Author recalls events leading to Woodstock festival

By Julie Mollins

TORONTO (Reuters Life!) - Without Elliot Tiber there may have never been a Woodstock music festival.

The legendary concert in 1969 that attracted almost 500,000 people and became a symbol of the 1960s counterculture almost didn't happen.

Tiber had hosted a music concert at his parent's motel in White Lake, New York for 10 years but only a handful of people ever showed up.

So when he heard that Michael Lang, an organizer of the original Woodstock Music and Art Fair, had been barred from holding his festival in a nearby community, Tiber says he offered him his concert permit, and introduced him to Max Yasgur who owned the land where it was held.

In his autobiography "Taking Woodstock: A True Story of a Riot, a Concert and a Life" Tiber, 72, described the events that preceded the festival 38 years ago.

He spoke to Reuters about his involvement with the event that began on August 15 and the famous people, including Truman Capote and Tennessee Williams, he met while living in Manhattan in the 1960s.

Q: What was your involvement with the Woodstock festival?

A: "If not for me there wouldn't have been one. When Woodstock was thrown out of the other towns ... because local townspeople were afraid of hippies, drug addicts and gays all coming to their little towns I had my permit.