1968
The Great American Drama:
Something's Happening Here
An Unfamiliar Nation In only five years' time, America had turned upside down! Old class lines were blurred by the spread of an affluent middle class and the rise of public conscience. Blacks were splintered by violence and hatred. Young people had staked out a counterculture that rejected conventional society and embraced communal lifestyles, psychedelic music and experimental drugs. The race to the moon continued at a frantic pace while pollution on earth threatened to destroy our ecology. The Vietnam conflict erupted into a crippling war with tens of thousands of fatalities. The gains of President Johnson's “Great Society” were overshadowed by riots and demands for sweeping change. |
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Poetic License Political and social turmoil was reflected in law, education, music, literature, the arts, entertainment, and fashion. All offered fresh possibilities for shock and confrontation. Taboo subjects came to the forefront: homosexuality, interracial relationships, mind-expanding chemicals, free love, bigotry, mystic religions. America was now an angry and divided nation. |
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