Duck Lenhart

Hippies were not in fashion in 1968. In fact, one had to stick together with others for safety and for having fun!  Here’s a photo of Duck, Steve Star and Becky.

You know how it is fashionable these days to talk of hippies with “hippie names” like “Flower Girl” or the like?  That’s a lot of bull shit.

I’m here to tell you what the real names were.  There was Duck.  There was Giant, Little John, John-John, Becky, Virginia, Bin, Larry, Steve Star, Captain Bummer, Peter, Hennessey.  I could go on and on.

Today I spent maybe 40 minutes on the phone with my old pal Duck Lenhart, who gave me credit for wearing a big felt hat and for helping him decide to be a conscientious objector during Vietnam.  I just remember trying to get him to smoke weed the summer of 1967, but he was resistant to the idea.  Duck is an old guy living in Arizona these days.

Duck and I spoke of many things.  He once gave our friend Tad $10 to buy a lid of pot and Duck  never saw him again.  That was 48 years ago!

He said living in a friend’s hotel in Richfield, Idaho, with his rock and roll band in 1969 when he was 20, made a big impression on him.  He and the other band members were long-haired hippies before it was fashionable, or even wise, to be so.  He remembers being called out by the county sheriff to “defend [his] rights.”  Times have changed.

Duck said he drove through Richfield about 10 years ago and saw a guy on a tractor with hair down his back almost to his butt.

Duck worked a career as a roofer, eventually having to give it up because of failing health.  Now he lives with his son, daughter-in-law, and his granddaughter.  He is retired.  Tired and tired again, he said.  Most recently he taught guitar in Puyallup, Washington.  Says he no longer plays rock and roll, but mellower stuff.

We are getting old, he noted.  We are both 67.

I am forgetful, he will find that obvious the way I’ve garbled his story.