The last bedraggled fan sloshed out of Max Yasgur's muddy
pasture almost 30 years ago. That's when the debate began
about Woodstock's historical significance. True believers still call
Woodstock the capstone of an era devoted to human
advancement. Cynics say it was a fitting, ridiculous end to an era
of naivete. Then there are those who say it was just a hell of a
party.

The Woodstock Music and Art Fair in 1969 drew more than
450,000 people to a pasture in Sullivan County. For four days, the
 site became a countercultural mini-nation in which minds were
 open, drugs were all but legal and love was "free". The music
began Friday afternoon at 5:07pm August 15 and continued until
 mid-morning Monday August 18. The festival closed the New York
State Thruway and created one of the nation's worst traffic jams.
It also inspired a slew of local and state laws to ensure that
nothing like it would ever happen again.

Woodstock, like only a handful of historical events, has become
part of the cultural lexicon. As Watergate is the codeword for a
 national crisis of confidence and Waterloo stands for ignominious
defeat, Woodstock has become an instant adjective denoting
youthful hedonism and 60's excess. "What we had here was a
once-in-a-lifetime occurrence," said Bethel town historian Bert
Feldman. "Dickens said it first: 'It was the best of times. It was the
worst of times'. It's an amalgam that will never be reproduced
 again."

 Gathered that weekend in 1969 were liars and lovers, prophets and
profiteers. They made love, they made money and they made a
little history. Arnold Skolnick, the artist who designed
Woodstock's dove-and-guitar symbol, described it this way:
"Something was tapped, a nerve, in this country. And everybody
just came."

The counterculture's biggest bash - it ultimately cost more than
$2.4 million - was sponsored by four very different, and very
young, men: John Roberts, Joel Rosenman, Artie Kornfeld and
Michael Lang. The oldest of the four was 26. John Roberts
 supplied the money. He was heir to a drugstore and toothpaste
manufacturing fortune. He had a multimillion-dollar trust fund, a
University of Pennsylvania degree and a lieutenant's commission
 in the Army. He had seen exactly one rock concert, by the Beach
 Boys.
 Robert's slightly hipper friend, Joel Rosenman, the son of a
 prominent Long Island orthodontist, had just graduated from
Yale Law School. In 1967, the mustachioed Rosenman, 24, was
 playing guitar for a lounge band in motels from Long Island to
 Las Vegas. 
 Roberts and Rosenman met on a golf course in the fall of 1966. By
winter 1967, they shared an apartment and were trying to figure
out what they ought to do with the rest of their lives. They had one
idea: to create a screwball situation comedy for television, kind of
like a male version of "I Love Lucy".

"It was an office comedy about two pals with more money than 
brains and a thirst for adventure." Rosenman said. "Every week
they would get into a different business venture in some nutty
scheme. And every week they would be rescued in the nick of time
from their fate. "

To get plot ideas for their sitcom, Roberts and Rosenman put a
 classified ad in the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times
 in March 1968: "Young Men With Unlimited Capital looking for
interesting, legitimate investment opportunities and business
propositions. " They got thousands of replies, including one for
 biodegradable golf balls. Another seemed strange enough to work 
as a real business venture; Ski-bobs, bicycles on skis that were a
fad in Europe. Roberts and Rosenman researched the idea before  abandoning it. In the process, the two went from would-be  television writers to wanna-be venture capitalists. "Somehow, we
 became the characters in our own show," Rosenman said.

Artie Kornfield, 25, wore a suit, but the lapels were a little wide
and his hair brushed the top of his ears. He was a vice president at
 Capitol Records. He smoked hash in the office and was the
 company's connection with the rockers who were starting to sell
millions of records. Kornfeld had written maybe 30 hit singles,
 among them "Dead Man's Curve," recorded by Jan and Dean. He
also wrote songs and produced the music for the Cowsills.

 Michael Lang didn't wear shoes very often. Friends described him
as a cosmic pixie, with a head full of curly black hair that bounced
to his shoulders. At 23, he owned what may have been the first
 head shop inthe state of Flordia. In 1968, Lang had produced one
 of the biggest rock shows ever, the two-day Miami Pop Festival,
which drew 40,000 people. At 24, Lang was the manager of a rock
group called Train, which he wanted to sign to a record deal. He
bought his proposal to Kornfeld at Capitol Records in late
 December 1968.

 Lang knew Kornfeld had grown up in Bensonhurst, Queens, like
he had. Lang got an appointment by telling the record company's
 receptionist that he was "from the neighborhood." The two hit it
off immediately.  Not long after they met, Lang moved in with
 Kornfeld and his wife, Linda. The three had rambling, all-night
 conversations, fueled by a few joints, in their New York City
apartment.

One of their ideas was for a cultural exposition/rock
concert/extravaganza. Another was for a recording studio, to be
tucked off in the woods more than 100 miles from Manhattan in a
 town called Woodstock. The location would reflect the
 back-to-the-land spirit of the counterculture. Besides, the Ulster
County town had been an artists' mecca for a century. By the late
1960s, musicians like Bob Dylan, The Band, Tim Hardin, Van
Morrison, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin were moving to the area
and wanted a state-of-the-art studio.

 Lang and Kornfeld were searching for seed money for the festival
and money to build the recording studio. They never saw the
 "young men with unlimited capital" ad, but their lawyer
recommended they talk to Roberts and Rosenman. The four met
February 1969. "We met with them in their apartment on 83rd
Street in a high-rise," Lang recalls. "They were kind of preppy.
 Today, I guess they'd be yuppies. They were wearing suits. Artie
did most of the talking, because I think they seemed puzzled by
 me. They were curious about the counterculture, and they were
somewhat interested in the project. They wanted a written
 proposal, which we had but we didn't bring with us. We told them
that we would meet again with a budget for the festival.

To this day, the founders of Woodstock disagree on who came up
with the original idea for the concert. And, dulled by time,
competition and countess retelling, no one recollection is
consistent. Lang and Kornfeld say Woodstock was always planned
as the largest music festival ever held. At the second meeting, Lang
recalls discussing a budget of $500,000 and attendance of 100,000.
Lang said he had started looking at festival sites in the fall of
1968, which would have been well before he'd hooked up with
              Kornfeld or Roberts and Rosenman. But Rosenman and Roberts
maintain that they were the driving force behind the festival. As
Rosenman and Roberts recall it, Kornfeld and Lang primarily
wanted a studio, hyped by a party for rock'n'roll critics and record
company executives. "We would have cocktails and canapes in a
tent or something," Rosenman said. "We'd send limos down to
New York to pick everyone up. Tim Hardin or someone could
sing. Maybe, if we were lucky, Joan Baez would get up and do a
couple of songs." 

 At some point, Rosenman and Roberts focused on the party idea
and decided that it really ought to be a rock concert. "We made a
deal," Rosenman said. "We'd have the party, and the profits from
the party would be used to pay for the recording studio.
Ultimately, we had the money, so what we said went."

By the end of their third meeting, the little party up in Woodstock
had snowballed into a bucolic concert for 50,000 people, the
 world's biggest rock'n'roll show. The four partners formed a
corporation in March. Each held 25 percent. The company was
called Woodstock Ventures, Inc., after the hip little Ulster County
town where Dylan lived.

The Woodstock Ventures team scurried to find a site. Real estate
agents across the mid-Hudson were scouring the countryside for
land to rent for just a few months. Feelers went out in Rockland
County, then in Orange. For $10,000, Woodstock Ventures had
leased a tract of land in the Town of Wallkill owned by Howard
Mills, Jr. "It was a Sunday in late March," Rosenman said. "We
drove up to Wallkill and saw the industrial park. We talked to
 Howard Mills and we made a deal." "The vibes weren't right there.
It was an industrial park,"  Roberts interjected. "I just said, 'We
gotta have a site now.'"