May 7, 1968
SF Free City Poetry Bust. After a month of noontime poetry readings on the steps of City Hall, the San Francisco police arrested five of the participlants. One of the Diggers began reading a poem on America while wearing an American flag shirt. The police arrested him for violating a law against defiling the flag. A second man was arrested for profanity after shouting "Fuck" (the newspaper account described it as "a four-letter word meaning to make love." Ron Thelin was arrested for wearing a mask after Judge Albert Axelrod informed that it was a violation of the Penal Code. A fourth man was arrested while trying to prevent Ron's arrest. A woman was also arrested, but no reason indicated. Terrence Hallinan, the Diggers' lawyer, charged that talks with the Mayor's Office had produced no results except for pressure from The City on produce market vendors to discontinue supplying free fruits and vegetables to the Diggers. He also said that the police had ordered the noon poetry events off the Polk street steps of City Hall. The Diggers provided free apples to the crowds. Other days they had provided free oranges and strawberries. source:Jerry Burns, SF Chronicle, May 8, 1968, p. 1.

May 7, 1969
Another beautiful day in the park. Grateful Dead and the Airplane performed at the Polo Field in Golden Gate Park .

May 7, 1984
American veterans of the Vietnam War reached an out-of-court settlement with seven chemical companies in their class-action suit relating to use of herbicide "Agent Orange."

May 9, 1934
West Coast longshoremen (ILA) go out on strike to gain control of hiring.

May 9, 1968
The Loading Zone
Crome Syrcus
H.P. Lovecraft
@ Fillmore Auditorium
Artist: Wilfred Weisser
featuring special guest Tiny Tim

 

May 9, 1969
New York Times reveals the United States has been secretly bombing Cambodia--officially a noncombatant, neutral country.

May 9, 1974
Congress begins impeachment hearings of President Richard M. Nixon.

May 10, 1968 Steve Miller Band Kaleidoscope The Youngbloods @ Carousel Ballroom Artist: Alton Kelley	May 10, 1968 Quicksilver Messenger Service Ace of Cups The Flamin' Groovies @ Avalon Ballroom Artist: Bob Schnepf postcard

May 11, 1855
The oldest gambling house in San Francisco, the El Dorado closed forever because of a new state anti-gambling law.

May 11, 1975
Eighty thousand turn out in New York's Central Park to celebrate the end of the Vietnam War.

May 12,1820
Florence Nightengale born. Read Country Joe Mc Donald's tribute to Florence Nightingale

May 12, 1948
Gold Fever was begun by Sam Brannan in San Francisco when he waved a bottle of gold dust and shouted "Gold! Gold! He went on to recieve Gold as payment for goods that he sold in his store at Sutter's fort. during its period asIn the the elegant 1860s, Calistoga Hot Springs resort was developed by then successful pioneer, promoter, publisher, entrepreneur, and California's first millionaire, Sam Brannan.

May 12, 1965
"Boss of the Bay," KYA presents the Rolling Stones, the Byrds, Beau Brummels, Paul Revere and the Raiders, and the Vejtables, at Civic Auditorium.

May 12, 1972
Police clash with 3,000 anti-war protesters in San Francisco.

May 13,1960
San Francisco police attack students (including a young Abbie Hoffman) protesting a local hearing of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).

May 13,1967
Blacks riot in San Francisco's Playland by the Pacific, while the Diggers host a "love feast" in Haight-Ashbury.

May 14, 1856:
The editor of the San Francisco Daily Evening Bulletin was assassinated by a rival newspaper owner. A vigilante group seized the assassin from the sheriff, then tried, convicted, and executed him.

May 14, 1945:
Plutonium is injected intravenously into a human subject in an experiment carried out by the Los Alamos scientific laboratory. In all, 18 people were similarly tested between 1945 and 1946.
List of Experiments Plutonium Injection

May 15, 1872
Julia Ward Howe declares the first Mother's Day as an anti-war holiday.
Julia Ward Howe's ' MOTHER'S DAY PROCLAMATION' and more about her

May 15, 1969
Governor Ronald Reagan sends in National Guard to reclaim People's Park from 6,000 protesters in Berkeley, California. Police gunfire kills a bystander, James Rector, blinds another, injures dozens.

May 16, 1969
The U.S.S. Guitarro, a $50 million nuclear submarine undergoing final fitting in San Francisco Bay, sank to the bottom as water poured into a forward compartment. A House Armed Services subcommittee later found the Navy guilty of "inexcusable carelessness" in connection with the event.

May 18, 1849
Sailing ship "Grey Eagle" arrived with 34 passengers from the East in 113 days, a record at that time.

May 18, 1966
PH Phactor Jug Band opened at 40 Cedar Alley near Polk and Geary. Does anyone e,lse remember Cedar Alley. I remember seeing art films there.

May 20, 1966
Love
Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band
Big Brother and the Holding Company
Tour/Show: Hupmobile 8
@ Avalon Ballroom
Artist: Wes Wilson

 

May 21, 1916
Clocks go forward for the first Daylight Saving Day, originally sold to the public as a wartime emergency measure to conserve evening use of electricity.

May 21, 1968
Police in helicopters drop tear gas on a University of California campus rally in Berkeley.

May 21, 1979
An all-straight jury convicts former San Francisco city supervisor Dan White of the lightest charge possible in the assassination of S.F. city supervisor Harvey Milk and mayor George Moscone. White's defense argued that White was depressed because of overconsumption of junk food, the so-called "Twinkie defense." Thousands march on city hall in response, provoking a police riot.

May 22,1930
Harvey Milk, gay rights activist and San Francisco city Supervisor, born as Glimpy Milch. Woodmere, Long Island, New York.

May 22,1989
Univ. of Calif.-Berkeley chancellor calls People’s Park a “vacuum for anarchy” after riot three days previous.

May 24, 1941
Birth of songwriter and anti-war folk singer Robert Zimmerman.

May 24, 1990
Earth First! activists Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney are seriously injured when a car bomb explodes under Bari's seat as they drive through Oakland. The FBI and Oakland Police immediately arrest the two and charge them with bombing themselves; the charges are later dropped, and the perpetrator is never found.

May 24, 1968
Big Brother and the Holding Company
Clara Ward Singers
H.P. Lovecraft
@ Carousel Ballroom
Artist: Crazy Arab

 

May 24, 1969
The Haight-Ashbury Festival in the Golden Gate Park Panhandle.

May 9, 1934
San Francisco Stevedores & Longshoreman's strike.

May 26, 1967
The Charlatans
Salvation Army Banned
Blue Cheer
@ Avalon Ballroom
Artist: Rick Griffin
Herb Greene

May 26, 1975
Alaska legalizes home use of marijuana.

May 27, 1848
Crewmen on ships in San Francisco deserted and rushed to the gold fields. There was a major population drop in the coastal cities as the people rushed off to the Sierra foothills

May 27, 1906
Bubonic plague in San Francisco for the first time in the United States in 1900, at San Francisco, and shown to be present among rats in that city in 1902. At first business interests, in collusion with conservative politicians in both the city and the state, resisted official acknowledgment of plague as well as all official efforts to control its spread. This refusal to address the problem for fear of hurting business led to a far worse outbreak than would otherwise have occurred. Eventually, other states quarantined California, and forced them to deal with the plague after all.

May 27,1937
The opening of the Golden Gate Bridge were held in San Francisco with much ceramony and celebration.The bridge has been called one of the greatest engineering marvels in the world.

May 27, 1966
Andy Warhol and His Plastic Inevitable
The Velvet Underground
Nico
Mothers of Invention
@ Fillmore Auditorium
Artist: Wes Wilson
Handbill

May 28,1957
The National Leagurer voted to allow the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants baseball teams to move to California. . The Dodgers to Los Angeles and the Giants to San Francisco.

May 28, 1969
Aum
Creedence Clearwater Revival
Elvin Bishop Group
Grateful Dead
Jefferson Airplane
Santana
Tour/Show: People's Park Benefit
@ Winterland
People's Park Bail Ball benefit.

May 29, 1848
The "Californian" complained: "The whole country from San Francisco to Los Angeles, and from the sea shore to the base of the Sierra Nevadas, resounds with the sordid cry of gold, GOLD, GOLD! while the field is left half- planted, the house half built, and everything neglected but the manufacture of shovels and pickaxes." "The Californian" also announced suspension of publication because of staff leaving for the diggings.

May 29,1968
The Chambers Brothers appearing at Fillmore Auditorium
 Hear this concert @Wolfgamg's Vault

May 30, 1966
Benefit for the Haight- Ashbury Legal Organization (HALO) at Winterland.
The Jefferson Airplane performed.

May 30, 1967   Same place , same date, same cause, one year later.
Jefferson Airplane
Big Brother and the Holding Company
Quicksilver Messenger Service
Tour/Show: HALO
@ Winterland
Benefit for the Haight-Ashbury Legal Organization

May 31,1819:
Birth of Walt Whitman, "To states everywhere, resist much; obey little.