Timothy Leary Movies and Career Information

Timothy Francis Leary (October 22, 1920 – May 31, 1996) was an influential American psychologist and writer known in later life for advocating research into psychedelic drugs. A hugely controversial figure during the 1960s and 1970s, he encouraged the use of the drug LSD for its therapeutic, emotional and spiritual benefits, and popularized the phrase "Turn on, tune in, drop out", both of which proved to be hugely influential on the 1960s counterculture. Largely due to his influence in this field, he was attacked by conservative figures in the United States, and described as "the most dangerous man in America" by President Richard Nixon. Leary was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, the only child of an Irish American dentist who abandoned his wife Abigail Ferris and the rest of the family when Leary was thirteen. Leary graduated from Springfield's Classical High School. In 1940, Leary enrolled as a cadet in the United States Military Academy at West Point. In his first months he acquired numerous demerits for rule infractions and then got into serious trouble for a bout of drinking and failing to be forthright about it. For violating the Academy’s honor code, the Honor Committee