Garcia and the Grateful Dead
 

Hi
We are an English family, and our son is soon to commence some of his University studies in California. We'll be coming across to visit him and do some touring around as well, and my husband is pretty excited about this as he is a huge Grateful Dead and Garcia fan. In England we have trouble buying Grateful Dead merchandise and the cost of shipping it from America is somewhat prohibitive. We plan to visit San Fran of course - is it easy to find shops selling Grateful Dead merchandise? He isn't into the beanie stuff or the Jerry dolls, but would love some T shirts, mugs, towels etc. We have never been to the West coast before so don't really know what to expcect!

Your best bet in San Francisco for Grateful dead merchandise is the west end of Haight Street. There are several stores there that sell Grateful Dead merchandise, including the horrid aforementioned Dead Bears.

I've never seen a grateful dead towel though...

Hello Morgana,
Do check out the website for the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco. If you could attend a concert while in S.F., I think it would add to your experience. The very nice cafe on the second floor of the auditorium has just about every Fillmore poster ever published (many of them for Dead events) on its walls - it's a treat for the eyes.

Hi
Thanks for the replies. Last summer, whilst on holiday in Florida, we saw the Dead at Tampa (with Dylan) but there was hardly any merchanidise for sale - just the latest Dicks Picks and some tour T shirts.
I've seen a Grateful Dead towel on a website - it had that blue and red flash across it - I've even seen Grateful Dead golf balls!
M

Have you looked on Ebay?

I have seen everything on there from a stuffed armadillo to a Haile Selassie thong, so a Dead towel doesn't seem like so much of a stretch to me :)

If your husband wears ties, there is a line of Jerry Garcia ties. Pretty cool, very colorful! I've seen them mostly in department stores.

You can also go to the band's website at www.dead.net and find stuff there! Also, I thought that there was to be a Dead museum built in San Fran, did that ever get off the ground?

Make sure that your husband looks for Herry Garcia art as well, very wonderful stuff.

Obviously, that should've been Jerry Garcia.

There is no Grateful Dead museum in SF that I know of.

Would your husband be interested in seeing the remaining Dead? They still give shows in and around SF quite often, they played various bay area venues at least 3 times last year. You might check their website to see. They have a special ticketing service that might be of use to you, were there a concert planned for the time of your stay.

If your son is meant to be studying at UC Berkeley, there will be some amount of Grateful Dead paraphenalia to be found in Berkeley (Telegraph Avenue near the campus) as well.

just up the block from haight street - where every other store has jerry merchandise in the window to cater to folks just like you- is the famous grateful dead house at 710 ashbury. you cannot go inside but you can have a "moment" out front. you can google it online to learn about it. the owners have a small laminated sign out front.
also, if you are really really dead heads, when you rent a car for the required visit to muir woods, you can budget in another 45 minutes of driving to visit inverness where anyone you talk to will tell you a grateful dead story as that's where a lot of those guys lived back when...it's conveniently bordering a great hiking area so you can fit it all in to your trip.
have fun (and i am not a dead head but suffer relatives who are)...