Synopsis
"The Bull Island Rock Festival: The experience had by me and others at 1972's Erie Canal Soda Pop Festival" by Dan Davis is a personal narrative that chronicles the chaotic and infamous events of a largely forgotten music festival held over Labor Day weekend in 1972. Davis, a first-time author from rural Lebanon, Indiana, recounts his own attendance at the festival, which took place on Bull Island—a strip of land technically in Illinois but accessible only from the Indiana side of the Wabash River. Officially named the Erie Canal Soda Pop Festival, the event was also dubbed "Woodstock on the Wabash" by attendees and promoters, evoking the spirit of the iconic 1969 festival. However, unlike Woodstock’s celebrated legacy, Bull Island devolved into a disorganized mess marked by rampant drug use, scarcity of food and water, and a breakdown of order, culminating in the crowd burning down the main stage by the festival’s end.
The book captures the festival’s ambitious beginnings and rapid descent into chaos. Promoters Tom Duncan and Bob Alexander initially planned the event for Chandler, Indiana, promising a lineup of over 30 high-profile acts—including Black Sabbath, Joe Cocker, The Allman Brothers, and Fleetwood Mac—and anticipating a crowd of about 55,000. Legal opposition from Indiana authorities forced a last-minute relocation to Bull Island, a remote and ill-equipped site. This shift, combined with poor planning and a lack of coordination between Indiana and Illinois law enforcement, led to an unmanageable influx of attendees, with estimates ranging from 200,000 to 300,000 people—far exceeding expectations. Davis describes how the sheer volume of festivalgoers overwhelmed the limited infrastructure, leaving only a handful of sheriffs to manage the crowd and resulting in severe shortages of basic necessities. Many of the advertised bands canceled due to safety concerns, though some, like Black Oak Arkansas, The Eagles, and Ravi Shankar, performed despite the deteriorating conditions.
Davis’s narrative is enriched by his effort to weave in the perspectives of other attendees, acknowledging that his own memories of the event—nearly 50 years old at the time of writing—have faded. He incorporates comments from social media, online publications, and blogs to provide a broader tapestry of experiences, ranging from the humorous to the tragic. These accounts highlight the festival’s dual nature: for some, it was a wild, nostalgic adventure filled with music and camaraderie, while for others, it was a harrowing ordeal of survival amid mud, drugs, and lawlessness. Davis also attempts to reconstruct the lineup and sequence of performances, though he notes discrepancies between online setlists and individual band tour histories, reflecting the event’s disorganized reality. The book serves as both a personal memoir and a collective history, preserving the stories of those who witnessed what could have been a triumphant Midwestern Woodstock but instead became a cautionary tale of excess and mismanagement.
Beyond the firsthand accounts, Davis offers context about the festival’s aftermath and its lasting impact. The event left promoters with a $200,000 loss and years of legal battles, including a bizarre lawsuit from a farmer claiming cattle deaths due to marijuana inhalation. Tragically, two deaths were reported—a drowning in the Wabash River and a heroin overdose—underscoring the festival’s darker side. Despite its failures, Davis reflects on the resilience of the attendees and performers who braved the chaos, as well as the cultural significance of Bull Island as a snapshot of 1970s counterculture. Written with a conversational tone and bolstered by black-and-white photos, the book appeals to readers interested in music history, regional lore, or the unpredictable nature of human gatherings. For Davis and those he quotes, Bull Island remains a vivid, if flawed, memory—a testament to a time when idealism clashed with reality on the muddy banks of the Wabash.