The Ouija Board Consultation In late January 1966, Ken Kesey and Carolyn Mountain Girl Adams had both been arrested on marijuana charges, facing serious legal consequences. Desperate for guidance, Kesey convened a meeting in Bernal Heights and consulted a Ouija board about what to do. The board’s message was unambiguous: leave. Being a novelist prone…
Trey Anastasio, John Popper, and Chris Barron all came from Princeton. The Grateful Dead built the system they inherited — and in 2015, Anastasio completed the circle at Soldier Field.
Stella Blue was born from Robert Hunter’s 1969 acid nightmare and debuted at Pigpen’s last show. Garcia performed it 328 times before he understood it.
The Grateful Dead tried to name their live album something unprintable. Warner Brothers said no. The compromise produced a mailing list that made the Dead ungovernable for 24 years.
After Jerry Garcia died in 1995, it took seven years and multiple false starts before all four surviving core members of the Grateful Dead played together again. The Other Ones wasn’t a triumphant resurrection — it was four years of grief work in public.
In 1970, Lenny Hart — Mickey’s father, a self-proclaimed reverend — stole up to $350,000 from the Grateful Dead after literally swearing on a Bible he wouldn’t rip them off. The betrayal cost Mickey his seat in the band for three and a half years and reshaped the Dead’s sound, management, and identity.
The Grateful Dead built a touring operation on trust instead of enforcement — and on July 2, 1995, at Deer Creek, that system broke. Thousands of ticketless fans tore down the fence and stormed the venue.
The Grateful Dead walked away from Ken Kesey and the Acid Tests in 1966. From the Watts double-dosing to the Halloween Graduation, this is why they left.
Most people think the Grateful Dead started at an Acid Test. They didn’t. They started in the back of a music store — playing for Dana Morgan Jr., who they fired after just 4 shows.
Donna Jean Godchaux took fifteen hits of Owsley acid and hid under Keith’s piano. Twenty-four hours later, the band escaped through a bathroom window. The two Paris Olympia shows became the wildest chapter of Europe ’72.
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