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Owsley Stanley, icon of 1960s counterculture, dies at 76
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March 17, 2011
Original URL: http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Owsley_Stanley,_icon_of_1960s_counterculture,_dies_at_76



,  mass-producer of , the  underlying much  of the culture of the , died
Sunday in a car accident in Australia at the age of 76, his family
announced on Tuesday.

According to ''The New York Times'', "Mr. Stanley lent the ’60s a great
deal of its color — like White Lightning, Monterey Purple and Blue
Cheer, the varieties of his LSD that were among the most popular."

Stanley, a talented, self-taught chemist who was known for the purity of
his LSD, supplied the drug to such music groups as the , the , and , and
provided the acid for  and his , whose antics were recorded by  in the .
The  once called his acid "the best LSD in the world … the genuine
Owsley." 

He was also an early  sound engineer and designed the high-fidelity
sound system for the live rock concerts of  the Grateful Dead, known as
the  “wall of sound”. It was essentially   a massive public address
system made up of 600 speakers that enabled  musicians to mix their
sound from the stage and reduce distortion. His  recordings of  Grateful
Dead live performances, some having been commercially released,  are
valued as a documentary of their early music.

, formerly the tour manager of the Rolling Stones, said of Stanley: "He
was a very sophisticated man, an amalgam of scientist and engineer,
chemist and artist."
, 2007}}
Stanley was born in Kentucky  and studied engineering briefly at the 
before dropping out and joining the . In 1958, he moved to California
and worked at a wide variety of jobs, before enrolling at the  in 1963,
at a time when drug use was pervasive. He got his first taste of LSD in
April 1964 which transformed him. "I remember the first time I took acid
and walked outside, and the cars were kissing the parking meters," he
said in an interview with the  in 2007.

Deciding to provide his own LSD to ensure its quality, Stanley created
his own lab to produce it. According to ''The Washington Post'',
"Working at first from a makeshift bathroom laboratory in Berkeley, Mr.
Stanley produced at least 1 million doses of LSD between 1965 and 1967."
His LSD was widely distributed. The lab was raided and he spent two
years in prison. 

Stanley moved to Australia in the 1980s when he become convinced the 
would be destroyed in the coming of a new  . He lived in the Australian 
 near , Queensland. 

== Sources == 
* http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/bear_stanley_who_made_the_lsd_on_which_haight_ashbury_tripped_dies_at_76/2011/03/15/ABt95Ib_story.html?wprss=rss_crime
* http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-owsley-stanley-20110315,0,3733346.story
* http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/obituaries/articles/2011/03/15/owsley_bear_stanley_1960s_counterculture_icon_at_76/?p1=Well_MostPop_Emailed3
* http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/15/us/15stanley.html



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