Longhaired Hippies

I remember the first time I saw real hippies. If I remember correctly, the year was 1968 and the band calling itself “Canned Heat” was on an afternoon music program. They were playing a song that was hitting the AM radio stations called "On the road again". This particular song was nothing like the later version Willie made famous. Canned Heat’s version was untamed and hypnotic, as was their appearance. They had long straggly hair. I mean real long and they dressed funny. It was disgusting and invariably “cool”.

*”Almost cut my hair
It happened just the other day
It's gettin kinda long
I could have said it was in my way”


It’s commonly reminisced that longhaired hippie types were common in 1968 and maybe they were in some small parts of the country, but mainstream America viewed the Beatles cutesy hair over the top of the ears, as real hippie fodder --- and it wasn’t. Long hair on young men didn’t really catch on across the country until the 70’s. I know, because I lived it and remember it as well as younger people can tell you the day they heard Tupac Shakur had died.

Back in 1964 when Ed Sullivan brought John, Paul, George and Ringo into our homes and Beatlemania swept almost every young person in this country off their feet, I imagine Barbers in every town let out a groan. The Beatles had hair hanging on their foreheads and their ears were plainly visible, but to hear people talk, they had hair “down to there”. It was just the beginning.

“But I didn't and I wonder why
I feel like letting my freak flag fly
Cause I feel like I owe it to someone”

Almost every parent hated the Beatle haircut and since I wanted to be cool and hip, like the Beatles (and everyone else), I quit wearing the “Flattop” haircut with that sweet-smelling pink “Butch Wax” pomade. More than once I walked out of the barber shop only to get turned around by my Dad, so I could get more hair cut off. He was determined I would get a “regular” and I was determined to have “bangs”, but the thought of wearing a ponytail never entered my mind…at least not for a few more years.

Long hair on men and the hippie persona was a strong attractant to most young rebels back then, but not in the Houston, Texas arena. Here, folks were comfortable in traditional western clothes and proud of their redneck ways, as the Marshall Tucker Band would later say and the very appearance of longhaired hippie boys, absolutely meant something unpatriotic and worthy of a good “licking”. Wearing that long hair cost a number of young men a few bruises.

“But I'm not giving in an inch to fear
Cause I promised myself this year
I feel like I owe it to someone”

By the mid 70’s I fit in quite nicely with the longhaired cowboy rednecks that unwittingly had adopted the hippie look (with cowboy boots, of course), thanks to Willie, Waylon and the boys. No longer did I have to fear getting a good beating because of my ponytail, but I, like most longhairs, instead had a good chance of getting a Gilley’s sticker on my truck bumper.

The country was exiting the Vietnam years and there was a lot of wild living going on. It was a time of optimism, debauchery and religious revival. Hippies were no longer called hippies, but “Freaks” instead because of the drug culture, and Willie and Waylon were doing their share to knock down that bridge also.

Hippie/Freak/Cowboys. Who would have believed it ten years before?

“When I finally get myself together
I'm going to get down in that sunny southern weather
And I find a place inside a laugh
Separate the wheat from the chaff
I feel like I owe it to someone”

In 1975, I found the Lord and inevitably gave up my heathen ways and my ponytail, freak-flags, and all the trappings that went with it. Long hair on men was already doomed anyway, as Lou Reed had launched the album “Rock and Roll Animal” in 1974 and on the cover; Lou had an almost shaved head. Punk Rock had arrived. It took 10 years for people to catch up with old Lou and even though I never shaved my head, I never grew that ponytail again.

*ALMOST CUT MY HAIR - David Crosby