 I'd like to welcome Ann Cohn to the Haydashbury Oral Video History Project. Welcome Ann. Oh, welcome. I'm glad to be here. Thank you Rebecca. Okay. Well, we'd like to learn a little bit about you and then fit all the pieces into this giant puzzle of the 60s that you're a big piece of. Where were you born? I was born in Los Angeles area in Glendale. In fact, my dad still lives in the same home I was born and raised in. Wow. What's your father's name? Allen Bundt. So I was Ann Mary Bundt. Wow. Beautiful. And your mother's name? Nettie Virginia. And she is with us as president? No, she's passed away. My mom was quite an artist. She was a singer, artist, and it's something that's handed down. Grandparents, great-grand, all the while. Were filled with amuse. Wow. What, your grandparents, where were they from? Let's see, Germany. We have a good old German stock, English stock, that's where they are. And I moved up to Southern, from Southern California to San Francisco when I was about 20 years old. Okay. Had to move away from the home. And what, about approximately what year was this? This was back in 1966. I moved to Walnut Creek, and I was a hairdresser. Oh, wow. And during when the 60s were happening and you guys were growing long hair, I was busy cutting it. No, amazing. And then my husband was killed in an automobile accident in December 13th of 1969. Wow. So about six months after rushing to get home to start dinner and remembering he was gone, I leased my house out and went hitchhiking around the country. Wow. Before that time, I was pre-conservative Republican. Wow. And I had to use 22 when he died. Wow. And he was in a coma for a couple weeks, and I had to tell him to turn the machines off and his brain flat. So that was hard. That was a big one. That was hard. And you were looking for person butterflies? You were looking for someone white? Just happiness. Right. And because I had gone right from living at home into marriage, I didn't know too much about this world. Right. So I was on a quest when I went hitchhiking because I knew that there was good in every single person alive, and I was out to find it. Right. What brought you back to San Francisco? Well, first of all, I ran out of money. And then I got a job managing a beauty salon. But then, from then, I started wanting to real estate because I got married. You met someone? And met somebody else. And then I was Ann Peters, and I'm getting it mixed up. That's okay. I haven't had anybody ask me these questions before, but I haven't been interviewed before. So I'm glad we're doing this. So anyway, I met my children. Quite a joy. Yes. Thank you, Rebecca. You're welcome. I met my children's papa, Steve Oliphant, and married him. I was 25, I think, something like that. I had two children. What are their names? Patrick Oliphant. He's now 29. And my daughter, Christy Oliphant, she's 25. Beautiful. Right. And Stephen and I were together about 10 years, 15 years. During that time, I did wigs for a local theater group. I was a head whip girl. And I also headed up a lot of children's art programs for our city of Oliphant Creek. I would get two, three, 400 children together and we'd do art. And I did this for a number of years because it was just fun. I really like the muse. I'm my mom's daughter. That's right. And the best thing in children is always to face off. Yeah. And so then Stephen and I did divorce. I don't remember the years. Divorce tears I never remember. That's necessary. No, I remember. And when I remember people, I always remember them fondly no matter what happens. Yeah. Because why not? Why not? It's great that way. And then I met Alan Cohen in 1986. This is a photo of Alan. I'm going to, yeah, this is a photo of Alan Cohen. This was taken at Cal Theater for the Jan Carowick benefit. I love this photo. And I'm going to show you a photo of Alan and me and Christie at the 20-year anniversary of the summer of love. It's a great photo. Young and beautiful. You're still young and beautiful. I was so at awe. Of course. For our young. I spent most of my life just taking care of my family. Yeah. I never just wasn't the rock. I wasn't a rock and roll girl. Right. In fact, I never, I don't even have a, you know, I still don't have a radio in my car. Wow. I love the silence because I find that the silence and the city noises is beautiful music. And I always like to live where I am right now. At this point in your life and even a little earlier, did you find yourself drawing? I know. I just really don't know how artistic you are. I found a drawing. In fact, how I found the drawing, because before that I did a lot of, I make a, I'm a singer and I compose music. Children's music I mostly do. And now I make it up on the moment with the children. But I found it was so expensive to record the music that it wasn't a way for me to really get out what I needed to. So I started doing black and white drawing because for six cents I could reproduce it. And so I didn't have to worry about the recording. So you would see me out at music venues and I'd be sitting here down like this just drawing. And I, I loved it. So I did line drawing. Love to see some. Here's a picture of Alan right over here. And Tony Seldin is here. And this would be Jerry Nicosea and George Mikowski. We used this for posters. I did a bunch of these. That's amazing. Yeah, that captures it. Yeah. On the other side I illustrated, not only did I illustrate Alan's poetry, but I illustrated Tony Seldin, the Vagabond poet. One of Alan's dearest, dearest friends. Let me show you another picture. Oh, here's another one that we used for a benefit. Not a benefit, one of our shows. We did a lot of shows. We put back Alan musically on the stand-up bass or guitar. So you play guitar? Yeah, I do. I play on different strings. I play harp, guitar, and bass. Wow. Yeah. So basically, you know when you're a wife and you have somebody you love and they have some area that they need to fill, especially with Alan, because he was so out there, he needed, he wanted, when he was in the 60s, he wanted to have artists. And he, with the Oracle, it was all about having collaboration of the different muses. Well, he did that in his own life. He liked doing that. So he had me play the stand-up bass or the guitar. In fact, the first time I played the stand-up bass after many years was in front of 20 or 30,000 people at the, at this event, the 20,000. Oh, wow. I didn't play that well. And there was a great sound man. And who knew when I was, had great licks, he turned me up. And when I sucked, he turned her down. He was great. So anyway, when I met Alan, it just changed my world because I hadn't really gotten out of my backyard, you know, being a mom with two children. And my children were five and nine when Alan. And I met, in fact, here's a family photo. Here we are. It's a great photo. And it was about the time Alan is here, was growing back. I had cut his hair shorter. It was a great show. Yeah. Yeah, I liked that picture. There's something to be said about being so close. It just changed my whole world because I hadn't, I spoke with the children and I did my, you know, whatever music I was doing. So being out in the world, it was a little bit uncomfortable. And Alan says, no, they're going to love you. It'll be okay. And he was such a sweet man. Yeah, he was. I wanted to talk a little bit about Alan's poetry. But it seemed, I mean, you weren't here in the 60s, but through Alan, who, what the 60s was so much part of Alan, you got to relive it in a lot of ways with the friends and the people in the community. I mean, I can't imagine, I feel I'm part of this community, but I can't imagine you not in the community. Yeah. And through Alan, you were able to relive some of the 60s and get the feeling and the essence of it. Well, what I liked about it is that I really didn't know any of you through your fame. I knew you. And I really, because I don't really care about fame. Exactly. And so like right now after Alan passed away, March 29th last year, one of the, one person that's really helped me a lot is Stephen Levine. And he is an author of many, many books on death and dying, a very spiritual man. And he actually, he was one of the editors of The Oracle in the 60s. But I've gotten to know these people with just their, and I prefer knowing them personally than with the fame anyway. It's comfortable. It's really interesting. It's almost a calling. And then Alan's legacy is left in your hands. It certainly is. I call this Alan's baby blanket. When I met Alan, he was living on 26th and Irving. And this had all the different oracles wrapped in, were all wrapped in this, in this tie dye from the 60s. What was The Oracle for people who don't know? It was a visionary newspaper. I brought one that was solutions and quests and artists and writers that came together. An Oracle staff that put the art and poetry and writing together in a fashion that it made it beautiful. Solutions that were beautiful. It wasn't complaining about what we don't have. It was looking forward. And so hopefully that people would embrace these values that we felt so strong with and want them to be all over the world. Exactly. Yeah. Not the bad news, but the hopeful news. Yeah, the good old The Oracle. Do you know how often they came out? They were supposed to be coming out every six weeks, but I think it did end up being a little longer than that. You know, Rebecca, you're asking me the questions about The Oracle. That's when I want to call up The Oracle staff and say, come on. Answer the questions for me. Well, we will. Because Alan, in our lives, Alan was actually a fairly private man. And when we were at home, I was busy doing my work. He was doing his work, and we were just living life. And I always stepped back when we were in public so he would shine. So I wasn't trying to take ownership of his world. So when he passed, I got ahold of The Oracle staff. Wonderful staff. Wonderful people, I've got to tell you. And we've been emailing. We've been trying to revisit The Oracle again in doing a new publication, a new Oracle. And I've been spearheading it. And when I make mistakes, they're so sweet. They're just wonderful people. Yeah, it's true. It's a destiny that you've fallen into. I want to ask you a little bit, Alan. From living with Alan, learning. Do you know when Alan came to the Hadesbury? Do you know anything about his experiences here? How he became part of The Oracle? Yeah, I do. He actually came to North Beach because he's a poet. And he wanted to be part of the beatnik. But by the time he got here, it was already dissolving. And he went to City Light's bookstore down in the basement and ran into a high school friend, Steve Walser. And Steve Walser was living in The Hate and offered him a place to stay. So that's how he came to The Hate. And he, at the time, shortly after that, he met a woman named Maury. And they fell in love. And one night, Alan had this dream of a newspaper being read all over the world in rainbow colors. And he told Lori about it. She went out on the street and told people about it. And the rest of it is history. Yeah. Amazing. Alan had many parts to him that a lot of people don't know. I knew him also and loved him dearly. And he's a writer. Can you tell us anything else about the Alan you know that maybe the world doesn't know? I have to tell you, there was a time when Alan was out in the city magazine. And I watched him edit it. Do you know how he edited it? He would cut it apart and not add any words and he would just put the puzzles back together. He was incredible at this. Layouts. The way he would lay them out. And it was excellent. Alan was a midwife. When he left the 60s, the Haight-Ashbury, he moved up to a commune called Table Mountain. And he became a midwife. In fact, he wrote this book called Childbirth is Ecstasy. Wow. And he, in this book, he delivered his son River. I'm going to show you a picture of him. This is, the pictures were, it all came about Lori. This is Lori, the woman I told you about. She was just about starting delivery. Alan was going to be the midwife. Steve Walzer, the photographer, who lived down in San Francisco, happened to be coming up there. And he took these pictures. This is Alan. And this book, I think they sold like 500, 500 to 1,000 copies, but it was shared just like the Oracle Different Midwives would share because this book is pretty explicit and it's colored in the photographs and the poetry, it was explaining where it's a little bit long. No, it's definitely out of print. Yeah, that was quite a book. And Alan also was very, like I said, was very serious about his poetry. Here's a picture of Alan reading his poetry. You can see Alan right here, right there. And then this is Emmett Grover. Okay. And I brought this, and then also I wanted to bring throughout all Alan's life, he's been writing. Here's a picture of Alan in the basement of City Lights Bookstore reading poetry. And then later on, Alan really did a lot of music accompanying with George Mikowski. I think you interviewed George. Great to give him a hug this afternoon. He's contributed a lot. Yes. And I think, where is this photo? This was taken, I believe, when we did the 25th anniversary of the Summer of Love, and that would have been on the soccer field. Was that when we did that? At the beach. Yes. And that was a great show. These have been great shows. So Alan loves to, in fact Alan did a put together an opera with a woman on this poetry. And the world is a butterfly's wing. Wow. But writing was, in his poetry, what I'd say was his big passion. And wanting to start the Oracle up again. Yes. That was something, because that was bringing the muses together to have the burst of energy that makes people stand up and take notice. And then take action. And take action. Yes. Would you like to read something of Alan's? Oh, yes, I would. I think what I'm going to do is one of Alan's dearest friends was Tony Selden. And I'm going to read a poem that Alan wrote about the Vagabond poet. Here he is back from Baja on his way to Denmark, the fandom Vagabond poet. He's welcome everywhere. 72 invitations to stay in Scandinavia. A cabin offered in Mendocino. Performing his magic act at this very moment on stage for his last appearance in America. His poems flow around the world. Watch out, Melancholy Danes. Here he comes for dinner with his laundry, tossing Caesar salad with his videos, poems and tales. The Vagabond poet leaps across borders and continents. Alan was true to his friends. And he wanted to help people with their muses and things in their life. I can't tell you how many times people have said, if it hadn't been for Alan Cohen, I would never have done the writing that I've done, or I would never, because he was like a father to a lot of people without any reason to do it other than just the joy of doing it. He didn't have a word. He was very passionate about it. He's a very passionate man. And when he tells you he's going to do something, you would do it. But getting him to commit, that was one of the main reasons why he wouldn't commit unless he knew he was going to do it. Exactly. Very honest. He worked with me in my school. The children loved him. And that was great. That was a great experience. He was very lenient with him. At first it would drive me nuts because he'd say, why can't they just take their hot wheels and drive them down the hill? But he just was full of life. Kind of there was a part of him that was very serious and then there was another part that was very alpha. Childlike. Childlike. That's right. In fact, after the 60s he sold crystals at the Renaissance fair and he'd wear this hat. Or he would sell fruit and come have some papaya get higher with papaya. And he was... See a lovely picture you have there. Is that taken on H Street? Yes. This is a picture of Alan on H Street. With a friend. Yeah, Gene Anthony did this photograph. Great. In fact, Gene Anthony and Alan did a series of shows over at the Roxy. Slide shows. In fact, it was through that series of shows that we ended up getting the publisher that did the facsimile of the Oracle which is the Oracle and the entire 12 issues plus the full start. And it came about from Gene Anthony. That's wonderful. Yeah. Alan was a pretty handsome man. That's... It looks very familiar. The green backpack. Yeah. Oh yeah. Would wear that all the time. This backpack? Yeah. Alan would be... Because you know Alan never drove. Right. Exactly. He's from New York and so he never drove. If I ever... I asked him to take the wheel for me one time and he drove the car like this. My children helped Alan. You're right. When we'd go on trips together with the children, we would start stories and it would go around from Patrick to Christie to me to Alan and we'd just make up stories. Oh, that's fine. Our lives were really based around creativity. Yes. And Alan and I made a pact that I would... I would work with us. He'd work with me in the school and he would teach me how to learn how to make money with my artwork. You have some other photos there? Oh, there's a... Did I show you... Oh, right. I didn't show you this... Oh, yes I did. Yeah, we saw that one. And I think we did... I did show you that other photo of them. These are... This was the last book that Alan... book of poetry that Alan and I did. It was the first time we collaborated with the art and the poetry throughout the entire book. This was... came out in October of last year and when they did the benefit for Alan... So he never saw it completed? We did see it completed. He did see it completed. We just never really had a good understanding. We didn't get to do that. You did that? Right. In fact, we were going to have the book signing over there at the Great American Music Hall but it ended up being that Alan had his liver transplant. Right. Right. This was the book... That's great. Book of hats. Where are many hats? Yeah, and this was a book when Alan... Every time Alan and I set divorced and we were divorced for two years and we... about six months after we divorced we became close friends again but while we were divorced Alan put out this book called An Eye for an Eye Makes the Whole World Blind and this was a collaboration again of poets all over the United States that would send in their work and Alan would... They put it in... He put it in the book. He published this with Clive Manson. Wow. He really did spend his adult life wanting people to collaborate together. It's a way of joining. It's a way of joining. Gathering and joining. It's a very peaceful positive energy. Yeah. A way to create peace and communication and understanding. Yes. There was a time when Alan was having sleep deprivation and there was a mockingbird that woke us up about two in the morning and it kept waking us up and Alan decided that he was going to see about having the mockingbird stop this so he got up about two in the morning and went and got a flute. Well, he had a flute. And the mockingbird started the singing and he played the flute back to the mockingbird and she did leave. Oh, wonderful. He always had a very peaceful way of dealing with situations. Then you guys remarried? We remarried. When we separated in divorce, I told Alan that if he ever got sick because he had to see he should come home. And so when Alan got sick he came home. That's love. And we remarried. So you're telling me I have two minutes so I'm starting to cry. No, two minutes is a lifetime. What I would like to say I want to say thank you so much and I'm Rebecca Nichols, I'm the moderator but I want to say thank you much I want to ask you a question if this tape is watched in the future. I see a lot of passion here. A lot of love here. It's like the the altar's been in to you. For some reason it's come in your hands and his memories. How would you like Alan's works thought of in the future? How would you like 50 years from now when something is up in red and when people punch in the libraries Alan Cohn his memory how would you like him how would you think he would want to be remembered? I think the way he's been remembered now and like I said he's like a father figure to a lot of people and he holds the muse near to him and love, compassion and harmony these were very important to him and they're very important that we look for the good and vision the good and not worry about they not think about how things are going wrong and I think that through the Oracle and through Alan and the other Oracle staff this is extremely important and we need this more this year, next year 50 years from now peaceful people that laugh when there is an obstacle laughing will make the barrier go away and there'll be no barrier and I think that that's I think for 50 years from now people watch this piece they will also see the strong woman behind the great man just a little poem just a second this is a poem I wrote since Alan passed I wrote this one songbird rides the waves around her her song reflects her surroundings oh sweet bird let your song be one of easiness one that joy and good health is plentiful let the heavens rejoice with this new found love in our world she brings the shrill that is destructive to all sing your love song for diversity so all mankind will be in harmony with you beautiful thank you Rebecca and I hope the future you write many more things I can see you're inspired and we will be in a relationship I think well in the future to document all of this stuff spread the inspiration and the light and the words and the future generations will benefit from this community that has contributed so much to the whole I want to tell you thank you