1960s counter culture

1960s Counter-Culture

Art
109A:

Art
Since
1945

Westchester
Community
College

Fall
2012

1955-1965: The
Consensus Years
The prosperity and
optimism of the 1950s
continued in the early
decades of the 1960s

“And so, my fellow Americans: ask
not what your country can do for
you — ask what you can do for
your country.

My fellow citizens of the world: ask
not what America will do for you,
but what together we can do for the
freedom of man.”
President John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Speech, January
20, 1961

President John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Speech, January 20, 1961

The Consensus
Years: 1955-1965
Faith in government

The Consensus
Years: 1955-1965
Trust in Capitalism

The Consensus
Years: 1955-1965
Belief that America was
steadily becoming more
equal and free

George E.C. Hayes, Thurgood Marshall, and James M. Nabrit folowing Supreme
Court decision ending segregation May 17, 1954. Kibrary of Congress
Image source: http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/civilrights/cr-exhibit.html

The Cold War
But the Cold War led to a
series of international
crises

Paul Vathis, 1962 Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph of President John F. Kennedy and
former President Dwight D. Eisenhower walking together at Camp David following the
Bay of Pigs invasion. Washington Post

The Cold War
In 1962 the Cuban Missile
Crisis brought the United
States and the USSR to the
brink of nuclear war

October 1962 Executive Committee of the National Security Council
meeting. The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston

The Military-
Industrial Complex
American involvement in
the Cold War had other
consequences as well

F-111 Production Line, General Dynamics, Fort Worth, Texas, 1968
http://www.f-111.net/RAAF-F-111s-off-the-production-line-1.htm

The Military-
Industrial Complex
In 1961 President Dwight
D. Eisenhower warned
about an emerging
“military-industrial complex”
that threatened American
democracy

President Dwight D. Eisenhower in his televised Farewell Address 1961.
In this speech President Eisenhower warned against the emergence of the “military industrial
complex” which became a catchphrase of the 1960s protest movement

“The potential for the disastrous rise of
misplaced power exists and will persist. We
must never let the weight of this combination
endanger our liberties or democratic
processes.”
President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Farewell Address,
1961

General Dynamics, Fort Worth Texas, 1969

The Military-
Industrial Complex
Military defense had
become one of America’s
leading industries

General Dynamics, Fort Worth Texas, 1969

The Military-
Industrial Complex
As James Rosenquist
suggested in F-111,
American prosperity was
directly linked to the arms
industry

James Rosenquist, F-111, 1964-65

“It seemed the prime force of this war machine was to
economically keep people employed in Texas and Long Island.

At the time, I thought people involved in its making were
heading for something, but I didn't know what, like bugs going
towards a blinding light. By doing this they could achieve two
and a half children, three and a half cars, and a house in the
suburbs.”

James Rosenquist
http://www.moma.org/collection/printable_view.php?object_id=79805

The Great Society
After the assassination of
John F. Kennedy, Lyndon
B. Johnson became
president

Andy Warhol, 16 Jackies, 1964
Walker Art Center

The Great Society
He introduced sweeping
social reforms designed to
create the “Great Society”

“The Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Pub.L.
88-352, 78 Stat. 241, July 2, 1964)
was a landmark piece of legislation
in the United States that outlawed
segregation in schools, public
places, and employment. Conceived
to help African Americans, the bill
was amended prior to passage to
protect women, and explicitly
included white people for the first
time. It also created the Equal
Employment Opportunity Cecil Stoughton, Lyndon B. Johnson signing the Civil rights Act, 1964
Commission.” Wikipedia
Wikipedia

The Great Society
But his escalation of the
War in Vietnam led to his
downfall, and he did not
seek re-election at the end
of his term

President Lyndon B. Johnson listens to tape sent by Captain
Charles Robb from Vietnam, 07/31/1968,
LBJ Library photo by Jack Kightlinger
http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/learning_history/vietnam/
vietnam_lessons.cfm

1960s Counter
Culture
The social activism of the
1950s gave way to the
counter culture of the
1960s

Fred W. McDarrah, Allen Ginsberg at Vietnam Peace Rally, 5th
Ave. NYC, March 26, 1966
http://www.stevenkasher.com/html/noresults.asp

1960s Counter
Culture
The civil rights movement
reached critical mass under
the leadership of Dr. Martin
Luther King Jr.

Martin Luther King Jr. addresses a crowd from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial where he delivered
his famous I Have a Dream speech during the Aug. 28, 1963, march on Washington, D.C.
http://news.stanford.edu/news/2011/august/i-have-a-dream-082511.html

1960s Counter
Culture
The drive towards
integration sparked violent
reactions from white
communities

Anti-integration rally in Little Rock, Arkansas, on 20 August 1959
http://faculty.polytechnic.org/gfeldmeth/1045a.html

1960s Counter
Culture
“One of the drive towards
The most important legal
integration sparked violent
decisions in U.S. history, the 1954
Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of
reactions from white
Education . . . declared school
communities
segregation unconstitutional and paved
the way for the civil rights achievements
of the 1960s. By overturning the "separate
but equal" doctrine . . . Brown v. Board of
Education began the process of
unraveling more than half a century of
federally sanctioned discrimination
against African Americans. As a result, it
also initiated a struggle between a
government now obligated to integrate all
public schools and recalcitrant
communities determined to maintain the
status quo.” Anti-integration rally in Little Rock, Arkansas, on 20 August 1959
http://www.oxfordaasc.com/public/ http://faculty.polytechnic.org/gfeldmeth/1045a.html

features/archive/0507/photo_essay.jsp?
page=1

1960s Counter
Culture
The Civil Rights Act of
1964 and the Voting
Rights Act of 1965
represented progressive
legislation

Lyndon B. Johnson signing the Civil Rights Act, 1964
Wikipedia

1960s Counter
Culture
But violence against blacks
continued

Collage depicting the bombing of The Sixteenth Street Baptist
Church in Birmingham, Alabama that killed four girls in 1963
http://www.liu.edu/cwis/cwp/library/african/2000/1960.htm

1960s Counter
Culture
Martin Luther King Jr.
advocated non-violence as
a strategy of resistance

“[T]he nonviolent resister does not
seek to humiliate or defeat the
opponent but to win his friendship
and understanding . . . . The
aftermath of nonviolence is
reconciliation and the creation of a
beloved community . . . It is merely
a means to awaken a sense of
shame within the oppressor but the
end is reconciliation, the end is
redemption.”
Martin Luther King Jr., The Power
of Non-Violence, 1957
http://
Civil Rights March on Washington, 1963
www.teachingamericanhistory.org/ http://oralhistoryeducation.com/civil-rights-stories-2
library/index.asp?document=1131

1960s Counter
Culture
But government response
was often violent and brutal

Andy Warhol, Red Race Riot, 1963
Top: Firemen hose down protestors
Bottom: Police set dogs on civil rights protestor
Birmingham, 1963

1960s Counter
Culture
Other groups advocated
more aggressive tactics

Black Panther Party national chairman Bobby Seale (left) and
defense minister Huey Newton
http://www.africawithin.com/studies/black_panther_party1.htm

1960s Counter
Culture
In 1965 violence erupted in
the Watts section of Los
Angeles, which lasted for
five days

Race riots in the Watts section of Los Angeles, August 11-15, 1965

1960s Counter Culture
Race riots spread across
the nation

• 1966: Chicago, New
York, Cleveland,
Baltimore

• 1967: Detroit, Newark,
Rochester, New York,
Birmingham, New Britain

Police subdue an injured rioter during race rights riots in Newark, N.J.
(Three Lions/Getty Images)
http://abcnews.go.com/US/popup?id=3371026

1960s Counter
Culture
Violence also erupted in a
wave of political
assassinations

Roy Lichtenstein, Time Magazine Cover, 1968

1960s Counter
Culture
Nation of Islam leader
Malcolm X was
assassinated in 1966

Malcolm X waiting for a press conference to begin on March 26, 1964
Wikipedia

1960s Counter
Culture
And in 1968 Martin Luther
King and Senator Robert F.
Kennedy were both
assassinated

Martin Luther King and his aids moments after his assassination on a
Memphis landing in 1968
Busboy comforts Sen Robert F Kennedy moments http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/1,28757,1726656,00.html?
after he was shot, June 5, 1968 iid=redirect-mlk
L.A. Times

1960s Counter
Culture
America was a nation at
war with itself

Blacks are searched at bayonet point by the National Guard in Newark,
N.J., July 17, 1967
(Eddie Adams/AP Photo)
http://abcnews.go.com/US/popup?id=3371026

1960s Counter
Culture
The civil rights movement
stimulated other
marginalized groups to
seek equality

Betty Friedan, a founder of the National Organization for Women,
led a march in Manhattan in 1970 for the Women's Strike for
Equality J. P. Laffont/Corbis Sygma
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2006/02/05/national/
05friedan_CA1.html

1960s Counter
Culture
The National Organization
of Women (N.O.W.) and
the Gay Rights movement
were both launched in the
later 1960s

http://www.stonewall-place.com/

Gay Liberation flyer, 1970
University of Washington Library,
Vietnam Era Ephemera Collection

A driving force behind the
1960s counter culture was
the growth of student
activism

“There comes a time when the
system becomes so odious that
you can’t take part, you can’t even
tacitly take part.”
Mario Savio, 1964

Mario Savio at a Free Speech rally, UC Berkeley 1964
http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/events/bancroftiana/114/times.html

The UC Berkeley Free
Speech Movement was one
of the first student protest
movements to make
national headlines

Mario Savio and students in a free speech rally at UC Berkeley
Oakland Museum

Protesting Cold War
restrictions on free speech,
students occupied the
administration building

Close to 800 students were
arrested

Student protestor Mario Savio (C) being roughed up by two Berkeley
cops as they arrest him during student riot at Free Speech Movement
demonstration on campus at UC Berkeley 1964
Nat Farbman, LIFE Magazine

The Free Speech
Movement sparked a wave
of student activism across
the nation

Amherst College students using bullhorn & carrying
signs as they during protest demonstration against US
investments in South Africa which indirectly support
apartheid, at General Electric Plant, 1965. John
Loengard LIFE Magazine

The war in Vietnam
became the main focus for
student protest activities

Sound clip: War written by
Barrett Strong and Norman
Whitﬁeld, sung by Edwin Starr –
1970

An anti-war demonstrator burns his draft card at a Vietnam War protest
outside the Pentagon in October 1967.(Photo by Wally McNamee via
Corbis)

Students Protest The Vietnam War, John Muir College, 1965
http://www-muir.ucsd.edu/40/pictures/pictures.html

“War, huh, yeah
What is it good for
Absolutely nothing
Uh-huh”
War written by Barrett Strong and
Norman Whitﬁeld, sung by Edwin
Starr – 1970

http://www.utwatch.org/archives/disorientut2005/military.html

In 1970 President Richard
M. Nixon announced the
expansion of the war to
Cambodia
"If when the chips are down,
the world's most powerful
nation acts like a pitiful
helpless giant, the forces of
totalitarianism and anarchy
will threaten free nations...
throughout the world.”
President Richard M. Nixon,
televised address announcing the
invasion of Cambodia, 1970

President Richard M. Nixon in a televised address announcing
expansion of the Vietnam War into Cambodia,April 30, 1970
http://www.vw.vccs.edu/vwhansd/HIS122/KentState.html

At Kent State University in
Ohio students
demonstrated in response

Students gather for protest rally at Kent State University, 1970
Howard Ruffner Gallery of Kent State Massacre Photos on Picasaweb
http://picasaweb.google.com/hruffner/KentStateUniversityMay141970#

The National Guard was
called in and four students
were killed

National Guardsmen at Kent State Universtty, May 1970


Opposition to the United States involvement in Vietnam led to several domestic confrontations between antiwar demonstrators and
government troops. National Guard troops stunned the nation when they shot into a crowd of protesters during a 1970 demonstration at
Ohio’s Kent State University, killing four students and wounding nine.
http://encarta.msn.com/media_461562516_761552642_-1_1/Kent_State_Shooting_Aftermath.html


Kent State Massacre, May 1970


Pulitzer prize winning photograph of Kent State Massacre by Paul Filo

Two weeks later two
students were shot during a
protest at Jackson State
University

James Earl Green, one of the students shot at Jackson State University, May 1970
http://www2.kenyon.edu/Khistory/60s/webpage.htm

The events at Kent State
and Jackson State sparked
further student protests and
a government commission
on campus unrest

Source: http://www2.kenyon.edu/Khistory/60s/webpage.htm

The Report of the President’s Commission
on Campus Unrest, 1970
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/
2008/1655549123_f5947098e9.jpg

Public support for the war
hit an all time low

Source:
http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/learning_history/vietnam/
vietnam_pubopinion.cfm

A major factor in dwindling
public support for the war
was the unprecedented
coverage in the media

Henry Huet, cover LIFE Magazine, February 11 1969
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Henri_Huet,_LIFE_cover,_110266.jpg

It has been called “the
living room war” because of
the unprecedented
television coverage

Yale Joel, Nixon TV Speech

Iconic images of the war
include this prize-winning
photograph of a Buddhist
monk who set himself on
fire on a Saigon street

Buddhist Monk Thich Quang Duc immolates himself in protest against
South Vietnamese persecution of Monks, Saigon, 1963
Prize winning photograph by Malcolm Browne
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Th%C3%ADch_Qu%E1%BA%A3ng_
%C4%90%E1%BB%A9c

In 1968, during the Tet offensive, viewers of NBC news saw
Col. Nguyen Ngoc Loan blow out the brains of his captive in a
Saigon street.
http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/V/htmlV/vietnamonte/vietnamonte.htm

South Vietnamese National Police Chief Brig Gen. Nguyen Ngoc Loan executes a Viet Cong officer with a single pistol shot in the head in Saigon,
Vietnam on Feb. 1, 1968 AP Photo: Eddie Adams
http://www.nandotimes.com/nt/images/century/photos/century0258.html

And in 1972, during the North Vietnamese spring offensive,
the audience witnessed the aftermath of errant napalm strike,
in which South Vietnamese planes mistook their own fleeing
civilians for North Vietnamese troops.
http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/V/htmlV/vietnamonte/vietnamonte.htm

Nick Ut, Naplam Attack on a South Vietnamese Village, June 1972
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4517597.stm

On Mar. 16, 1968, a unit of
the U.S. army America
division, led by Lt. William L.
Calley, invaded the South
Vietnamese hamlet of My Lai,
an alleged Viet Cong
stronghold. In the course of
combat operations, unarmed
civilians, including women
and children, were shot to
death; estimated to be about
500.
http://library.thinkquest.org/C0129380/
events/mylai.html

Ronald L. Haeberle, Mai Lai Massacre, published in LIFE Magazine, 1969
http://library.thinkquest.org/C0129380/events/mylai.html

Hippie Culture and the
Generation Gap
Descendants of the
“hipsters” and “beatniks” of
the 1950s, Hippies were a
sub-group of the 1960s
counterculture

Hippies dancing to folk music during anti-war demonstration, San Francisco, 1967
Ralph Crane LIFE Magazine

Generation Gap
Embracing sex drugs and
rock ‘n roll they rebelled
against the accepted
values of “The
Establishment”

Album cover for Timothy Leary Turn on Tune in Drop Out
Tom Wolfe, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Soundtrack to a 1967 motion picture that was suppressed within weeks
Test, 1968 of its premiere in LA
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leary.jpg

Generation Gap
They called for a non-
violent revolution that
promoted the values of love
and peace

Sound clip: Revolution
The Beatles
1968

Generation Gap
Their exploration of
alternative lifestyles was
symptomatic of a widening
“generation gap”

Norman Mingo, cover of Mad Magazine, 1969
http://flickr.com/photos/66733752@N00/2036801738/

Generation Gap
Icons of the Hippie sub
culture include the
“Summer of Love” in San
Francisco, 1967

Robert Altman, “The First Rave”
http://www.yenra.com/music/summer-of-love.html

Generation Gap

“School was out for the summer
and hundreds of young people
traveled across the country to San
Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district
to become a part of a counter
cultural phenomenon that some
said would change the world.
Others weren't so sure.
Still others cared only about
scoring some acid (LSD) for the
Jefferson Airplane show at the
Fillmore auditorium.

The year was 1967 and those
who'd come to San Francisco wore
Robert Altman, “The first Rave”
flowers in their hair as part of the http://www.yenra.com/music/summer-of-love.html
Summer Of Love.”
http://www.jour.sc.edu/pages/
wigginsweb/0204summer.html

Generation Gap
And the Woodstock festival
and concert that drew half a
million people to Yasgur’s
Farm in 1968

Generation Gap
Popular music became a
primary expression of the
youth counter culture

The American Experience: Summer of Love
Chapter 2: (7:53)
Disillusioned members of the Baby Boom generation embrace a utopian vision.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/love/program/love_02_qt_lo.html

1960s counter culture

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