There I am, Ted Self, top left, 20 years ago, just before I moved to the farm in Summertown Tenn. I first started smoking pot and tripping in 1971, when I was 16. My dad found out I was tripping and gave me a beating. I hitch-hiked out west and ended up on Rainbow Family Tribe south of Eugene Oregon, with Garrick and about 50 others. Before eating we would all gather in a great circle and chant, many would chat OM. I asked a friend what is this OM? He said, "Man, OM is like sending out love vibrations to every living being." I think we had the last of the pure LSD25 that year, and I had a nice guided meditation. I soon came back home to continue my education and started smoking and tripping with my dad, who obviously figured if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. We lived across the street from the local hippy hangout, Avondale Park, and on March 18,1973 Stephen Gaskin came with the Farm band for a gig. Soon dad and I started visiting the Farm often, and made lots of friends. Later in 1979 after dad died me and m first wife moved to the Farm. (Die hard hippies!) The farm was at that time billed as the worlds largest longhaired spiritual community, with around 1,300 folks living there. To attempt to join, one had to agree to certain guidelines including: No alcoholic beverages, no tobacco, no meat eating, no chemical drugs, no artificial birth control. Now I was a pothead and pot was hard to find, because the Farm had been busted, and you had to know someone to keep a supply of pot. Also my wife had went off the pill and her temperature chart was not working, so soon I realized, "Here I am on a hippy commune and I have no drugs or sex!" We soon left the farm. Two divorces and several years of drug (mostly cocaine) abuse later I decided I had had enough. Sick of friends who rip you off, sick of being afraid to see a cop in my rear-view mirror, sick of having no money, I decided to quit drugs. I got my guru to help me. I still respect the people of the tribes I have known, and I love them always, but I am reformed. To those who say drugs bring them closer to God I ask: "And what happens when you die? Can you take drugs with you?" Through the magic of computers I have found that I can do worthwhile things, like leading others to my Divine Guru, Sri Paramahansa Yogananda. I have put up many webpages and a message board dedicated to him. By the way, one of his meditation techniques teaches you to hear the inner sound of OM, and it is still like sending out love vibrations to every living being. It is inner communion, the voice of Divine Mother within. OM Guru, OM Shanti, Jai Guru, OM, peace.

http://www.farmcatalog.com/

So What Happened?? at the 1999 Summer Solstice Hemp Happening? or My $30,000 Birthday Party I guess I should start with a short note on how and why the Sshh Freedom Festival came to be. As many of you know, I have been traveling the country, protesting at fairs court houses and campuses. Along the way as rewards for my hard work, I often stop and enjoy the festivals along the way, especially hempfests. While enjoying one of those festivals in Michigan, I wondered why don't we have one in Pennsylvania? Then I decided to take it upon myself to host Pennsylvania's first Hempfest. I selected my birthday as the best time for the fest and the Summer Solstice Hemp Happening was born. I began an internet campaign, gathering bands and potential concert goers. By February I was so busy making arrangements that I had to quit my job. I wanted to produce a flawless show, I came damn close and for that I want to thank all my friends, who helped out, and all those who came to the show. A very special thanks to my very close friends Diane and Terry, Samar and Ted, Jay and Susan, and my brothers Larry and Jeff. We pulled off a miracle, we ran a full scale production with only 8 people. Thanks I love you all. The rest of the Thank yous... The Summer Solstice Hemp Happening was expected be a gathering of the peaceful tribes, of the earth people, the politically disenfranchised, and the people feeling oppressed by their government, and the system, a classic freedom Festival. It was to be a festival of community sharing, loving and planetary service. Add to the solstice celebration, sun, fun, music, and activist speakers covering everything from activism, itself, as a right as well as a duty to voting, petitioning , peaceful methods of protesting , freedom, earth issues and the threads of the hemp movement and you have the recipe for interesting weekend. I arrived a few days early, help cut firewood and set up my command post at Tune Town. Last minute details kept me busy all week. People started showing up as early as wednesday, The first groups through the gate were from Florida and Colorado, I thought to myself this is going to be huge. Only six of my "workers" came in thursday, I was a bit worried about security. By Thursday night we had 50 or 60 people already, plenty enough for a party and party we did. I spent most of my time friday manning the front gate. Some people were shocked and amazed to be greeted by John Galt jr himself at the front gate. I asked them, who else other than the host, would serve in such a position? By friday night, we had seen cars pass through from New York, Alabama, Tennessee, Ohio, Indiana, Iowa and Michigan. One group had hitch hiked in from Vermont, another from New Hampshire. With less than 200 through the gate, I began to wonder where all my friends from Pa. had gotten to... The bands began to arrive in the late afternoon, Stephen Gaskin wasn't far behind. A few minutes before 5 o'clock, I fired up the show by introducing my friends "Pauli and Kelli", who wooed the crowd with traditional folk songs as well as some originals. I then gave a short introduction to sshh, what it was about, what the rules of the park were and the like. Next up 7pm was Harvest Moon, who did an hour set of Neil Young classics. I then gave a speech on what I felt was important to the future of the planet. Next up was Diane Fornbacher Aka Honeybud Weedwhacker and Hightimes Freedom Fighter of the month for January 1999. Diane did her "Marijuana Poetry" and then gave a short speech. 9pm viperHouse took the stage and blew the crowd away, because most of them had never heard of this nine piece jazz band, with an electric violin, throaty vocals and danceable groove sound. After viperHouse, Stephen Gaskin Aka Saint Stephen from the Grateful song, gave his speech on Cannabis Spirituality, and then tried to stea

steal my thunder, by jumping into his campaign for President. At 11pm Smokescreen took the stage and finished off the night with a set of classic rock from the 70's and 80's. The party went on all night long. Saturday June 19th. We fired the stage up bright and early, the Ben Swift band took the stage at 11am. After a rocking set Diane Fornbacher spoke again, followed by Marvin Marvin Surowitz of the P.A.R.T.I.E. Party. Marvin talked about looking to the future and the challenges of the new millennium. Next up Larry Goya of Quantum Monkey, talked about the 100th monkey phenomena and the many uses of industrial hemp. Dogtown Road took the stage next with some soulful rock and roll. I spoke next and staying on the what is important theme gave this speech. Next Allset, an amazing jam band from Boston did an awesome two hour set. Then my best friend and companion Sehlis made her debut as a speaker, she talked about voting rights, disenfranchisement and the importance of voting. Next up was Samar Hatem (who I had introduced as Samar Lovejoy, damn women always changing their names...)

Samar took on the recreational value of the sacred herb and continued into what's wrong with the war on drugs. It was now 6pm but Electric Blue and the Kosmic Truth was no where in site. Steven and Marvin and Diane took over the stage until we got some replacement music. One of the guitar players from Dogtown road did an acoustic set. Then all hell broke lose as the Cannabis Cup Band took the stage with Reggae as only the Cannabis Cup Band can. Stephen then again took the stage, and mystified the crowd with his gentle, loving and caring philosophies. Next up "In the Flesh" just another Pink Floyd tribute?

That's what we all thought, but they proved us wrong by doing the most incredible Floyd set anyone in this crowd had ever seen. They finished up just before midnight, so I took the stage, told the crowd the Disco Biscuits still hadn't arrived and passed out some free stuff from the stage. I then began my speech about my run for the presidency. At this point I knew we hadn't had anywhere's enough people through the gate to pay for this show, but I decided to have some fun. Someone in the crowd asked if I inhaled, I said I did and a pipe was passed onto the stage. I took the pipe and said "Gee I never did this before" Someone cried out yeah right. I replied "No really I have never smoked a bowl on stage in front of a crowd before". Hoots and hollers followed. I inhaled deeply and someone said exhale into the mike. I did and it was a really cool sound so we did it a couple more times.

A short intro for Electric Blue and the Kosmic Truth (who had arrived a couple hours late) and most of the crowd were so blown away, that the Disco Biscuits were not missed by many. At 2am the stage was shut down for night and my friend Jeff from Chicago cranked up his kick ass Stereo with some Zeppelin and the party continued with no end in site. Having slept an average of three hours a night for the past 4 days, I moved into the back stage trailer, for a sound sleep. However as I fell asleep I swore I heard the Disco Biscuits playing. I thought, Damn Jeff's stereo is good. In the morning, some people claimed the Disco Biscuits showed up at 3am and played until the sun came up? Did it really happen? Was it a mass Hallucination? Well one guy I ran into swore Pink Floyd did a set the night before, so I just don't know what happened while I slept... So what happened Sunday? I got up early, roamed around the campground and mixed with all the remaining souls. I passed out free stuff and listened to all the comments about love, kindness and good feelings we had all experienced. Everybody in the crowd said I give a kick ass party and they had received way way more than they had bargained for... We passed the hat to help cover expenses, many kind souls threw in amounts ranging from $2 to $50. The party continued, drums were beat upon and ... The hundred or so of us who stuck around, got together and decided that those who had not attended should not know what happened on Sunday. The rest of the world missed that loving caring, sharing day, those of us who were there will cherish those memories for the rest of our lives... Letters from people who attended Another report from a friend...

SSHH 99 Letters John, I was Fortunate enough to attend The SSHH Festival last year in 1999. I had a Blast!!!! We are planning to attend this year as well!!! Although, there wasn't as many people as I expected, and the Disco Bisquits didn't show up, but for as many people we had there, we made the best of it. I will never forget that time!!!! Mr. Gault, You might have lost a little $ over that whole deal, But the times I had there are unforgettable. Since then, I have moved to Las Vegas with my Girlfriend. But, I will make a point to attend the SSHH festival again this year! Diamond Ray To: JohnG101 Hi! I'm, Naomi, one of the two girls who came to the festival from Philadelphia. You might remember us-we got there really early. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that we had a great time at the festival, and I hope you do it again next year. Everyone I talked to there also said that they were having fun and that they would definitely do it again next year. I have one suggestion for getting more people to know about it. I got about four or five flyers for other similar festivals this year from some of the vendors, and maybe if you just printed a bunch out and gave them to vendors who are traveling to other festivals, they could distribute them to people who are interested in the cause. Also, you could just give flyers to people who are going to various protests, gatherings, concerts, etc. Just an idea.

Well, I hope that you were able to have a good time despite the small number of people. I really enjoyed it, and, because there weren't all that many people, we got to meet and talk with just about everyone there. Just one more thing...I really admire you and everyone who worked on the festival and all of the awesome bands (those who showed up!) and speakers for working so hard and being so dedicated to the cause. Let me know if there's anything I can do to help out. Maybe we'll run into you on July 4th or somewhere else. Good luck in all future endeavors. ~Peace~ Naomi John and Sue, How do you do!? We had an absolute BLAST at the shindig- What's the deal with the financial gouge- are you set up as a non-profit? Would you like some of my stickers? I probally should have left some for you... Are you going to be going to any of the HAPPENINGS? We are from Kalamazoo Michigan, , but hopefully we will be in touch and see each other before roach roast. Let us know if there is any way we can help you all with what you're going. Love, peace and plenty of happy green nugs to you two, Elizabeth John, Too Cool. I had a great time. You should do it again... . Jay John, Just wanted to let you know that my wife and I really enjoyed the concert this weekend. Don't be discouaraged by the small turnout, your message still got out. Hope your able to do it again next year. Thank you. Peace, Redeyes Mr. Galt: First off, I want to congratulate you on putting together the Freedom Festival. From what I gathered from the web page print-out I recieved, you pretty much did it all yourself. Stellar work! I've reviewed the footage we shot last weekend, and it's pretty good considering the short notice and low audience levels at the time we were there. I don't know if you do any more of these festivals, but we would be interested in professionally filming/documenting events like the one last weekend in the future. Enjoy the ride! Dave Station019, Congradulations on a succesful festival. I will definately be sending in a donation, and hope to participate in many more. If you need any help organizing next years or could use another super band, just send me an email. Peace, Erykaa Forwarded from Sehlis Hi. I just want to tell you that I really enjoyed the festival and so did the two boys that I traveled with. Please tell John Galt. I am very sorry that you two lost so much money and I wish I had money to give you. The purpose of this letter (besides to tell you that I had a great time) is to tell you that I'm a girl. Let me explain: I read your view of the festival and I noticed that you wrote about me and friends and how we hitchhiked from Vermont. My two friends are boys and I'm a girl, you wrote that all three of us were boys. No big deal, I'm used to it because of my name. Just thought you'd like to know. The journey was half the adventure too. This was my first time hitchhiking (not so for the boys) so I was a little nervous but very excited. We met some really cool people and one guy even bought us lunch because we had no money. This whole adventure has made me realize that although there are a lot of mean people in the world, the love generated by all the kind people outshines all the anger. Thank you and John for inspiring me to make this journey, physically and spiritually. Breathe deep and seek peace. Love Morgan

Hi, I lived in the Adobe, bunkhouse, and Dome, from Apr to Dec 1977. My website is http://www.geocities.com/jidanni/ I now live in Taiwan. I was born in 1960. I think you need a table of houses vs. years people can register with to find old friends --- a on line database.

That's a great idea Dan, we're building up some databases on this system. What are your memories of the Adobe? I had to struggle with your web page because of the mixture of fonts, languages and symbols, how about and choice of languages to see your page in. I could tell there was some good content there, but it was hard to get through these barriers. I don't know if html tidy and html validator have done the trick. Maybe it's because I was reluctant to download the language plug in when I opened your page?

I got a kick out of your exploits with gnu and emacs and being windows free.

Thanks, and thanks for your e-mail notification else i don't think i would have checked back soon... Hmmm, i thought i made a "valid" page with stuff... yes, but true it is in "big5" Chinese as well as english... I don't have much fun with netscape on this spring website... now i'm using lynx [no graphic though]. OK, i especially remember Wade who oiled[!] the roads, David Brown of the compost crew, Valery Dyess, Rain & Agnes... oh boy many. I was hot on mapping farm boundaries. Anyway, a simple row x columns table of years vs. houses connected to a database where people could click several boxes & register/search... would be nice to find old friends. OK thanks

Would you like to help set this up? Do you have database admin skills?