Cary Socci, owner of Future Fence Co. in Mamaroneck.
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Cary Socci began his career in the fence installation industry at the most legendary concert in the country”™s history.
It was 1969, and the then 20-year-old and a friend were commissioned by Bronx-based Gun Hill Fence Co. to fashion three miles of chain-link fence around the perimeter of Woodstock.
“It was wild,” said Socci, owner of Future Fence Co. in Mamaroneck. “We didn”™t cement anything; we just drove poles in the ground, and we were there for three weeks. We watched the whole concert come together.”
As Socci installed the 6-foot fence, he looked up to see concert-goers hanging from the treetops.
“People were doing a lot of acid back then,” Socci said. “Everyone went down to the lake and started taking their clothes off. That lake had thousands of naked people in it. It just got a little bit crazier day after day. I was in shock.”
Socci and his friend were given free passes to the concert, which they promptly sold and “made a lot of money.” Then an even better deal came along; all-access passes to not only the concert, but to the stage and the tents where the stars drank, drugged and slept.
“It was an amazing experience,” Socci said. “It was like taking someone from the country and throwing them in a nightclub in the middle of Manhattan.”
But what became of the fence after the concert?
“They destroyed it,” Socci said. “It was a garbage fence, so as people stepped on it in certain places, there was almost nothing there. I went back weeks later to get the fence, and there were big, fat farmer women with rolls of it on their tractors. Whatever was salvageable, they took. They used it for their farms; I wasn”™t going to argue with them.”
Since then, Socci has been busy as the owner of Future Fence Co. in Mamaroneck. Other than Woodstock, he has installed fences all over the state; in country clubs, private residences and even prisons.
White PVC fences were popular in years past; that”™s dying down, Socci said.
“People are going back to wood,” Socci said. “Everything is Cedar and it”™s all stained.”
The recession impacted the business “a lot,” but Socci isn”™t worried.
“I know it will come back,” he said. “Fall is usually a busy season for us.”
