The sixties was one of the most tumultuous decades of the twentieth century. Although today many who were alive at the time tend to romanticize it as the era of peace and love, hippies and flower power, and the Beatles and Woodstock, the 1960s was also a decade of war, political assassinations, and a volatile cultural climate which pitted the young against the old.
Driven by the twin issues of civil rights and America's involvement in the Vietnam War, mostly college-aged protesters demonstrated in cities and on college campuses across the nation. The young generation further demonstrated its complete rejection of the values of their parents by openly experimenting with psychedelic drugs and the new sexual concepts of free love. Led by the Beatles and Bob Dylan, the rock music of the sixties reflected these same political and cultural values, producing wildly experimental and innovative works ranging from Sgt. Pepper to Blonde On Blonde.
The sixties are also remembered for the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert, as well as civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. Other landmark events of the period include the United States landing a man on the moon and the 1969 Woodstock music festival.
Today the sixties continue to be analyzed and celebrated on cultural and historical blogs like hippy.com and Sixties City.