40 years after famous photo, Woodstock couple still together
Woodstock cover couple still together
‘We just had to go,’ remembers woman in iconic 1969 photograph
TOM KEYSER
, ALBANY TIMES UNION Published 5:30 am, Thursday, August 13, 2009
Bobbi and Nick Ercoline appear on the soundtrack album that immortalized them at the legendary festival. Photo: Rhino Records
Photo: Rhino Records
Image 1 of 2Bobbi and Nick Ercoline appear on the soundtrack album that immortalized them at the legendary festival.
IMAGE 1 OF 2
Bobbi and Nick Ercoline appear on the soundtrack album that immortalized them at the legendary festival.
Bobbi Kelly and Nick Ercoline were girlfriend and boyfriend, 20 years old. Bobbi lived in Pine Bush, N.Y., and worked at a bank. Nick lived in Middletown, N.Y., and worked two jobs while going to college.
They had heard so much on the radio about an approaching festival called Woodstock that “we just had to go,” Bobbi says. They took back roads to Bethel, N.Y., parked their car when they couldn’t drive farther and walked the final two miles.
They stayed only one night. They never saw the stage because they were so far away. But at some point, and they have no idea when, a photographer took their picture hugging, draped in a quilt, on a muddy hillside.
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Does Woodstock mean anything after 40 years?
The photo appeared on the cover of the Woodstock soundtrack. And Bobbi and Nick became part of the legend.
“Woodstock was a sign of the times,” says Bobbi, now Bobbi Ercoline. “So many things were churning around in our world at that time: civil rights, the Vietnam War, women’s rights. It was our generation.
“I know some people say Woodstock changed their life. But I don’t think it contributed to who I am or who Nick is. I think we became the people we would have become anyway.”
An estimated half-million young people like Bobbi and Nick descended upon Max Yasgur’s dairy farm in Bethel, N.Y., for the Woodstock Music and Art Fair, Aug. 15-18, 1969. A documentary film and soundtrack of the music lifted the event into legend.
And the legend — or at least the merchandising of it — continues. For the 40th anniversary, we’re getting more than a dozen books; the Taking Woodstock film by Academy-Award-winning director Ang Lee; the original Woodstock movie, expanded and in high definition; and a six-CD box set featuring, for the first time, music from every performer at the festival.
BEATNIKHIWAY 