The hallmark of the sixties was not Woodstock, but two later concert/debacles, Altamont and the Isle of Wight festival. Just watch "Gimme Shelter" to see it all unfold (at Altamont, that is). The peace loving hippies were giving the bands crap for charging money while the Hell's Angels beat the holy sh*t out of everyone. Things were so bad that the Grateful Dead refused to go on (there's some footage of hippies giving Jerry Garcia an earful for charging money to play). The Isle of Wight was ugly too, really gnarly hippies kicking down the fence erected around the festival grounds and threatening the promoters. Scary stuff. Yep. At Woodstock, the only violence was Pete Townshend decking Abbie Hoffman (hooray!) At Altamont, you had the Hell's Angels stabbing a fan to death, as well as beating up Jefferson Airplane's Marty Balin. And who could forget Joni Mitchell, the woman who wrote the "Woodstock" song, pleading with the crowd to behave at the Isle of Wight show?
"...The hallmark of the sixties was not Woodstock, but..."
Hollywood thinks the 60s began in 1968.
Of course were almost over by then.
They began with Eisenhower in the White House.
The 'hallmark' of the 60's might be the Cuban Missle Crisis or the murder of Kennedy.