At a magistrate's court in 1971 London, three men dressed as schoolgirls heard that the magazine they published would be put on trial for obscenity. The trial of Oz magazine would, at its end, epitomise the era of hippies, political turmoil, youth culture and 'failed seekers'.

The sixties were an era of huge social change; the governments in the UK and the US were faced with armies of protesters over the Vietnam War and civil liberties; psychedelic music, drug taking and free love were on the minds of its disenfranchised youth.

With that, Richard Neville, Felix Dennis and Jim Anderson invited secondary school children to produce content for what became the 'Schoolkids Oz' issue. When the magazine hit the streets, its purpose became widely misunderstood, leading to the Oz offices being raided by the Obscene Publications Squad as issue 28 was interpreted to be targeted towards school children rather than having been created by them.

The magazine included a sexualised cartoon of Rupert the Bear, created by 15 year-old school boy Vivian Berger using an explicit cartoon by US cartoonist Robert Crumb and the editors were tried at the Old Bailey in June 1971, under the 1959 Obscene Publications Act for conspiracy to corrupt public morals which carried a more serious penalty than corrupting public morals because of the charge of conspiracy.

The issue was identified as dealing with 'homosexuality, lesbianism, sadism, perverted sexual practices and drug taking' by Mr Brian Leary prosecuting, but Rumpole of the Bailey creator John Mortimer's defence stipulated that the 'case stands at the crossroads of our liberty, at the boundaries of our freedom to think and draw and write what we please'.

From 'evidence and judicial instruction clearly aimed at securing a conviction' the three editors were found guilty and sentenced to 15 months hard labour, causing public riots, before being acquitted following an appeal that found that Justice Michael Argyle had grossly misguided the jury.

The hippies had pushed the boundaries of civil liberty and incurred the wrath of the established order while aiming to create a utopia of like minded individuals through being anti establishment. But ultimately, Oz failed and the magazine ceased its publication in 1973.

Feminist and Journalist Germaine Greer has said of Oz magazine and the trial: 'Oz could fool itself and its readers, the alternative society already existed. Instead of developing a political analysis of the state we live in, Oz behaved as though the revolution had already happened.'