the west coast. Class of '84. I know me and my friends were weird, but we liked it that way.

[pnwmom]

170. Weird is a compliment, as far as I am concerned.

Regular is kind of boring.

[Mythsaje]

172. We always found it so.

I mean even then I was on the path to being an author. I figured weird went with the territory. :D

[WillyT]

151. If Ya Wanna Read A Great Book On The Subject...

Link: http://www.tomwolfe.com/KoolAid.html

Reviews
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test is not simply the best book on the hippies, it is the book . . . the pushing, ballooning heart of the matter . . . Vibrating dazzle!" —Eliot Fremont-Smith, The New York Times

"A Day-Glo book; illuminating, merry, surreal!" —The Washington Post

"Among journalists, Wolfe is a genuine poet; what makes him so good is his ability to get inside, to not merely describe (although he is a superb reporter), but to get under the skin of a phenomenon and transmit its metabolic rhythm." —Newsweek

"The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test is an amazing book . . . A book that definitely gives Wolfe the edge on the non-fiction novel." —Village Voice

"Some consider Mailer our greatest journalist; my candidate is Wolfe." —Studs Terkel, BookWeek

"Tom Wolfe is a groove and a gas. Everyone should send him money and other fine things. Hats off to Tom Wolfe!" —Terry Southern

:hi:

[Mythsaje]

156. I've actually read it, many, many years ago. n/t

[countryjake]

153. boo coo, spaced out, into the void

sometimes tres boo coo if it was a whole lotta somethin' in your stash. And if anyone ever went over the edge into the void, they were bound to crawl out really spaced out.

Shoplifters were punks who copped instead of shopped.

Straight wholesome family types were called ho-jos.

Eating ice cream cones and tossing frisbees and impromptu street dances were cool and reading underground papers like the Berkeley Barb, Chicago Seed, the Fifth Estate, the Spectator, and Rat Subterranean News kept one up on happenings in the country. And you always kept a bandanna in your pocket, just in case the pigs showed up.

[pnwmom]

176. You forgot getting tear-gassed on your way from your dorm to the library.

Happened to one friend of mine, anyway.

[pnwmom]

154. From PBS, here is a treasure trove of 60's era history and nostalgia,

for example

the word "hippie" - 1965

the show Star Trek -- 1966

the Summer of Love 1967

first issue of Rolling Stone Magazine 1967

and on and on and on . . .

http://www.pbs.org/opb/thesixties/timeline/timeline_text.html

[Why Syzygy]

159. In 1967 .. hippies were still fairly new

to the *scene*. They were formerly, hip, the hipsters, cool daddy, beatniks.
One day I was watching Dobie Gillis and the next I was vacationing in Arizona.
1965 . a transformational summer.

I learned there were no more beatniks. There was a new breed. Hippies.
I almost found out what 69 meant. I hid when my cousin was trying to tell us that information.
We went to see Sound of Music.

So, depending on the specific 60 date, you could get some alternate answers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippy

[pnwmom]

171. The word "hippie" was first coined in 1965, according to PBS.

See post 154 above.

[Why Syzygy]

195. That's what wikipedia says too.. and

that's what I wrote in my post.

I first heard of it in 1965 in Tempe, AZ in a backyard swimming pool.
Obviously I remember it well. I had planned on being a beatnik when I got a few years older. Took the hippie train instead!

[pnwmom]

200. Sorry, it wasn't clear to me from the post. n/t

[leftofthedial]

160. hip

mellow

[Angry Mollusk]

162. Groove to the music of the Doors, Love, Canned Heat and The Beatles to dig the vibe of the time

To understand the time, you must understand the music

PicK up these great albums

"Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts club Band" by the Beatles
"Forever Changes" by Love
"Strange Days" by the Doors
"It's a Beautiful Day" by It's a Beautiful Day
and anything by Canned Heat, one of the greatest blues bands in rock history

[Mythsaje]

167. I grew up listening to all of that.

Rolling Stones, Let it Bleed.

Beatles White Album, Sgt Pepper's, Abbey Road...

Jefferson Airplane--you name it.

Definitely "It's a Beautiful Day." I can almost envision the album cover even now. For years it was in the front of my dad's stack of LPs.

Cold Blood.

The Moody Blues.

Steppenwolf. Who can forget the Monster album? Oh, wait. Just about everybody. All the radio stations ever played was "Born to be Wild" and "Magic Carpet Ride" and, very rarely, "The Pusher."

Janis Joplin.

Joan Baez

Bob Dylan

Cat Stevens (a little later, perhaps, but not by much).

Tower of Power

Carol King

Jim Croce

the list goes on.

I know the music well enough, I think. And I think mentioning it, though I can't use the lyrics specifically, might lend a little of the right atmosphere to the story.

Thanks for the suggestion, though. I honestly hadn't thought about doing that until you wrote this.

[Angry Mollusk]

173. Rock was at its best in the late 1960s

Great bands!
There was also

Quicksilver Messenger Service
King Crimson
The Grateful Dead
Taste
Ten Years After
The who
Lighthouse
Donovan
The Kinks
Frank Zappa
Jethro Tull
Otis Redding
Pink Floyd (with Syd Barrett)

[Mythsaje]

174. Quicksilver and Ten Years After

were in my dad's album collection. I had a friend who turned me onto The Who, Frank Zappa, and Donovan. Also really introduced me to Dylan. And OLD Aerosmith.

I'm going to have to disagree with the "at its best" though. One thing I've learned over the years is that musical tastes differ to such a wide degree that no one genre or era is better than another. Each has its positives and negatives and trends repeat themselves. I like music going all the way back to the swing of the 1940s, and classical pieces a lot older than that. I also like a lot of the sixties stuff, eighties heavy metal (though I prefer the progressive metal to the pop/puff stuff by far), the singer-songwriters of the late 90s (I wasn't a big fan of grunge, though a lot of post-grunge is damn good), and some of the bands making the charts these days--particularly Evenescence.

My introduction to hard rock came in the late seventies when I discovered Heart's "Barracuda," and Pat Benatar's "Heartbreaker," then bands like Zeppelin and Sabbath.

[kristopher]

175. Don't forget that most of the country wasn't "cool".

Flattops, tough guys, cigarettes rolled up in tshirt sleeves, god & country, Lucky Strike Means Fine Tobacco;

sputnik, Cape Canaveral, Mercury Program, Gemini Program, Apollo Program, LEM, X1 rocket, rocket sleds, sound barrier, sonic booms;

tectonic theory;

the pill, Griswold v. Connecticut, Comstock Law, Margaret Sanger;

the transistor, the transistor radio, cheap junk from Japan;

slide rules;

bacon and eggs for breakfast everyday;

cowboys and indians, Stan Musial, hoola hoops, Bazooka bubble gum, Rock 'em Sock 'em Robots; Battleship, Spudsy the Hot potato, Frisbee, Spiro Graph, ABC, NBC, CBS, Saturday morning cartoons

Chevy Camaro, Ford Mustang, Corvette

punji sticks, care packages, helicopters, M16-the Viet Nam rifle,

Riding the bus long distance taking 24+ hours Philadelphia to Florida

The New Interstate Highway System

Duck and cover, bomb shelters underground in the back yard, doomsday



Looked up on the internet:
1966 News Headlines
Apollo Test Launch Kills Chaffe, Grissom, White
B-52 And Jet Tanker Collide- 7 Die 4H-Bombs Lost 3 Recovered
Russia Makes First Soft Moon Landing
Lost H bomb Found Off Spanish Coast
Supreme Court Rules On Rights Of Accused In Miranda Case
Sniper In Texas Shots 45 from Tower
Long Time Favorit Buster Keaton Dies
Auto Critic Nader Gets Apology From GM
Lost H-bomb Found Off Coast Of Spain
Artificial Pump Is Implanted In Heart

In The News
Stokely Carmichael is elected head of Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
Walt Disney dies
Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton star in "Who's Afraid Of Virginia Wolf"
Green Bay Packers under Vince Lombardi win record third straight NFL title
Jim Brown ( Cleveland) retires with a career rushing record of 12,312 yards
Mini Skirts and Bell Bottoms are the in dress code
James Meredith is shot on civil rights march
Frank Sinatra and Mia Farrow are wed in Vagas ceremony

1967 News Headlines
Communist China Announces It Has H-bomb
Christiaan Barnard Performs First Heart Transplant in Captown South Africa
US Bombers Raid Hanoi
Svetlana Alliluyeva, Stalin's Daughter Defects To West
Newark Black Riots End After Six Days 26 Dead
Detroit Riots End after 8 Days 43 Dead
3 Astronauts Die In Apollo I Fire On Launch Pad
US Suffers highest Weekly Casualties
Draft Board Refuses Exemption For Ali
Stalin's Daughter Defects
Dr. Christian Barnard Does First Heart Transplant In Cape Town South Africa

In The News
Troop level in Vietnam reaches 525,000
Anti War protesters make night march to Pentagon
Expo "67" opens in Montreal
Dow high 943 low 786
Rene Favaloro, Cleveland Clinic develops first coronary bypass operation
Ali won't serve, loses title
Israel smashes Arabs in six day war
Jane Mansfield dies in car crash
http://www.1960sflashback.com/1967/News.asp

[mtnester]

177. Unfortunately, as a person classified as a boomer due to my birthday

I cannot help you as I was 7 years old, and still hunting tadpoles in the pond when the mud got warm.

Yeah, I was a tomboy. Birth date 1960.

[retread]

179. What the hell is a "hippie?" n/t

[H2O Man]

181. There is a great film

of the festival, somplete with wonderful intereviews with young folks going to the concert, and older folks who view the young folks as a threat to decency. I rented it years ago, and have since taped it when it played on ShowTime. You could probably find it, and I think it would be worth the effoty.

[B Calm]

182. Narc, groovy, got any white cross man? Mexican meant cheap weed!

[Usrename]

183. Hey, hey LBJ, how many kids did you kill today?

The Allman Bros. were the high school band when I was in jr high, in a tourist town in the South. Cassius Clay changed his name and became a conscientious objector.

The whole drug scene, as I remember it, seemed like it came in waves or something. Except for the few really dry periods (when folks would drive all the way up to Atlanta to score in Piedmont Park), there was always pot around. One time a friend of mine unrolled a 23-point pot leaf the size of an album cover from a lid of Acapulco gold (he was pretty stoned at the time).

My town was one of the importation sites for the Columbian pot that came up on the banana boats. On more than one occasion, people had dope which had just washed up on the beach in bricks (not too tasty, but it was usually free). There was also an abandoned WWII airstrip outside the city limits where DC-3s would land at night and offload pounds or kilos of good smoke. The local cops wouldn’t even go out there because they were outgunned, the drug runners were armed with Uzis. Eventually the local county sheriffs were permitted to legally carry automatic weapons, I’m sure they were the first in the country to do so.

All the other drugs would come in these different waves; there’d be lots of people taking barbs then speed then acid, then it would start all over again. Most of the prescription stuff was rumored to be “Syndicate” drugs (Mafia). LSD was readily available, but you can't take it too often. Some people would get strung out on speed or barbituates, but most people just took whatever was around. It also seems like, as common as drugs were on the street there was a total absence of narks, even though everyone was always on the lookout. Coke and heroin were extremely rare, and nobody in the local scene ever did any real narcartics, except for some ocasional hash.

For acid there was purple micro-dot, yellow sunshine, orange sunshine barrel, purple Berkley, window pane, and blotter.

For the prescription drugs there were:
twoies (amobarbital/secobarbital combo) Tuinal
black beauties (amphetamine/dextroamphetamine) black/blue capsules
reds (secobarbital) red capsules Seconal
yellow jackets (pentobarbital) yellow capsules Nembutal
Nembutal (pentobarbital) blue tablet
Desoxyn (methamphetamine) yellow tablet
Desbutol which was desoxyn (methamphetamine) and nembutal (pentobarbital) a weird half-and-half tablet that was blue on one side and yellow on the other and people used to split them with a razor blade.

And of course, who can forget Boone’s Farm Apple Wine and Ripple?

I think the sixties, as your talking about them, either ended or at least changed dramatically when the musical “Hair” came out. There was necked people in it! It sort of marked the end of an era, or at least the beginning of a different one. The drug culture became metropolitan.

My next door neighbor told me about all of this.

[Thothmes]

209. Sadley

several of the kids my high class didnt come back from Viet Nam. Several came back missing pieces. A sad time.

[B Calm]

184. Boones Farm, Ripple were the wine of choice, Nickle bag was a match box full of pot, a Lid was

an ounce of pot normally costing fifteen dollars for Mexican and twenty dollars for Colombian Gold.

[earth mom]

186. I grew up in the 60s & 70s and still use the slang of my youth.

Cool, Bummer, Groovy, Dig it, Bitchin, Dude, Man, The Kind, etc.

We had WAY COOL slang back then dude. O8)

[Le Taz Hot]

188. One I still use today

and still elicits a laugh:

"Dude, you're harshin' my mellow." :hippie:

[livetohike]

189. I was a Sophomore in High School in 1967 - here is what I remember

My Civics teacher (also my homeroom teacher) screaming at us kids because no one volunteered to help put together boxes for the service men in Viet Nam. I can still see his red face as he yelled, " I know a man that died in Viet Nam."

We still had a dress code in school. Girl's skirts had to be no more than 3" above the knee and we had to kneel and have it measured if any teacher suspected an infraction.Your parents were called and you were sent home to change clothes. Slacks were not allowed to be worn.

Boys were not allowed to have their hair touch the back of their collar, or to have sideburns that came down below their ear lobes.

What did we talk about?

Whether Paul McCartney was dead or not.
General high school gossip.
Whether you had a date for the weekend or not.
Music, music, music :-)

Nothing earth shaking until 1968 - that's when everything changed.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

190. "cop" or "kype" for "steal"

"Who kyped my notebook?"

"bod" for body or figure.

"zero" as an adjective, meaning deficient or undesirable.

"He's got a zero bod."

"Move your bod."

"Simple" for stupid and unfashionable.

"Those clothes make you look simple."

"Neat" and "sharp" were the highest forms of praise.

The kids who had money and looked down on everyone else were referred to as "society."

"She'll never go out with you. She's society."

A semi-delinquent teenager who affected a tough attitude was called a "hood."

"He's cute, but he's kind of a hood."

We used the exclamation "duh!" and referred to stupid people not as "doofuses" but simply as "doofs."

We used the slang terms "barf" and "zits," and I think that "barf" was relatively new, because The Family Circle cartoon (yes, it's been around that long!) had a dog named Barfy, and we all thought that was funny.

Some of these may have been local to Minnesota in the mid 1960s.

[Vinca]

191. Boone's Farm wine was the quaff of choice in the day.

Women ironed their hair (using a regular iron and ironing board), wore maxi skirts as well as mini skirts and bras were MIA. Peter Max began his heydey, R. Crumb "Keep On Truckin'," VW bug or bus was the car, communes sprung up as people went back to the land, Beatles still toured - it's hard to remember since everyone was stoned most of the time.:rofl:

[mitchtv]

217. Don't Bogart that joint my friend

pass it over to me.
One toke over the line

[ourbluenation]

192. The youngest of the boomers, like myself, hella loved The Monkeys...

I remember arguing with my mom about who was better...Beatles vs Monkeys. As if. I was born in 63.

What else - those smiley face stickers were highly prized among me and my set. Lots of unfortunate polyester. Sorry, that's all I remember.

[Longhorn]

193. It's been real.

Said when you're saying goodbye. I know I was saying it in 72-73 and I wasn't on the cutting edge of anything. ;) I wasn't a hippy but I guess a lot of us were wannabes.

[WinkyDink]

197. Read some Hunter S. Thompson! Don't get co-opted!

[Why Syzygy]

198. We all thought we could change the wolrd.

This is one thing that is so disillusioning about seeing other adults of that time who grew up to be Bushes and Roves. They were the dorks of the day back then to be sure.

Hippies are idealistic. You probably know some now and they haven't changed that much. If your character identifies with idealism, he will be drawn to the hippie soul.

The culture envisioned a less pretentious and more REAL existence. We hated all the money and war games. Still do.

We were the counter culture of the day. You would have to check with Stella upthread to get an exact, but it probably ended about 1978. (due to the transit of an outer planet)

footnote: It was the hippie culture which pushed for civil rights, including feminism. And much more.

[Breeze54]

199. "Oh no.... (lol) I fell through a window, man!" - "Fuck the pigs!!"

Window pane LSD mandatory party cry! :P

[DemoTex]

201. A "short" was a car. An "ax" was one's musical instrument. A "gig" was a job.

"Tight" referred to a well-played jazz tune. "Cats Wailing" were the horns blowing their hearts out. "Skins" were drums and a "tub" was a bass violin. Listening to a "side" was listening to an LP album. A "juicer" was a drinker, usually a musician .. The Juicer is Wild was a Buddy Rich (one of the greatest skins-man, ever!) tune.

[PhiBetaCretin1]

204. Oh man! This is a wonderful stroll down memory lane...

I was just reading some old '60s-'70s war demonstration stuff elsewhere before I stumbled upon this thread at DU. It all has me feeling a little nostalgic. Those were interesting times indeed! ("May you live in interesting times.") It's pleasantly funny to recall all of this slang. We sure were creative with the English language.

Sock it to me!
I'm ready to get out my Incense and Peppermints vinyl album by Strawberry Alarm Clock... :smoke:

[lumberjack_jeff]

206. Solid! But don't bogart all the great lingo, man.

Or, everything I need to know I learned by watching Scooby Doo. :)

[tucsonlib]

208. Sharp??!! Went out in '59.....

From an FBI-certified 60s-era hippie - Trust me:
Heavy, Deep, Trippy, Bummer, Far Out, Wow, Bogart, Roach Clip, Fried, Wasted, Windowpane, Blotter, Hash, Shrooms, Downer, Upper, Fucked-up, Pig, Narc......Lots more if you need 'em.......

Topics Discussed: Viet Nam (The Draft) and, yes, Sex, Drugs & Rock'n'Roll.....

[Lydia Leftcoast]

216. Not in Minnesota--I used it in the mid 1960s

We may have been a little retro.

[tucsonlib]

218. That's Okay

A state that produced Robert Zimmerman can't be all bad..........

[NOLALady]

210. Wasted!

[NOLALady]

211. What's your sign?

[shanti]

212. bitchen thread, dude!

:hi: raised in the OC in the 60's

[Two Americas]

213. a different point of view

Most of what people associate with "the 60's" today is either a caricature, or is more appropriately associated with the very late 60's and the 70's.

There weren't any "hippies" really, let alone an "average hippy." I think that as late as 1968 there were 10 people in the city of Detroit who would fit the modern cartoon caricature of "hippies," while there were a couple hundred thousand serious political activists. Of course, by 1971 everyone looked like a "hippy" - that was nothing more than fashion, though, and the fashion statement represented the death of the political movements of the 60's. Why bother being politically active when you could make a statement with how you dressed?

The 60's were mostly a time of serious political activism. The right wingers have been on a campaign ever since to paint it as a time of "hippies," drugs, rock and roll and hedonism.

Woodstock and the Yippies at Chicago were at the end of the 60's, and not very representative of the era, but they have come to define the era.

The 60's were sober, serious, and important.

[mitchtv]

215. There were many many Hippies in Calif

msny from the midwest By 68 there were thousands all with long hair. (that took about10 years to hit mid america).

[Two Americas]

220. maybe

"Long hair" is a fashion trend, and I am sure that, like all other fads, started in California a few years earlier than the rest of the country.

Sad that long hair and hippies symbolize the 60's.

I think it was mostly a media created phenomenon, that was then copied by people. Hardly representative of the 60's, though.

I think we are hearing from people from a very narrow demographic here.

Social upheaval all across the country, SNCC, Malcolm X, Civil Rights work, insurgencies in the Labor movement, suburbanization and white flight, freeways and malls and sprawl destroying neighborhoods, the collapse of public transportation, poor people's city on the Mall - all of this dwarfs fashion statements by a relative handful of relatively well-off and privileged young people.

[mitchtv]

214. Well I was there, and the others remembered all the words

came out in June 67 to SF. Muni cost 15 cents but everyone was hitching around town, Free was the word. The Diggers were soon to be on Waller , around the corner from me on Ashbury. The Manson crowd were up in Cole , I think Diggers gave out free food and made bread in coffe cans called "Digger bread" People bought food at the Food Conspiracy, the bulk cream chease was the greatest, and all that Granola.Music was to be had on the Panhandle and at night we went to the Filmore on Geary and the Avalon ballroom on Sutter. Chet Helms had the consciousness raising group at Playland, which was passing into SF history by then. North Beach was hot for us gay hoppoes and upper Grant had the best bar of all, the Capri.I delivered mail in Station J on Clayton right next to the Haight Ashbury free Clnic, then I went to South America . a little atmosphere

[SoCalDemGrrl]

221. How about bitchen. we used to use that phrase alot and

also "far out". There was a lot of political talk about Nixon, Watergate. In high school those of us who opposed Vietnam were called "peace creeps". Lots of talk about lottery numbers as in what number were you in the draft lottery depending on your date of birth.