Animal House on Acid: The Barrington Hall Saga

Animal House on Acid is a memoir by Beverly A. Potter, a neighbor of the most notorious housing unit on the face of the Earth. Barrington Hall, a large student-run co-op on the south side of the University was Berkeley’s last outpost of the ‘60s. Barringtonians, as they called themselves, held fast to the culture of sex, drugs, and rock 'n’ roll long after it had ceased to be fashionable. Inside Barrington Hall, youth rebellion never grew old, because each year it was replenished with a new crop of 18-year-olds sorry to have missed the ‘60s. But Barrington became a victim of its own mythology: with a house culture dedicated to outrage, it eventually outraged all, even its natural allies. Animal House on Acid is packed with stories: it’s Potter’s memoir of a truly long, strange trip, which she tells in a scrapbook-like format, composed of local newspaper stories, city reports, incident notes, posters, and photographs, all of it stitched together with Potter’s retelling of wild tales - wild even by Berkeley standards.