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During Willie Nelson’s 1975 Fourth of July Picnic a flood of 70,000 fans invaded the rural community of Liberty Hill, dragging ice chests and tents behind them. Extreme heat baked the audience in the treeless pasture, until a surprise evening thunderstorm transformed it into a mud pit. A weary deputy exclaimed,  “If we had arrested all the naked and drunk people I saw, we’d have filled our jail and yours, and all of the jails from here to Dallas.” Rain delays overwhelmed the schedule and Willie didn’t take the stage for the final set until after five in the morning. He was charged with violating the Texas Mass Gatherings Act. 

J Scott was a student at the University of Texas, and one of the attendees camped in the field. In this first person narrative he explores what it was like to be there for the memorable show. Follow along as he and his trusty sidekick Mike enjoy a night with Kris Kristofferson, Charlie Daniels, Doug Sahm, Willie Nelson, and friends.

Townsend Miller is a character who should not exist in the real world, but for over a decade he was one of the unique personalities comprising the outlaw country scene that permeated Austin in the seventies. He is a throwback to a time when America was great, and dinosaurs like Hunter S. Thompson roamed the country disguised as journalists.

Townsend’s life reads like a tall tale, with one outrageous event following another. He set a world record for catching the largest long-nosed garfish (and ignited a controversy that burns to this day), but he is best remembered for reporting on Austin’s country music for the Austin American Statesman from 1972 to 1983. It wasn’t just the reporting that made him memorable, but also the way he reported. He led a double life—spending his days in an office and his nights in honky-tonks.

He was one of a kind. Things just happened to him, even when he didn’t want them to—like the months-long battle he waged against a particularly stubborn case of the hiccups. Even his death was dramatic and mysterious; his body was found one morning next to a burning car on the shores of Town Lake.