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Revision as of 03:51, 14 June 2007
Carolyn Cassady (b. April 28, 1923) is an American writer associated with the Beat Generation by her marriage to Neal Cassady, and friendship with other writers. She was consequently a frequent character in the works of Jack Kerouac, who wrote extensively about Neal.
She was born Carolyn Robinson in Lansing, Michigan on April 28, 1923 and raised in Nashville, Tennessee. She received a scholarship to Bennington College, an exclusive women's school in Vermont. After she received her degree in theater arts, Carolyn went to the University of Denver for a master's degree.
In Denver, in March of 1947, Carolyn met Neal Cassady. He had just returned from his first New York visit where he had met Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. Cassady was married to LuAnne Henderson at the time. In August 1947 she discovered LuAnne, Neal and Allen naked, in bed together. She thought her brief romance with Neal was over, departing for Los Angeles to work as a costume designer.
Carolyn moved north to San Francisco to live with her sister when she could find no work in Los Angeles. But five weeks after she left Denver, Neal re-entered her life and resumed the romance. His marriage to LuAnne was annulled and on April 1, 1948 Carolyn and Neal were married. On September 6, 1948 Carolyn gave birth to a daughter, Cathleen Joanne, the first of their three children. Carolyn fully expected life to settle down, but was shocked when, in December, Neal bought a new Hudson and declared he was going to be taking a short trip to New York to pick up his friend Jack Kerouac.
Neal drove to Denver to pick up ex-wife LuAnne, and then picked up Kerouac in North Carolina. The story was immortalized in Kerouac's On the Road. Believing the marriage was finished Carolyn moved with her infant daughter to an apartment near Mission Dolores in San Francisco. At the end of January of 1949, Neal dropped Jack and LuAnne off on a San Francisco street corner and was back.
In July, Jack Kerouac arrived in San Francisco at the Cassady home. Kerouac would visit them in San Jose and Los Gatos, California where Jack and Carolyn would begin an affair that had Neal’s tacit approval.
Neal would continue his infidelities and road trips for the rest of his life. On February 4, 1968, Carolyn got a call informing her that Neal had died in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Neal was 42. Carolyn, who was 46, moved to London, England where she now lives.
Bibliography
- Heart Beat: My Life with Jack and Neal. Berkeley, CA: Creative Arts, 1976; St. Albans: Granada, 1980.
- Off the Road: My Years with Cassady, Kerouac, and Ginsberg. New York: Morocco, 1990; London: Bloomsbury, 1990.
External links
- Official Neal Cassady Site Authored by Carolyn Cassady and Family
- Literary Kicks - Carolyn Cassady
- Carolyn Cassady, an Interview
- On the Road to Desolation - BBC Interview
- Women of the Beat Biography Page for Carolyn Cassady