Joel Selvin

Summer of Love: 40 Years Later / Margot St. James

MARGOT ST. JAMES, retired, living on her grandmother's farm in Washington state. THEN: She ran one of the great salons of the scene at her Haight-Ashbury apartment and produced the notorious Hookers' Balls during the '70s.

In '66 I was living on 63 Alpine Terrace, just a short walk to the Haight through the park. Don Asher and I used to play a little tennis — I played around at playing tennis — but I met Arthur Ashe because he played up there in that park. It used to be sort of a gay rendezvous up at the top in the parking lot. One day I was walking through there coming back from the Haight and the Oracle office, and there was this black, young guy sort of retarded and he tried to pull me into the public restroom, unsuccessfully because I stiff armed the door jambs and he couldn't get me through the door. He pulled my sweater and it came up over my head. So I was standing there bare-chested and I had a shoulder bag on. He grabbed the purse. The strap broke. He took off running with the purse. I'm chasing him bare-chested with my sweater flapping around one shoulder and I'm whipping him with my strap. I lost him. He was very quick. Later the postman showed up at my door with my purse, minus the cash. I called Jack Webb who was a cop then in San Francisco. He said "What — you've been raped in that park? That's a gay park." I had a hard time convincing him. I didn't get raped — it was an attempt. Eventually they poked around. Many women had complained about this kid. I didn't know what they did with him. I never had to go to court. It was just another little experience.

I had the Committee party there that year. And it was great. I hung out on Haight a little bit. Magnolia Thunderpussy was a friend of mine. Occasionally we'd have the sundaes delivered at 11 at night. I had a patron, J. Harold Smith, and he was quite senile, I guess you would call it then. He bought me some furniture. He sat around and told the same 18 stories. (Ken) Kesey came over with a movie camera and he got some of these stories of Mr. Smith. We had the TV thing set up so you could watch it while he filmed. He was a sweet old guy. This was a remodeled Victorian, couple gay guys lived upstairs, but I had the two floors on the bottom, including my round bed. I had a little garden. Everything was great. Don Carpenter used to come over and help me make notes for my book, which I still haven't published.

And Kesey, when he snuck back from Mexico, he had his press conference there. It was going on and on. About three o'clock in the morning and I crawl into my nice round bed. It wasn't long before I see this guy coming at me staggering toward the bed with his d--k out. I said, What are you doing?' He said 'I'm gonna f--k you.' I said 'With that?' He lost his hard-on immediately and turned around and left. It was the Hells Angel guy — not my type.

The next morning I had a bunch of cardboard boxes I wanted to get rid of so I called up Larry Devers. He came over with his pick up. We loaded all these boxes and I noticed this green van parked outside with the guy sitting in the passenger seat leaning back so you couldn't tell anybody was in there, but I could see him. When we left I said drive around the block, Larry, and see if the guy's trying to follow us. Good thing we drove around the block because one of the boxes had fallen off. We threw that back on and took off. The van didn't follow us, but the car, nondescript undercover-type car, started following us. We're going up Divisadero, getting close to Alto Plaza, and we take a right, go around the block and go back on Divisadero. But the car didn't follow us; they turned on the next street. Course we meet on the adjacent corner and I could see into the car from our truck. Here is this second guy — there's always two, y'know — lying down on the seat so we don't know they're tailing us. They know they've been seen, so they pull us over. The good guy goes to Larry's side and the jerk comes to my side, shows me a picture of Kesey and says 'You know this guy?" I say 'Yeah, he's a good friend of mine.' 'Where is he?' I said 'Well, even if I knew, I wouldn't tell you. So you can forget about it.' It was a few days after that he got captured on the freeway.

It was a good time. It was '66 and '67 that I lived there. That's when I got my nun's habit from Dick Gregory. He sent it to me from New York. I became the Realist Nun in (Paul) Krassner's publication. That's when I met Krassner for the first time, too, because he came out from New York and he went to that Committee party. So I was having my own Summer of Love and happening and running my salon, if you will. The neighbor lady didn't like me laying topless in my little garden because on her deck, she had a 16-year-old boy. I had a black girlfriend living with us, Barbara. This lady next door was kinda antsy. She'd be watering her flowers up there and make sure to squirt me with the water. One day I put on my nun's habit and walked down to Haight Street. The florist ran out and gave me some flowers. He thought I was from the Good Shepherd. 'He said 'You're doing such good work.' Then the neighbor lady's husband passes me on the street and I thought, Oh I'm busted now. But he didn't recognize me. I had on the Mammy Yokum shoes, the rimless glasses with, of course, the whole habit. That was my contribution to the Haight, just providing a place for people to hang out and meet. I had Steve Mann living with me. Frank Zappa came by to see Steve. Dr. John came by, Mac Rebbenack. I had a grand piano there so we always had live music there. I loved it. It wasn't North Beach. Barbara and I always used to ride this little motor scooter together. It would hardly get us up the hill. I don't know if it was a 50 or a 75. But we really had a great time. The neighbors were complaining, saying, hey, she's running a whorehouse and I actually wasn't.

Just a lot of people in and out. Mr. Cohen was one of the Hollywood Ten who'd been blacklisted.

The Be-In's in the Panhandle, I went to all those. The music was great, the Jefferson Airplane, the Brothers and Janis, the Grateful Dead were all getting started. Kesey was putting on things at the Fillmore. I knew a lot of the artists and writers, Michael Bowen and those characters.

I loved the Be-In's and Michael Bowen's girlfriend Martina was just a wonderful dancer. I liked to dance. I was having a wonderful time as far as music and hanging out. I'd go by the Oracle office a lot to see what was getting printed. We all smoked pot. Some people were taking a lot of acid. At the time, it was mostly pot and brownies and things like that and a lot of people living communally. I had two or three roommates always. It was just a way of life. But I was a little paranoid since that was after my bust in '62 and even after I'd won my appeal and everything, I was reluctant to go to even protest the Vietnam war. I didn't want to do that and be filmed by the FBI. So I didn't really do a lot of public things. But everybody hung out at my place.

There wasn't any kind of health care at that time until David Smith opened the Free Clinic. I always wanted to open one myself and we finally did in 1998 — it took that long. St. James Infirmary. My pads were always called the St. James Infirmary and my hippie friends always thought I was the most stable of the beatnik/hippie types. I remember being in North Beach in the early '60s and people were leaving and moving out to the Haight. I think that's why the Summer of Love happened. There was more of a community out there than had been in North Beach.

I think its shows in that people are vegetarians, vegan, and that people are going more for organic food and sustainability as far as living, eating and growing your own.

People are finally, four decades later, they're getting hip to what I think the beats and hippies were espousing — a way of life that doesn't damage the planet and doesn't damage people. At that time, they called them third world countries, they now call them developing nations. I knew a lot of people who were going to India, and going to Nepal and Tibet. When I ended up in the late '60s living in Marin, being the housekeeper and chauffeur for Alan Watts, I met Ram Dass and Leary and all those types. I just think I've had a fabulous life, sort of falling through life and having many facets to it. I've always had a sort of happy disposition. And I also don't think it's all from smoking pot for the last 50 years.