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Curated category

Counterculture of the 1960s

  • Bob DylanOn the 24th of May 1941, Robert Allen Zimmerman entered the world at St. Mary's Hospital in Duluth, Minnesota. His parents ran a furniture and appliance…
  • Jimi HendrixJohnny Allen Hendrix arrived in Seattle on the 27th of November 1942. His father Al Hendrix was stationed in Alabama during the birth and could not visit due…
  • John LennonJohn Winston Lennon was born on the 9th of October 1940 at Liverpool Maternity Hospital. His father Alfred worked as a merchant seaman and was away during…
  • LSDOn the 16th of November 1938, Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann synthesized lysergic acid diethylamide at Sandoz Laboratories in Basel.
  • Psychedelic musicIn 1964, the New York folk group The Holy Modal Rounders used the word psychedelic on a recording of Lead Belly's Hesitation Blues.
  • HippieThe word hippie emerged from the jazz slang of 1940s Harlem, where musicians used terms like hip and hep to describe someone who was sophisticated or…
  • Kurt VonnegutKurt Vonnegut was born in Indianapolis on the 11th of November 1922. He descended from a long line of German Americans whose family fortune rested on the…
  • Rolling StoneJann Wenner borrowed seven thousand five hundred dollars from his family and the parents of his soon-to-be wife Jane Schindelheim to launch Rolling Stone in…
  • Hunter S. ThompsonHunter Stockton Thompson entered the world on the 18th of July 1937, in Louisville, Kentucky. He grew up as the first of three sons born to Virginia Davison…
  • John CageJohn Milton Cage Jr. was born on the 5th of September 1912 at Good Samaritan Hospital in downtown Los Angeles. His father, John Milton Cage Sr., worked as an…
  • The DoorsOn a hot July day in 1965, Jim Morrison and Ray Manzarek crossed paths on Venice Beach. Both men had attended the UCLA School of Theater, Film and…
  • Ralph BakshiRalph Bakshi was born on the 29th of October 1938, in Haifa, Mandatory Palestine. His family moved to the United States in 1939 and settled in the…
  • Philip K. DickPhilip Kindred Dick was born on the 16th of December 1928 in Chicago, Illinois. He arrived six weeks prematurely alongside his twin sister Jane Charlotte…
  • François TruffautOn the 6th of February 1932, François Roland Truffaut was born in Paris to a mother named Janine de Montferrand. His biological father remained unknown for…
  • Jean GenetJean Genet was born in 1910 to a mother who worked as a prostitute. She raised him for only seven months before placing him up for adoption.
  • Michelangelo AntonioniMichelangelo Antonioni was born on the 29th of September 1912 in Ferrara, Emilia-Romagna. He grew up in a prosperous family of landowners.
  • Jean-Luc GodardJean-Luc Godard was born on the 3rd of December 1930 in the 7th arrondissement of Paris. His father Paul Godard worked as a Swiss physician while his mother…
  • WBAIThe call letters W75NY first crackled through the air in 1941, marking the birth of a station that would eventually become WBAI.
  • Frank ZappaFrank Vincent Zappa was born on the 21st of December 1940, in Baltimore, Maryland. His father worked at the Edgewood Arsenal chemical warfare facility of the…
  • Summer of LoveJack Kerouac's 1957 novel On the Road ignited a spark that would eventually consume San Francisco. The Beat Generation authors of the 1950s had already…
  • Jean-Pierre MelvilleJean-Pierre Grumbach was born on the 20th of October 1917 in Paris. His parents were Alsatian Jewish immigrants named Berthe and Jules Grumbach.
  • British InvasionIn the late 1950s, American rock and blues musicians became popular with British youth. This rebellious tone and image sparked a cultural shift across the…
  • Richard LesterRichard Lester Liebman was born on the 19th of January 1932 to a Jewish family in Philadelphia. He graduated from William Penn Charter School at age fifteen…