Manson: The Life and Times of Charles Manson

by Jeff Guinn

Winter weather in San Francisco is notoriously erratic, making any outdoor program chancy, but January 14 dawned clear and bright. Organizers were concerned that the San Francisco press would emphasize a smaller than expected crowd, so Haight shops and cafés voluntarily closed for the day in an effort to encourage residents to go to the Polo Field instead. They shouldn’t have bothered. By 9 A.M. hippies in rainbow robes and feathered headdresses began arriving in the sprawling meadow. They mingled with students wearing blue jeans and T-shirts. More than twenty thousand were present by the official 1 P.M. kickoff, everyone crammed together and no one minding. The Diggers distributed free turkey sandwiches; Owsley donated a large, particularly potent batch of LSD tabs dubbed “White Lightning.” Anyone who felt like tripping on acid did so in style. Ginsberg, who desperately wanted to be as important to the hippies as he had been to the Beats, opened the program by chanting “We are all one!” while someone blew into a conch shell. Leary encouraged all present to turn on, tune in, drop out, and a dozen San Francisco bands performed. As the sun set around 5 P.M., Ginsberg offered a final chant to close the program. Then the crowd stunned park officials by cleaning up every scrap of trash before wandering off into the dusk, still singing and chanting. The Be-In was a magical event, far surpassing what its organizers could ever have hoped for, and it was directly responsible for de...