[12][13][14][15] The festival has become widely regarded as a pivotal moment in popular music history, as well as a defining event for the silent and baby boomer generations.

[16][17] The event's significance was reinforced by a 1970 documentary film,[18] an accompanying soundtrack album, and a song written by Joni Mitchell that became a major hit for both Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and Matthews Southern Comfort.

[21] Lang had some experience as a promoter, having co-organized the Miami Pop Festival on the East Coast the previous year, where an estimated 25,000 people attended the two-day event.

Unpersuaded by this Studio-in-the-Woods proposal, Roberts and Rosenman counter-proposed a concert featuring the kind of artists known to frequent the Woodstock area, such as Bob Dylan and the Band.

[25][page needed] When Lang was unable to find a site for the concert, Roberts and Rosenman, growing increasingly concerned, took to the road and found a venue.

[30]: 40  Growing alarmed at the lack of progress, Roberts and Rosenman took over the search for a venue, and discovered the 300-acre (120 ha; 0.47 sq mi; 1.2 km2) Mills Industrial Park (41°28′42″N 74°21′51″W / 41.47823341524296°N 74.3641474°W / 41.47823341524296; -74.3641474) in the town of Wallkill, New York, which Woodstock Ventures leased for US$10,000 (equivalent to $83,000 today) in the Spring of 1969.

[21][page needed] The stop work order was lifted, allowing the festival to proceed pending backing by the Department of Health and Agriculture, and removal of all structures by September 1, 1969.

[44][45] Arlo Guthrie made an announcement that was included in the film saying that the New York State Thruway was closed,[46] although the director of the Woodstock museum said that this did not happen.

And this is the moment I will never forget as long as I live: A quarter mile away in the darkness, on the other edge of this bowl, there was some guy flicking his Bic, and in the night I hear, "Don't worry about it, John.

The festival was remarkably peaceful given the number of people and the conditions involved, although there were three recorded fatalities: two drug overdoses and another caused when a tractor ran over a 17-year-old sleeping in a nearby hayfield.

The eventual article dealt with issues of traffic jams and minor lawbreaking, but went on to emphasize cooperation, generosity, and the good nature of the festival goers.

The paper had the only phone line running out of the site, and it used a motorcyclist to get stories and pictures from the impassable crowd to the newspaper's office 35 miles (56 km) away in Middletown.

Artie had been turned down everywhere else, but against the express wishes of other Warner Bros. executives, Weintraub put his job on the line and gave Kornfeld $100,000 (equivalent to $830,000 today) to make the film.

Wadleigh strove to make the film as much about the hippies as the music, listening to their feelings about compelling events contemporaneous with the festival (such as the Vietnam War), as well as the views of the townspeople.

In 1994, Woodstock: The Director's Cut was released and expanded to include Janis Joplin as well as additional performances by Jefferson Airplane, Jimi Hendrix, and Canned Heat not seen in the original version of the film.

The film also starred Jonathan Groff as Michael Lang, Daniel Eric Gold as Joel Rosenman, and Henry Goodman and Imelda Staunton as Jake and Sonia Teichberg.

It focused on Woodstock's social and political context and contained previously unseen footage supplemented by voice-over anecdotes from people at the festival.

[120] Tracks from all three albums, as well as numerous additional, previously unreleased performances from the festival (but not the stage announcements and crowd noises) were reissued by Atlantic, also in August 1994, as a four compact disc box set titled Woodstock: Three Days of Peace and Music.

[116] In July 1999, MCA Records released Live at Woodstock, an expanded, double disc set featuring nearly every song of Hendrix's performance, omitting just two pieces that were sung by his rhythm guitarist Larry Lee.

[116] In August 2009, Rhino/Atlantic Records issued a six-disc box set titled Woodstock 40 Years On: Back To Yasgur's Farm, which included further musical performances as well as stage announcements and other ancillary material.

[116] On August 2, 2019, the Rhino/Atlantic released Woodstock – Back to the Garden: The Definitive 50th Anniversary Archive, a massive 38 disc, 36-hour, 432-song completists' audio box set of nearly every note played at the original 1969 Woodstock festival (including 276 songs that were previously unreleased), a "CD collection [co-produced for Rhino by archivist Andy Zax] that lays the '69 fest out in chronological order, from the first stage announcements to muddy farewells."

[122][123][124][125] Also released in 2019 was Live at Woodstock, an official album of all 11 songs played by Creedence Clearwater Revival, from "Born on the Bayou" to "Bad Moon Rising" and "Proud Mary".

[21] Bethel voters did not re-elect Supervisor Amatucci in an election held in November 1969 because of his role in bringing the festival to the town and the upset attributed to some residents.

[130] In 1984, at the original festival site, land owners Louis Nicky and June Gelish put up a monument marker with plaques called "Peace and Music" by a local sculptor from nearby Bloomingburg, Wayne C.

[132] The field and the stage area remain preserved and are open to visitors as part of the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts after being purchased in 1996 by cable television pioneer Alan Gerry for the purpose.

Bethel Woods described the festival as a "pan-generational music, culture and community event" (including some live performances and talks by) "leading futurists and retro-tech experts".

Michael Lang told a reporter that he also had "definite plans" for a 50th anniversary concert that would "hopefully encourage people to get involved with our lives on the planet" with a goal of re-capturing the "history and essence of what Woodstock was".

This included some artists who performed at the original Woodstock festival in 1969: John Fogerty (from Creedence Clearwater Revival), Carlos Santana (as Santana), David Crosby (from Crosby, Stills & Nash), Melanie, John Sebastian, Country Joe McDonald, three Grateful Dead members (as Dead & Company), Canned Heat, and Hot Tuna (containing members of Jefferson Airplane).

Cartoonist Charles Schulz named his recurring Peanuts bird character (which began appearing in 1966 but was still unnamed) Woodstock in tribute to the festival.

[158] Keith Robertson's 1970 children's book Henry Reed's Big Show has the title character attempting to emulate the success of the festival by having his own concert at his uncle's farm.