With Flowers on Our Brain

The Chronicle's Special Edition

The Chronicle commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Summer of Love.

In 1967 an estimated 100,000 hippies and young people who aspired to be like them converged on San Francisco for months of music and partying. There was also another side. The "squalid" reality

of kids living on the streets like refugees, panhandling for food, a sudden epidemic of speed and toxic psychedelics laced with animal tranquilizer (and worse) left something to be desired for many.

The glory of the Summer of Love lives on in the selective memory of baby boomers, who 50 years later can be seen on the corner of Haight and Ashbury taking snapshots of their children and grandchildren. (For the record your humble blogger was barely in high school, 2,000 miles away.)

(Chronicle photo)