'talkin bout my generation'

Heather McKinlay, currently on her third tour in Bahrain, left Ireland, its horses, hunt balls and tennis parties in the 60s, to hit the London scene and shared a flat near King's Road, with a couple of girlfriends

"I was already into pop music and fashion before I moved to London and like to think I was influenced in the right direction by the 60s scene, because even today my tastes in fashion and music are still very important.

"My friends and I loved being in the thick of things and seemed to spend our time going to parties and night clubs and keeping up with the fashion trends.

"I would catch the No 11 bus to work from Kings Road and was mesmerised by the fashionable young people walking by, or riding their scooters (very 'in' then) or driving their cool sports cars.

"I guess I was more of a mod than a rocker and wore very short mini skirts or hot pants, white or black thigh length boots with winkle picker toes.

"My hair was long, my eyes heavily made up and I wore lots of pink lipstick! Colours were strong and my favourite boutiques were Biba in Kensington, Mary Quant, Bus Stop and Granny Takes a Trip, the latter just beside my bus stop!

"I am and was, quite liberal in my outlook but I never tried drugs although some friends smoked a bit of pot but no heavy stuff.

"We had read and heard about the trends in America such as the San Francisco hippy scene and although my crowd partied hard, loved a lot - there were no drugs. The contraceptive pill had just been introduced so for many, this was a real plus. I had an optimistic outlook when times were hard and that remains with me to this day.

"The music was 'magic'. I loved Satisfaction by the Rolling Stones and Wild Thing by the Troggs, The Beatles, Searchers, Gerry and the Pacemakers, Billy Fury, Swinging Blue Jeans, Cilla Black and, of course, Radio Caroline out there in the North Sea.

"Films of impact were Darling starring Julie Christie, Blow Up, The Avengers, Alfie with Michael Caine. Laurence Harvey and Pauline Stone the 'it' couple, he a film star and she a top model. Twiggy who was and is, so fab and still around today modelling for M&S, Jean Shrimpton, Joanna Lumley, Marianne Faithfull and also some 60s restaurants still successful today, such as 'La Familigia' and 'Mr Chow'.

"The 60s was a time of upheaval across the world and I took a keen interest in current events particularly the peace and anti-war movements which affected people then, as the Iraq War does today.

"Martin Luther King made a huge impact on me, I was riveted by Tariq Ali a leading revolutionary and anti-war activist in England against the Vietnam War, (now a journalist and historian) as were Jane Fonda and Tom Hayden in America.

"I took part in the Northern Ireland Peace March in the 70s where Joan Baez spoke and sang.

"I disagree with comments that children of Baby Boomers aren't disciplined or successful because although we were dubbed 'wild' at the time, I think our ground rules today are pretty good and most of the young people I know who are now in their 30s with young families and holding down responsible jobs are on the whole successful, well-organised and not particularly wild.

"Despite our liberated ideas, I think our values were deeply imbedded in us by our parents and consequently we have tried to instil similar values into our own children.

"I feel that many of today's ill disciplined youths are children of parents born in the late 80s or early 90s who have lost the bond of family, perhaps due to the high cost of living which forces both parents to work.

"I hold some old fashioned views on life despite having had lots of wild times and a colourful life. I was a career girl but now have interests in many different areas.

"I still love 60s music and my hairstyles are not dissimilar to those of the 60s such as the flip and a chignon similar to the bee hive!

"Today I am happy married to Michael (participant in Morocco's gruelling Sable d'Or Sahara desert marathon) and enjoy looking after him and being a housewife. I have an easy going outlook on life and am 'an absolute soft touch' for my grandchildren and children!

"A typical young-at-heart memory of the late 60s is of me and my husband and a couple of friends regularly squeezing into our 1954 Daimler Conquest Coupe car with the roof down, cruising along Kings Road on a Saturday afternoon, passing Jagger, Faithfull, Brian Ferry and other young 'celebs' of the day, who were also cruising along to see and be seen.

"With a cool breeze rushing through one's hair on a sunny afternoon in an open top car and feeling on top of the world - the world was our oyster!"

Trish Lowe was a teenager during the 60s, lived with her parents in Southsea, UK, and worked in a bank

"I wasn't 'aware' of being part of the 60s phenomenon, it just happened around us.

"Even in those days we had television although it was a very small black and white screen.

"Like girls today, we got a lot of fashion ideas from magazines although I wasn't particularly outrageous in my choice of clothes but I did wear mini skits, skinny rib sweaters, high boots and some designer wear from Biba and a couple of others. But as women didn't get equal pay in those days, I couldn't afford many of them! In the 60s, money wasn't as readily available as it seems to be now.

"I didn't join any riots or protests. Working in a bank it would have meant instant dismissal! And certainly as far as the bank was concerned, there was NO freedom of speech!

"The Portsmouth Guildhall's entertainment office had an account with our bank and we were often given free tickets for the big groups who performed there so I was lucky to see several of them.

"Sadly, when the Beatles (one of my favourites) came to the Guildhall, my friend and I couldn't get tickets for their concert, so we stood outside the stage door for hours hoping to see them arrive or leave but never even got a glimpse of them because they left by another entrance!

"My parent's generation thought that the Beatles hair was too long! But when you see them on old newsreels, you realise that their hair was actually quite short. And the Beatles were smartly dressed, as were a lot of the 60s groups who copied their fashion style.

"My other favourite groups and singers included Cilla Black, Marianne Faithful, The Tremeloes, Manfred Mann and, in common with my contemporaries, I always bought the current 'No 1' single.

"My lifestyle wasn't particularly liberated, although probably much more so than that of my parents, which is why I made sure that my daughters had far more freedom (within reason) than I did.

"I was certainly aware of some people taking marijuana or hash but I never tried any.

"Once I was in a night club when it was raided but fortunately managed to dive through a window with my then boyfriend and got away.

"If my parents had heard that I had been there during a raid, I would have been banned from ever going out again at night!

"Today I am a housewife and an old age pensioner as well as being a mother to two daughters and grandmother to two-year-old Sophie Louise."

Jan and John Rundall arrived in Bahrain in 1989 when John was posted as First Secretary to the British Embassy. At the end of his assignment, they chose to remain here. In the 60s, Jan lived in Ham, Surrey, close to the River Thames and rode at the Ham Polo Club

I worked several summers in the City and remember running like hell for the No. 71 bus to catch the train to Richmond on time.

The weather always seemed to be clement and sometimes a group of us would swim in London's Marshall Street Baths, near Carnaby Street.

During her varied career, Jan was once headhunted for a summer job in Greece for Juliana's discotheque and wonders where she would have ended up today if she had accepted.

"Another time, I chauffeured a Rolls Royce between London and Geneva and ended up working at the United Nations in Geneva in the Joint Inspection Unit.

"I worked for retired ambassadors who were very amusing, a bit like being in a London gentleman's club (or what I thought a club would be like) because in those days there was absolutely no equality so I would never have even aspired to entry!

"I think I was the first person in Geneva - definitely in the Palais des Nations - to wear a mini skirt. A bright red, very fine corduroy suit."

Jan was aware of the US Hippy / Flower Power / Human Rights issues supported by such singers as Joan Baez and activist Che Guevara and recalls standing on the corner of Haight / Ashbury Streets in San Francisco in 1971 and thinking that this was where it all happened.

"Definitive events included the Kent State fracas where the US government sent in the National Guard to disperse the students, the furore over segregated buses and schools in the Southern States of Alabama and Arkansas, the deaths of Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy and the US drug culture. I can remember people imagining that they could fly on LSD, although I was never aware of drugs on the London scene.

"One of the best things for women in the UK during the 60s was 'The Pill'. It gave the average female a sense of her own worth and determination to govern her own existence. She no longer felt the need to get married to whoever would have her.

"The lyrics Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose summed it up - although it was written by a man!

"Emancipated women could determine their own partners freely - these were interchangeable and could be discarded at the drop of a hat.

"We weren't beholden to any man, whether or not he expected 'payment in kind' for buying you an expensive dinner or letting you sleep in his flat as a favour if you missed the last bus home. Every one could get what they wanted whenever they wanted, without pressure.

"A boyfriend had a flat on the King's Road opposite the Chelsea Drugstore where all the trendy people hung out.

"There didn't seem to be a particular fashion trend; men wore jeans or flares and girls wore long, flowing skirts and beads or very short mini skirts or hot pants.

"I had a beautiful pair of pale green suede hot pants from Liberty's which I was very proud of and even wore them to the Centre Court a Wimbledon! I thought I was better than Mary Quant. I loved her silver make up which we would plaster on our eyes or all over the face. Biba's Boutique was a great place to hang out and shop in, although I couldn't afford to buy much there.

"Music was super and really good to dance to. I wasn't a Beatles fan until their Sergeant Pepper album but the Stones were great.

"We also listened to American music such as Bob Dylan for the protest songs and black singers to dance to.

"I never went on a protest march - it always seemed to rain on the CND crowd so I gave that a miss. Anyway, I think I thought it was a good idea to have our own bomb - just in case!

"I have given my daughter far more freedom than I ever had, though I'm not sure whether this was a good thing as perhaps she may have felt rather directionless as a teenager.

"Now in her mid-20, she is certainly better educated than I was but yet is nowhere near as independent - and has never felt the need to get out into the world.

"I had to fight for my freedom and by God I did. I think Ursuline nuns do teach one to fight the system although the education I got was exceedingly good. When I was Emma's age I had taken myself half way around the world and worked in some very strange (but not dishonest) jobs.

"Looking back, the 60s were fun times and although we may not have been conscious of it at the time, I realise how lucky we were to have been at the heart of a new era of independence and freedom - particularly for women."

Born to a playwright, scriptwriter and author of best-selling books, Anthony Terrot entered this world aboard a train between Knaresborough and Guildford, UK. During the 60s, Tony attended Guildford Art School as a photography student

"I don't remember being unduly influenced by the youth revolution or Hippy age that surrounded us, we just sort of 'got into it' in terms of being part of a new musical and fashion culture which, upon reflection, developed rather flawed political notions - the negative results of which will take the UK and elsewhere some time to overcome.

"The Flower Power era was actually less visual on a regular basis than newsreels would have us believe today. I did roam around one winter in a moth-eaten fur coat bought from Oxfam, although this was more a practical choice to keep out the cold for a student whose photographic expenses ran high.

"They were interesting times; Eric Clapton gigged on the roof of my first car, a bright turquoise 1953 vintage (Austin) A 55. This rather improbable event occurred because my then girlfriend grazed her donkey in the grounds of his Surrey villa. He must have liked the colour.

"I also remember Roger Daltry (pre-Who) performing at our college ball, and having a photo session with Julian Bream, the famous classical guitarist. Another occasion I attended a recording session with The Hollies in the days when recording was done between two open reels. On rewind, one of the tapes spiralled into the air, wrecking a day's recording session. They were quite phlegmatic about it though.

"I shared a flat with Henry Strachey, nephew of Lytton Strachey - one of the unconventional 20th century 'Bloomsbury Group'. With a third friend, Richard Hill, we took off to Greece via Italy on, rather than in, a Triumph TR4.

"One night, totally broke whilst returning through Yugoslavia (then under Tito's rigid Communist control) we were awoken at gunpoint by a posse of police.

"Rather menacingly, they couldn't make out why three young men were sleeping in a ditch when their wheels were quite cool for the day.

"I wasn't interested in riots or protests; my interest was photography. During the strikes and demonstrations of '68, I was more interested in making money to pay for photographic equipment."