The Zip to Zap was an idea of Chuck Stroup, a student at North Dakota State University in Fargo. Stroup could not afford to attend the more traditional spring break festivities held in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Therefore, he came up with the idea of what was to become known as the "Zip to Zap a Grand Festival of Light and Love". Stroup placed an advertisement in the student newspaper at NDSU, The Spectrum. His idea was soon embraced by college students throughout the upper midwest of the United States and states as far away as Texas and Florida, thanks to extensive publicity in various college newspapers and in newspapers throughout the nation over the Associated Press wires....Kind of an early flash mob, accomplished without social media. The Spectrum ran an article:
"Located in the valley of the scenic Knife River, Zap (Zip 58580) has thrown open its arms to students. The beautiful burg's 250 residents welcome us to their shores. Shall we say no to this truly fine gesture of western hospitality? Of course not. On May 10, we and students like us from all over the Midwest will flock to Zap, the Lauderdale of the North (where do you get your suntan, Miami? No, Knife River.)."The article comically spoke of "a full program of orgies, brawls, freakouts, and arrests."
Zap was a tiny place. I don't know the population in 1969, but it's something like 200 today. But the people who lived there seemed to like the idea:
The two local bars stockpiled a supply of beer and local diners began marketing "Zapburgers" in anticipation of the event. "We thought, well, we'll put ourselves on the map here," remembered Norman Fuchs, the mayor of Zap in 1969....But the reality was way too many people:
Students... quickly filled the town's two taverns. The demand for beer was such that the tavern owners decided to double the price. This action upset the students, but in the long run it did not matter since all the beer was rapidly consumed. Drunken students took to the streets of the small town. Vomiting and urinating on the streets by the students caused great concern among the locals, who quickly began to fear for their safety. The temperatures fell below freezing and the drunken college students started a bonfire in the center of town, using wood that was left over from a recent demolition project.The media were there to titillate Americans with more of the kids-are-going-crazy news that cluttered the airwaves of the time:
The townspeople, led by Mayor Fuchs, asked the students to leave: most complied but some did not. What had started out as a spring break get-together quickly turned into the only riot in North Dakota's history. Local security forces were overwhelmed and the cafe and one of the bars were completely destroyed.
Governor William Guy called in 500 troops from the North Dakota National Guard to quell the riot. Over 1,000 partiers were still in Zap when the guard arrived on the scene at 6:30 am, although just 200 of them were still awake. The guardsmen with fixed bayonets roused the hungover students.....
It was just spring break in the north.
I don't know why they picked Zap, but "Zap" had hippie panache. There was Zappa and Zap Comix:
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17 comments:
Stoner Comix
Stoner Colorado
Mr. Zap. I do not.
Mr. Morris. That is a man in the State Department ?
Mr. Zap. No ; I don't know him.
Mr. Morris. Mr. Zap, does your wife work in the United Nations?
Mr. Zap. She does.
Mr. Morris. What position does she hold? What is her name?
Probably "Mrs Zap", dickhead.
How much abuse did Mayor Fuchs take for that name?
Incredible opportunity to make some quick cash for the locals. A couple years' worth of business in two days.
“Upped the price of beer to fifty cents.”
Price gouging in 1969.
Of course, Frank Zappa pretty much hated hippies and drug use, and made brutal fun of them.
do you remember?
Never heard of it.
I remember that issue if Zap and carried it around for years, guiltily.
It was doity.
Yeah.....I was 12. My biggest concern was getting a first class badge, and checking out what Renee was wearing.
I was a senior in high school in 1969, in Glendive, Montana, a couple hours from Zap, ND. The Great "Zap-In" was big news in Glendive. One of my classmates worked at KGLE, the local radio station and saw all the wire reports coming out of Zap. The wire reports were emphatic that the Mayor Fuchs' name was to be pronounced FOOKS on air.
Fuchs, Buttigeig, when do you get to the point where you can’t take it any more, and get your surname changed?
Crumb. Mr. Natural. Angelfood McSpade. Some things you never shake.
I'm constantly amused to remember how non-PC the counterculture was. I saw a lot of Sixties-envy in my life on campus, renewed in each generation of muddleheads, and they have NO IDEA how it was.
Ah the pleasures of age.
Narr
Sixty-six tomorrow
I didn't make it to the Zip to Zap spring break in '69. I drove through there later that summer, though, for a used car dealer in Billings, who bought cars cheap in rural ND and hired a group of us college students to drive them back. My Ford Fairlane 500 blew up on the way back, didn't even make it back to blacktop roads. Some a those simple ND farmers could cheat a Montana used car dealer.
I was 13 50 years ago- and I don't remember it.
Non-PC sixties humor! I was a teenager then, and the underground comixs of R. Crumb (what a star!) prefigured National Lampoon, Monty Python, very early Saturday Night Live, Firesign Theater,etc. all manna for a kid with a different sense of humor. Oddly, those who objected were largely conservative blue nose scolds. Now it's leftist ideologues.
Here's my take on the ZAP Comix Cover.
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