Couple Who Met At WOODSTOCK, Celebrates 50th Anniv. w Surprise Cake From Family
(People Mag., Aug 17, '19). Judy and Jerry Griffin are celebrating two special milestones this summer — their 50th anniversary and the fact that they finally found a photo from when they met at Woodstock in 1969. The Griffins celebrated their anniversary earlier this week with family and friends, who surprised them with a very special celebratory confection.
“Our kids surprised us with this wonderful cake,” Judy, 72, says and shared a photo of the cake with PEOPLE. The writing on the cake reads, “Happy 50th Anniversary!,” alongside an edible re-printing of the long lost photo of Jerry and Judy at Woodstock that they had been searching for the last five decades. The Griffins met by chance, 50 years ago this week, on the way to the iconic music festival when Judy’s car broke down, and Jerry and his friends happened to see her hitchhiking.
“I was just thinking, ‘Damn, now we can’t go,’ and we were dying to,” Judy, 72, recalls to PEOPLE in this week’s issue. “Then Jerry and his friends pulled up. I stuck my head in and I saw that there was a woman in the car. I’d never hitchhiked before, but I figured, ‘Well, since there was a woman, it was fairly safe, and I probably should just get in the car.’ “
The Griffins have been together ever since and they’d never seen a photo of themselves from the event that started it all until earlier this summer, when a friend texted them a screenshot from the new PBS documentary Woodstock: Three Days that Defined a Generation, which features a brief bit of footage of a rain-soaked Judy and Jerry huddled together under a blanket.
“We both had cameras, but neither of us took any pictures,” Jerry, 72, says. “For 50 years we’ve been looking for a picture of ourselves, and out of the blue one shows up. We’d known each other less than 48 hours when that was taken.”
Judy says their kids “always thought it was a cool story,” but the discovery of the photo and the footage has increased their cool factor exponentially. “When the picture came out and the [documentary] came out, my daughter-in-law freaked out,” Judy says with a laugh. “She couldn’t believe it. She started Facebooking all her friends and the thing went viral...More-
*MORE &*PHOTOS, https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/couple-who-met-at-woodstock-celebrates-50th-anniversary-with-surprise-cake-from-family/ar-AAFWN21?li=BBnbcA1&ocid=HPCOMMDHP15
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TRAILER. New, documentary FILM, "Woodstock: Three Days That Defined A Generation" (2019)
Now on PBS TV, or *WATCH Online (90 mins.): https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/woodstock/#part01
WOODSTOCK: THREE DAYS THAT DEFINED A GENERATION (2019) premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival on April 28, 2019 and opened in select theaters on May 24, 2019. Click here to find a screening near you.
In August 1969, nearly half a million people gathered at a farm in upstate New York to hear music. What happened over the next three days, however, was far more than a concert. It would become a legendary event, one that would define a generation and mark the end of one of the most turbulent decades in modern history.
Occurring just weeks after an American set foot on the moon, the Woodstock music festival took place against a backdrop of a nation in conflict over sexual politics, civil rights and the Vietnam War. A sense of an America in transition—a handoff of the country between generations with far different values and ideals—was tangibly present at what promoters billed as “An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace and Music.
Woodstock turns the lens back at the audience, at the swarming, impromptu city that grew up overnight on a few acres of farmland. What took place in that teeming mass of humanity — the rain-soaked, starving, tripping, half-a-million strong throng of young people — was nothing less than a miracle of teamwork, a manifestation of the “peace and love” the festival had touted and a validation of the counter-culture’s promise to the world. Who were these kids? What experiences and stories did they carry with them to Bethel, New York that weekend, and how were they changed by three days in the muck and mire of Yasgur’s farm?
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I'd seen the photo but hadn't heard the complete story, till now.
It's amazing that the picture turned up at all.
- 4000,000 people attended the 3-day Woodstock Festival in Bethel, New York, Aug. 15-18, 1969.
