What Hunter S. Thompson Missed in My Hometown

Back in January I had a post about the connection between my hometown, Jersey Shore, PA, and the original Gonzo Journalist, Hunter S. Thompson. He spent three weeks there in 1957 as a sports editor- his first job out of the Navy. To say he hated it would be an understatement, referring to them as a "nightmare people." (I was nine years old when Thompson lived a couple blocks up the street from my grandfather and worked at the newspaper office across the street from my Dad's pharmacy.) In a letter to a friend he had commented on many differences between Fort Walton, FL, and Jersey Shore, PA. One of these was:

There were innumerable bars in Fort Walton: there are two in Jersey Shore.

I am sure there were far more than two bars in my hometown in the late 1950s, especially if you counted the “hotel”, The Legion, the VFW, and the Elks and Moose clubs. Alcohol was not forbidden in Jersey Shore. It played a part in the area history as much as the Susquehanna River or the logging of Pine Creek. A local hero from the Prohibition Era was one Prince Farrington, arguably the greatest of American bootleggers. (Info from Lock Haven Express, 5/3/08)

Farrington, who died a year before Hunter S. Thompson arrived in town, was, to many, the Robin Hood of Central Pennsylvania. He purchased shoes and food for poor children, a roof for a local church and helped with mortgages for local families in danger of losing their homes. He is said to have hired every farmer within 50 miles of Williamsport to provide his supplies. He bought grain above market price, and then paid them more to store and hide the barrels. It’s said milkmen delivered jugs of Farrington’s product on their standard milk routes; most of the area’s law enforcement, regulatory and judicial staff were on his payroll. (LHE)

Originally from North Carolina he heard about the wonders of Central Pennsylvania from a fellow inmate during one of his youthful incarcerations. He was told of the clear and wonderful water in that part of the country. A perfect place to brew whiskey. It didn’t take long for Farrington and his family to move to the area. Loganton, in Clinton County, became home. His whiskey was considered better than the “big names” of the business. The story went that film star Roy Rogers once had a trainload of Farrington whiskey sent to Los Angeles for a Hollywood party, the barrel taps dipped in root beer to disguise the odor. It was so good that he continued to brew his own well into the early 1950s, long after Prohibition ended. After all, moonshine whiskey had no taxes on it.

The “last raid” on his stills came in 1946, but after posting bail he fled the state. He was eventually caught in Florida, served two years and released due to failing health. His daughter brought him back to Central Pennsylvania where he died in 1956. The family, it is reported, continued to make bootleg whiskey into the 1960s. (LHE) I guess Hunter S. Thompson didn’t hang around long enough to find them.

A few years later I could have helped. One of my teachers in high school was a relative of the Prince- and no one hid the fact. The legends of Prince Farrington, which was his real name, were never lost. It may even be that they have grown with time. His homestead is now an Inn along Main Street. In the 2008 article in the Lock Haven Express the good and bad of the story was recalled.

While Tammy Farrington [Prince’s great-niece] is proud of her family history, and the rogues that populate it, she says some of her relatives are a bit embarrassed by their association with one of the world’s most famous bootleggers.

And, she admits readily, there is a dark side to the family legend: Many of the Farrington clan developed serious drinking problems. In fact, she had her own past battles with alcohol.

But if the Prince Farrington legend lives on in the local imagination, it’s largely because of the folk hero’s genuine altruism, which kept food in the mouths and roofs over the heads of so many families.

One story that bears repeating involves his donation of $400 to replace the roof of a church in Sugar Valley. When parishioners finished the project at a cost of only $200, they tried to return the balance to Prince. He refused to take it, advising them to give the money to the church reverend.

The good reverend mulled over the offer from the millionaire bootlegger and finally decided to accept his largesse, saying, “God needs it more than Prince Farrington does.”

The Susquehanna Valley may have been too narrow for gonzo journalism, but it was a perfect place for bootlegging to thrive.

This was rural Pennsylvania in my formative years.

Before He Was Famous

Hunter S. Thompson was one of the off-beat characters of the late-20th Century. He started- and personified "Gonzo Journalism."

Gonzo journalism is a style of journalism that is written without claims of objectivity, often including the reporter as part of the story via a first-person narrative. The word "gonzo" is believed to have been first used in 1970 to describe an article by Hunter S. Thompson, who later popularized the style. It is an energetic first-person participatory writing style in which the author is a protagonist, and it draws its power from a combination of social critique and self-satire.
--Wikipedia

Over the past few years I came across some information that linked Thompson to my small, north central Pennsylvania home town. Last year when doing some research on some memoirs I discovered even more about that. Here is what I wrote at the time.

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The world of the 1950s and early 1960s was, in small town America still the “old world”. The soldiers had come home, America was prosperous and lots of babies were being born. Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania, was as typical of that world as any other place. If you were looking for excitement and change, challenge and movement, this was not the place. The world of Central Pennsylvania was still as it had been for decades.

Perhaps no one expressed that better than future Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson. In 1957, fresh out of the Air Force and looking to become a professional, Thompson found a job working as sports editor for the Jersey Shore Herald, a daily newspaper whose office was across the street from Lehman Pharmacy. He was 20 years old with no college degree. His resume said he had worked for the Command Courier, the newspaper of Eglin Air Force Base at Fort Walton Beach, Florida. He moved into an apartment four blocks from my grandfather’s house.

Jersey Shore, he discovered was not the (New) Jersey shore, as he had originally thought. He wrote a letter to a friend that clearly explained his no fear but a lot of loathing of Jersey Shore.

So you think Iceland is bad: ha! Let me tell you about north-central Pennsylvania.

There were three red lights in metropolitan Fort Walton: there are two in Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania. There were four laundry and dry cleaning establishments in Fort Walton: there are NONE in Jersey Shore. There were innumerable bars in Fort Walton: there are two in Jersey Shore. There were at least four good eating establishments in Fort Walton: there are but three small grills in Jersey Shore. There were women (whores, lesbians, and divorcees, if you must) in Fort Walton: the only women under forty in Jersey Shore go to high school. There were beaches and water and sand dunes and sea gulls and boats and bays in Fort Walton: there are mountains of coal dust, dirty old people, ancient wrecks of houses, and "True Confessions" magazines in Jersey Shore.

And now you're going to ask just what in the hell I'm doing in Jersey Shore, Pa. I know... and I'm ready with a quick answer I'm having a nightmare.

To say he was unhappy would be an understatement. But it’s not that he was unwelcome. On the Internet I found a scan of his press pass signed by the Chief of Police who I knew. Thompson even explains in his letter about what the people of the town thought.

These nightmare people think I’m a “nice young man” who’s come to settle in their community and make it a home. They call me “Mr. Thompson” and “sir” and insist that I attend the Lions’ Club meetings, become an Elk, and join a bowling team. They invite me to their homes for dinner and tell me that the only thing wrong with America is the fact that we’ve given all our money to foreigners.

He went on to briefly describe his work as sports editor. “Half of one entire page has to be local bowling scores – a goddamn list of people’s names…If a man really wanted to bury himself, I can think of no better place to do it than in Jersey Shore.”

Obviously the rural, small town America was not for Thompson. Staying in Jersey Shore was not an option. But the Hunter S. Thompson that Johnny Depp would one day portray on screen was at work. He left Jersey Shore after a few weeks, but only in a Hunter S. Thompson way. Here is a description from an online blog.

He had taken out a colleague’s daughter; the father was kind enough to allow the young couple access to his '49 Chevy. Sure enough Hunter got the man's prized possession stuck in the riverbed. The next day, the angry co-worker drove the car into work and Thompson said, “I knew heavy trouble was coming …I just got up, took my coat off the rack and went out the front door. Didn’t even collect my pay. Went straight to the apartment, loaded the car and drove to New York.

These “nightmare people” were, of course my relatives, neighbors and friends. “They” included me. During the time Thompson was in town the only thing I worried about was the tonsillectomy I had that November just before Thanksgiving. I want to defend my “nightmare people” but I am at a disadvantage. I knew nothing else but Jersey Shore and its seemingly ideal life. It was probably as quiet and dull as Thompson reports. At least on the surface. Later, the joke would be that the bus drivers on the intercity bus called Jersey Shore, "Jersey Whore". That or "The Peyton Place of the Susquehanna." Of that I have no personal knowledge.

Source of italicized information:
Outta the Way Blog

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As always, I guess things depend on your own experiences and history.

It's Not Supposed to Change

I drove through my hometown today. It's been about six years since I last was there and this was just a passing through. We didn't have time this trip to stop and visit like we prefer doing. Over the past year or so I have been working on a memoir that, naturally, features my hometown. That means that I have spent a lot of time there - in my head and memory.

Imagine my shock today when the real town was there. The town that does not look like it did in 1965 (and earlier); the town that has been through changes and disasters as well as boom and bust. I drove down the street beside my childhood home. It's not the same. It was, as I remember it, a tree-lined street all the way down the next two blocks. Today there are none of those trees. All gone. "My" backyard is now not visible from the street as tall, narrow trees block the view and it looks like a fence was there. The building that was once a high school and then my junior high, looks a little worse for wear although it is now a shopping center.

The streets seemed smaller. The yards more compact. The neighborhoods closer together. There were newer homes next to older ones. There were falling down older homes and others that were well-kept. New businesses exist and some of the older ones are still there. What had been my Dad's store is gone, replaced in town by the big chain store.

No, it is not the place that was my hometown. That place was left behind a long, long time ago. At first I felt sad. But then I realized that even more recent places and memories exist only in the past. We can learn from them, build on them, but we cannot live there.

The town that was my hometown is now someone else's hometown. Over 45 years of high school students have gone through, including the children of family and friends. I am not part of that town and have not been for over 30 years.

That's okay! It was what it was, and for that I am grateful.

A 70-year Memory: On the Homefront and the Battlefront

From my grandmother's diary in 1945:

April 12: Ruth (her daughter) called at 6 o’clock and said that President Roosevelt had died at 4:30. It was an awful shock
April 14: Listened to train bringing FDR to Washington

Sunday, April 15: Roosevelt was buried in Hyde Park, NY.

Meanwhile in the war during those four days:

April 14: The Allies march through the center of encircled German troops in the Ruhr Pocket, taking prisoners and splitting the German ranks.

The Allies launch Operation Teardrop in an effort to locate German U-boats in the North Atlantic rumored to be carrying V-2 rockets to be used against New York City.

April 14-15: Japanese imperial loyalists crush an attempted coup by hard-line military officers who, convinced that Emperor Hirohito was on the brink of surrender, had decided to seize control.

April 15: The Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, with a survivor population of 40,000, is liberated by the British Army.

April 16: Adolf Hitler announces that he expects his officers to fight to the death. He orders summary execution for any officer who orders a retreat.

The Allied air force announces that future operations over Germany will focus on cleanup rather than strategic targets, effectively ending the air war.

A 70-Year Memory: Homefront at the End of the Year

While my dad was in Europe, his mother at home kept her own silent vigil. The pages of her diary said very little. She was clearly just trying to maintain whatever semblance of normal she could have. Once in a while a comment would be made about getting gas ration stamps, but overall she cooked, cleaned, visited friends, sat alone as her husband worked on the railroad, her daughter lived 140 miles away and her oldest son passed through weekly.

One amazing bit of information is how often she got letters from my dad, who she usually referred to as "Buddy." I wish I had all those letters. They would certainly add something to what I've been reading and writing about the 10th Armored 70 years ago. I am sure he didn't say anything that would give anything away. All letters were censored, of course. But they might give the same bits and pieces I get from grandma. Like this one note in her diary on December 29, 1944:

Had a letter from Buddy and he sent me a dime for good luck

Beyond Dad thinking of her like that, there's not much else until later at the end of the war when he sent postcards which I still have. But that's a few months off.

Dad, Grandma 6/1944

The last entry in the diary summed up her roller coaster of a year. It had been a year when her youngest and oldest children, the two boys, both got married and her younger son went to war at age 38. She said nothing about the Battle of the Bulge anywhere in these last days of the year. She simply put a few words down, saying volumes of fear and hope:

12/31 – This is the last day in 1944. Gee, I hope 1945 will be better