OT; Jack Kerouac at the library.

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Posted By: Steve

As suggested in a post here long ago;

I took a walk through this massive exhibit of his works at the midtown New York Pub Library this past weekend. Didn't have much time, but snapped a pic of the cards that a young Jack created for his intense fantasy BB game. This guy had an amazing imagination and far too complex for me to analyze.

Kerouac, being from Lowell, I expected his Boston team to be named the Cadilacs or Chryslers... But Ford, c'mon?

The Library also has a card album with a T206 Wagner and many others that appears "Around the beginning of baseball season.", I was shown a digital image of it and I think the librarian was trying to whisper that at one time, a visitor had try to pull the glued card from the scrapbook.

Also, some valuable antique art pieces are on display. More like a museum than a library, I highly recommend a pop-in when in the city, it's just a short walk and culturally lightyears from Times Sq.

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Posted By: Dave Hornish

IS this the main library at 42nd and 5th? I'll have to check that out.

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Posted By: Jeff Shepherd

I've only been there to peruse their extensive microfilm/fiche collection. Mental note on checking out the other attractions. Perhaps the Boston Fords come from the blue collar factory lifestyle of Lowell, MA - here's a few shots from a trip I took there fall of 'o6...Kerouac Country.

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Posted By: davidcycleback

I remember Kerouac's autobiographical story about being a firetower watchman in the mountains near where I live. He said he became so insanely bored that he tore apart the tower's floor boards looking for something to read. Offers psychological insight into Ranger Gord, a psychotic Canadian firetower watchman television character. Rarely having visitors in his tower, Ranger Gord mistook a log for a naked woman, tried to tag flies using a stapler, married the woods (with wedding photos) and had various psychotic episodes ("The first time you see a snake and a birch fighting to the death in middle of the woods, you think you might be seeing things. But when you see it seven or eight times a day, you know it's real.").

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Posted By: Rob Ray

Funny...I was there Saturday and saw the same exhibit. Didn't realize he had these interests!
I would heartily recommend this exhibit for anyone near the NYPLibrary...besides this exhibit,the Library itself is a grand place to hang out and look through some great old books.
For anyone interested (like me) in old baseball books...fictional and historical...the library has some fantastic books you can look at while there (can't check them out,unfortunately)...such as "Pitching in a Pinch" by Christy Mathewson...
Rob Brooklyn, NY

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Posted By: Jodi Birkholm

Thank you, thank you, thank you! I am a Kerouac fanatic and have always wanted to see that baseball game he devised as a kid. He ended up modifying it throughout his life, playing it well into adulthood. I believe it also involved marbles, or that could have been yet another game (something to do with horse racing?).

I've read every JK bio at least twice, and still feel that Ann Charters' pioneering volume on Kerouac might be the best one. Perhaps not as detailed as some, but certainly less speculative. Nicosia's "Memory Babe", although certainly the most voluminous, is rife with errors. I used to know Kerouac's life story better than most, but it's been a few years, and my memory can't seem to remember those facts like it used to! I recall at least twelve factual errors of major importance in the Nicosia bio, though.

Incidentally, I was never much of a fan of JK's writing, but rather the life he lived. I really don't consider him to be a very good writer at all.

Thanks again! You've made my day!

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Posted By: Jodi Birkholm

Ranger Gord! David, are you a closet Red Green fan? Remember the time when Red went up the tower to visit Gord, and Gord got all excited showing Red all his "new" 8 tracks?! He was so isolated from the rest of the world that he never noticed that all his mail took over ten years to reach him! He received this "Teach Yourself Guitar" book featuring "current" pop tunes. In 1991 he was learning "Stayin' Alive"! That show was classic in its formative years, but should have been discontinued a long time ago.

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Posted By: davidcycleback

And after 18 years on the job without ever receiving a paycheck, he finally inquired and found out he was never hired.

My mother was born in a fishing town of 26 in the far north, and both she and my dad (who visited) say there are remarkable similarities between the show and where she grew up. Which may explain why she moved down south to Ann Arbor when she turned 18.

One of my favorites was when Red Green showed how to use a lawn mower as a coffee maker: "Put the beans on the ground. Then grind the beans into the bag..." He also made a computer disc drive out of an old toaster. It worked, except it shot the disc across the room when you were done. And the all time classic, where he made one big car out of two smaller cars (using saw and duct tape), and had enough left over to make an extra compact.



When stars of a tv show look like this, you know it's a Canadian production.