Grateful Dead House

Seven ten Ashbury Street. This unassuming Victorian house was the epicenter of psychedelic San Francisco, the communal home of the Grateful Dead from October nineteen sixty-six to March nineteen sixty-eight.

The band — Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir, Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan — all lived here together, along with girlfriends, managers, roadies, and whatever assortment of characters happened to drift through on any given day. The house was equal parts commune, crash pad, rehearsal space, and party headquarters. The Haight-Ashbury neighborhood was ground zero for the Summer of Love, and seven ten Ashbury was ground zero for ground zero.

On October second, nineteen sixty-seven, narcotics agents raided the house. They arrested multiple band members and associates on marijuana charges. Here's the thing that makes it a perfect time capsule: the raid was covered in the first issue of Rolling Stone magazine. That's right — the very first edition of the most influential music publication in American history led with a story about the Grateful Dead getting busted at this address. The magazine and the band launched into public consciousness at the same moment.

The band moved out in early nineteen sixty-eight as the Haight-Ashbury scene curdled. The Summer of Love had attracted so many people that the neighborhood was overwhelmed — hard drugs replaced psychedelics, crime spiked, and the utopian dream got messy. The Dead decamped to Marin County and kept playing for another twenty-seven years.

The house was sold in two thousand and twelve for one point four million dollars — which, for a Victorian in this neighborhood, was actually a reasonable price. It's a private residence. Please be respectful. Just stand here, look up, and imagine the music pouring out of those windows.