Hunter Kennedy

Out of South Carolina he came to speak his vision of betterment for his people: Come follow me up to the ridge behind the Wal-Mart. I’ve found an old house without cable or internet where we can talk in complete sentences.

His hope lay in educating the young: Who might believe what they haven’t seen.

He said: Yeah to magic tricks!

Of the limitations and intractableness of his people: In ten years, we will all be getting microchip implants, because some impossibly cool celebrity did. Blockbuster and NetFlix will diversify into dream rentals. Americans will pay for imagination like another magazine subscription, for we are lazy and require constant stimulation.

He combined his educational philosophy with method in this way: He put a blank sheet of paper in the typewriter and wrote a ransom note concerning his own abduction. “World, please take me back…” As yet, no response.

He was convinced that making and creating develops character: Actually he is certain of it. One is judged by their acts, and thy own judge is most unforgiving.

He expressed his satisfaction with the development of The Minus Times: It is deeply satisfying to watch these contributors get better with every issue, or find a new voice barely a whisper over the hiss and crackle of electronic mail, or simply to open a letter from someone who’s stumbled onto the magazine God knows where and confesses their enthusiastic bewilderment, because I like getting surprises as much as the next fella, but with the MT, I get to give them out, too.

And his broad and unselfish vision for it: Silkscreened posters, ground shaking books, and perhaps a small colony of writers and artists somewhere in South Carolina. Long live Black Mountain College!

And finally: Multum in parvo.