POT PORTENT

NOW's newsfront item on the Toronto leg of the Global Marijuana March
in Queen's Park May 5 (NOW, May 10-16) reminded me of an event I just
read about in Before The Gold Rush, by Nicholas Jennings, on the music
scene in Toronto in the 1960s.

Forty years ago, on May 22, 1967, a Toronto version of a love-in took
over Queen's Park. More than 4,500 listened to the music of Leonard
Cohen and Buffy Sainte-Marie. Many smoked pot, and some tried the new
thing, smoking banana peels.

Perhaps some of the people who were at that love-in will make it to
the Summer Of Love re-creation in Yorkville Park on June 2, part of
the Luminato festival, and there will be no need to chant, "Close our
street."

Erik Malmsten

Toronto