Summer of Love

Summer of Love

Part of the Counterculture of the 1960s and the hippie movement
Spencer Dryden, Marty Balin, and Paul Kantner of Jefferson Airplane performing at the Fantasy Fair, early June 1967
Date	1967
Location	Haight-Ashbury, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco
Participants	~100,000 (estimated)
Outcome	A surge in 1960s counterculture in the United States Inspiration for the Second Summer of Love in the United Kingdom in 1988

The Summer of Love was a major social phenomenon that occurred in San Francisco during the summer of 1967. As many as 100,000 people, mostly young people, hippies, beatniks, and 1960s counterculture figures, converged in San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district and Golden Gate Park.^[1][2] More broadly, the Summer of Love encompassed hippie culture, spiritual awakening, hallucinogenic drugs, anti-war sentiment, and free love throughout the West Coast of the United States, and as far away as New York City.^[3][4] An episode of the PBS documentary series American Experience referred to the Summer of Love as "the largest migration of young people in the history of America".^[5]

Hippies, sometimes called flower children, were an eclectic group. Many opposed the Vietnam War, were suspicious of government, and rejected consumerist values. In the United States, counterculture groups rejected suburbia and the American way and instead opted for a communal lifestyle. Some hippies were active in political organization, whereas others were passive and more concerned with art (music, painting, poetry in particular) or spiritual and meditative practices.^[4] Many hippies took interest in ancient Indian religion, such as Hinduism and Buddhism. While the Summer of Love is often regarded as a significant cultural event, its actual significance to ordinary young people of the time, particularly in Britain, has been disputed.^[6]