Century, i talk about the hipsters and the beatles. I get two figures of the cast of Allen Ginsberg and jack kerouac who were central, biographical elements in this book. And talk about Timothy Leary and a whole array of characters who course through the decade of the 1960s and think of the counterculture of the 1960s when we think of the hippies and participants in one capacity or another and they were individuals who were disenchanted with matters as they were in some fashion, concerned about jim crow and its continuance, they were deeply concerned about the war in vietnam, two of this when pillars in a matter of speaking and they were also concerned about elemental issues, family relationships and personal dealings and sexuality and consciousness, rationality, there was this coalescing of forces, demographic, economic, literary, cultural, some political in nature that welded together and provided this backdrop allowing the counterculture of the 1960s to be as large in scope and scale is approved to be. There were several sparks or triggers to the counterculture of the 1960s, you have the backdrop of the cold war. Internationally speaking, you had that feeling and reality of alienation. And demographic matters came into play, large pools of young people congregating together, off and on your College University campuses and then you had those terrible realities of racism and war. And i think that enabled a large number of young people to be receptive to different possibilities and then you have key figures like berg and caraway and larry and tv and the great bands of the ear and great musicians from bob dylan to the beatles to San Francisco sound groups and the grateful dead. I think young people were drawn to messages that were being imparted, messages of the challenging and probing and provocative task, of a radical nature. Testing severities that were in place, contesting american institutions and even contesting the way people interacted with one another and the way people thought and behaved. There is a radical facet of the counterculture that i highlight. There were revolutionary possibilities inherent in some of this which is why it is perceived the way it is considered by the powers that were. There are other avenues, setting up the an underground newspaper, a new kind of comics that are in place during this period. Gilbert shelton and others, the rag is the underground newspaper in austin in the 1960s and i talk about it in that chapter, the Texas Capital city. And this incredible compendium, you can look at the issues and snapshots of so much that was going on, the other movements of the entire period. An interesting matter to reflect on and i grapple with it as best i can in the book, the question of how universal in scope and nature the counterculture is. Think of the counterculture, in new york city, San Francisco, we think of other pockets above la and so forth but the reality is young people congregate and find seeds for and the planting of the counterculture which means virtually any College University has the possibilities inherent in the fact that there was a community of likeminded people that would be present. For instance, one of the focal for focal points is on austin, texas, university of texas, people would question why that would be included. Austin and the university of texas were epicenters in their own fashion, the antiwar movement, with the womens movement, we use that as a microcosm examining the process, focusing on hate not surprisingly from 1967. Earlier in scope, the appearance at columbia university, the small circle of friends referred to in that manner, ginsberg and jack kerouac and their bodies were challenging the institution that was columbia and challenging the literary establishment and questioning moloch as goods are referred to it as he does in the famous epic poem howell, as jack kerouac does on the road. The delivery presented in public the first time in 1955, the publication of on the road, those who accompany those seminal moments serve as triggers. The appearance, the emergence and harvard believe it or not which involved Timothy Leary, Richard Albert and brought in young people to serve as guinea pigs as it were, proved enormously controversial, surprisingly what became most controversial at harvard was undergraduates were included in the mix seem to be okay, Community Members professors or graduate or undergraduate, the pranksters, the journey across america in 1964, went to meet jack kerouac in new york city, shifted very far to the political right by that time, they went to meet leary and albert above new york city and that was not a happy experience, and 3000 files, and get later into the 1960s, and the portion together and one event after another, and the bay area in general that involved ginsberg and the pranksters and held angels, the acid tests the pranksters put on. 66, 67, a human being in the end in San Francisco, Goldengate Park in january 1967, summer of love in 1967, woodstock, the unveiling of the family, the killings by Charles Mansons gained in late 1969. It is almost applicable points, and some spoke to the better side of the angelic quality, the darker side and end up with peoples own and drug usage, sexually transmitted diseases ushered in and lost lives in this part of the story, and the famous musician who died from overuse, correct . Almost in one fell swoop, janice and jimmy and jim died and jimi hendrix, jim morrison in a matter of months, countless lesserknown figures, their education became standards and their occupational possibilities became wanted, stillborn and some of the people never recovered, never recovered, the psyche didnt recover, damaged relationships. Lots of serious aspects of the counterculture. Them, as i said before, seeing this lineal possibility, some of them seemingly reached to the stars in a millennial like manner, in some ways apocalyptic realities helped dampen the hopes of how transformative this might have been. I talk about this at the close of the book. The computer revolution we have experienced over the last few decades, the pc revolution, silicon valley, a lot of that is enacted with the counterculture and part of it is pertaining to who is drawn to those pursuits. The attempt to reach consciousness in different ways, just as the Us Intelligence agencies and us militarys bond the counterculture, believe it or not, through drug tests people partook of and help spread the gospel of out, the let terri is heavily involved in birthing the computer revolution in the 1970s and beyond, there is this weird symbiotic relationship between the counterculture and the us voluntary and intelligence operatives, not saying this is conspiratorial in nature, i am not suggesting that. I am stating the entwining of these threats