This is a grassroots level, Web 1.0 site.
It first went online in the year 2000.
Now it's older than MySpace, Facebook, Twitter etc.
Welcome to
my hippie crib on the Web
Hippie also spelled 'hippy' is a
member of a counterculture group that began in the United
States during the Vietnam
War, just
after the British
Invasion in 1960s. Hippie, Flower
Child or
sometimes Hipster are synonyms for a Hippy. Hippies are people whose
behavior, dress, worldviews, use of psychedelic drugs,
tastes in art, music etc. imply a rejection of
conventional Middle
Class
values. Origins of hippies can be traced back to European
freedom movement groups and Bohemians, American 1940s Hipsters and 1950s Beats. But probably every
bohemian, artist, hipster, beatnik and/or hippie will
tell you that they are who they are because it came
naturally to them from the heart. Hence, the real hippie
crib is in the heart.
During the 1950s, aspects of the Beat
movement
metamorphosed into the sixties counterculture,
accompanied by a shift in terminology from
"beatnik" to "hippie" [Read more]. Hence, hippies came from
the Beats. The leading writers known as the
"beats" were Allen
Ginsberg, Jack
Kerouac, William
Burroughs
and Gregory
Corso. Their
followers were called "beatniks", and the word
"beatnik" came from the word
"beatific", which means "bestowing bliss,
blessings, happiness, blissful, saintly [Def. from:
Dictionary.com].
The most obvious differences between beatniks and hippies
were their tastes in dress and music. Beatniks preferred
Jazz music, abstract art and fashions from Paris, France.
On the other hand, hippies preferred Folk-Rock music,
psychedelic art and Mod fashions mostly from London, and
also from San Francisco such as jeans, bandanas and the
Hippie Look (bell bottoms, overalls etc.), which was
introduced in San Francisco in 1969.
The name of The
Beatles, a
1960s English band that started the British
Invasion was
a play of words in the spelling of the words "beat"
+ "beetle = "Beatle".
That play in spelling identified The Beatles with the
Beats and with Hippies. The spelling was a stoke of
genius that came to John Lennon in a dream. On July 6,
1961, John
Lennon was
asked by a reporter from Mersey
Beat (Vol.1
No. 1) how did the name Beatles arrive? He replied
"It came in a vision - a man appeared on a flaming
pie and said 'From this day on you are Beatles, spelled
with an A'. Thank you Mister Man, they said, thanking
him."
The hippie movement was like a magic event brought about
by many coincidental events or by Synchronicity. Some of those were the
British music invasion headed by The Beatles, the Vietnam
War, Peace movement, Civil Rights movement, Women's
Rights movement, and others that merged somehow at the
same time. Hippies popped up like mushrooms in different
parts of the country, and the world. At first, the
Beatles style long hair became a hippie trademark. That
was followed by Mod fashions from London, and by other
fashions from San Francisco such as bell-bottoms in late
1969. The movement did not have a hierarchical or family
type structure with leaders or elders at the top. Though
the movement had different "heros" (persons
admired for having done or said something important), and
there may have been groups or communes that may have
taken on a hierarchial structure, the hippie movement was
a freedom movement that revolved mainly around music,
liberal ideas, gatherings and other events. It did not
have an organized structure and was different in many
ways from those that were formed abroad later.
Well over 90% of American hippies were young and of draft age, just like me. But the
movement was open for people of all ages who shared
hippie ideas. Attempts to categorize hippies into various
categories, casts or groups is a mistake and not in line
with its real freedom loving character. And the hippie
slang word "Head" was just an inside slang word
for a fellow hippie - not for a hippie leader. However,
it was an underground movement, and had its secrets and
intimate side. So, not all hippie circles were open for
anyone; especially those that weren't "heads";
in other words for those that didn't share hippie ideas
and weren't trustworthy. But that was not always the
case... There were also hippies that were eager to
accepted anyone who knocked on their door. And especially
in the early 1970s, sometimes hippie ideas and lifestyles
opened an opportunity for abuse by criminals and/or
pushers of hard drugs. But time has shown that hippie
ideas of peace, love and happiness have prevailed because
they are strong, universal and timeless.
Please remember Woodstock 1969 and the Summer of Love.
Peace!
To know where were going, we
have to understand where weve been. In that spirit
this website was built. At first, it was made for folks
the author had met in his travels abroad, who didn't
understand the influence 1960s and hippies had on our
modern culture. The site has also become a source of
first hand information about 1960-70s hippies and the author's personal
experiences, among other things.
Some reasons for the creation of the site
because many websites on the subject were made by people
that were too young in the 1960s to understand what was
going on, weren't born yet or were not hippies
themselves,
because the media portrays of the 1960s is often an image
created to serve conservative corporate propaganda
interests,
because the author's experiences were different from
those of others, to
prevent destortion of facts about hippies and 1960s Peace
movement, to
contribute to the global community, to
create a personal home site on the Web, to
tell about the author's experiences, to
preserve the spirit and ideas that are dear to hippies, and
for other reasons.
I was there, drank the wine, smoked the weed, passed the
acid test, got initiated and was given a hippie name: The
Polish Hippy. So, if you won't expect too much from my
writing skills and find the time to go through some stuff
posted on the site, perhaps you'll learn a bit more about
the 1960-70s and how and why they changed the world so
much. But most of all, this will be a biography of a
1960s Chicago hippy rather then a research type work on
the subject.
In my transatlantic travels and the mentoring work I've
done in Europe, I've met many folks that didn't
understand America; especially the 1960s and hippies. So,
instead of writing a book on the subject, caring photo
albums and scrap books with me and retelling the same
story to everyone I've come across, I've built this site
instead. You'll find lots of information, related links,
photos, my music, etc. here. And the site was built by
me. Thus, the site is an online work of art, and blog
style literature.
My experiences were somewhat different from other 1960s
hippies. I lived in Chicago and traveled to Europe. When
I started building this site in about 2000, there were
just a few hippies on the Web. Perhaps that was because
many old hippies were not computer literate; though
hippies and psychedelics did play a major role in the
development of computers, informatics and the World Wide
Web. Later, after I've built the site came Web 2.0 technology and services that
made it possible for almost anyone to create their own
blogs, websites and pages on newly created social network
sites such as Facebook, YouTube, MySpace etc. Web 2.0
opened the World Wide Web for the masses.
My concept music
inspired by Amsterdam and the 1960s
AdamsCrib.com
This is a non-profit website.
To maintain this website, I need your help.
A small donation will help me a lot.
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