By: Kyrie Sismaet By: Kyrie Sismaet | April 19, 2022 | Story, Culture, Travel, Events, Local,
Tucked away in the sprawling Golden Gate Park lies a gently sloping hill popular for its lush foliage and sunny atmosphere.
While peaceful and unassuming, this small patch of the gorgeously massive park actually has a very concentrated and vibrant history from the swinging sixties, which the nearby Haight Ashbury community and San Francisco as a whole continue to honor every year, remembering it by naming the site "Hippie Hill."
By simpling walking to the east of the Golden Gate Park tennis courts past Kezar Drive, you will encounter Hippie Hill, a bucolic oasis surrounded by tall and shady redwoods, eucalyptus and pine trees.
The hill overlooks the Robin Williams meadow (named prior as the Sharon Meadow), and is a popular destination for locals to claim their spot in the expansive area for picnics, lounging, and even performing in community-driven drum circles.
The hill's close proximity to Haight Ashbury has made it the legendary landmark to the counterculture movements of the area during the 1967 Summer of Love movements. Considered a rebirth for art, peace, love, and spiritual enlightenment, this history and culture are still appreciated fondly today as many flock to Hippie Hill particularly on the hill's major 4/20 festivities.
A visual history of San Francisco's 4/20 at Hippie Hill event.
San Francisco truly solidified itself as the city for peace, love, and civil rights activism during the pivotal 1960s. Such promotions of the counterculture movement and hippie subculture culminated out of Haight Street in 1967 with the Summer of Love event overflowing right onto what is now Hippie Hill. More than 100,000 people packed onto the park to connect, celebrate life, and enjoy live music from globally-known San Francisco artists.
Janis Joplin, Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and more were among those local and often spotted in the area, playing vivaciously at the park for all those to remember vividly still long after.
Janis Joplin was integral to both Hippie Hill and San Francisco's musical culture.
Today Haight Ashbury and Hippie Hill are still cultural hubs for this free-spirited music and art, particularly commemorating those golden days every year since with their annual 4/20 massive gathering.
"4/20 at Hippie Hill" is a common term now, and since the legalization of marijuana, many have celebrated this by bringing all kinds of Cannabis. The giant event is free to the public, with many community members and groups planning a variety of commemorative marijuana-centric activities.
This year there will be a city-sanctioned event to keep the holiday, as according to Mayor London Breed, "organized,” “coordinated,” and “sponsored.” As Breed explicates, "this event will have food, entertainment, and for the first time, because of changes to local and state laws, there will be on-site (legal) cannabis sales."
A soundstage for the many performers for the upcoming event at the spacious hill.
Whether it be for the famous 4/20 at Hippie Hill, with more information found here, or just on a regular sunny day, you will definitely feel the history alive all throughout the rolling greens of this cozy park cove.
Photography by: Priscilla Du Preez/Unsplash
