You are holding one of the last great finds of 1960's photography, a treasure chest of long-hidden images from one of the decade's key events, the May 26 to June 2 1969 Bed-In for Peace, starring two of its central players, John Lennon and Yoko Ono.
The images were shot by Gerry Deiter, the only man to chronicle the entire Bed-in. They were locked away for 35 years because the Gerry who went into the bed-in was a different man from the Gerry who came out.
Until the Bed-in he had been a commercial photographer, focusing on high-end fashion work. He had moved from Manhattan to Montreal in 1968, and was available when Life Magazine called. It was supposed to be a quick in and out. But John and Yoko liked the way he worked and offered him complete access if he would stay to document the entire event.
By the end of that week, having listened to pretty much every word the couple uttered for the entire time it was not possible to return to a life of models and parties. Gerry Deiter fixed up an old bread van and headed for the west coast of Canada to become something bigger: a much-loved writer-editor-photographer-sailor-activist-raconteur.
