Friday, February 15, 2008

Between the Beat and the Hipped



When you write about something on your blog you never know who might respond to what when. I guess it is sort of like Forrest Gump’s box of choco-lites.

Back in 2006 I had two entries about The Golden Horn beatnik coffee house on 15th Street in Atlanta. If you want, you can search for Golden Horn in the blank in the top left corner and see what I said..

Just a couple of days ago I received an email from a person doing research on Beatniks and Hippies of Atlanta. He said he ran a Google search of Golden Horn and got my blog. He wanted to know if I had anything more to say about The Golden Horn, the Beat and Hippy scene of the same neighborhood – and why did that area attract the bohemians?

I responded saying I didn’t know why that area attracted the bohemians and went on to say probably because of Piedmont Park, the rent in the old houses on and near Juniper Street, the nurses school home, and being near the High Museum.

I went on to say that I was too young to feel part of the beatnik world and too old to be part of the Hippie community. I was out of place in either group, which seems to sum up my life story. Which also partly explains why I am invisible.

I could have throw in that I felt out of place in the Yuppie World too, but I doubt if he really care.

But I did tell of my multiple visits to Greenwich Village in NYC when I was in the Navy. How some Navy buddies and I were fascinated of the hipped scene and combed the Village like roaches taking mental notes, going to coffee houses, art galleries, bookstores, hanging around Washington Square, and so on. But that was a long long time ago, in a Kingdom far far away.

In his email he had his website address, which is about the Hippies of the Peachtree, 14th to 10th Streets area. It brought back a lot of old memories when we visited that area a lot. Check it out:

Peace Brothers & Sisters

8 comments:

Michael Bains said...

Wow man... Such a groovy post. And those pictures! Like, Wow man!

Peace and namas te Ya know.

:)

Eddie said...

Michael,
cool, daddy-o.

Jean Campbell said...

I was too square and born ten years too soon to be part of that scene.

For a short time in 1960, I lived at the corner of 11th and W. P'tree. There were boarding houses all around, all the way to 14th.

I remember the A&P, the drugstore and the Margot (dress) Shop near 'tight squeeze' (12th and Peachtree). I think there was a dime store, too and an arty movie theater somewhere along there.

It makes a great anthropological study, doesn't it? Y'all go ahead and dig.

Eddie said...

Jean,
I can "dig" it.
I probably saw you back then, seeing a blood related cousin and didn't even know it.
Did you go to the website at the bottom? If so, did you watch the You-Tube reunion party of the hipped people of the Peachtree-14th area? They are all middle age now, but it the party is interesting. Look at it, you may recognize some of them.

kenju said...

Eddie, did you ever go to "The Bitter End" in NYC? I had a former highschool classmate who worked there. It was her "Cleopatra" period, and she wore full Egyptian makeup....LOL

Eddie said...

Judy,
I remember hanging out in front of the Bitter End, and I think one time we went inside to hear somebody unknown a the time... it is all hazy.

janie said...

I am not sure if it was age or circumstance that kept me from being a hippie, or a beatnik, or a yuppie, for that matter. Probably age for the beatniks, circumstances for the hippies. Common sense let me realize the yuppie thing was not for me. You think?

I remember when Watkin's Glen "Music Festival" was going on in Watkin's Glen, NY,(after Woodstock, but same kind of thing.) I was in the hospital close by, having just delivered another little boy to my already large family. They were bringing them in from Watkin's Glen on helicopters- lots and lots of them; women in labor, overdoses, diabetic coma, accidents, all kinds of things.

I decided it was far too dangerous to be a hippie, and have all that free love and stuff. They seemed to be dropping like flies.

Eddie said...

Janie,
Well, I am pretty much beat... beat and left for dead.
And I am pretty much hippie too..., but as soon as I it gets warm, I hope to run some of that hip off.
And as for Yuppie - I don't even know how to qualify.