TIMOTHY LEARY - HOW TO OPERATE YOUR BRAIN ON DRUGS PART 1 OF 4

Timothy Francis Leary, Ph.D. (October 22, 1920 – May 31, 1996) was an American writer, psychologist, advocate of psychedelic drug research and use, and one of the first people to be buried in space. As a 1960s counterculture icon, he is most famous as a proponent of the therapeutic and spiritual benefits of LSD. He coined and popularized the catch phrase "Turn on, tune in, drop out."

Leary was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, as an only child and the son of an Irish American dentist who abandoned the family when Timothy was 13. He graduated from Springfield's Classical High School. Leary attended three different colleges and was disciplined in each. He studied for two years at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts and was known for cutting classes, drinking and chasing girls. He transferred to West Point to please his mother but was forced to resign after an incident where he lied about smuggling liquor during a school field exercise. An extended period of a schoolwide "silent treatment" followed.

He received a bachelor's degree in psychology at the University of Alabama in 1943. An obituary of Leary in the New York Times said he was a "discipline problem" there as well and "finally earned his bachelor's degree in the Army during World War II."

His education also included a master's degree at Washington State University in 1946, and a Ph.D. in psychology at the University of California, Berkeley in 1950. During World War II, Leary served in the U.S. Army, as a sergeant in the Medical Corps. He went on to become an assistant professor at Berkeley (1950-1955), director of psychiatric research at the Kaiser Family Foundation (1955-1958) and a lecturer in psychology at Harvard University (1959-1963).