Hunter S. Thompson

I’m going to take a moment to talk about a badass.

I had to get this out at some point- I talk about him a lot. But only because he's so awesome. I mean just listen to what I have to say....hear me out here!

But I’m going to go with it anyways.

The first time I ever encountered the name was when I watched the Movie “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” with Johnny Depp. After love the movie for what it was, I read the book, which was even better than the movie and gave a special insight into who Hunter S. Thompson was.

He started in journalism when he was in the army at Eglin Air Force Base. He took some classes at the local college (in Florida) and became a part of the base’s newspaper.

He was honorable discharged from the military (I don’t think he followed rules up to standard) and worked a number of jobs in the industry.

He really wanted to write the next great America novel- he was obsessed with “The Great Gatsby” and he would type it over and over on his typewriter just to hear the music the keys made.

Later, he worked in Puerto Rico, which can be seen in his book “The Rum Diary” which recently became a movie, again with Johnny Depp (they were good friends).

Trailer for the Rum Diary

His first famous novel was “Hells Angels” which is sitting on my bookshelf right now waiting to be read. He wrote the book by infiltrating the motorcycle group in the 60s, but since it didn’t turn out the way the gang wanted it, he got beat up by some of the members.

At the time, that group was infamous for petting kitties and paining rainbows everywhere.

I think what one of the really cool things about Hunter was that he lived the life of a rock star, with the job of a journalist. He was a wild one, he was.

He loved guns, drugs, and he hated Nixon. His writing style revolutionized journalism. He made his own style called “Gonzo” which was basically what is sounds like. I think the whole thing really is that he’s totally gone when he’s writing stories. “Buy the ticket, take the ride,” he said.

I think this video exemplifies him. It’s hard for me to really explain who he is. He was a pretty awesome guy.

In 2005, Hunter killed himself with a handgun. He son, daughter-in-law, and his grandson were in the adjacent room, but his son thought the noise was simply a book falling.

He asked for his ashes to be shot into space – and they were. A large statue was built with the image of a double thumbed-fist with a peyote button in the middle. That was his symbol when he ran for sheriff in Aspen Colorado.

If you watched the whole of that last video (I know, it was long) you’ll see he explains his plans for a funeral.

And Depp made sure it happened that way—to the tune of :

Basically there is a lot of interesting things about him, I could never really explain all of it…But if you wanted to check him out- you could read any of him books, or watch a movie that was based of a his books. I know there are also a few good documentaries about him on Netflix if you wanted to go that route.

Well I'm glad I did this.