After getting married on March 20, 1969, John Lennon and Yoko Ono proceeded to have possibly the strangest honeymoon ever.
From their room in the Amsterdam Hilton (room 902, the Presidential Suite), they held a series of press conferences each day from March 25 to March 31. Between 9am and 9pm each day, they invited the press into their room, where the couple discussed peace (especially in regards to Vietnam) while sitting in their bed. The wall above them was decorated with signs reading “Hair Peace” and “Bed Peace”.
It’s unclear exactly what effect, if any, this all had on the outcome of the Vietnam War. If nothing else, Lennon’s astute use of his celebrity to get his mesage out certainly helped to raise the issue’s profile, although it’s arguable he was preaching almost entirely to the converted – by 1969, pretty much everyone already had an opinion about Vietnam…
Born Shawn Corey Carter, the man today known as Jay-Z probably didn’t realise at the time that he would become one of the most financially successful rap artists in the history of the genre, win ten Grammys or marry Beyonce. Continue reading 1969 – Shawn Carter, a.k.a. Jay-Z, is born
Jan Palach was a twenty year old student in Prague when he set himself on fire. His action was intended as a protest of the brutal suppression of the Prague Spring the previous August, when Soviet tanks rolled into Czechoslovakia to put an end to the liberalisaton that was taking place under the government of Alexander Dub?ek.
Palach spent three days in excrutiating pain before he died of his injuries on January 19, 1969. In death, he became a martyr to the cause of Czechoslovakia liberation (and liberation in general). When the Velvet Revolution freed the Czechs and Slovaks from Soviet rule in 1989, Palach was one of those honoured with memorials by the new government.
Referenced in:
Euromess — Jean-Jacques Burnel
Nuuj Helde — The Janse Bagge Bend
Va De Du Jesus — Åge Aleksandersen
Pochodnie (Torches) — Jacek Kaczmarski
The Funeral of Jan Palach — The Zippo Band
Woodstock Music & Art Fair (informally, Woodstock or The Woodstock Festival) was a music festival, billed as “An Aquarian Exposition”, held from August 15 to August 18, 1969, at a dairy farm belonging to a Max Yasgur in the rural town of Bethel, New York. Bethel, in Sullivan County, is actually 43 miles (69 km) southwest of the town of Woodstock, after being turned down from its original venue.
Thirty-two acts – inlcuding Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, the Who, Arlo Guthrie, Joe Cocker, Neil Young, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Jefferson Airplane and Grateful Dead – performed during the sometimes rainy weekend in front of nearly half a million concertgoers – the organisers had expected only 50,000. Woodstock has come to be seen as one of the high water marks of the hippie movement, and it is sometimes regarded as marking the end of the Sixties.
One imagines that the various acts who were invited but did not attend (those still alive, at any rate) – including the Doors, Led Zeppelin, Jethro Tull and Bob Dylan – probably still regret it.
Referenced in:
Woodstock – Joni Mitchell
My Generation (Part II) – Todd Snider
We Didn’t Start The Fire – Billy Joel
She Is Always Seventeen – Harry Chapin
Woodstock – Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
With those words, Charles Manson initiated one of his most infamous murder sprees: the Tate killings. Manson despatched Charles Watson, along with three other family members, to the house of Terry Melcher. What no one in the family knew is that the Melcher no longer lived there – the house was now being leased by director Roman Polanski and his wife Sharon Tate. Polanski wasn’t home, but Tate, unluckily for her, was.
Tate and three guests were brutally murdered by the Mansonites, each of them stabbed multiple times. The following night, the family committed another set of murders. On August 16, 25 member of the Manson Family, including all the Tate killers and Manson himself, were arrested. It would take several more months for the police to put it all together – it wasn’t until October that they connected the two different murder sites – but in the end, the murderers would all be caught.
Referenced in:
Mister Manson – Klaatu
DI-1-9026 – J. G. Thirlwell
ATWA – System of a Down
Revolution Blues – Neil Young
Manson Clan – Righteous Pigs
Death Valley ’69 – Sonic Youth
Do The Charles Manson – Necro
Lunatic of God’s Creation – Deicide
Charlie Manson’s Birthday – Otis Ball
Charles in Charge – Ian Brady Bunch
Manson Family Feud – Diesel Queens
Bloodbath in Paradise – Ozzy Osbourne
Charlie Manson Blues – The Flaming Lips
SST Superstar Charles Manson – Ultraviolet Eye
Spahn Ranch (Charles Manson) – Church of Misery
Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins took off from the Kennedy Space Center, near Cape Canaveral, Florida, on July 16. Four days later, the lunar landing module, carrying Armstrong and Aldrin, landed on the Moon. They were supposed to take a sleep break, but Armstrong was impatient to walk on the moon – and who could blame him?
It was July 21 (UTC) by the time they began the EVA. They stayed on the lunar surface for about 150 minutes (15 minutes longer than was originally a plan). During this time, the two spoke to President Nixon in the White House, planted an American flag on the Moon, performed a number of scientific experiments and took numerous photographs, all of them now iconic images.
Despite what you may have heard, it is highly unlikely that the landings were faked. I do not believe that they were, and neither does Buzz Aldrin.
Referenced in:
I Was Only 19 — Redgum
Man On The Moon — REM
Shrink — Dead Kennedys
Saturn 5 — Inspiral Carpets
We Didn’t Start The Fire — Billy Joel
Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins — The Byrds
For Michael Collins, Jeffrey and me — Jethro Tull
Concorde was the first supersonic aircraft designed expressly for passenger services (as opposed to military use). Its design process was lengthy and filled with pitfalls, and in the end, only 20 of the aircraft were built. This represented a substantial financial loss, particularly for the British and French governments, which had underwritten much of the design and development of Concorde.
The Concorde was faster than nearly any other passenger aircraft, and in its several decade service history, only one incident occurred which led to loss of life. However, the aging of the planes, their general lack of modern comfort features and changing attitudes to passenger aircraft in the wake of the 9/11 attacks led to the withdrawal from service of Concorde, with the last passenger flights taking place in 2003.
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