We Can All Join In: How Rock Festivals Helped Change America

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Bill Mankin

Bill Mankin is a music-lover, writer and international environmental policy activist who spent his teenage years in the 1960s in Atlanta. He attended five rock festivals in Georgia and Florida from 1968-1970, serving as a volunteer for one of them and as a member of the construction and stage crews for another. From 1969-1973 he also worked on innumerable rock concert stage and security crews, in promotions, as a stage manager, and on concert tours as an equipment roadie, truck driver, and sound technician in charge of stage audio. He currently lives in Washington, DC, where he occasionally recalls a favorite quote by Leonard Cohen, from Chelsea Hotel No. 2: "We are ugly, but we have the music."
Number of posts: 1
Email address: email

Posts by Bill Mankin:

Peace, Love and...

We Can All Join In: How Rock Festivals Helped Change America

by Bill Mankin | 11, Add your Comment | Mar 4, 2012

Crowd huddled against the cold at the Palm Beach Pop Festival, November 1969. Photo © Bob Davidoff / oldrockphoto.com.

The dawning age of America’s great rock festivals was legendary both for its music and its massive crowds. But a different kind of legacy could be its greatest.

When the Rolling Stones took to the stage one windy November night in Palm Beach, Florida, in 1969, it’s doubtful their audience had any thoughts of politics or cultural change. We were just a crowd at a rock festival who had endured a downpour the previous day and now braved the bone-chilling cold front that had rolled through. It was hours after midnight and we had waited a long time for this moment. We were simply die-hard music fans, huddled together, buzzed and ready to rock…

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Bill Mankin

Posts by Bill Mankin:

Peace, Love and...

We Can All Join In: How Rock Festivals Helped Change America

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Also on the Dew

The Zero Sum Business Plan

The Swimming Pool Qs

The Straw House I Built

In the hearts of men