I was born on the side of the road just outside Salt Lake City, Utah while my parents were passing through en route from Los Angeles. Needless to say, there's been much to say about my life "on the road" ever since that February day in 1926. While still a young child, I was sent to live w/my father in Denver, where I spent much of my time rebel rousing on the streets & in the poolhalls where I became quite the juvenile delinquent. By the time I had turned sixteen, I managed to steal well over one hundred cars and spent over half my life in juvenile hall. It was while in reform school that I began corespondance w/Allen Ginsberg, whom I later met firsthand while on a roadtrip to New York City w/my then wife, LuAnn, who was very young & capable of doing horrible things. Ginsberg brought over his friend Jack Kerouac & I immediately dipatched the occupant (LuAnn) to the kitchen to make coffee , resulting in an improbably long conversation in which the three of us hit it off quite well. Some time after this initial meeting, I headed back to Denver & Jack Kerouac soon followed suit by taking in his own roadtrip, during which we met up along the road. It was during this period that we became quick friends--best friends, in fact--the sight of me, he would later write, "was like some long lost brother." He chronicled our travels in the 1957 American classic, "On The Road." It became an overnight success, but life was anything but chipper after that, as I percieved the book as exploitation; I couldn't go anywhere afterward in public w/o getting hounded. After removing myself from Kerouac, I embarked on travels w/Ken Kessey & his free spirited conglomeration of friends, The Merry Pranksters. It was w/these people that the "acid tests" of sixties notoriety were first held, introducing the American counter-culture to a new realm of self-discovery. Oh, yeah...during all this youthful revelry & heartache, I also had time to author a book: "The First Third." Read it!
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