Morningstar East

The "Free Land" movement in the Bay Area of the mid-sixties spread north along the coastal range of California. One of the earliest of of these was Wheeler Ranch in Sonoma County, originally owned by the Limelighters folk musician, Lou Gottlieb. He deeded the ranch to God before the county sheriff and community outrage closed the property. Some among these people took to Taos New Mexico and set up a small adobe pueblo and a few hogans along with a magically constructed kiva on the mesa above Arroyo Hondo. G, B. Couper came to the commune after the fiasco at Altimont Speedway in the winter of 1969 and stayed a few months until after spring planting in May of 1970. His experience there profoundly changed him from the inside out. This is a memoir of his brief sojourn and a tribute to the place and the people who made it happen.