CALIFORNIA LETTERS
Richard Schlatter
Friday afternoon was clear, warm and sunny
in
San Francisco.
Having finished my work, I asked the porter
in
the St. Francis Hotel
how to get to Haight-Ashbury. He told me to go to Market Street and
take a Number 7 bus, which would take me there in about fifteen minutes.
I got off the bus at Haight-Ashbury and began to walk, and what I saw
was incredible. This is an ordinary San Francisco residential neighbor–
hood - San Francisco is wonderfully handsome - with thousands of
hippies sitting and wandering about, hair long and dirty, beaded, bearded,
many with headbands, mostly with dirty bare feet, some with sandals,
and bizarre clothes of all kinds. Lots of kids were selling mimeographed
or printed sheets: some advocating the legalizing of marijuana and LSD;
some praising sexual freedom; one asking for donations for the free
medical clinic (it closed that day for lack of funds); and others
denouncing the war in Vietnam and advocating love, etc.
I sauntered along until I came to an old movie theater. Kids were
handing out leaflets inviting everyone to a free American Indian program
which seemed to have something to do with the prophecies of the Great
Spirit. I went in and sat down. All was leisurely confusion, with various
people putting cushions on the floor in front of the stage and others
taking them away, a rock 'n' roll record on the gramophone and every–
one, including some stray dogs, wandering about genially and aimlessly.
Garlands of marijuana leaves were being hung from the balcony.
Eventually some Indians in costume arrived and one man talked a great
deal of nonsense about the teachings of the Great Spirit. These teachings
are supposed to be found in pictographs on the walls of kivas in Mesa
Verde National Park. The Great Spirit had apparently prophesied the
coming of the white man and the eventual restoration of the red man -
typical millenarian dreams. But he was a nice Indian, all in favor of
love, nonviolence, justice, equality and all the good things. And he
