I was also at the original Woodstock. I went with my brothers and a couple friends. We thought it would be a great concert, but had no idea that it was going to be historic. The first clue that it was going to be big – in terms of number of people – was when we got a couple miles from the site and saw that people had already started parking on the side of the road, because there was no parking closer in.
By the time we got to the entrance, they had already declared it a “free concert” and stopped collecting tickets. We actually had tickets, and I think someone in my family may still have one in a scrapbook somewhere.
One of the first things that I remember, looking back, was how wet it was. It rained the first night (Friday). There were some empty barns (actually, someone said they were once chicken coops, but they were huge) up on a hill about a quarter mile or so from the stage area, and we hung out there to keep dry.
My biggest regret is that I spent too much time in that stupid barn – if I had it to do all over again, I would have just found a good spot in front of the stage and parked myself there for the entire weekend! IIRC, the concert went on pretty much around the clock, and some of the best bands were on quite late. I was way into The Who back then, and I remember waking up in that stupid barn at one point and hearing Pinball Wizard playing. I think it was 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning. I prayed that they were just starting their set, but that was the last song! When I think about it, I am still so mad that I missed it. (I had to go see the dang movie to see some of the bands that I really loved back then – arrgh!)
I do remember watching Joan Baez (I specifically remember her singing “Joe Hill”) and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young on Friday night. I remember CSN&Y saying they were kind of nervous, because it was their first big gig. For Saturday & Sunday, my memories are a mixture of listening to/watching the music, wandering around trying to find food & water (not a problem, really, but a lot of standing in line), and just enjoying being there. Everyone was very friendly – I remember that there were police on horseback who would flash the peace sign. The only nudity I saw was some people skinny-dipping in a pond. I remember that every so often there would be an announcement over the sound system telling someone to meet their friend somewhere, because their friend had their “medicine.” I mentioned to my one of my brothers that there seemed to be an awful lot of people who had friends who were holding medicine for them, and he said it wasn’t medicine, it was drugs – duh! At some point on Sunday, I think, someone on the stage held up a copy of The New York Times and announced that we had made the front page. That was very cool.
At some point my younger brother and I met a woman who worked in Manhattan as a nurse. She offered us a ride back to the city (we were from New Jersey), and we decided to go with her to spend some time in Manhattan before heading home. I remember walking away from the concert Monday morning at about 6:30 am, and hearing Jimi Hendrix playing his rendition The Star-Spangled Banner. That was a great ending to the weekend.
When we got to Manhattan, people kept stopping us on the street to ask if we had been to Woodstock. (I think it was our very mud-spattered clothes that gave them a clue.) For a long time I kept the bell-bottom jeans (embroidered with flowers, how embarrassing!) that I wore that weekend. I think I might actually still have them packed away somewhere . . …