The hot summer of 1967 was full of cruising and drinking, sleeping on roofs, and listening to music late into the night
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There was a hit song in the 1960s by the Lovin’ Spoonful called Summer in the City all about how the days were hot and gritty, everyone looking half-dead, but the nights passionate and fun, full of sex and dancing. That was certainly my experience of the summer of 1967, an especially hot one when New York became a tropical city full of cruising and drinking, of people sleeping without air conditioners on the cindered roofs of their buildings, sharing wine coolers out of Mason jars, and attending late-night horror movies. In the Village on Sixth Avenue and West Third Street, there was always a pickup basketball game going, the beautiful shirtless bodies slathered in sweat.