stone age hippie

Cb CCrocerdOf A Stone Age Hippie.




Every thing was fairly normal for me until I reached puberty and read “on the Road” by Jack Kerouac. From then on it was a wild and crazy ride down many a dusty trail. I am going to skip the puberty part because it would make this tale too long.

Kerouac is widely believed to be the god father of the “beat generation” History of the beat generation

When “On the Road “ was published it was still an innocent George Rockwell sort of era. We had just won the big war, and the average citizen had begun an era in our history known as the American Dream. It was part of the evolution of “A chicken in every pot” in American political history.

American cars ruled. The 55 chewy was winning most of the races at the local drag strip and street races. Peeling out was common and a chirp in second gear was considered awesome. Sock hops, Little Richard, Fats Domino, Buddy Holly, Eddie Cochran, Jerry Lee Lewis, to just name a few of the new music called rock and roll which was emerge ing from the Patti Page and Perry Como era. The Catholic church was really afraid of it and started many campaigns to ban it while their priest were molesting children. And then of course there came elvis.







cigarettes and booze were cheap and plentiful and John Wayne would walk a mile for a Camel.
There were amusement parks with wooden roller coasters and cheap 3.2 % alcohol beer for those who were over 18 or had a fake draft card.

Kerouac appeared in my life at that time.

Skipping ahead in the story to 1964. I was a shrimp boat captain in the gulf of mexico with home ports of Aransas Pass , Texas in the summer months and Fort Myers , Beach Fl in the winter. I had just been promoted to captain after five years as a rig man. My first boat was the “Outlaw” It was the oldest boat in the Kiesel fleet at the time. Everything on it was jury rigged and it leaked like a scow. Other than that it was a fine trawler.

When I first got the boat I could do no wrong. It’s as if my guardian or saint peter were helping me. My first three month I wound up sacking up the rest of the blue nose fleet. I never tore up any nets or had any breakdowns and my luck was unrivaled. But, you know as I have found out in life that life is like a big roller coaster. You go up, up, up, and then you come down, down, down as I was soon to find out when I called my mother in Ohio.

“Hi mom, how ya doing? My mom answered, “Richard, the FBI was here looking for you.They want to know where you are, but I did not tell them.” “That’s okay mom, it’s probably about the draft”, I explained. “I had sort of been hiding from them. When I got a draft notice from Florida I would go to Texas and when I got a draft notice from Texas I would go to florida.

That day I went to the draft board in fort meyers fl. And told the recruiting sergeant about my problem and he said to me, “Your in a heap of trouble, young man..There is only one way out and that is to sign up for military service, immediately, which I did that day.

I was leaving it all. Just when it seemed I had reached my pinnacle of success and sexual gratification it was gone in a minute, poof. I had a 1948 Cadillac limousine that had been owned by a funeral home. It was in perfect shape and the electric windows even worked. Better yet I had a vintage 1948 Indian Motorcycle with three sapped shift with a suicide clutch. The women used to have to make an appointment to get a ride from either. I no longer had blue balls because I was getting plenty of booty. And it was free, or as free as it can be without going to a sweet cream lady for sex.

I went through basic training at Ft Jackson and then on to advanced individual taring at fort dix, nj among the cranberry fields.

After training I was sent to Germany on the troop ship, the “Rose”. It was a nine day trip across the atlantic until we reached the white cliffs of dover on our way to hamburg, germany.

I finally wound up as a battery clerk at battery b, 7th battalion, 16 artillery.

It was there when my first encounter with the hippy culture began.