Ken Babbs (born January 14, 1936) is a famous
Merry Prankster who became one of the
psychedelic leaders of the 1960s. He along with best friend and Prankster leader,
Ken Kesey
Ken Elton Kesey (September 17, 1935 – November 10, 2001) was an American novelist, essayist and countercultural figure. He considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s.
Kesey was born in ...
wrote the book ''
Last Go Round''. Babbs is best known for his participation in the
Acid Tests
The Acid Tests were a series of parties held by author Ken Kesey primarily in the San Francisco Bay Area during the mid-1960s, centered on the use of and advocacy for the psychedelic drug LSD, commonly known as "acid". LSD was not made illega ...
and on the bus ''
Furthur''.
Early life
Ken Babbs was born January 14, 1936 and raised in
Mentor, Ohio
Mentor ( ) is the largest city in Lake County, Ohio, Lake County, Ohio, United States. The population was 47,450 at the United States Census 2020, 2020 census. It is part of the Cleveland metropolitan area.
Mentor was first settled in 1797. In 187 ...
. He attended the
Case Institute of Technology
Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) is a Private university, private research university in Cleveland, Cleveland, Ohio. Case Western Reserve was established in 1967, when Western Reserve University, founded in 1826 and named for its location i ...
where he briefly studied
engineering
Engineering is the use of scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad range of more speciali ...
for two years on a basketball scholarship, before transferring to
Miami University
Miami University (informally Miami of Ohio or simply Miami) is a public research university in Oxford, Ohio. The university was founded in 1809, making it the second-oldest university in Ohio (behind Ohio University, founded in 1804) and the ...
, from which he graduated ''
magna cum laude'' with a degree in
English literature in 1958. He then attended the
Stanford University graduate
creative writing
Creative writing is any writing that goes outside the bounds of normal professional, journalistic, academic, or technical forms of literature, typically identified by an emphasis on narrative craft, character development, and the use of literary ...
program on a
Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship from 1958–59; having entered the
NROTC program to fund his undergraduate studies, Babbs was commissioned as a
second lieutenant in the
United States Marine Corps
The United States Marine Corps (USMC), also referred to as the United States Marines, is the maritime land force service branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for conducting expeditionary and amphibious operations through combi ...
following the end of his fellowship.
He trained as a helicopter pilot and served in one of the first American advisory units in
Vietnam
Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...
from 1962-1963 prior to his discharge. Babbs had no understanding of the impact the war had on him until he received his orders to go to Vietnam. Babbs later stated that he "had no perceptions of the right or wrong of
the situation before I went to Vietnam, but it took about six weeks to realize we were wasting our time there... being humble, respect
nglocal customs, learn
ngthe language and helping does more good than hurting."
[Olson, Andrew.]
Ken Babbs
. '' The Fountain Heads''. Retrieved on June 2, 2008. While serving in Vietnam he began writing about his experience.
In the fall of 1958, Babbs took a writing class at Stanford University with another Wilson Fellow, Ken Kesey. Babbs later described meeting Kesey as "a moment of mirth and sadness, highness and lowliness, interchanging of ideas and musical moments." They became friends, maintained a correspondence while Babbs was stationed in the
Far East
The ''Far East'' was a European term to refer to the geographical regions that includes East and Southeast Asia as well as the Russian Far East to a lesser extent. South Asia is sometimes also included for economic and cultural reasons.
The ter ...
with the Marines, and eventually formed the Merry Pranksters.
Merry Pranksters
What started as a
Happening or series of theatrical performances eventually emerged into a movement. According to Babbs, a Happening is something that "can’t be planned ..It just happens! It takes place in public or private and involves everyone present. In Phoenix in 1964, we painted "A Vote for Barry is a Vote for Fun" on the side of the bus and waved flags and played stars and stripes forever..this qualified as both a prank and a Happening."
Furthur
The most famous happening of the Pranksters was the nationwide trip on the 1939
International Harvester
The International Harvester Company (often abbreviated by IHC, IH, or simply International ( colloq.)) was an American manufacturer of agricultural and construction equipment, automobiles, commercial trucks, lawn and garden products, household e ...
school bus named ''Furthur''.
While on a trip to
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
, the Pranksters needed an automobile that could hold fourteen people and all of their filming and taping equipment. One of the members saw a "revamped school bus" in
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...
that was for sale, the Pranksters bought the bus and named it ''Furthur''. Babbs was the engineer for the bus.
Ken Babbs is mostly credited for the sound systems he created for the Trips Festival, a 1966 three day music festival held in San Francisco. Prior to Babbs’ creation, it was discovered that particular music usually sounded distorted when cranked to high levels because of the concrete floor in the San Francisco Longshoreman’s Union Hall (where the Trips Festival was taking place). Babbs being a sound engineer resolved the problem. He made sound amplifiers that would not create distorted sounds when turned up to high sound levels.
The purpose for this Happening was to link the psychedelic tribes from the west and the east. Many people tend to remember the east tribe because of Timothy Leary and LSD. Many misjudgments have been made on the Pranksters and their promotion of LSD. However, Babbs makes it clear that "just because we used LSD does not mean we were promoting its use. (LSD) is a dangerous drug...
t’sa way, I guess, of breaking down the conformist ideology."
Acid Tests
During the legendary Prankster cross-country bus trip to the New York World's fair in 1964, a movie was filmed during the process.
The film shot on a camera and 16 mm color film was intended to be called ''The Merry Pranksters Search for a Kool Place''.
However in 1999, a 50-minute edit of the movie was released, and in 2002 another excerpt was distributed but not completed. The 2011 documentary film,
Magic Trip
''Magic Trip'' is a 2011 documentary film directed by Alison Ellwood and Alex Gibney, about Ken Kesey, Neal Cassady, and the Merry Pranksters.
The documentary uses the 16 mm color footage shot by Kesey and the Merry Pranksters during their 1964 ...
featured much of the footage.
The Acid Tests were inspired from when the Pranksters met the
Grateful Dead.
The Hog Farm collective was established through a chain of events beginning with Ken Babbs hijacking the Merry Pranksters' bus, ''Furthur'', to Mexico, which stranded the Merry Pranksters in Los Angeles.
Later years
Babbs currently lives on his farm in
Dexter, Oregon (near Kesey’s house) with his wife Eileen, a high school English teacher.
In 1994, he helped Kesey co-write ''The Last Go Round'', about the oldest and largest rodeos in America.
In 2011, Babbs published ''Who Shot the Water Buffalo?'', a
coming of age novel about the Vietnam war. Based on his early writing and his life in the armed forces during the first years of the Vietnam War, it took him 45 years to finish writing the book.
In January 2022 Tsunami Books of Eugene, Oregon published Babbs' recently completed memoir "Cronies."
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Babbs, Ken
1939 births
Living people
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American male writers
American male novelists
Case Western Reserve University alumni
Stanford University School of Humanities and Sciences alumni