Sixties Day on Fri, Mar 13: bring photos, dress in style

Give peace a chance 2
Originally uploaded by trudeau

Sixties day celebrations amuse me because I was there in the late 60's and was a part of the alternative culture. The late 60's were a thrilling era but easy to misunderstand.

Some easy bits of perspective -
- the late 60's didn't really happen in the Deep South until the mid-to-late 70's. The South was pretty retarded when it came to new fashion.
- 60's style was mostly a big city phenomenon.
- On the straight side there were mini-skirts and they were shockingly short. On the hippie side were long skirts, peasant blouses, no bras, and moccasins instead of stacked heel shoes.
- Hindu style became popular. Guys and girls wore kurtas, light cotton tunics, over jeans with Indian sandals.
- Love beads were a mark of someone who did not really understand the deeper change that was occurring.
- Fabric belts and headbands were often crafted via macrame, creative knotting of string. Bandanas were commonly used as headbands.
- Tie-dye was part of the Do-It-Yourself hippie ethic.
- Wire frame glasses were important. I found a pair of my grandmother's glasses from the 1930's or 40's and used them.
- Dashikis, tunics that featured bright African patterns, were popular with Black Americans. Also, the Afro, a bush that could be picked out into a leonine mane, was widely worn.
- Army surplus clothing was cool. In fact, bell-bottom jeans as made by Levi's and other companies, were inspired by youths who wore bell-bottom sailor's pants.
- The Yin Yang symbol began to be integrated. Few people knew what it meant.

1. Wear something that fits dress code. Wild things from your family's closet might be brought in a box or bag and shown.
2. Choose 1 or 2 photos from album or yearbook of your relatives in1968. Or choose a couple of photos from a magazine, book or online site. Some of you will get to show and tell.
3. Food? We ate plain yogurt, drank tea and experimented with vegetarianism, as in brown rice w beans. Homemade bread as well as home-made yogurt. I'm afraid there's nothing exciting about classic hippie meals from the late 60's except - the illegal - poison mushrooms and hashish brownies.