You might have seen him in Minburn, Iowa, in the 1920s and 1930s. His lineage on his mother's side - the Miles family - dates back to Robert Blogate (1530-1602) and Thomas Blowgate (1490-1560), the latter a resident of Haughley not far from London. For his genealogical chart, see if you're related.

You might have been a fellow student at the University of Northern Iowa from 1940-1942 and again from 1946 to 1948.


You might have been in World War II with him from 1942-1946, stationed at Ft. Knox, Kentucky. Or on Omaha Beach in 1944, or at Hq. Oise's Adjutant General's Office in the Little Red Schoolhouse in Reims where he was chief clerk at the time German General Alfred Jodl surrendered to General Ike Eisenhower in 1945.

You might have been a fellow student at Columbia University in 1949 when, with Lionel Trilling as his advisor, he received his M.A. 

Or perhaps you didn't know he was a teacher or a businessman and knew him only as a dabbler in philosophy, the book review editor of The Humanist in the 1950s, a long-time director of the Bertrand Russell Society.


Or perhaps you saw him when from 1949 to 1954 he taught at Bentley School on West 86th Street in Manhattan, succeeding Mrs. Edgar Guest and others as English department chairman (and where he taught, among others, actress Celeste Holm's illustrious son, Ted Nelson). Or at New Canaan High School in Connecticut, where he became English department chairman in 1954 and taught there until 1986 (including, among others, Oscar nominee Susan Tyrell, television comedian Martin Mull, Pulitzer Prize winning photographer Edward Keating, Olympic Decathlon Winner Bill Toomey, the daughters of Admiral Chester Nimitz Jr. and those of Norman Cousins, and other sons and daughters of prominent and not-so-prominent New Canaan townspeople). 

You likely did not know he composed several songs.  For example, click to see the score and hear the music to "Hymn of the Pantheist." 

     First, the hymn is sung by a tenor who performed on Broadway in "Timbuktu":

     

     Second, hear variations of the tune that preceded the hymn.

     After the variations, a combo played the hymn, at the end of which the tenor starts singing.

Or perhaps you didn't even know he was a teacher. In that case, you may have known that for 40 years with Fernando Vargas he ran Variety Recording Studio, first on 46th Street (where they recorded Liza Minnelli's first demo, Marvin Hamlisch on the piano), then (after a total fire caused by an arsonist) at 130 West 42nd Street, just off Broadway, until its close in 1996. For a just-compiled list of our many VIP customers, click here.


Or you knew, when he was a member of the International Press Institute, that he had a desk at the United Nations and that his column supplied Caribbeans but particularly Bahamians with gossip about Howard Hughes while he was in seclusion there in the 1970s, or you have read articles of his that have been in The Villager or his "Stateside Gossip" that now is published in the United Kingdom's Gay and Lesbian Humanist.

Jane Street's history is most interesting.  It's a 5-block area in the West Village where I now live, and I have compiled a page about its history from 1969 on, complete with photos (including one of a nude sunbather on my building's rooftop.

You might care to read what he thinks is the best descriptive interview which a stranger ever made with him, the second best by a Canadian, and the one which made the front page of New York Observer. 

Today in Greenwich Village, he lives with Nano, Tico, and Ganymede (his iMac):



The funniest interview, one seen by millions, was CNN's famed Jeanne Moos. She filmed him on his Greenwich Village rooftop, asking about his Who’s Who in Hell. Then she proceeded to St. Patrick’s Cathedral on 5th Avenue and, as parishioners exited, she asked for their names to see if they were included. 

Click Picture to Play, and be sure your sound is on:

Last updated: 25 October 2011