RoadDreams

The Barber Institute at Birmingham University in England has come up with some big Kerouac events this fall.

There’s “Road Dreams: A Super-8 American Film Diary 1968-82” by Elliott Bristow. There’s “Exhibition in Focus” from Richard Ellis. And there is Jim Sampas’ “One Fast Move and I'm Gone: Kerouac's ‘Big Sur."

The scroll itself arrives in Birmingham in December.

Kerouac never made it to B’rum, but he did encounter one of the city's top 1950s gangsters, Paul Lund, on his trip to Tangier. Kerouac called Lund "John Banks" in “Desolation Angels,” in Part Three of Book Two, "Passing Through Tangiers, France and London."

A good friend of ours who lives in Birmingham, England, once had reason to know Paul Lund and has told us here at abouthedbeats that the fellow was "the black sheep of a wealthy Birmingham family who became a bank robber and escaped to Tangier to avoid a long stretch [no extradition from Morocco]. He married a black sheep of the Kellogg family. A great tale with an intriguing ending but I don't think Jack was very impressed with him.”

So.
Keep reading ...

... A Book of Names for Kerouac fans by Britain's Dave Moore coming soon
... we hope ...
... And Bill Burroughs' autobio, "River of Evil"
... We pray ...

- more later -