Tag Archives | Memoir

! ## $$ JPB-10-book-covers-web-version

Why I Write

Mises Institute, August 11, 2020 Why I Write by James Bovard I was born in Iowa, raised in the mountains of Virginia, and attended Virginia Tech sporadically from 1974 to 1976 before dropping out to try my luck writing. At some point in the late 1970s, individual liberty became my highest political value and I […]

Continue Reading
jpb-blanton-face3-less-red-santajim_edited-2-SHRUNK-FOR-BLOG-SNIPPET

Confessions of a One Season Santa – WSJ

In my wayward youth, I worked one season as a Santa Claus at a Filene’s Department Store in Boston.  I wrote up that escapade for the Wall Street Journal in 2011.  This piece is an outtake from Public Policy Hooligan – which includes some other details of that gig not fit for a family newspaper. The […]

Continue Reading
KPB-1958-scantest

My Last Father’s Day Letter (2001)

I was sorting through the clutter on a kitchen desk this morning and stumbled across the letter reposted below.  I wrote this shortly after my father had been diagnosed with the leukemia that would finish him off the following February.  This was the kind of letter that it is easy to put off writing – […]

Continue Reading
killer-rabbit-(ver

Easter & My Insane Rabbit-Terrorist Gig in Boston

Technically, I was never an Easter Rabbit – at least not that I can remember. (Some Easter dinners involved way too much beer.) But when I lived in Boston, I served time as a Beatrix Potter promotion rabbit at a Filene’s Department store in nearby Manchester, New Hampshire. Except that the bizarre outfit looked more […]

Continue Reading

Post-Inaugural Rage & Loathing – My Hot Times in 2005

There have been some screaming matches on Washington-bound flights between people coming for Trump’s inauguration versus the Women’s March  the following day. A dozen years ago, I saw – well, maybe sparked – similar fracases on a flight from Washington to Dallas, Texas, two days after Bush’s second inaugural speech whooped up forcibly spreading freedom […]

Continue Reading
05-harvardbusinessschool

My Path-Breaking Work at the Harvard Business School

The Northeast is getting whacked by a blizzard, bringing back memories of one of my favorite gigs when I lived in Boston in the late 1970s.  Following is an excerpt from the Public Policy Hooligan chapter on “Playing Left Field in Boston.”  That chapter begins, “My 1977 move to Boston was akin to the Beverly […]

Continue Reading