Counterculture Periodicals I: The Organ

1970-71

Every few weeks for the past few months, I’ve made an appointment in a special collection at the New York Public Library to view 1960s-70s counterculture publications as part of my research for a chapter in an academic book that I’m writing (more on this later). While I had looked through some of these periodicals while doing my PhD work, this has been the first time that I’ve sat and analyzed them page by page—becoming well acquainted with the particular voices and personalities of different newspapers and aware of the internal dynamics leading to changes in style and focus.

These periodicals range from the weekly to the very occasional. I’ve looked through ones that only came out once before disappearing, and ones that survived for hundreds of issues. Some consisted solely of current news through a countercultural lens, while others concentrated on art, poetry, or esoteric and occult subjects.

As I’m preparing to start writing this chapter, I thought I would share some thoughts and images from The Organ. Printed as a 36-page folded tabloid, the first issue came out in July 1970 with eight irregularly published issues to follow—the last appeared in July 1971. Based in San Francisco, The Organ was published by Christopher Weills and edited by Gerard van der Leun and was not connected to an earlier counterculture publication of the same name from Frisco. Boldly beautiful, when folded it featured a two-color cover, which unfolded to reveal a tabloid-size black-and-white newspaper with a double-page centerfold poster in each issue. Not part of the Underground Press Syndicate, The Organ did not cover the news other than to have ads for upcoming events. Countercultural art, literature, music, and lifestyle composed the majority of the articles.