Before she was a 17 year old groundfloor member of the 1960's San Francisco counterculture, Rosie McGee was the child of French Holocaust survivors who, after WW2, flipped a coin on where to emigrate and as Rosie says, “I won” because San Francisco in the early 60’s was a city of beatniks melding into hippies – the perfect place for a teenage detective to become a psychedelic woman.  Before she wrote her memoir, Dancing with the Dead, Rosie McGee was Florence Nathan, a naïve, theater enthusiast who lived a double life, secret from her conservative French parents who had no idea their daughter’s job with Big Daddy Tom Donahue would lead her into the arms of comedian, Lenny Bruce, Grateful Dead bassist, Phil Lesh and to the Far East with the SF counterculture’s most infamous smuggler.  This episode unpacks true stories of the Muir Beach Acid Test, the Human Be In,  Janis Joplin, The Coffee Gallery, The Committee, the Warlocks and more.

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“You can smuggle anything except for drugs and guns…” These were the rules laid down by a Brazilian beauty queen to her Uraguyan Jewish husband, who smuggled everything from hi-fis to Hindus.  In this episode of Smuggler Family Album, host Rainbow Valentine chats with her Brazilian drummer friend, Pedro Strasser, whose father (also named Pedro) was a smuggler during the Brazilian dictatorship of the 1970s and 80s.  Everyone in the counterculture smuggler scene or those interested in the smugglers of yore, will relate to/be fascinated by Pedro Jr.’s memories of his scrappy smuggler dad’s innovative creativity and entrepreneurial spirit as he moved everything but drugs and guns, in his handmade yacht, in order to support his wife, kids and art.

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In this bonus episode host, Rainbow Valentine, continues to put the psychedelic puzzle pieces of her culture together as Dr. Maria Mangini, PHD, co-founder of the Women’s Visionary Congress, nurse practitioner and psychedelic historian, tells RV and listeners about her friendship with Nicky Scully, subject of Episode 10 and takes us down some serious counterculture rabbit holes.  Topics include insider Grateful Dead trivia, Timothy Leary, the Emerald Tablets movement, Goldfinger the smuggler, Esalen, Millbrook, Fred and Bill Wahpepah, the Sundance Ceremony, a gem called the Seva Diamond, a secret room stuffed with psychedelic goodies, women’s colleges and the Academy Award winner in Dr. Maria's theater program and much more…

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Cults! Kidnapping! Concubines!  This epic bonus episode of the Radiate story (Eps 1 - 6) with Rainbow Valentine and her Zelig artist mom, Kathy Mason Lerner aka the Astrologer’s Daughter, gets into RV’s mom’s life before she gave her signature fur hat to Janis Joplin.  True stories of RV’s mom’s godparents who were California Bohemians of the 1930s, 40’s and 50’s,

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How many counterculture brides can say that Janis Joplin sang at their wedding?   At least one and her name is Nicki Scully and host, Rainbow Valentine’s mom made her wedding rings.  Shamanic healer, Nicki Scully was an LSD-taking teenager who arrived in San Francisco during the 1967 Summer of Love, where she met and married Goldfinger, the infamous, one-handed smuggler who kept Nicki doped up and in a gilded cage before she left him for one of the managers of the Grateful Dead. In this gritty episode, Nicky Scully shares dark stories about surviving relationships with famous counterculture men, which gave her the tools to becoming a healer.  Along with Nicki's stories, Rainbow Valentine gets into the history of women’s shelters, abortion laws in America and Janis Joplin’s veterinarian… plus that time Nicki took LSD and delivered a baby without midwifery training, let alone the internet.  If you like counterculture history don’t miss the trippy true stories shared by Grateful Dead family member/shamanic healer, Nicki Scully.

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What do you call a deranged smuggler who asks you to stash a brick of gold

The second part of the saga of Goldfinger reveals brand new, never-before-heard information about the notorious, one-handed, counterculture

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When your parents tell you about a real one-handed smuggler

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A lo-fi, stripped-down convo with Rainbow Valentine and Dr. Maria Mangini, PHD, co-founder of the Women’s Visionary Congress, Hog Farm Member & psychedelic historian.  RV and Dr. M talk about the true stories in  Eps 5, 8, 9 and Bonus ep 2, including RV’s mom’s shocking revelation about Dizzy

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Don’t everyone’s parents small-talk about MDA chemists

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Can you imagine process-serving the Beatles? Raechel Donahue, SF's acid-rock radio pioneer, was a psychedelic second away from doing just that because she and her husband, Big Daddy Tom Donahue, produced the Beatles very last concert in North America and it didn’t go quite as planned.  And that’s just the first 5 minutes of this episode which includes Raechel’s life in swinging 60’s London where it was common to see Led Zepplin hitchhiking, the Rolling Stones buying baby clothes and smuggling pot in Pampers was routine.  And have you ever heard of the Medicine Ball Caravan aka Woodstock on Wheels? Produced by Tom and Raechel Donahue, who tells us about the epic roadtrip documentary (edited by a young Marty Scorsese) that took 150 hippies and rock stars across 1970’s America to play psychedelic music festivals in small red towns.  Plus, we learn he history of Frito chips and hear stories about the Record Plant, Sly Stone, Trident Studios, a psychedelic wedding at the Jefferson Airplane’s mansion and a psychedelic funeral...all told to us by Raechel Donahue, the Anne Frank of Rock'n'Roll, as Big Daddy Tom Donahue called her.

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