Jerry attended Balboa High School, but dropped out before graduation to sign up for the armed forces in 1960. While stationed, Jerry played guitar in his downtime. Eight months after enlisting, Jerry was discharged from the U.S. Army and moved to Palo Alto, California. It was there that he met and teamed up with poet Robert Hunter, who would later become the main lyricist for the Grateful Dead. Jerry joined a local bluegrass and folk band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions, which later changed to The Warlocks, and finally, The Grateful Dead in 1965. The band was named after a British ballad about spirits referred to as grateful dead upon being freed from their ties to Earth.
At the height of San Francisco’s counter-culture in the 60s, the Grateful Dead were almost worshipped for their improvisational, transcendental music. The city’s native, Jerry Garcia, was heralded as one of the originators of the "San Francisco Sound" along with Janis Joplin. Their music embodied the live-and-let-live spirit of the times. The band attracted one of the most famous and literal followings in history. Grateful Dead fans – known as "Deadheads" – traveled to attend concert after concert; often quitting their jobs and selling wares at concert venues to make a living. The Grateful Dead encouraged their fans by including fan information inside the sleeves of their albums as well as varying each performance to entertain the regular concert-goers. Jerry in particular was accepting of the fans who taped live performances and made bootleg recordings, stating, "There's something to be said for being able to record an experience you've liked, or being to obtain a recording of it ... my responsibility to the notes is over after I've played them".
Jerry married three times – first in 1963 to Sarah Ruppenthal; then in 1981 Carolyn Adams (nicknamed Mountain Girl); and finally, to Deborah Koons in 1994. He had four children, all of whom were daughters.
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Jerry played on the side in bands such as the Jerry Garcia Band; The Legion of Mary; and Old and in the Way. He also collaborated with other artists such as Bob Dylan, and played guitar on the hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young.
Jerry’s creativity extended to a talent for painting. He studied art at the San Francisco Art Institute, and had his first art exhibit in 1991, at which prices for his work sold from $300-$40,000. A series of neckties based on his psychedelic, surrealist paintings were also marketed, and continue to sell at high-end retail outlets. His collective work has been compiled into the book, The Book J. Garcia: Paintings, Drawings, and Sketches.
During the early 1980s, Jerry’s health became compromised by heroin addiction, diabetes, and sleep apnea. He was inducted into the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame in 1994, but died one year later of a heart attack at a drug rehabilitation center. On his passing, Garcia was heralded as an "an American icon" by then-U.S. President Bill Clinton, and commemorated by the thousands of fans that attended his memorial service.
YUDDY
