1954. General Dwight David Elsenhower was president.
Ten years earlier his GIs and British forces had made
history on the beaches of Normandy and across Europe.
Ever since, the United States had been the international
symbol of rediscovered liberty and happiness.
Yet the Cold War was in full swing, stirred up by the
seemingly permanent threat of nuclear
conflict with the USSR. The fear of
Communism incited a witch-hunt led by Senator Joseph McCarthy, and intellectuals
were his first victims.
But this repressive atmosphere did not impede the strong
artistic current flowing between New
York and San Francisco. It was the time
of beatniks, of (to use the Beat terms)
desolation angels and celestial bums, rebels,
and lovers of jazz, poetry and the road. They
even looked alike: writers Jack Kerouac and
his friend Neal Cassady, actors James Dean
and Marion Brando, and artists Jackson Pollock
and Robert Frank. They wore T-shirts, blue
jeans and leather jackets, and had cool looks, guarded
gazes and provocative smiles — all fragile, crazy and free. Next
