How Do You Remember The Beat Generation?
Jack Kerouac died forty years ago in October, 1969 at only 47 years old. You can do your own pilgrimage to landmarks of the Beat generation in San Francisco. The term Beatnik was used to describe those who chose not to work, share poetry and play music and followed ‘beat writers’ such as Kerouac. San Francisco Chronicle columnist Herb Cain who wrote about this generation made eulogized the writers including Kerouac, William S. Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and Gregory Corso. The journey should begin where the state of mind evolved; you can still immerse yourself in much of what the generation in the 50’s did. Kerouac coined the phrase ‘the Beat generation’ in 1948 when he lived in Russell Street near Lombard Street in San Francisco. This is where your pilgrimage is slated to start. Head to San Francisco and first stop is 29 Russell Street where Jack Kerouac lived in 1948. Nothing spectacular, a little brick house in the Russian Hill house but the appropriate starting point for our journey.
