Hunter S. Thompson Sets His Christmas Tree on Fire, Nearly Burning His House Down (1990)

in Literature, Random | December 15th, 2023

It was some­thing of a Christ­mas rit­u­al at Hunter S. Thomp­son’s Col­orado cab­in, Owl Farm. Every year, his sec­re­tary Deb­o­rah Fuller would take down the Christ­mas tree and leave it on the front porch rather than dis­pose of it entire­ly. That’s because Hunter, more often than not, want­ed to set it on fire. In 1990, Sam Allis, a writer for then for­mi­da­ble TIME mag­a­zine, vis­it­ed Thomp­son’s home and watched the fiery tra­di­tion unfold. He wrote:

I gave up on the inter­view and start­ed wor­ry­ing about my life when Hunter Thomp­son squirt­ed two cans of fire starter on the Christ­mas tree he was going to burn in his liv­ing-room fire­place, a few feet away from an unopened wood­en crate of 9‑mm bul­lets. That the tree was far too large to fit into the fire­place mat­tered not a whit to Hunter, who was sport­ing a dime-store wig at the time and resem­bled Tony Perkins in Psy­cho. Min­utes ear­li­er, he had smashed a Polaroid cam­era on the floor.

Hunter had decid­ed to video­tape the Christ­mas tree burn­ing, and we lat­er heard on the replay the ter­ri­fied voic­es of Deb­o­rah Fuller, his long­time sec­re­tary-baby sit­ter, and me off-cam­era plead­ing with him, “NO, HUNTER, NO! PLEASE, HUNTER, DON’T DO IT!” The orig­i­nal man­u­script of Hell’s Angels was on the table, and there were the bul­lets. Noth­ing doing. Thomp­son was a man pos­sessed by now, full of the Chivas Regal he had been slurp­ing straight from the bot­tle and the gin he had been mix­ing with pink lemon­ade for hours.

The wood­en man­tle above the fire­place appar­ent­ly still has burn marks on it today.

Note: An ear­li­er ver­sion of this post appeared on our site in 2015.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Hunter S. Thompson’s Har­row­ing, Chem­i­cal-Filled Dai­ly Rou­tine

Hunter S. Thomp­son Chill­ing­ly Pre­dicts the Future, Telling Studs Terkel About the Com­ing Revenge of the Eco­nom­i­cal­ly & Tech­no­log­i­cal­ly “Obso­lete” (1967)

Hear the 10 Best Albums of the 1960s as Select­ed by Hunter S. Thomp­son

Hunter S. Thomp­son, Exis­ten­tial­ist Life Coach, Gives Tips for Find­ing Mean­ing in Life

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You Can Get Open Culture Posts on Threads, Bluesky & Other Social Media Platforms

in Random | July 16th, 2023

As Twit­ter decays, we want to remind you that you can find posts from Open Cul­ture on oth­er social media plat­forms. Find us now on Threads, where have 900+ fol­low­ers in the first 24 hours. We’re also on Blue Sky and Face­book. Or get our dai­ly email newslet­ter. Pick your favorite and keep tabs on our dai­ly posts.…

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Kraftwerk’s “The Robots” Performed by German 1st Graders in Cute Cardboard Robot Costumes

in Music, Random | May 31st, 2023

“Teach your chil­dren well” sang Cros­by, Stills and Nash once upon a long ago, and that adage could be para­phrased as “make sure your stu­dents don’t grow up learn­ing sub­stan­dard pop songs. Give them a real edu­ca­tion.” An enter­pris­ing ele­men­tary school teacher in Mom­bach, a dis­trict of the Rhineland city of Mainz, did so in 2015, dress­ing up his stu­dents from Lemm­chen Ele­men­tary in their own hand­made robot out­fits and teach­ing them to sing the clas­sic 1978 Kraftwerk hit “The Robots” (or “Robot­er” if you own the Ger­man ver­sion, which you can hear below).

While the orig­i­nal prog-rock­ers turned elec­tron­ic demigods tried to strip away as much of their human­i­ty when play­ing live, you just can’t do it with kids. They’re just too cute, and their wob­bly, shuf­fling attempts to be machines only warms the heart more. (Could their par­ents tell who was who, I won­der?) Their ver­sion of the music is sim­i­lar­ly charm­ing and pret­ty faith­ful, though it’s pos­si­bly played by instruc­tor Lars Reimer. (An old­er class shows their faces and plays instru­ments in a more recent video, a cov­er of “Tanz” by Stop­pok.) So yes, Mr. Reimer, you’re pass­ing on some good musi­cal taste.

Though Kraftwerk was often thought of as cold and arti­fi­cial when they first arrived on the inter­na­tion­al music scene, the inter­ven­ing years have only empha­sized the roman­tic beau­ty of their (most­ly major key) melodies. (See for exam­ple the Bal­anes­cu Quartet’s ren­di­tion of the same song below.)

Note: An ear­li­er ver­sion of this post appeared on our site in 2016.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Ele­men­tary School Kids Sing David Bowie’s “Space Odd­i­ty” & Oth­er Rock Hits: A Cult Clas­sic Record­ed in 1976

Kraftwerk’s First Con­cert: The Begin­ning of the End­less­ly Influ­en­tial Band (1970)

One Man Shows You How to Play Kraftwerk’s “The Robots” with Just One Syn­the­siz­er

Ted Mills is a free­lance writer on the arts who cur­rent­ly hosts the FunkZone Pod­cast. You can also fol­low him on Twit­ter at @tedmills, read his oth­er arts writ­ing at tedmills.com and/or watch his films here.

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A Star Wars Film Made in a Wes Anderson Aesthetic

in Film, Random | May 4th, 2023

Above, you can watch the Galac­tic Menagerie, “a whim­si­cal and visu­al­ly stun­ning fan-made fake trail­er that reimag­ines the clas­sic Star Wars uni­verse through the eccen­tric lens of Wes Ander­son. This enchant­i­ng mashup brings togeth­er icon­ic Star Wars char­ac­ters with Ander­son­’s trade­mark sym­met­ri­cal com­po­si­tions, pas­tel col­or palettes, and quirky humor.” There are also, of course, “pecu­liar loca­tions rem­i­nis­cent of Ander­son­’s beloved films such as Moon­rise King­dom and The Grand Budapest Hotel.” Enjoy!

Relat­ed Con­tent 

Wes Ander­son Goes Sci-Fi in 1950s Amer­i­ca: Watch the Trail­er for His New Film Aster­oid City

Wes Ander­son Explains How He Writes and Directs Movies, and What Goes Into His Dis­tinc­tive Film­mak­ing Style

How the Aston­ish­ing Sushi Scene in Wes Anderson’s Isle of Dogs Was Ani­mat­ed: A Time-Lapse of the Month-Long Shoot

A Com­plete Col­lec­tion of Wes Ander­son Video Essays

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Benedict Cumberbatch Reads a Letter to People Who Don’t Lock Bathroom Doors

in Letters, Random | April 20th, 2023

In April 2018, author Andrew For­rester wrote an open let­ter to “Peo­ple Who Don’t Make Every Con­ceiv­able Effort to Ensure that the Bath­room Door is Locked.” And now Bene­dict Cum­ber­batch has read it, and read it well. This read­ing took place at Let­ters Live, an event cel­e­brat­ing the pow­er of lit­er­ary cor­re­spon­dence, held at Lon­don’s Roy­al Albert Hall. You can find oth­er Cum­ber­batch read­ings in the Relat­eds below.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent 

Bene­dict Cum­ber­batch & Ian McK­ellen Read Epic Let­ters Writ­ten by Kurt Von­negut

Bene­dict Cum­ber­batch Reads “the Best Cov­er Let­ter Ever Writ­ten”

Hear Bene­dict Cum­ber­batch Read­ing Let­ters by Kurt Von­negut, Alan Tur­ing, Sol LeWitt, and Oth­ers

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Gnome Chomsky: The Indispensable Ornament for the Thinking Person’s Garden

in Random | February 16th, 2023

Images via Just­SayG­nome

The Noam Chom­sky Gar­den Gnome. That’s right, I said it, the Noam Chom­sky Gar­den Gnome.

Over at justsaygnome.net, you can buy “Gnome Chom­sky the Gar­den Noam.” Here’s is how it’s gen­er­al­ly described:

Just over one foot in height, the ful­ly paint­ed Gnome Chom­sky the Gar­den Noam (Ver­sion II) stands relaxed and con­fi­dent in his classy gnome clothes, hat and glass­es. Equipped with a cou­ple books on an author­i­ta­tive pil­lar, he’s ready to give your gar­den or home a big infu­sion of insight­ful gnome polit­i­cal per­spec­tive. A sol­id foun­da­tion base com­plete with a carved title assures that Gar­den Noam will be well-bal­anced and helps inform any­one who may not imme­di­ate­ly rec­og­nize him of the iden­ti­ty of this hand­some and schol­ar­ly gnome.

The gnome costs $228.00 paint­ed and $124 unpaint­ed (plus ship­ping). And if you’re inter­est­ed, you can also get Howard the Zinn Monk and BerGnome Sanders.

In putting this post togeth­er, I spot­ted an old com­ic bit that took the idea of a Noam Gar­den Gnome as its premise. You can watch it below.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Noam Chom­sky on Chat­G­PT: It’s “Basi­cal­ly High-Tech Pla­gia­rism” and “a Way of Avoid­ing Learn­ing”

Clash of the Titans: Noam Chom­sky & Michel Fou­cault Debate Human Nature & Pow­er on Dutch TV, 1971

Noam Chom­sky Explains the Best Way for Ordi­nary Peo­ple to Make Change in the World, Even When It Seems Daunt­ing

Noam Chom­sky Defines What It Means to Be a Tru­ly Edu­cat­ed Per­son

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Winston Churchill Goes Backward Down a Water Slide & Loses His Trunks (1934)

in Random | October 14th, 2022

World-chang­ing fig­ures can have their lighter moments too. Just wit­ness Win­ston Churchill above, tak­ing a trip to the French Riv­iera in 1934 and slid­ing back­ward down a water slide, only to lose his swim trunks at the end. The pre­vi­ous­ly unseen clip comes from the Churchill fam­i­ly archives and founds its way into a Smith­son­ian doc­u­men­tary in 2021.

via @Fasc1nate

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent

Win­ston Churchill’s Paint­ings: Great States­man, Sur­pris­ing­ly Good Artist

Win­ston Churchill Gets a Doctor’s Note to Drink “Unlim­it­ed” Alco­hol in Pro­hi­bi­tion Amer­i­ca (1932)

Ani­mat­ed: Win­ston Churchill’s Top 10 Say­ings About Fail­ure, Courage, Set­backs, Haters & Suc­cess

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How Plants Move in a 24-Hour Period

in Biology, Random | October 9th, 2022

Neat to watch. Learn more about how plants move over on this Penn State web site.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

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