Special feature: The East Village in 1967, 'walk into a sex, marijuana and LSD orgy'

Longtime East Village resident Anton van Dalen shared this clipping with us from the Daily News dated Feb. 8, 1967.

Titled "East Village Theme Is Now Love and Let Love," the piece begins with a bang, so to speak:

There was a time when you could knock on any of a dozen doors in the East Village and walk into a sex, marijuana and LSD orgy.

This "Special Feature" provides a snapshot of the area... from drug use to dating. You can click on the images for a better read of the article. It is well worth your time to do so.

A few excerpts by subject.

Dating:

Many of the relationships are interracial, with the usual coupling being a white girl and Negro man. At places such as The Dom, the Annex, the Old Reliable and PeeWee's Other Side interracial pickups and dating don't even raise an eyebrow.

A Negro writer who lives in the area described one East Village saloon as the "meat market" because because so many chicks from outside the area flock to it, as he said, "to prove how unprejudiced they are."

Drugs:

The artists, writers and hangers-on who take drugs lean toward marijuana and LSD. The slum-dwellers — those who live in the East Village because they have no choice — take heroin or cocaine if they take anything at all.

The "heavy" drugs bring the usual problems of muggings and burglaries, committed by addicts with expensive habits to feed.

Residents:

Strangely, the great majority of East Villagers are not from the underprivileged classes, trying to fight their ways to the top. Most of them come from middle class families or higher.

A local bank manager told Father Allen [of St. Mark's Church-in-the-Bowery] that many of the beatnik types are supported by their parents, drawing weekly allowances of up to $100.

Weekend tourists:

Most of these are not artists or writers. Ishmael Reed, whose novel 'The Freelance Pallbearers' is scheduled to be published by Doubleday in the fall, calls them 'A-trainers,' those who ride the subway downtown "to take their lessons in hip," then go back to where they came from.

Not everyone is scornful of the newcomers. Father Allen feels that "terrible tensions are being built up in the community."

He sees a "tendency to develop a 'we-they' attitude — 'we' when we think of ourselves, 'they' when we think of others."

We asked Anton, who moved to the East Village in 1967, for his thoughts on the article.

It's a fascinating read, this 1967 Daily News "special feature" story about our neighborhood. Beyond the shrill headline "Love and Let Love" is a good snapshot of the social revolution that took place here.

The last paragraph with naming this new culture "a kind of accidental laboratory" does call it right.

The East Village/Lower East Side by the early 60s was a largely poor and forgotten Eastern European neighborhood. But then because of its cheap rents and old-world immigrant charm came to be an attraction for counter-culture young. Mostly for young white people that sought to counter mainstream America which they felt disenfranchised by.

Out of that intermingling of old and new world cultures an unifying vision sprung of transcending cultural differences. Many, like me, came here because of wanting to be in the front row and watch up close this love revolution unfold a new way of life.

But then soon this spectacle of life drew many of us in to participate in this "accidental laboratory." In time I learned that our neighborhood had already for two centuries been a spawning ground for human social and political progress.

Last line says it well and still good today: "If we can work out our differences here, maybe there's a chance someplace else."