The Woman Who Saved the Grateful Dead's Legacy

Описание: A thousand master tapes. A storage auction. One woman's life work — hours away from disappearing forever. This is the story of the Betty Boards.

Betty Cantor-Jackson was the Grateful Dead's pioneering live sound engineer from 1968 to 1981. She recorded hundreds of shows on her own equipment — including the legendary Cornell 5/8/77 performance at Barton Hall, the Capitol Theatre run in February 1971, the Sunshine Daydream concert at Veneta in 1972, and the complete May 1977 tour that became the Get Shown the Light box set.

When financial hardship forced her tapes into a 1986 storage auction in Marin County, the Dead's organization didn't bid. Three separate buyers walked away with over a thousand reels of master recordings. What happened next — how a Deadhead named Ken Genetti opened a closet, recognized what he was looking at, and got the tapes into the trading network — changed how an entire generation heard the Grateful Dead.

This documentary covers Betty's full career: learning from Owsley Stanley, co-producing Workingman's Dead, engineering through the Wall of Sound era, her relationships with Rex Jackson and Brent Mydland, and how 350+ reels eventually returned to the Dead vault. Featuring the official releases sourced from Betty Boards including July 1978: The Complete Recordings and the Cornell '77 tape now preserved by the Library of Congress.


Chapters:
0:00 The Grateful Dead Tapes That Almost Vanished Forever
1:27 Who Was Betty Cantor-Jackson?
3:25 Recording Workingman's Dead, Capitol Theatre & Veneta '72
5:01 The Wall of Sound Era & Betty's Live Engineering
6:54 Cornell '77: The Show That Changed Everything
9:33 The 1986 Storage Auction — 1,000 Lost Reels
13:01 Ken Genetti & The Tape Trading Revolution
16:23 Betty Boards Return to the Dead Vault
19:03 Betty's Legacy & Why It Still Matters

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About The Shakedown Archives

Welcome to The Shakedown Archives — a home for Grateful Dead stories, sound, and history.

I’m a lifelong Deadhead using this channel to explore and preserve the music, the moments, and the culture that made the Dead legendary.

I create original documentaries, song histories, and storytelling pieces that keep the band’s legacy alive for future generations. Whether you’re rediscovering legendary nights or learning the stories behind the music, this channel is built for people who love the Dead as much as I do.

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