by Bob Spitz
“Excuse me, Mr. Yasgur,” Michael said, interrupting the long-winded farmer, “but does all this belong to you, too?” He motioned to the scenery.
“Sure does.”
Michael sat back in the seat and smiled as Abraham pulled the car off Happy Avenue and barreled down a service road toward the wooded ravine.
Lawrence couldn’t believe his eyes and spun around in a circle trying to take in as much of the view as he possibly could in one glance. “I can’t believe it,” he gasped, “this is really great. It’s just incredible.”
Lang grinned and gave him the “high sign.” Drawing Mel aside, he whispered, “Listen, you take care of Abraham. Keep him out of the way for a couple minutes. I’m gonna see what Max has got up his sleeve. I got a feeling he’s a pretty slick dude.”
Indeed, he was. At first, Yasgur was reluctant even to discuss this portion of his land. If it was disturbed by a group of young kids—or, for that matter, by anybody else—he stood to lose an entire crop.
“Look, Max, without it, we’re sunk. We can lose close to three-quarters of a million bucks. I’m layin’ it on the line to you. We need this land, and we’ll make it worth your while.”
Yasgur said that he wanted to help, but he could not afford to give up the crop. “You’d have to reimburse me for my loss,” he said, looking sideways at Lang out of the corner of his eyes.
“How much, Max?”
“It’s going to come to close to $300 an acre. Let’s say, $50,000.” Michael whistled. “And that won’t permit you to use certain pieces of land until later on because I can still salvage some of the growth.”
“You got it. Anything. We don’t need most of the land until a day before the show. None of that matters. Let’s make a deal.”
“Hold on, now, young fella. This is valuable property, and I don’t intend to risk everything I’ve worked for over the years to make a quick buck. This is serious. Now, I’m going to want your company to guarantee that I get my property back in the same condition it was given to you. And you’re going to have to place a substantial sum—for safety’s sake, let’s say $75,000—into an escrow account in case there are any damages. Do you have that kind of money?”
Michael nodded meekly. The figures Yasgur was quoting made his head spin. Sure, they had the bread. But another $125,000 was an awful load to carry—even if it wasn’t his money.
“All right then—why don’t you bring your representatives around to my attorney’s office tomorrow morning, and we’ll discuss the fine points of this arrangement.” He gave Lang his lawyer’s name and address and agreed to meet them there a little before noon. “You fellas can roam around out here while Mr. Abraham takes me home. I’ll send him back for you when he’s done.” They shook hands, and Max Yasgur slipped into the car with Abraham and drove off.
Lawrence practically catapulted onto Michael’s shoulders. “Far fuckin’ out, man! This place is even better than Wallkill. How’d it go?”
Michael, however, was still looking at his outstretched hand.
“What’s the matter?”
“Oh, nothin’! Well, actually, it’s gotta do with Yasgur’s handshake.” Michael scrunched up his face. “The cat’s only got three fingers. It was really weird, man. I mean, I grabbed his hand to shake on a deal, and I only got three fingers.”
“You mean—we got the place?” Lawrence asked.
“Uh, yeah,” Michael said, staring at his hand.
“That’s great! I mean—Michael, we’re back in business!” He slapped Lang on the back five or ten times and, soon, they were hugging one another, dancing around in a circle. “I can’t believe it! I can’t fuckin’ believe it!” Lawrence screamed. “Kid—you’re incredible!”
“Thanks.” Michael was grinning from ear to ear now, and the two men began to slap each other’s hands so rapidly that their palms turned bright red. Lawrence collapsed in the wet grass, ecstatic. “C’mon, get up. Let’s take a look around the place before ol’ Abraham comes back.” Michael pulled him up by the arms, and they wandered across the bowl, not quite really knowing where to go or what to look at first.
“The incredible thing,” Lawrence said, pointing toward the section of land carved out from the woods, “is that this is a natural amphitheatre. In all my years doing shows, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything more suited to a performing arts center than this place.” He explained acoustics to Lang, using his hands to show how sound would careen off the trees in direct/reflecting audio frequency and travel outward, in this case up the hill, in an ever expanding radius. “If we place our sound towers just outside the line of the reflected waves, everyone within a mile of this place will be able to hear as clearly as if they were listening to a record at home.”
While they discussed the layout, the fog had lifted off a patch of ground to the left of the woods revealing a lake. Lawrence and Lang stared open-mouthed at the mist-covered body of water.
“Holy shit! Where did that come from?”
“I don’t know, man, but if a voice comes from its depths, I’m cuttin’ outta here.”
“Do you believe this? Huh? Do you fuckin’ believe this?” They hugged each other again. “Oh, this is really going to be good,” Mel said. “It’s perfect, perfect, perfect!”
“Are you gonna be able to put it together in three weeks?”
“Yeah. Don’t give it another thought. Come August 15, you’re gonna see one hundred thousand kids sittin’ up there on that hill turnin’ on to our show.”
“Haven’t I heard that before somewhere?”
“Yeah.” Lawrence nodded sheepishly. “You have. But this time, I think you can pretty much bank on it, m’man. We got ourselves one helluva festival site.”
“I think you’re right, Mel. C’mon—let’s get outta here. I think we could both use a rest.”
They slapped palms again—once, this time, for good measure—and walked up the embankment, arms draped around each other’s back, to where Abraham’s car waited to take them back to the EI Monaco.
3
Since their ouster from Mills Heights, John Roberts and Joel Rosenman had shuttered themselves in the uptown office, juggling the torrent of inquiries from the press and other interested parties as to the destiny of the Aquarian Exposition. They had no idea what to tell their interrogators, except that the Town of Wallkill’s decision to ban the festival was completely unjustified and, as far as their lawyers could determine, without regard for the law. They intended to stay and fight. Unfortunately, not only did that rationale not hold water with those who had already purchased tickets, but John and Joel didn’t really believe it themselves. The festival’s tortured soul was on the critical list, and John couldn’t help but ponder the incredible medical bill he’d be picking up for its intensive care treatment.
The Concerned Citizens Committee certainly hadn’t helped matters. After the permit was rejected, they saw fit to call a press conference in order to announce the verdict to the world. While they were at it, they also implied that, since there would be no festival in the Town of Wallkill, all patrons of Woodstock Ventures should seek refunds on their ticket investment. That little thorn prompted their ticket vendors to curtail all future sales, brought their mail-order activity grinding to a halt, and signaled the attorney general’s office to call out the consumer complaint troops. There was little else they could do but to lie. “Cancelled?” Roberts feigned astonishment. “Not on your life! In fact, we’ve already got an alternate site lined up.”
In light of that exaggeration, Michael Lang’s phone call, which would have ordinarily been held in dubious esteem, was greeted with vast relief. “Well, Michael, I certainly hope you have some good news for us for a change. We’ve been pretty fucking miserable trying to put people off. Where do we stand?”
“Even better than our position in Wallkill,” he said, and John had to do everything possible to
refrain from laughing. Lang, however, persevered in his description of the White Lake site and topped it off with a testimonial to their newfound benefactor. “Max is a prince, man. He’s totally behind us and the rest of the townspeople are in our corner. It’s like—beautiful, man. Listen, the whole thing’s gonna go down tomorrow morning at Max’s lawyer’s pad. I think you oughta be in on it, and you’d better bring along a lotta bread. Max drives a hard bargain.” He told Roberts the terms of the agreement.
“I think I oughta see the place before I buy it, Michael. Tell this Yasgur guy that we’ll meet him on the site before the meeting, and we can all drive to the attorney’s together. I’ll meet you in Middletown about nine o’clock.” Lang agreed, however reluctantly, and hung up.
The next morning, John and Michael drove from Wallkill to White Lake in near silence. Their lack of conversation might have been embarrassing had they not been absorbed by the news reports about Teddy Kennedy’s auto mishap in Massachusetts, which had evolved from a tragedy into something of a national scandal. From what they could gather from the various broadcasts, the senator had been driving home from a party the night before and had plunged his car off the Chappaquiddick Island Bridge, and his twenty-eight-year-old companion, Mary Jo Kopechne, had drowned. Speculation abounded about the incident, linking the two accident victims as partners in an illicit romance. Kennedy’s failure to report the accident until the next day served to heighten the suspicion.
“Unbelievable,” John snorted, trying to appear as hip as he possibly could be in front of Michael. “It goes to show you just how much we cannot trust politicians.”
“Well, you can’t be sure, man. The way I figure it—they got John and Bobby. Ted’s the only one left.”
“Who, Michael?”
“They, man. Y’know, the Establishment. Sooner or later they pin a bum rap on all their enemies. That’s why the revolution’s just around the corner, man. This country belongs to the people, not the FBI and CIA, and one day they’re gonna take it back from those dudes who hold the power. You’ll see.”
“Hmmm . . .”
“Right here, man,” Michael said abruptly, pointing to the entranceway to Yasgur’s farm. “There’s Max up ahead.”
Roberts was afforded the same professional treatment that Michael had received the day before. He found Max quite charming and an improvement many times over their former landlord, Howard Mills, Jr. Here was a man he found very much like his own father—middle-aged, well dressed, eloquent, educated, Jewish—and, yet, Max Yasgur exhibited more compassion toward young people than Alfred Roberts might have shown in the same situation, especially when it came to their being prejudged because of their age and appearance.
“That’s great, Max,” Roberts agreed, “but, gee, you’re talking about an incredible amount of money for us to put up just to rent your land for a couple days.”
“You’re right. But, right now, it’s the only thing you have, and I’m taking a considerable risk with my neighbors and my reputation. They’re not going to like this too much.”
“We’re worried about that, too. We have no guarantee that once we move in, we’ll be able to stay.”
Max looked stupefied. “What do you mean—stay? Of course, you’ll be allowed to stay. What I do with my property is my own business.”
“I understand that, but we’ve just been tossed out of one place that told us the same thing. A lotta good that did us. Now, it’s going to cost us another $125,000 to get ourselves situated, not to speak of publicity and another public relations campaign from scratch. What happens if the Town of Bethel decides they don’t like what they see?”
“Don’t you worry about a thing. I carry a substantial amount of weight in this town, and if I enter into a contractual arrangement with you, I intend to deliver my end of the deal. Anyway, I’ve taken the liberty of arranging a town meeting for you fellas next week—that is, if we have a deal.”
“We do, Max, we do. You said it yourself: it’s the only thing we have. And, anyway, I rather like it. I think we’ll get along real fine.”
Michael, who had remained a spectator throughout the proceedings, let out a comical sigh of relief.
“Good,” Max said. “Now why don’t you fellas come over to my house. I’ll take you on a tour of my dairy, we’ll have ourselves some chocolate milk”—he sardonically smiled—“and then we’ll get down to business.”
• • •
When the collective bargaining session was over, Max Yasgur had made himself a deal as shrewd as the one in which Peter Stuyvesant got New York in exchange for a handful of glass beads. Roberts had agreed to Yasgur’s preposterous asking price early in the negotiations and prepared to take leave and compute his new indebtedness in the privacy of his Manhattan apartment. Three hours—and several gallons of chocolate milk—later, the two men remained locked in debate over the term of occupancy Woodstock Ventures would be entitled to by virtue of the lease. Max had prepared an intricately detailed map of his land featuring each crop, barn, cow, and, if one were to ask Roberts, every blade of grass between Happy Avenue and the great unknown. Beneath each notation, Max had penciled in a date on which that particular segment of the site would be made available to them. Several times during the discussion, John feigned breaking off the talks, and each time, Yasgur reminded his young associate of his recent heart attack until Roberts acceded to the farmer’s demands. No one was permitted to disturb Max’s crops until it was contractually all right to do so; any violation of the time schedule would draw a stiff monetary penalty.
“This is the best I can do, John,” Yasgur contended. “I don’t think you have many options open to you other than what I’m offering. You’d best think twice before you walk out of here without a deal.” In other words: take it or leave it.
Roberts took it. By 10:30 P.M., both parties confirmed their accord with each clause (one party more enthusiastically than the other) and a deal memorandum was submitted to Yasgur’s attorney for formal papers to be drafted. The Woodstock Music and Art Fair was back in business.
On their way back to New York City, Roberts painfully brought up a subject that, only recently, had provided him with sleepless nights: financing. “You know, Michael, we’ve said goodbye to the $500,000-mark we originally set. I think it’s time we took a realistic look at what this thing’s going to wind up costing us and work something out.”
“Like what, man?”
“Nothing that will get you upset. Look, I’m going to have to come up with at least another $500,000 before the end of this thing. Okay—so it was more expensive than we thought. I realize those things happen. But I’m the guy who’s going to be taking all the risks.”
“And you want to adjust the percentages, right?”
“Wrong. I don’t do business that way. We made a deal, and I intend to stick by it. We’re equal partners.”
“Outta sight, man. I can appreciate what you’re doing, and all.”
“But I do have to sign a promissory note with the bank for the rest of the financing within the next day or two. Now, I don’t think your and Artie’s guarantees are worth a pile of beans. But, at least to my way of thinking, it would be an act of good faith if you guys were to come in on this damn thing with me.”
“You want us to sign on the loan?” Michael was incredulous.
“That’s right.”
“Well . . .” Lang’s voice trailed off, “I don’t know, man.”
“What don’t you know?”
“I mean, what good would it do?” Michael shifted his seat to face Roberts. “Let me see if I’ve got this straight. Now, if the festival goes into debt, that means Artie and I would have to bear a share of the responsibility—right?”
“That’s right.”
“Well, I don’t know about Artie, man, but if I’m called on to come up with $500,000, I couldn’t do it. Whew! What a bummer, man.”
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br /> “I know you couldn’t do it. You guys probably couldn’t buy a newspaper on credit between you. But I just think that it would be a vote of confidence for me when I walk into the bank on Monday and ask for another half million. Anyway—it’s not going to mean anything to you in the long run. Look at ticket sales. We’re going to make a bundle on the festival. What do you think?”
“I don’t know, man. Let me sleep on it, and we’ll talk about it tomorrow.”
“All right, Michael. But if you’ve got any second thoughts about the success of the festival, I hope to hell you’ll let me know before I spring for the rest.”
It was, however, the last time the subject was discussed between the partners.
The only person with an afterthought about his deal was Max Yasgur. Like Roberts, Max intended to honor his commitment to the promoters, and he was satisfied that the deal he had made with the boys was a fair one. But the reality of hosting the event on his land—well, something told him that he hadn’t taken enough time to consider all of the consequences. He was confused, not only about the eventuality of the festival, but also about the young people who were likely to attend it. Yasgur was a conservative Republican farmer who took a strict line with his own children. Now, in a strange turn of events, he was about to assume responsibility for an entire generation whose social politics were a puzzle to him. In the most profound sense, he had been taken aback by Michael Lang’s appearance—the dirty jeans, bare chest, beaded vest, rawhide wristbands, the long curls, the crazy leather hat, and motorcycle boots. Only a day before, he would have shunned a person like Lang had they passed one another on the street. There was no doubt he would have branded the boy a troublemaker had he not known him. But that afternoon, Max strolled into his house, found his wife, Miriam, in the living room reading a newspaper, and told her, “You wouldn’t believe that a boy who looks like that could be so nice.” He had been charmed by Lang’s soft, polite voice and ingratiating smile—and that worried him, too.
