If You’re Going To San Francisco

Fifty years ago, during a few short weeks in the summer of 1967, thousands of hippies descended on San Francisco. It was a moment that changed popular culture for ever.

The small suburb of Haight-Ashbury became a magnet for young people seeking sexual freedom, freedom to experiment with mind blowing drugs, to debate social and economic utopias and freedom to listen to new types of music. Peace and Love were the mantras of the day, and the Flower People embraced psychedelic kaftans, music and all things floral.

Marco Werman looks back at those hedonistic times through the music and recollections of people who were there 50 years ago, and hears why after 1967, the world was never quite the same place again.

A Ruth Evans Production for BBC World Service.

Publicity contact: SS2