Today is the 43rd anniversary of Woodstock….While barely dressed hippies were gathering for “three days of peace and love” and dropping acid to Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead and Janis Joplin on a dairy farm in upstate New York in August of 1969, Black folks were partying on the hot concrete streets of Harlem with a series of concerts called the Harlem Cultural Festival. It is referred to as Black Woodstock. It was a celebration of Black music, culture, and Black pride with an estimated 100,000 concert-goers. The concerts took place every sunday at 3PM in Harlem’s Mount Morris Park (renamed Marcus Garvey Park in 1973) from June 29th to August 24th.The concerts came on the heels of 2 of Malcolm X’s former aides being shot—one fatally, Charles Kenyatta and Clarence 13X Allah as well as 21 Black Panthers being arrested for conspiring to assassinate police officers and blow up buildings. The local NAACP chairman likened Harlem at the time to the vigilante Old West. So it came as little surprise when the NYPD refused to provide security for the festival. That wouldn’t stop anything because the Black Panther Party stepped in and provided security while the people enjoyed the sounds of Gladys Knight and the Pips, Stevie Wonder, Sly & the Family Stone, Staple Singers, David Ruffin,Nina Simone, B.B. King, The 5th Dimension, Edwin Hawkins Singers, Mahalia Jackson and others.