New York

Tompkins Square Park, Grateful Dead, June 1967

| Mostly Rumors

Several many of us, including three pictured, occupied a sixth-floor stair-climb at 608 East 9th, half a block from Tompkins Square Park. In June I saw the Grateful Dead play a free concert at the band shell. Their first album had come out in March.

  • 608 East 9th Street, NYC
    608 East 9th Street
  • Valerie David Keith
    Three from East 9th
  • Grateful Dead Tompkins Square Park
    Grateful Dead perform at band shell

Photo credits: 608 East 9th from Zillow. “Three from East 9th Street”, a still grab from video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSBdOQrkS5k (accessed July 16, 2020). Grateful Dead at Thompkins Square, http://morningdew.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=553 (accessed November 7, 2018).

Underground Uplift Unlimited

| Mostly Rumors

In 1967, after 8 months on a road more extreme than Kerouac traveled, I lived in the Lower East Side and worked on St Marks Place at Underground Uplift Unlimited. The store and mail order business sold buttons such as Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out, Keep the Faith Baby, and We Shall Overcome. It quickly evolved into a head shop.
I would be beholden to anyone who contacts who has or knows of other photos of the Underground Uplift Unlimited, 28 St Marks Place.

  • Underground Uplift Unlimited
    Underground Uplift Unlimited
  • Randy Wicker
    Randy Wicker (aka Chaarles Hayden), Underground Uplift proprietor
  • Turn On Tune In Drop Out
    One of the buttons sold at UUU
Photo credits: Teenyboppers in front of Underground Uplift Unlimited, https://www.tumblr.com/search/underground%20uplift%20unlimited (accessed January 12, 2018). Randy Wicker http://gaytoday.com/garchive/viewpoint/042400vi.htm (accessed March 27, 2018). Button images from http://www.lancefuhrer.com/60s_Buttons.htm (accessed June 21, 2018, no longer online).

The poet Tuli Kupferberg dropped in occasionally. Valerie Solanas brought her SCUM magazine in to sell. Abbie Hoffman lived upstairs from the store.

  • Tuli Kupferberg
    Tuli Kupferberg
  • Valerie Solanas
    Valerie Solanas
  • Abbott Hoffman, Yippie
    Abbot Hoffman
Photo credits: Tuli Kupferberg, http://www.azquotes.com/author/20227-Tuli_Kupferberg (accessed March 27, 2018). Valerie Solanas, http://crimefeed.com/2017/06/crime-history-valerie-solanas-shoots-andy-warhol-in-1967 (accessed March 27, 2018). Abbot Hoffman https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/how-new-york-stock-exchange-gave-abbie-hoffman-his-start-guerrilla-theater-180964612/ (accessed March 27, 2018).