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Libre- 60's cultural revolution- History of Libre Commune

Thursday, November 19, 2009

The Sixties Cultural Revolution
The formation of communes in the l960's was the result of a cultural revolution that transformed American society profoundly. The raising of the anchor of the materialistic expectations of the mainstream culture of the l950's opened Pandora
The Sixties Cultural Revolution
The formation of communes in the l960's was the result of a cultural revolution that transformed American society profoundly. The raising of the anchor of the materialistic expectations of the mainstream culture of the l950's opened Pandora’s Box and a cadre of souls looking for a new Utopia began to form. Some were able to create a version of Paradise that has endured and elements of which still pervade and change global society. ln the Sixties what happened in this country was nothing short of a revolution. When other boomer men ask my father if he was in Viet Nam my father replies that he was a foot soldier in the sexual revolution and then elaborates that he is proud to stand up with the other hippie men who helped the feminist to flush patriarchy down the toilet. He then offers me and my sisters as living proof of the war that he fought and won.
The collateral damage of an increase in divorce, and the ultimate decline of the nuclear family was the fare paid for the ticket of redefined roles for women sexually and in the workplace, redefined responsibilities for men as the provider for the family, redefined racial relationships and rights for people of color, and a general suspicion about the role of government as a socially benevolent force. It was a powerful time for cultural change and the youth culture of the day created a counter-culture that was a reaction against the very conservative social norms of the previous generation. Basic inequalities of race and sex were exposed. Other controversies that destroyed faith in the American Dream were the horrors of the Vietnam War and also the visually graphic nature of that war as presented on television, the inequalities of the draft, and the fascism of a Police State that had to answer to the public for very little of what it did.
The youth culture reaction to these injustices was the creation of a counterculture that explored possibilities for an alternative society, one based on World Peace, Love, and Racial Equality. The counter-culture contained many young Americans who were reacting to what was perceived as lies presented to the public by the mass media. Media information was scrutinized by all and either rejected as appallingly wrong or else completely embraced with Christian right wing fervor. There were very few opinions that were not entirely polarized. Men began to organize catalyzed by the unfair mandatory draft. Women banded together to procure rights for women who then often had no legal recourse in domestic disputes or with employment issues. An early member of Libre, Juana Bordas, moved to Denver in the 70's and devoted her life to a quite successful career promoting the rights of Hispanic women. Youth of conscience everywhere supported the civil rights movement which had it’s beginnings in l954. It was in full swing by the mid-sixties and had begun to be violently revolutionary after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, and the murders by police of students protesting at Kent State. The Black Panthers, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), the Weathermen, and the Symbionese Liberation Army were some of the very radical groups.
On college campuses around the country students often felt like they were under siege. It felt dangerous to wear your hair long and to protest against war and racism because it was dangerous. There was a wave of violence action and thought that was countered by the teachings of Gandhi who taught change though non-violent protest and introduced the west to the concept of not harming other beings. Gandhi does not receive nearly enough credit for his influence on the youth of the sixties.
Popular songs of protest were especially successful in converting the masses . Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, The Beatles and Jimi Hendrix all gave voice the sentiments of the times. John Lennon was an incredible activist in American politics of the time. In August of 1969 the Woodstock Festival was the atomic bomb of all music festivals of all times, an explosion still reverberating in the world. As early as 1965 the Beat Poetry of the l950's and the wildly popular voice of Rock and Roll were becoming relatively mainstream. The hippie counter-culture sincerely believed that they could change the world for the better and in many ways they did! These revolutionary ideas along with and the widespread use of LSD and marijuana by the youth culture began to create the emergence of a search for a new utopian ideology. Before the media invented the term hippie the hippies originally referred to themselves as “Freaks”. They were rebelling against the very limited palette of socially acceptable fashion and lifestyle options that represented a mainstream culture largely defined by antiquated patriarchal gender roles.
People began experimenting with alternative ways of building inspired by Buckminster Fuller’s “Operating Manual For Spaceship Earth“. The design of the geodesic dome was suddenly very popular The beginnings of the Health Food buying clubs and cooperatives is one very important contributions to modern American society that had its roots in the Hippie Culture. Stewart Brand parked his Airstream trailer in my Dad’s front yard for a month while he was writing “The Whole Earth Catalog”. It elegantly presented counter-culture alternatives to the stifling establishment options.
The youth culture of the 1960's grew their hair long and began to wear ethnic peasant clothes that were often handmade and that defined their wearers as a very different tribe from “normal” members of the bourgeoisie. Uppity Hippie Chicks assaulted the fashion sense of the middle class with their compelling open sexuality. They burned their bras, quit wearing underwear, took their clothes off entirely whenever they could get away with it, and nursed their babies in public. They spawned the modern beginnings of the women's movement. They made the then very bold statement with their actions and words that their sexuality and their reproductive choices were not only their own personal business but also their legal right.
The concept of Free Love was a prevalent sentiment that was vocalized much more than it was actually acted upon. Although the term was usually used to imply a freedom to be promiscuous what was actually much more relevant was the aspect of freedom from the tyranny of oppressive social attitudes limiting personal choices. There was also a freedom to love others in a spiritual sense that was a very important unifying element of the movement: “All You Need Is Love” was definitely not a song about getting off sexually. The sexuality of the sixties was for the most part much more innocent than the wild excess of the eighties. Even though the hippies liked to think that they were so very free there still remained all the problems inherent in most sexual relations. Nuclear families were ruined by jealousy and children were then raised by single mothers. Children were exposed to abuse. The increase in STDs was sometimes epidemic. Women were still locked into subservient roles within the family. Drug and alcohol excess fueled some very joyous celebration but also some very poor judgement. In spite of all the obvious failings of the Free Love ideal some profound global changes in women’s rights and a trend to discard millennial old attitudes of women as property was begun. Hate crimes against promiscuous women or homosexuals are no longer viewed as socially acceptable because of these changes in conscience. The profound trend to liberalize sexuality begun in the sixties continues today as a powerful social force. That being said, it is also necessary to note that open sexuality destroyed quite a few of the Hippie Communes.

The experimentation with sexuality dovetailed with widespread experimentation with psychedelic drugs. The main point of taking acid, mescaline, peyote and a few other such drugs was generally perceived as a way of expanding one’s consciousness. By making these personal changes it was also the intention to change the world in a positive sense. Timothy Leary preached from the pulpit of academia. His mantra was to, “ tune in, turn on, drop out”. The hippie code about dropping out was based on an ideology of blowing one’s own mind and the minds of every straight person you met by opening their hearts to love and beauty. Ken Kesey and his Band of Merry Pranksters took a psychedelic painted school bus called “Further”, on a tour across the country conducting Acid Kool Aid Tests. Wavy Gravy and the Hog Farm did similar socially interactive events interlaced with political demonstrations. The flagship of the Hog Farm was called “The Road Hog”. My mom, Sesame, lived on both of these buses and quite a few other buses including “Dr. Gonzo” and “The Lust Bus”. There were also some extremely colorful caravans of house trucks from the Northern California commune called “Blackbear”. One of these in particular, “The Excess Express” was a 1930's moving van with a removeable canvas roof and a wood cook stove. It was a rolling happening involving an open relationship between three ladies and two very colorful men, Samurai Bob and Kiwa.
The Diggers in San Francisco stepped up to the plate with grass roots socialism which was basically the poor caring for the destitute. They were a collective of peace activist street performers bent on creating a new paradigm on the streets of Haight-Ashbury who were radical, responsible, and resourceful. Libre members Pat MacMahon and Steve Raines were among their ranks. The Diggers created a micro society, a street utopia that included free food for the poor, free medical care, free stores, and communal free living spaces.
The response of the establishment to these changes was to criminalize drugs as a weapon against the youth that they perceived as a threat to their power. The cities had become battlegrounds. When the police started arresting hippies on the streets of the wilder cities the venues for activism changed to larger gatherings that were much harder to police. The Monterey Pop Festival and Woodstock were much more than just music events. These music festivals were happenings were the tribes gathered not only celebrate but to also stage political protests against the Vietnam War and the wrongs proliferated by the police state. Impoverished rural areas all over the country offered cheap land in areas that were relatively safe from the persecution that was escalating in the cities and a migration to such places in New Mexico, Colorado, Northern California, Oregon, and Upstate New York began. A movement of providing alternative ways of living simply on the land gathered steam. Dropplng out all together was in many ways the only thing that seemed to make sense.
Rural communes such as Drop City, The Farm, New Buffalo, Lorien, Reality Construction Company, The Hog Farm on the Llano, Ojo Sarco, Long John’s Valley, Libre, The Red Rocks, The AAA (Anonymous Artists of America), Ortivez Farm, Blackbear, Ojao Mountain and many more sprang up as places of refuge from the storm. Some such as New Buffalo emphasized subsistence farming. Libre was founded by artists for artists. The Red Rockers lived in an impressive 60 foot theater dome.
Hippies also sought out religious groups, especially Buddhist and Hindu. Maharishi Mahesh, Paramahansa Yoganada, Yogi Satchitanada, Yogi Bagwan, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, Lama
Yeshe, Lama Zopa, Geshe Tsultrim Gyaltsen, Geshe Sopa and many others found their first western students and began what would become a profound transformation of America’s spiritual landscape. There was also a blossoming in Rosicrucian theology and Native American practices as well as darker stuff such as Aleister Crowley and Scientology.
The commune on which I was born is called Libre. It is situated on 360 acres of land surrounded by National Forest, mainly between 8000' and 9000' at the base of 12,300' high Greenhorn Mountain in Southern Colorado. Dean and Linda Fleming and Peter Douthit, aka Peter Rabbit, were the prime instigators who with the help of the Lama Mountain hippie philanthropist Rick Klein purchased the land in 1968 for $12,000. The local rancher who sold the land thought that he really pulled a fast one on the city slickers because he thought it was only worth $8,000 and was hoping that Libre would not last a single winter and that he would be able to buy it back for practically nothing. They were totally wrong in
underestimating the hippies. Much was accomplished the first year. It was an impressive beginning for city slicker hippie commie beatnik artists with limited funds.
Dean and Linda (a very pregnant redheaded sculptor from Pittsburg) put up a 40' dome in one summer where their first child, Lia was born. Linda was and still is a fireball of energy and participated fully in the construction. Peter Rabbit and his wife Judy, both from Drop City, also accomplished putting together a geodesic structure with two wings and a loft called The Zome. The design came from Steve Baer from the Zomeworks in Placitas, NM. It was a quite elegant building. Owsley sent Peter a quart jar of Sunshine Acid as a housewarming present and Peter became the resident wild man poet trickster shaman of the tribe. Peter Rabbit was a poet, indeed probably one of the very first slam poets, although that term had not yet been invented. He was a charming irascible trickster who loved nothing better than to trip you out and send you down the Rabbit Hole to Wonderland. If anyone ever embodied the caterpillar that Alice encountered it was Peter Rabbit.
Dean Fleming was a Malibu surfer dude, a Venice Beach Bum Beatnik and an impressive painter who had already begun to achieve recognition in the New York art scene as a member of the Park Place Gallery. Other artists from that scene in New York also came to Libre - Steve Vasey, Tony Magar, Patsy Krebs, and Jason Crum among them. Dean also had a strong connection with Native American traditions and modeled the Libre charter and later its bylaws on an idealized Tribal Council Meeting format at which every tribal member had not only a chance to speak and vote but also a right to withhold their approval on matters of communal gravity. That right amounts to a veto meant to protect members from being bullied by other members. What truly sets Libre apart from the way that others conduct business is the value the members put on achieving unanimous consent whenever possible. Libre was and still is unique in being a tribe of chiefs with no indians.
Dean also gave Libre it’s name which in Spanish translates as “free”, unless of course it is on a taxi in which case it means “available for hire”. It’s meaning was supposed to be free from establishment oppression, freedom to be creative, free to be happy, freedom of choice, sexual freedom, free to not be locked into some preordained role, hopefully free of suffering and its causes, but especially free to participate in the Utopian experiment that Libre is still conducting. No one wrote down a list of ways to be free but they all knew that, whatever it was, they wanted all of it immediately!
One of the land use decisions was an agreement to be stewards of the land in an ecological sense. Another important idea was that house should not be build within sight of each other so that each household could enjoy a certain amount of privacy. This brought a lot of criticism from other communes, especially the communes such as New Buffalo (they were determined to survive by farming) who accused Libroids of being elitist and bourgeoisie. At the Red Rocks everyone shared the same six hole outhouse- those uppity Libroids dug their own! It turned out to be a rather good thing to have the privacy of a home to retreat to and Libre endured for the next 40 years whereas many other communes floundered.
There were no building codes in those days and creative design was valued by all. It was a condition for membership in the first decades that a house needed to be built in order to join the group. The land and the houses are owned by the group which grants stewardship of the individual homes to its members. New members can only be admitted by unanimous consent. Libre was also meant to be primarily an intentional community of artists of all kinds. Steve Vasey had also completed a smaller living space, and Steve and Pat had broken ground on their building and were living in a teepee.
My Dad arrived at Libre in the spring of 1969. He had been living in theTaos, NM area with his first wife, Tzadi. He had invited some California hippies, Zaul, Quannu, and baby Dort, who were living in Volkswagen buses to share his rent free shack. Zaul was a mechanic, a fortune teller, and a welder. He taught my Dad how to weld and Daddy Dave Gordon gave him the back half of a ‘40 Chevy panel truck to weld onto his ‘47 Plymouth 2 door sedan. Much housepaint and paisley fabric later the Humpmobile house car was on the road and Daddy Dave said that a road trip to Libre should happen as that was where he was sure that my Dad belonged. That proved to be the case and Jim and Tzadi were rather quickly welcomed as the first new members to apply for a membership council. They were offered the entrance area to Libre as a building site which was appealing because it was on the creek and it had an electric pole. They built a crude mud cabin that summer while living in the Humpmobile and cooking outside on an antique wood cookstove. Pat and Steve, Tony and Marilyn, Steve and Harriet, and Bill and Annie Keidel were also building that summer. There was deep snow that winter and the 10 miles of roads to the highway were mud trails but Libre had already become a village inhabited by a tribe.
Izzy Zane (David Perkins) and his wife Roberta were the next new members to join. They were Ivy League and well educated, writing dissertations about communes and touring the west in a 1948 Chrysler. Roberta was a practical tough as nails little blond who would walk up the steep ridge to where they were building a house around a huge boulder with a five gallon can of water on her back. She totally did the pioneer woman bit and soon had a horse and goats. Izzy was a writer, a dreamer, and also a rather excellent songwriter and musician. Before very long his buddy from back east arrived with a guitar in a handmade leather case, leather pants that matched. David Henry was 6'6" with blond hair half way down his long skinny back. He was also an excellent musician and songwriter and the seeds for the Dog Brothers Band had been planted. The summers of ‘70 And ‘71 were full of wonderful visitors from both coasts and also from the New Mexican communes. Lovely new faces were coming and going in droves. Tom Grow and Peggy Abbot moved here from Drop City with Peggy’s kids, Lump and Lori. Tom built the Grow Hole, a lovely delicate rebar,wire, plaster and glass structure built into a hillside. The Okies showed up and built a remote lean-to between rocks in a back canyon. Richard and Vickie Wehrman built a lovely faceted double A-frame on the ridge. Richard was a world class jeweler and illustrator and Gary “Okie” did incredible western wildlife castings. Peggy was a gifted classical pianist and Juilliard graduate but had rebelled against the establishment to the point of becoming one of the most earthy hippies of all times with the exception of Tom.
The AAA Band from San Francisco played at the Gardner Community Center and later settled in the Huerfano Valley nearby. A group from L.A. some of whom were from a film making family came and bought land that became the Red Rock Commune. Another group started up using the name of the previous owners of the land, Ortivez Farm. The summer solstice that year included Peyote Indian ceremonies from Taos, Banditos from Ojo Sarco, caravans from Blackbear in California, a hippie sundance at Libre, some locally infamous orgies, a renaissance of marijuana cultivation, the formation of the Dog Brothers Band - it felt as if a three ring circus had suddenly sprung out of the earth! The Summer of Love arrived later in the Huerfano but it lingered longer here than elsewhere. Communal living flourished here well into the eighties and still lives on, although slowed to a much more geriatric pace.

There was a lot of joyous celebration but there was plenty of drama and tragedy as well. Many relationships did not weather the storms of promiscuity. A child accidentally drowned. Two older children died in an auto accident almost before their lives began. Some unhappy souls ended their own lives. Other people could not stand the level of poverty and sought lives and careers in the cities. The hippies stood by each other and helped each other out whenever they could and a tribal aspect of kinship still endures.
A low point in Libre occurred with the alienation and expulsion Peter Rabbit and his wife, Annie. Peter had used the financial resources of his previous woman, Alex (a gorgeous blond who looked like Jerry Hall) to build up a rather large marijuana plantation in the hidden meadow near the Zome. He had also started a brewery that made possibly the most potent of beers ever made - “Cottontail Ale” - below on the label it read - “With the Hip Hops”. It was a strong dark ale, almost a stout, and in addition to regular hops it also contained an ounce of strong bud leaf for each case of quart bottles. It even had its own label which featured a cartoon jack rabbit with a huge erection who was ejaculating into an open beer bottle. This brew almost destroyed the community, especially after it started to become the breakfast of choice. A single quart bottle was an instant rowdy party for a half dozen people but often left everyone with raw edges by the time afternoon rolled around. The entire community was very dismayed when Rabbit violently kicked Alex out of his house and replaced her with Bill Keidel’s wife and child, Annie and Julep.
Further domestic violence against both Alex and Annie alienated the community from Peter. It was also a very dry summer and Peter quarreled violently with his neighbors when they tried to use “his” water on “their” vegetable gardens. He had 300 large marijuana plants in the ground in a community that was divided about growing, especially on a commercial scale. Tensions were high, to say the least, when Frank Noga, who was the local building inspector, came up to the Zome where Peter had started to build a new wing. Nothing would have happened if Peter had just gotten Frank loaded and sent him home smiling but Peter was already out of control and threw one of his infamous rabid dog shows in Frank’s face. Frank showed up at dawn the next day with the biggest posse ever assembled in the county and busted not only Peter but everyone else in the area that was growing at several communes. The last straw that occurred was when the Flemings discovered that Rabbit had gotten the deed to Libre and was trying to remove everyone’s name but his own from it. When we confronted him about it he flew into a rage and said he was going to come back with a shotgun and kick us all off the land. After debating what we could do to prevent bloodshed we decided that he would have a hard time laying siege to Libre if he didn’t have a house and several of us went over the next day and tore down a large portion of his house. We all lost out on that day - Libre lost its Zome and its poet and Peter and Annie lost their tribe and their home. It was almost like in the Bible except it was the snake and the lady who got thrown out.
One of the main incentives for a person to resolve the interpersonal issues that are certain to occur within a tribe composed entirely of chiefs is that no one has any personal equity in the land or in the homes in which we have lived in, some of us for 40 years. Together we have a fabulous place with incredible quiet, stunning views, clean mountain spring water and life long friends, but when the boat starts rocking everyone gets seasick. One of the two huge lessons that we are all still trying to learn are: (1) Don’t sweat the small stuff... and (2) It’s all small stuff... which is to say utopia turned real, a mirror place, that connects the real and the unreal and is composed of virtual boundaries against which all places around them lie in the intersection of a concept of a place where the ideology of a utopia and the hardness of reality meet. Libre is the testing ground for the social experiment that Libre is. Life is short, make it count!
I think that my parent’s generation was brave and went boldly into the world and the legacy that they left is one where anything is possible through love and an idealistic vision of the world. The tribal nature of Libre is in many ways one of the few vestiges of civilization that we have. Modern life is so fragmented and to get refuge from the storm sometimes takes having a “Little Help From Your Friends“. Libre is in many ways a tribe of orphans, which makes it all the more fitting that it is in Huerfano (Spanish for Orphan) County ln Southern Colorado.
Current Members of the Libre Council
Dean Fleming
Linda Fleming
Luz Fleming
Mary Anne Flood
Electra
Jim Fowler
Sesame Fowler
Bill Haynes
David Perkins
Betsy Rich
Leon Smith
Sybilla Wallenborn
Andrea (Wallenborn) Bolman
Other offspring or spouses of current and previous Libre residents
Dr. Star Fowler (Star Desert Flower Viviette Fowler)
Waska Curly Arrow Redwing Hawk Archuleta John Lamb
Talatawi Sihu de la Joya (Glantz) Mousley
Ra Smith
Sean Kinnery
Angus Crum
Brent Seawell
Babs Seawell
Bo Seawell
Danielle Seawell
Truely Seawell
Graeme Seawell
Cole Rich
Pat MacMahon
Monty Ranes (d.)
Steve Ranes
Nanda Ranes
Tawa (Ranes)
George Kasander
Dr. Lori (Kasander)
Chamisa (Wienmeister) Gordan
Daddy Dave Gordan (d.)
Jimmy Robieson
Michael Moore
Tom Grow
Peggy Abbott
Roberta Price

Labels: 1960's, 1969, Colorado, Commune, Commune living, counter- culture, Freaks, geodesic dome, heterotopia, Hippees, Huerfano, Huerfano County, Jim Fowler, Libre, marijuana, revolutionary ideas, subversion