1969 Woodstock Music Festival

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Pagan Hetherington
16 May 2014
Kertesz Period 3
1969 Woodstock Music Festival
At a time of social reflection, with America reacting to war in Southeast Asia, the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy (1963), his brother Senator Robert F. Kennedy (1968), and Martin Luther King Jr.(1968), the Apollo landing on the moon, and a culture of public demonstration, through Woodstock, the country was asked to question its attitudes toward drugs, sex, and the establishment. Was Woodstock simply a music festival or a sign of growing dissatisfaction with government and its policies? Even though the Woodstock festival was defined as three days of peace, love, and music, its effects upon American society could be felt for generations, influencing a nation’s attitudes and becoming a symbol of an age of change.
During the 1960s America was involved and distracted with different problems. One of these conflicts had to do with the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., where riots began in cities across the country. Also, America was deeply involved during the continuing military conflict in Vietnam. As President Nixon continued drafting boys to Vietnam, riots were ongoing, including many campus protest movements. During these movements, people marched for peace and burned draft cards (“Did Woodstock Change America?”). Both of these conflicts brought a culture of public demonstration, where people would show what they were feeling peacefully and violently. “People were also judged and punished because of what they did. Some people were arrested, had left home, or got expelled from school just because of their choices in style”(Young and Lang 100). The Woodstock festival was a chance to support the music and style they liked and peacefully p...

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...or problems that were already going on in the United States. However, this problem of finding just basic facts ended when I went to the library and started to look for research in books. They were extra helpful because most of them were written by one of the promoters so you knew that this was an informed source. When I was reading these books I found that they go more in depth. One reason for this is because most of the time one of the promoters wrote it. This report has taught me that research is really hard and you can’t just rely on the internet because sometimes it can have wrong, conflicting, or not trustworthy information. For example, one time I was on a website where I could not find anything for the bibliography. Overall this project had its ups and downs during research, but I ended up learning a lot about the Woodstock Festival.

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