An original Grateful Dead tour bus — "Sugar Magnolia," a customized 1965 red Gillig that the band used to tour the purple mountains and fruited plains from sea to shining sea from 1967-1985 — is for sale via the Volo Auto Museum for a cool $200,000. Assuming the purchaser would not be using the bus to actually, you know, tour, that's a lot of scratch even though it's a serious slice of rock history with all of the original furnishings and décor preserved: the ceiling remains lined with hundreds of vintage rock posters featuring the Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, Janice Joplin and others who visited the bus.
In fact, the kind of person who could both afford and be predisposed to obtain this rather unwieldy heirloom, makes for a fascinating sociological study. Vietnam divided the war dialectic of "us" vs. "them," into a triad of "us" vs. "them" vs. "them." The war created hopelessly confused loyalties and antagonisms between the three parties. After the war was finally mercy killed, people came to realize that they had hated the internal confusion more than they had hated the external enemy. Who really cared about what happened to a bunch of crazed Asians? The people of Vietnam were never the point anyway: principle was, and principle wasn't worth this kind of internal conflict.
As a result, both sides of the internal conflict embraced the perceived highlights of the other's culture with a ferocity that was dizzying. Blood is thicker than ideology. The adults lightened up: Johnny Carson grew his hair long and joked about smoking pot, the youth embraced the acquisitive materialism of their parents with the shamelessness of Midas.
The very concept of a "youth culture" — a mass counterculture organized along generational lines — disappeared in the '80s. The Reaganonic codification of social and economic Darwinism successfully removed the language of the counterculture from public discourse. The line between "us" and "them" became the line between an individual's public and private personas. Everyone had to pay lip service to the "just say no" mentality. Everyone had to move his public persona four steps to the right just to continue to play the game.
Article comments
1 - Laura
An interesting and generally informed article, though I feel that the connection between the evolution of youth culture and an auction ought to have been forged a little more strongly.
Also, I feel the ending was a little trite, overgeneralizing the significance of the deadhead culture and the ingenuity and brilliance of the Dead's music.
2 - Vince Brooks
What is your problem with Don Henley Mr. Olsen? How do you know what he meant by Deadhead Sticker on a Cadillac, along with the other shots you take at him in other articles. Methinks there is a failed musician here with sour grapes!!!