The festival organizers at Woodstock knew that there would be a lot of drugs around — and therefore a lot of people who couldn’t handle whatever it was they were going to take and would need to be dealt with.
So they looked to this commune called the Hog Farm. They brought as many of these folks to the festival as they could to handle security. Their leader – the “Please Chief” of the “Please Force” was a fellow named Hugh Romney, also known as Wavy Gravy.
Asked by a reporter, Wavy Gravy described the group’s mission: “Well the Hog Farm is the many-sided, multi, kind of a family. We’re a huge extended family… mostly we’re just gonna try to be groovy and spread that grooviness through everybody. ”
Learn more about WOODSTOCK: THREE DAYS THAT DEFINED A GENERATION, including where to watch the full film: https://pbs.org/woodstock
WOODSTOCK: THREE DAYS THAT DEFINED A GENERATION turns the lens back at the audience, at the swarming, impromptu city that grew up overnight on a few acres of farmland. What took place in that teeming mass of humanity — the rain-soaked, starving, tripping, half-a-million strong throng of young people — was nothing less than a miracle of teamwork, a manifestation of the “peace and love” the festival had touted and a validation of the counterculture’s promise to the world. Who were these kids? What experiences and stories did they carry with them to Bethel, New York that weekend, and how were they changed by three days in the muck and mire of Yasgur’s farm?
