THE FREE REPUBLIC WELCOMES THE MERRY PRANKSTERS!!! (9-09 Book Discussion Thread)

Self | September 2, 2002 | PJ-Comix

[PJ-Comix]

Okay, I tried to track down some of the Merry Pranksters mentioned in “The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test” so that they might participate in our discussion on this book on September 9. However, I have been unable to contact any of them so in the spirit of the Merry Pranksters, who in 1965 hung a banner in front of Ken Kesey’s La Honda home that said “THE MERRY PRANKSTERS WELCOME THE BEATLES,” I am now hanging this virtual banner in Cyberspace---“THE FREE REPUBLIC WELCOMES THE MERRY PRANKSTERS.”

Hopefully this message will carry across the Cyberspace ether and reach Mountain Girl, Ken Babbs, Gretchen Fetchen, Owsley, The Hermit, George Walker, Hugh Romney, Norman Hartweg, Hagen, Doris Delay, Zonker, Black Maria, etc..

I will also be sending this thread to Tom Wolfe’s publishers. They told me that he usually doesn’t do such events but, hey, there’s an EXCEPTION to every rule.

If any of you happen to know the Merry Pranksters or know someone who knows the Merry Pranksters, please pass this thread along to them. Hopefully on September 9 (or soon afterwards) we can WELCOME THE MERRY PRANKSTERS!!!

Oh, and on October 14 our next book assignment is due. It will be a big change of pace---“Homage To Catalonia” by George Orwell.

[Cultural Jihad]

* If any of you happen to know the Merry Pranksters or know someone who knows the Merry Pranksters, please pass this thread along to them. Hopefully on September 9 (or soon afterwards) we can WELCOME THE MERRY PRANKSTERS!!!

* I smoked a dube with Jerry Garcia once.

I saw God.

[sushiman]

I double checked exhaustively researched bio of Jack by Gerald Nicosia called " Memory Babe " and it says he dropped acid once with Leary in 1961 ...Met up with the Pranksters in '64 when Neal Cassidy was running with them . I'll have to re-check Ann Charters' bio of him , and some other books on Jack that I have . What have you read ?

[tpaine]

tallhappy:
"What do you think about the whole thing now? I think it caused most of the problems we have now."
_________________________________
I really should write a book. It was all great fun for me, a convent educated white-glove-wearing young woman. I was in the thick of it, but not part of of it...it was like living on a movie set 24/7, and I did appreciate the freedom after a lifetime of repressioon. But yes, I agree that unreconstructed hippies continue to louse up this country. - Poised Woman -
_________________________________

I was there, up on Kings mountain in '65, as an already free, unrepressed 29 year old white male, with friends in both cultures. -- Still have most of them, and the 'problems' most of you claim to see are vastly overhyped.
-- The 'hippies' are all around you, - many, imo, right here on FR, pretending to now be conservatives.

They aren't. They are Rinos.

[sushiman]

ON THE ROAD - one of the great American novels - should not be compared to Electric Cool Aid and fear and Loathing !

[tpaine]

I saw God. -CJ-

Get over it.

[sushiman]

From a Kesey website :

By the time FURTHUR ( name of Prankster's bus ) had made it to New York, however, it had become sufficiently clear that, driven by Cassady, Kesey and his Merry Pranksters had left the Beats far behind. Significantly, in New York they encountered, among others, Jack Kerouac, who was completely put off by the Pranksters' appearance and habitus; in particular, the ardent patriot (Kerouac in his youth in Lowell, Massachusetts, had spoken the French Canadian dialect his parents had used at home) resented the Pranksters' abuse of the flag; and Kesey, the "Chief," liked to pose as Captain Flag.

[Syncro]

Good accurate comments by Thompson...did he have anything to say about Baba Ramm Dass (Richard Alpert)?

I am going to have to see that movie.

[Dr. Zoo]

Esalen and...

Aren't those hot mineral baths on the cliff above the ocean awesome?

Were you there when Fritz Pearls was there doing his "Gestalt" thing?

[Dr. Zoo]

The tranistion from the Beat generation to the Hippies...there was kind of a "limbo" for a short time.

[maxwell]

Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro as the Duke and Dr. Gonzo... Very well composed-- as good of an adaptation of the book as you could hope for. The right combo of desperate zaniness. You either love it or hate it... Most of my buds despise it but I cottoned to it from the start. Best viewed with booze and weed... ;)

[Spiff]

ON THE ROAD - one of the great American novels - should not be compared to Electric Cool Aid and fear and Loathing !

Oh Puh-lease! Is this Free Republic or the New York Times book review pages?

[maxwell]

[snortle]

[Dr. Zoo]

There are also some interesting recordings of Neal Cassidy...talking non-stop.

I remember when Cassidy worked in the Hip Pocket Book Store in Santa Cruz. With no one in the store but him, I would look in and see him in an animated conversation...with no one.

When I walked in he would change to talking to me, and then when I continued into the store, he would go back to his conversation.

A self contained self-entertaining unit he was.

[Syncro]

My drug years are far behind me, I prefer to remember the movie after I watch it...lol

Maybe a glass of wine.

[BansheeBill]

I will add more later, but I belives (I like typols)Owsley's first name was Stanley, we all know what his job was rite?

Born Augustus Owsley Stanley III on January 19, 1935, Owsley was named for his Grandfather, a U.S. Senator (1919-1925) from and Governor of Kentucky (1915-1919) and the father of the St. Lawrence Seaway.

(How's that for obscure trivia?)

[Joe Hadenuf]

And tied telephone poles in knots......

[Syncro]

Very good, I knew there was a Stanley in there someplace

Now what was he known for?

[sushiman]

Spiff ,

Why don't you have a spliff and lighten up ?

[BansheeBill]

Now what was he known for?

His self taught pharmacology and being the Grateful Dead's alchemist and soundman. He dropped out of college (U of Virginia Engineering School) after a few courses. He then was in the Air Force and after getting out in the early 60's took a few courses at UC Berkeley, where he used their Chemistry Library to teach himself how to make his famous specialty.

[Cultural Jihad]