Further back in time (Update: Further to be restored - but is it the real deal?)

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You may know Ken Kesey because of his novel ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’ and the famous later film adaption. But by the time the movie aired Kesey had already caused quite a stir among conservative Americans. Kesey had volunteered as a guinea pig for psychoactive drugs in his student days and quite liked the stuff. He formed a group of followers – ‘the Merry Pranksters’ – and toured the US with them to promote his latest book in 1964. Their choice of transport was as unconventional as their ideas were, as they drove an old school bus with full psychedelic paint job. It was named ‘Further’ and certainly managed to draw attention.

Further became one of the symbols of the hippie movement and was there on this day 49 years ago when Kesey and The Merry Pranksters reached headlines. They’d teamed up with the Hell’s Angels for a party on August 7, 1965 ‘Introducing psychedelics to the gang world and forever linking the hippie movement to the Hell’s Angels.’ Eventually Kesey was arrested for drug abuse; fled to Mexico ending up in a cell for five months never the less. After that he retired on his parents’ farm in Oregon. He died in 2001 at the age of 66. His bus supposedly survives in the depths of rural Oregon. If cars could talk…

(Picture courtesy Bob Hieronymus)

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