Some pictures of the friends of the famous San Francisco attorney at the Be-In 2007.
By Bruce B. Brugmann
Mel Belli’s friends got together last Friday night (Aug.24) for the Human Be-In 2007.
Belli, the famous San Francisco attorney and King of Torts, as he liked to call himself, has been dead for many years but his spirit lives on, at the Be-In and at Sunday’s Summer of Love spectacular in Speedway Meadows at Golden Gate Park.
The reason is a most tantalizing and unknown San Francisco story, as I mentioned in a previous blog and as a panelist at the Be-In. The two promoters of the first Be-In, Allen Cohen and Michael Bowen, were desperately trying to get a permit from City Hall for their original Be-In event in l967.
Allen got nowhere when he tried City Hall. So Bowen went to his friend Mel Belli, who sent his secretary over to City Hall. She came back later that afternoon with a permit. The permit was for “a birthday party for Mel Belli and his friends.” That was how the Human Be-In of l967, the precursor to the Summer of Love, was held legally on the Polo Field at Golden Gate Park.
And so you can say in an expansive Oraculean way that all the people who come to the Be-Ins and Summer of Love events, and tens of thousands are expected on Sunday, are friends of Mel Belli. He would get a kick out of that. B3
Click on the continue reading link to see some pictures of the Human Be-In 2007, taken by Raymond Van Tassel.
To see more pictures, go to his website at www.RaymondVanTassel.com.