Historical Background

Haight-Ashbury is a district of San Francisco, California, USA named after the intersection of Haight Street and Ashbury Avenue. In the mid-1960s, this was perhaps the most famous intersection in the world, a place where young people came to from all over the world, free spirited in search of love and peace.

In the summer of 1967 the tide of history swept through the nation and San Francisco was in the heart of it, as hundreds of thousands of young people converged on the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco with shouts of "Make Love, Not War,“ U.S. out of Vietnam!" and "Equal Rights for All!" Ideals of peace, social justice and ecology have resounded from the Haight-Ashbury area ever since, and today still remains a popular destination for political and fashion trends.

The hippies, who flooded out of the Summer of Love in all directions, to India, Europe, and Australia, made an influence on those cultures that continues to resonate. Today more people know that the Summer of Love occurred in San Francisco than know that the United Nations was founded here.