The Wallys

Wally was a multiple-use name anyone could use.

In 1974, a small Free Festival was also organised alongside Stonehenge, where an obscure electronic noise band named Zorch gave a performance through a dodgy PA system. A group of around thirty people stayed on after the festival and pitched camp in a field next to the stone circle. They lived communally in tents, a rickety polythene-covered geodesic dome and a small fluorescent painted tipi. It was an open camp, inspired by a diversity of wild ideas, but with the common purpose of discovering the relevance of this ancient mysterious place by the physical experience of spending a lot of time there. The Department of the Environment and the National Trust landowners set out to evict them. Such was the law in those days, the eviction process involved seeking a High Court injunction on named individuals. Aware of this potential legal loophole the occupants decided to exploit it and so they all adopted the multiple-use name of `Wally'.

Largely through later publications by Penny Rimbaud of the punk band Crass, The name `Wally' became increasingly identified with one man, Wally Hope aka Phil Russell who had written and published much of the promotional material for the 1974 Stonehenge festival.

External links

* [http://www.earthlydelights.co.uk/netnews/wally.html Where's Wally] - The origins of the multiple identity Wally in 1970s pop festivals and underground culture