My wife and I were there. I have more memories  than I could think about typing. I started at the  Catacombs, lived at Middle Earth and vaguely  remember a head shop on W P'tree at 14th...I  think. That would have been '66 or '67. It seems  like the strip started when Atlantis Rising got  established...the place to be. I lived all around the park. By '68 I was living at "The River  House" up on the 'Hooche. Brought Renée, my wife,  up from FL in June of '69. We were married  07/07/69 at the "Free Concert" in the park after  the 1st Atl POP. I got popped in early '70, which removed me from the scene, but didn't kill the  memories. Sadly, only 2 pictures have lasted as  long as my marriage.  Bob Oldsroyd, red headed Bob, was always taking pictures. Has he turned up? 

 Schroeder & Renée

Ahhh Peachtree and 14th street- Atlantis Rising.

 

I saw Jim Morrison read his poetry in front of 100 people at the museum and he was sober and wore a suit and tie .How many saw him sober?

 

Tripped with Duane Allman.

 

Met Russ Meyer at the age of 13- because he was auditioning my 18 year old girlfriend at the Festival Cinema run by George Ellis, aka Bestoink Dooley the TV horror host.

 

Organized a sit in against mandatory ROTC that 80% of the student body joined and resulted in a police riot. Grady High School.

 

Got laid like a s.o.b. and was the only person ever fired from The Graet Speckled Bird- for writing a piece in which I said The Black Panthers should not threaten cops with guns as the cops have more guns.

 

http://subgeniusslack.blogdrive.com

 

The way the above blog is written blends a 30 year period so you have to catch stuff as it comes up.

I remember those days so very well. I'm now 54 years old. At that time I was an impressionable young 16/17 year old. I went to both pop festivals. I lived off 13th street in a drug rehab house.......named Renewal House. I met a guy there named Robert Straight, But everyone called him "Decent". I married him in Piedmont Park in the gazebo June 21, 1970 or 71. A guy named Michael Spraidlin? or Spraitlin? married us. The Allman Brothers played in the park that day.......

Someone later told me the wedding was filmed by one of the local news channels and to this day I wish I had a picture to show my daughter. There are alot of memories of those days. I thank the Lord I made it through. I have scars from those days and the old saying  goes--if you play you may end up paying. Wish I had a picture of that wedding.........

Thanks

adavi

Well, I was rather rebellious as a teenager to start with. Out of control sexually, hated to live at home, and I guess you could blame it all on the Beatles.HA HA My mom took me and  my sister and a friend to see them August 18, 1965.. I was 12! They were at the Atlanta Stadium. From that time on I was hooked. I started smoking pot when I was 13/14 and started tripping on acid at 15.I was a wild child. Older friends took me to the strip and one experience led to another. My sister was a groupie to several bands at the time. I remember a club named Richard's.... Lynyrd Skynyrd first played there.

How could I ever forget?  Piedmont Park whose various bridges I slept under as a 14 year old runaway.  On whose grass I lost my virginity one humid southern night to a big hippie girl who went by the name Wild Honey Sunburst.  The park's fountains became bathtubs for the homeless young freaks of the day.   

This big blond was constantly in the company of small slim brunette named Canary- a self-professed "coal-burner" from Memphis.  They had a room in a boarding house. 

Hey do you remember that Fish and Chips on the Strip?  It was open 24 hours I think and was shelter for many during bad weather and that movie theatre that showed that movie theatre that never took down those Funny Girl posters.

Then there was the live Drag Theatre on the corner (or maybe a bar)....    I stayed with a dope dealer for awhile who had an apartment in a cool brick building.  There were French doors inside and he hid the dope in the .....   I remember it was a big place and the rent  was something like $75.00 per month.  He didn't beat me up when he discovered that some of the MDA was missing.  He was a much older man... about 27! 

Who didn't at one time or other sell "The Bird".  I used to sell somewhere on Roswell Rd. at the city limits I think.  Some guys were turning tricks in the parks for $5.00 (bj only) and others were "rolling the queers" as they sought sex partners at night. 

What was it all about?   Freedom? For me think so.  There was in those times a collective spirit of change and love and revolution which hasn't been matched since.  It was as if everyone was tuned in to the same psychedelic channel.  The free concerts in the park... the headshops with hand-written signs "no-rip-offs".  There was that old victorian house that the Black Panthers used as their headquaters.  Just so many memories. 

Thank God for guys like Carter Tomassi whose black and white photographs let us step back in time for a moment to remember where we've been.

Jimmy M

Oh, my; I am so sorrowfully out of touch. I did not know that John Cippolina had died. He in particular, as well as QuickSilver Messenger Service have been a part of my personal story (you know, the one that makes folks politely drift away when they hear it coming for the fourteenth time) since 1968.

Actually, it was with John's mother I first spoke. He was in the shower. She relayed conversation back and forth, at the end of which I was very excited: John had invited me to the Avalon for their gig that night--guest list, see us in the dressing room (which was not "back" stage, but out front, back a ways, and adjacent to the dance floor). Reason being--I was under recent indictment (May '68; this was maybe mid-late summer) for "refusal to submit to physical examination for the purposes of induction into the armed forces of the savior of the free world...lada,lada, lada). The purpose of the meeting at the Avalon was to see if there were some way that QSD could play for--my trial!

Well, that never happened, even though John thought it worth looking into. I always have remembered (obviously) the way they treated me. I think John said, in response to my gratitude for inviting me to meet with them, something about how they were only musicians--but I was really stepping out to fight against that war that truly exemplified the "Pride of Man." (That, of course, was the song that gave me the idea.) So I miss him, I miss the easy confidence that somewhere, probably in Marin Co. he's getting old (we were born the same year), regrouping with the old crew. But he's not.

I offer this tribute so that others of his fans may know that he cared about the humanity of this planet, in those dangerous (but truly alive!) days. -greg gregory

Greg convinced the jury and got his CO at the same time as Joan Baez’s husband David Harris was denied his. Greg moved to Atlanta and wrote for The Bird and was an early mover and shaker in the Little Five Points B.O.N.D. neighborhoods organization that laid the groundwork for making the neighborhoods humanly liveable..

My memories of the Catacombs and Piedmont Park era are of great fondness. I went to high school and lived in Forest Park. I was a senior in 68' and played in a band called "The Celestial Voluptuous Banana". I use to sneak out at night when my parents were asleep and steal their car and drive up to 14th Street to frequent the Catacombs where I got turned onto a lot of great music.

Doug Merrill(rip) was the owner and I wasn't really aware of all the supposedly illegal things going on behind the scene but became friends with The Hampton Grease Band, The Bag and many other groups. I met Steven Cole (rip) who understood the possibilities of the music scene way before other promoters actually acted on it. He predicted that one day bands would be playing huge venues to packed audiences. It was under Steve's management that The Celestial Voluptuous Banana, Hydra, The Fifth Order, Booger Band, Radar, The Hampton Grease Band, The Bag and many others started working clubs and performed in Piedmont Park.

The Catacombs was home to a lot of different characters that have scattered to the wind but I remember a guy named Jim Nieman who was a regular there and he would perform solo with a great voice and a pretty good sense of humor. Jim also had a gig for a while on a radio station based in south Atlanta called WBAD. His show was called "The Nasty Lord John Show" and he played some very hip stuff. A special show was put together at the old Atlanta City Auditorium which was promoted through the station and the band was called "The Jeff Espina Banana Boat Blues Band and Traveling Freak Show Too featuring Eddie The Road Manager". I went to the show which was sparcely attended but the band kicked ass and then you also had the strobe lights and smoke machines. I also got turned onto Ellen McInwayne and still have the 45 that she put out and sold from the catacombs. Ellen left and went to New York to work with a band called "Fear Itself" and I only remember Steve Cook as one of the band members.

I remember seeing some incredible music at the Catacombs including a band from DC called "Flavor" which was a three piece group that killed as did the night I saw the "Candymen" there. The Candymen was the basis for later formed "Atlanta Rhythm Section". I can remember the catacombs just like it was yesterday and the smells of the smoke machine which was furnished by "The Electric Collage" which was owned and ran by Frank Hughes who was also a partner of Steve Cole of the Discovery Agency.

I remember performing at Piedmont Park and the crowds were incredible and receptive. The Banana was nothing more than a cover band but still, the crowds were great. During that time (68-70) you could see and hear a lot of great music in the park like the time I saw the Allman Bros. with Boz Skaggs sitting in and Chicago Transit Authority staying over after a concert at the auditorium and they would perform with Santana. Local groups got in the act as well with Booger Band being one of those groups that people would make sure not to miss. Keyboardist, Will Boware (sp?)was formally with "The Souljers" and he was not unlike Stevie Winwood in the respect that he was a child phenom. He sang, wrote and played an amazing Hammond B3 and keyboard bass. The drummer, Joel Maloney (rip) was an amazing young drummer and the guitarist, Ted Trombetta was equally incredible on guitar.

Most of my memories are great ones although I do remember being hassled by the man. Yeah, don't stand there and keep moving. Some restaurants wouldn't serve you and if they did then they demanded a minimum. One restaurant located at 14th & Peachtree at the time (the name escapes me), demanded a 50 cent minimum order so one night Doug Merrill took a bunch of us over there and packed out the place and we all ordered the minimum and pissed off the owners. Cops were called and since they couldn't do much they busted some of the ones that they could figure out charges on such as minors etc.

I remember the riot on Peachtree when the buildings were set on fire and the cops were called and remember getting the hell out of there as cops were on a rampage to make arrests.

I remember the frat boys coming up from Ga. tech trying to get a piece of free love and hassling the groovy chicks with tie dyed shorts etc. I also remember some of those same frat guys driving by and throwing urine at the "hippies" standing around.

I remember thinking that the neighborhood started going down when drugs started making it's presence. Sort of like the time one of our guitarist drank beledonna (sp?) that was laced in his soft drink. Met a lot of incredible people there and a few I still am in contact with but have no idea where Jim Nieman is or what happened to some of the great musicians I saw but they all left an impression on me.

I also use to go to the 12th Gate which was on 10th and it was a house converted into a coffee house/music venue. I saw some of the most incredible music ever including drummer Elvin Jones, Pianist McCoy Tyner, Sonny Fortune, Oregon and many others. I performed there once with a collection of other local guys and it was just a place for magic to be on a stage that had seen some of your childhood idols. I could probably go on and on but that's pretty much the gist of a lot of my memories when music had so many possibilities and there were so many places for us to get our fix.

Darryl Rhoades

Greetings!

I have been waiting for the Internet to provide this project for 12 years!

I was there in '69. Tried the Orange Sunshine, stayed with (biker) johnny Reb, next door to the catacombs, up the street from white columns, Ate Thanksgiving dinner in Piedmont Park before being returned to my home.

Spent much time on the strip between 1970 and 1972.

"Worked" at the community with Gypsy (biker) Vick (hippie) and Crystal and many others.

Then the bikers had a meet and the charter changed and Gypsy was replaced with Chains

Remember Bongo and Steve (the guy with the big cross)

Sunshine (was that Bonnie Raitt?)

Spade Bob, Poet, Runaway Richard, Mary (The Bridge) Flower and the other folks who lived in the apartments under the Salvation Army Girls Lodge (127 or 1127 11th street)

Jd, chili dog charley, smokey, marvin gardens (how could I forget that name,ever)

Here are a few places I didn't see mentioned

General store (down 10th st. next to the alley)

G.B.'s an awesome restaurant for us (corner of 11th and peachtree after the Drag club closed)

owned by Golden Boy I finally figured

The Bridge (metro atlanta mediation canter)up 11th street

Salvation Army Girls Lodge (behind G.B.'s)

The Bowery (a club I wasn't old enough to enter) next door to the community center

our place outside the strip area - SHOTWELL

a couple of bands I didn't see mentioned

celestial voluptuous Banana

Eric Quincy Tate

I hope this project really takes off!

I was little Bob. Now my friends call me cat as in

cheshire T. cat.

Hi,

From 2 old Hippies who have both lived in The Dump -- now living in San Diego -- Miki Foote (now Miki Davis) and Jeannie Muse (now Jeannie Canaday) !!!

 

Bud Foote and I lived in The Dump (ground floor in what is now the back of the house) from 1961 to late 1964 - early 1965, when Gino Venzani bought it so the House of Eng Chinese restaurant that sat back-to-back with The Dump couldn't buy it, tear it down, and turn it in to a parking lot.

Gino is also the one who had it declared a National Historical Site so no one could tear it down. He loved that old building. I was living there when Gino first renovated it.  He kept it as apartments for quite some time.

Our son Joseph Nathaniel Foote was born in October 1964 while we were still living there. He now lives in Decatur. 

 Would you like some pictures of our family taken in The Dump when we lived there?

Hope you got some of Jim Bray's Art for display.  His studio was on the ground floor in the center in the rear.  Bud Foote and he were great friends.

One night Jim was having a family fight, got drunk, came to The Dump, took all of his paintings out in to the yard, piled them up, poured paint thinner over them and set them on fire.  A couple of the guys who lived there tried to put it out with the garden hose (not very successfully), Naomi Brown decided to get down on her knees and bow to the Great Fire Gods, and it was altogether quite a bonfire party until the fire brigade got there.

Darn near burned down The Dump that night !!

 

I could tell at LOT MORE stories ... but most of them are unpublishable.

 

Can you put me in touch with Bill Fibben or any of the others.  Only ones I know how to contact in Atlanta now

are Van and Martha Hall.

 

By the way, my daughter Anna Foote (now Anna Copello) sent me the info on this.  She was only a year old when

we moved in to the Dump -- she now lives in Atlanta near the Plaza Drug Store and will be at the "gathering" on July 26th.

 

Jeannie and I would give just about anything to be able to be there.  We'll be think of you all.

I'll be sending out the info on this to some more of the old crew and I'm sure you all will be hearing from some more of them.

 "Mother" Dave Braden -- knew and loved him well.  He lived in The Dump when we did.

Will confer with Jeannie and we'll send you some info.

If I remember right, he was one of the driving forces of the underground coffee house "The Catacombs."

I remember it well, too .... all black walls, black-light artwork, great wooden platters of cheese and fruit.

So dark in there you couldn't see your hand in front of your face.  Seemed to be a forerunner of "Gothic"!

It was in the basement of a house on 14th, between Peachtree and Piedmont, if my memory is still working right.

 

You really should include info on The Castle in your Web page.  You familiar with it?

How about Baltimore Block.  These were both very much a part of the 60s Hippie community.

 

Jeannie also has some great pictures -- but they're in her son's house in Las Vegas.  We'll try and get them to you soon.

 

Sorry to hear about Bill Fibben.  Many of the old originals have died:

Bud Foote

Dickie Espina (just last month), wife of Jeff Espina, now a sea captain out of Tampa, FL

Naomi Brown

Ernie Marrs

Jim Bray

(and many more I'm sure I've lost track of)

 

I've sent the message on to some of the old timers:  Eleanor Walden, Bill Hoffman, Pat Sky.

You may hear from them, too.

Love,

Miki

Hi,

What a great thing you are doing! I love it.

When did I first come to Atlanta? March 1970.

What brought me to Atlanta? My sister. I had run away

from boarding school. My sister came to DC and found

me, and I went to Atlanta to live with her.

When did I first visit the strip?  March 1970. It was

such an experience. I remember very clearly the first

time I walked down the strip. I felt like I was home.

My best experience? The free concerts in the park. It

was always such a beautiful day when the bands played.

So many people. My best experience of all was an acid

trip in the park that I shared with my sister. We sat

by the water for hours...in the gazebo.  My sister

died in an auto accident a few years ago. I felt

compelled to return to Atlanta and visit the park. I

sat in exactly the same place we had been during that

trip and remembered her.

Worst experience?  When the police came down the strip

and started arresting people for "loitering." They

beat people. I was arrested twice, once for loitering

and once for jay-walking.  Then the police cleared out

Piedmont Park. It became a lonely, sad place.

What did I learn? I don't know, really. It was a

defining time in my life. I thought it would go on

forever. I guess I learned that we can never really

have that time back again...though I would give

anything if we could. I sort of feel like a fish out

of water now.

Julie

I don't know if you are still collecting stories, etc., but on the off chance you are I thought I'd send mine along with the poster.

1. I first moved to Atlanta in the summer of 1968.

2. I moved to Atlanta to see what the whole Hippie movement was about and also to spread my wings and fly after two years of Jr. College in Bradenton, FL.  Five of us drove to Atlanta from Bradenton.  We got there in the early evening and started looking for a place to "crash."  We tried house after house on 14th St.  Finally we went to the Catacombs, a blues bar on the corner of 14th St. and Peachtree St.  We ran into a man called PaPa John.  He invited us to dinner at his home way out somewhere.  He had about 3 or 4 children and his wife made spaghetti for supper.  We went back to the Catacombs after that and met a biker named Monkey who said we could crash at his apt. because he wasn't going back there.

The next day I rented an efficiency apt. at 181 14th St.  I met a lot of very nice people living there.  While there I sold The Great Speckled Bird at various street corners.  I also would spare change people for some cash.  I remember meeting a guy named Beano who was somehow my cousin many times removed.  He was from Mississippi.  Two guys named Charlie and Stevie were acquaintances of mine then as well.  I remember going to a 4th of July Parade and a bunch of us stopping the parade in a protest. 

3. My best experience associated with the strip was the people.  There was a community there that was caring and felt safe like a family.

4. My worse experience was moving out of the community to Peachtree Hills.

5. I learned from that time in my life that all people are family members waiting to be met.

6.  Like I mentioned above, I lived at 181 14th St. for several months.

Peace,

sally

This is a link to a website of the era.

http://www.bandhistory.com has the history, music and photos of many of the period bands and their history leading up to the hippie era.  I was in one of those bands and lived on the Georgia Tech campus from 1966-1970.  We played some of the free concerts at Piedmont Park, as well as at "The Headrest" and "Funchio's House of Rock."

Good luck on your project.

Todd Merriman

While I had spent most of my life in Atlanta, I left to go to school in Macon, GA.  There I found a whole new world.  I had always liked "different" music, but a lot of it was being made in Macon.  I had gone to the Municipal Auditorium in Atlanta, sat in the "white only" balcony to see Jimmy Reed, Ray Charles, and many others while in high school. But,  I was introduced to The Magnolia Ballroom and Peacock Lounge during college.  In Macon, we hung out at the gay bar, the biker's bar, the black jazz club, the trucker's lounge & really listened to R & B, and the beginnings of Southern Rock.  I let my hair grow --- and got rid of the bleached blond look.  T-shirts and jeans, brighter colors and pierced ears entered my life, along with opposition to our involvement in Vietnam, and actively trying to integrate my college and Macon.

 

During a visit home --- Atlanta--- I discovered the Illien (sp?) Gallery and then, the Stein Club. After meeting a lot of people at the Stein, I decided to move back to Atlanta, and go to grad school at GA State.  Living just off Piedmont, I could walk home at 2 AM from the Stein with no problems.  I knew the folks at the A & P, the hardware store, the bakery and the deli.  It was small town life, but, oh, so different !

 

Music was available all up and down the Strip.  The Atlanta Pop Festivals, seeing Stevie Winwood and the "British Invasion" at the old Fulton Stadium, Little Feat on 10th St., shows at the Sports Arena, the Great Southeastern Music Hall----such great music ! Then, there was soccer at the Stadium ---- and those pre-game parties-- and rugby games and parties ! The big Atlanta Snow left about 15-20 of us "trapped" in a house on Piedmont, across from the Park.  Survival parties would set out for the liquor store at Ansley Mall, and come slipping and sliding back with cases of beer, etc.

 

During all of this, there was the Stein.  My home away from home where I could always count on finding friends, something interesting to talk about, meeting people from all over the States and elsewhere, discovering new places to go, finishing a pitcher while my clothes were washing/drying at the Laundromat.......the place where, when some of us started having kids, getting married, etc., the management built a beer garden with swings and a sandbox !  Both my children learned to walk at the Stein, rolling around in their little yellow walker, and then being helped out of the walker and picked up a million times by all their friends there at the Stein.  The Stein spawned other parties ---- Orphan's Thanksgiving, the Opera Party, 4th of July, the Halloween Costume Party, the Kentucky Derby Party --- all fun and a little crazy.  We would wander off to Rose's Cantina, the Chinese place on the corner of 10th, down to the Fox to see The Grateful Dead, to "the Park" where I heard the Dead and the Allman Bros. playing together about 10 feet away from me, but always coming back to the Stein to start the evening, end the evening, or both !  Suzanne

Larry Ortega :When I was 15 years old, my dad, who worked at Emory University in Atlanta, gave my friend Cynthia and me two tickets to see this guy named Pete Seeger, a folk singer who I had never heard of. (I think that my dad thought that folk singers were wholesome!). Cynthia and I piled into a small auditorium on campus, and sat on the floor. As we sat there, a college student came to the microphone and told us that earlier that day, the National Guard had shot and killed four students at a little college in Ohio called Kent State, during a protest against the war in Vietnam. Then, Pete Seeger came out and sang his heart out, and we all sang with him. That night my life changed, and I have never been the same. I have been to his concerts since then, but I don't think that anything will ever match the power, and the sadness, and the awe that we all felt that night. Pete Seeger and I share this stupid belief that children should be nurtured, and not shot down by their own government. The last couple of times that I have seen Mr. Seeger on television, he has mentioned that he was losing his voice in his advanced age. He isn't losing his "voice," at all. It's right here.

I grew up in Atlanta, literally--from 66-67 I was playing Army wife, then came home and worked for Delta till 68 then off to Kansas to play army wife again--thats where I got the Bird in the mail. Back to Atlanta in 69, and stayed. My Bottom of the Barrel days interspersed that--I remember meeting my husband in SF in April 68, buying beads and a brass peace symbol in the Haight.  The peace symbol still hangs in my car--Jeff Espina has/had the beads! We knew the owners and were there a lot--also==was it the Carousel, or something, that had a sliding board onto the dance floor?  That was definitely 67/68.

 

I think it was pre-68 when the Bird did a class-action suit because the postal service tried to shut them down for running ads for abortion centers.  I was one of the "class" with about 6 other women, but we never had to go to court, cause the PO just let it die.

 

And pre-67, before they tore down al lot of DT housing--dated a Tech guy who lived right on 75/85, and we would climb out on his roof, thru the kitchen window, smoke, and groove on the cars on the freeway.

 

My daughter was born in 1970, and I do remember taking her to a Jerry Rubin thing at Piedmont park--she couldn't have been a year old, cause we dropped her out of her stroller, and she still brags she is the youngest person with her pix taken by the FBI.

Jeani Jessen

I worked at the The Twelfth Gate starting in the summer of 1969 untill 1972 I think, and lived on 14th street. I was also in Daryl Roades and the HaHavishnu Orchestra from 1975-1976. I went to The Atlanta College of Art, the guy who ran The Catacombs went to the school also. I think he was called Mother David. He had a run in with one of the teachers and scared the teacher to death. He aimed a gun at him, the teacher started trying to talk him down, he shot it and out came pink flowers.There was also another coffee house called The Grand Central Cafe(something like that)on 9th St. I saw The Hampton Grease Band there for the first time in 1968. I lived in a sort of commune on 14th and then on 15th with Robin Feld, she, Ursula and I worked together after the church pulled out of The Twelfth Gate. It was exciting to see all the jazz bands come through, Elvin Jones, The Weather Report, Larry Coryell, Oregon, Macoy Tyner as well as Little Feat, Radar and The Grease Band, etc. You might want to contact Tony Garstein. He was the drummer for Radar and I'm sure he would have some pictures for you.

Gena

Jacob,

The Strip’s wino sage.