This page should be finished by April 1, 1997
April 1965The Dead come to life in the embodiment of Garcia, Weir, Kreutzmann, PigPen, and Dana Morgan Jr. but they call themselves the Warlocks. First concert is at Menlo College, Menlo Park, Calif., followed by gigs at Magoo's Pizza Parlor weeks later.
Phil Lesh joins as bassist for a show at Frenchy's in Hayward, Calif.
First crisis another band called the Warlocks is discovered. Garcia chooses a new name of a folk tale from a dictionary: "Everything else on the page went blank...there was Grateful Dead blasting out at me."
Band attends first Acid Test, drug guru Ken Kesey's LSD party in San Jose, Calif. Strobe lights and frisbees enter zeitgeist.
Their first show as the Grateful Dead, a benefit at the Fillmore Auditorium for the San Francisco Mime Troupe. Fillmore promoter Bill Graham hates the band's new name and at first refuses to put it on concert bills.
Dead perform in San Francisco at the Trips Festival, organized by Bill Graham, Stewart Brand,
and the Pranksters. Psychedelic posters debut (right).
The Dead's first single is released on the Scorpio label:
"Don't Ease Me In / Stealin'".
Dead and extended families move into 710 Ashbury Street, in San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury.
Another Crisis California criminalizes LSD.
First of the Dead's annual New Year's Eve shows, at the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco, costars Jefferson Airplane.
The Human Be-In at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. Rock & Roll meets the anti-Vietnam War movement. The Dead join Allen Ginsberg, among others, before a crowed of 20,000.
Band's first album, Grateful Dead (right), released on 
Warner Bros. Fades immediately.
First East Coast gig is a free concert in Tompkins Square Park, New York City.
Monterey International Pop Festival. Performing between Hendrix and the Who, Dead band members are bummed by the event's commercial nature.
Mickey Hart joins band as second drummer at a gig at the Straight Theater in San Francisco.
Narcotics agents raid 710 Ashbury Street with a dozen reporters and television crews tagging along. Pigpen, Bob Weir and nine others are arrested for possession of marijuana. charges are later dropped, but the case gets national attention when it is covered in the first issue of Rolling Stones.
Mickey Hart's last performance with the band; takes a 3 1/2-year hiatus to come to terms with his father's embezzlement scheme.
Last Dead show at the Fillmore West, which closes two days later for financial reasons.
First use of phrase "Dead Head", in the mailing address of the Dead's fan club on back of their new Skull and Roses album.
With Pigpen's health deteriorationg, Keith Godchaux joins band on keyboards at the University of Minnesota show.
The Dead's 
"Truckin" enters the Billboard chart and peaks at No. 64. ( R. Crumb's infamous "Keep on Truckin", right.)
Godchaux's wife, Donna, joins band on vocals.
During Europe '72 tour, Dead cancel in Lille, France, because the equipment truck fails to show. The band is forced to flee the angry crowed by slipping out a back window.
At the Civic Hall in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, the Dead unleash their longest-ever version of "Dark Star", clocking in at over 40 minutes.
Pigpen's final show, at Hollywood Bowl.
Concert at old Renaissance Faire Grounds in Veneta, Ore., regarded by most tape connoisseurs as the Dead's finest hour.
Pigpen dies of liver failure at age 27. Hart: "He was just living the blues life, singin' the blues and drinkin' whiskey."
Over half a million attend a Watkins Glen, NY, concert with the Dead, the Allman Brothers, and The Band.
Weir and bassist pal rob Wasserman perform at Tennessee inaugural ball, to introduce Vice President and Mrs. Gore.
Sting opens for a Dead concert in Las Vegas in one of the oddest musical pairings of all time.
The Dead inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Garcia is a no-show; the rest of the Dead appear with a life-size cardboard cutout of their leader.
Three Deadheads are struck by lightning at an RFK show in Washingotn, D.C. All three survive.
Three thousand white hats start a riot at a Dead concert near Indianapolis.
Seventeen people are arrested, four policeman are injured. The band posts a letter to fans: "Want to end the touring life of the Grateful Dead? Allow bottle-throwing gatecrashers to keep on thinking they're cool anarchists instead of the creeps they are."( Hence the sticker to the right ).
Two fans die- apparently of drug overdoses- before a Dead gig in St. Louis. That same night, a lodge porch at the concert campground collapses, injuring more than 100 fans.
After more then 2,200 concerts ( at which they've played over 430 songs more than 30,000 times) the Dead jam a final time with Garcia, at Chicago's Soldier Field. The long strange trip comes to a sad end.