Former Manson Family Member Claims Her Mother Gave Leader Her Photo

Dianne Lake claims in the late 1960s her parents became societal dropouts who gave up everything they owned to live in a bread van and, eventually, move to a Southern California commune known as The Hog Farm.

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“We were embarking on this counterculture experience and it seemed perfectly normal. I was looking forward to trying it,” says the now 64-year-old.

While she was in San Francisco as an emancipated minor, and her parents were living at The Hog Farm, Dianne says it was her mother who first met a “charming” 35-year-old man who would later become known to the world as one of the most notorious figures of the era: Charles Manson.

Dianne claims her mother gave Manson her photograph and her name. Six weeks later, she says she was introduced to him at a party.

“I walked in and the girls – a couple of the girls ran up to me and, ‘Charlie, Charlie, Dianne’s here, Dianne’s here. And I was totally in shock. How did they, I didn’t even know they knew me.”

Dianne Lake is the author of the new book, Member of the Family: My Story of Charles Manson, Life Inside His Cult, and the Darkness That Ended the Sixties. She says she became involved with Charles Manson and “The Family” nearly 50 years ago and lived with them for two years before the infamous Tate/LaBianca murders of August 1969. The slayings brought worldwide attention to Manson and his followers.

Sixteen at the time of the murders, Dianne claims she did not take part in the killings, nor did she learn about them until later.

What does she say were her first impressions of Charles Manson, and what does she claim prompted her to publish her story now?

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Woman Who Joined California ‘Family’ As A Teen Says She Believed Charles Manson ‘Was A Magic-Maker’