NY, Farrar Straus Giroux, (1968). Wolfe's ground-breaking account of Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters and their bus trip across the country, arguably the epitome of the "New Journalism" that Wolfe helped to bring about in the Sixties; it was called at the time "the most penetrating piece of writing yet done on the ethos and dynamics of the hippie," and it remains a classic of the time: the most definitive, sympathetic and insightful account of the seminal events of the 1960s counterculture -- the cross-country bus trip and the LSD-fueled gatherings -- "acid tests" -- that defined the Bay Area counterculture community in the mid-1960s, when LSD was still legal. This copy is inscribed by Wolfe, signed by Ken Babbs, Ed McClanahan, and Mountain Girl -- all of them among the original Pranksters -- and stamped and fingerprinted by Kesey, both on the front flyleaf and the front cover. With a photo of Kesey on the bus and a page of his handwritten notes, including Timothy Leary's phone number. Some spots and handling apparent; a near fine copy in a near fine, mildly edgeworn dust jacket, in a custom clamshell case. A unique copy of a modern classic, which mythologized the beginnings of the hippie movement and became the origin story of the 1960s counterculture (despite what many of the participants would say about Wolfe's being extremely free with the "facts" he recounted). [#033402] SOLD