The Woodstock Festival

The organisers expected fifty thousand people and sold tickets accordingly. Around half a million came, the fences went down on the first day, and it became a free festival by force of arithmetic. It rained hard, the roads were blocked for miles and performers arrived by helicopter.

There were two recorded deaths and two births. Jimi Hendrix closed on Monday morning to a field that had mostly gone home. The farm is now a museum, and the ground where the stage stood is still an open bowl of grass.