Editing Jack Kerouac (section)

===Early adulthood===
[[File:Jack Kerouac Naval Reserve Enlistment, 1943.png|thumb|Kerouac's Naval Reserve Enlistment photograph, 1943]]
When his football career at Columbia ended, Kerouac dropped out of the university. He continued to live for a time in New York's Upper West Side with his girlfriend and future first wife, [[Edie Parker]]. It was during this time that he first met the [[Beat Generation]] figures who shaped his legacy and became characters in many of his novels, such as [[Allen Ginsberg]], [[Neal Cassady]], [[John Clellon Holmes]], [[Herbert Huncke]], [[Lucien Carr]], and [[William S. Burroughs]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite magazine |last=Menand |first=Louis |date=2007-09-24 |title=Drive, Jack Kerouac Wrote |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/10/01/drive-he-wrote |access-date=2024-06-08 |magazine=The New Yorker |language=en-US |issn=0028-792X}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Douglas |first=Ann |date=1997-12-26 |title=City Where the Beats Were Moved to Howl |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1997/12/26/arts/city-where-the-beats-were-moved-to-howl.html |access-date=2024-06-08 |work=The New York Times |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Harbron |first=Lucy |date=2024-03-12 |title=Jack Kerouac's favourite neighbourhood in the world |url=https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/jack-kerouacs-favourite-neighbourhood-world/ |access-date=2024-06-08 |website=[[Far Out (website)|Far Out]] |language=en-US}}</ref>

During [[World War II]], Kerouac was a [[United States Merchant Marine|United States Merchant Mariner]] from July to October 1942 and served on the [[SS Dorchester|SS ''Dorchester'']] before its maiden voyage.<ref name=loss>[https://www.kerouac.com/the-profundity-of-loss/ "The Profundity of Loss"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211202163503/https://www.kerouac.com/the-profundity-of-loss/ |date=December 2, 2021 }}, ''[[The Beat Museum]] website'', August 31, 2020. Retrieved December 2, 2021.</ref> A few months later, the SS Dorchester was sunk during a submarine attack while crossing the Atlantic, and several of his former shipmates were lost.<ref name=loss/> In 1943 he joined the [[United States Navy Reserve]]s. He served eight days of active duty with the Navy before arriving on the sick list. According to his medical report, Kerouac said he "asked for an aspirin for his headaches and they diagnosed me [[dementia praecox]] and sent me here." The medical examiner reported that Kerouac's military adjustment was poor, quoting Kerouac: "I just can't stand it; I like to be by myself." Two days later he was honorably discharged on the psychiatric grounds that he was of "indifferent character" with a diagnosis of "[[Schizoid personality disorder|schizoid personality]]".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0906052_jack_kerouac_1.html|title=Hit The Road, Jack|work=[[The Smoking Gun]]|date=September 5, 2005|access-date=April 29, 2008|archive-date=May 13, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080513110046/http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0906052_jack_kerouac_1.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

While a Merchant Mariner in 1942, Kerouac wrote his first novel, ''[[The Sea Is My Brother]]''. The book was published in 2011, 70 years after it was written and over 40 years after Kerouac's death. Kerouac described the work as being about "man's simple revolt from society as it is, with the inequalities, frustration, and self-inflicted agonies." He viewed the work as a failure, calling it a "crock as literature" and never actively seeking to publish it.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/nov/25/kerouacs-lost-debut-novel-published |title=Kerouac's Lost Debut Novel Published |work=The Guardian |date=November 25, 2011 |access-date=December 6, 2011 |location=London |first=Stephen |last=Bates |archive-date=March 26, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190326140556/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/nov/25/kerouacs-lost-debut-novel-published |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 1944, Kerouac was arrested as a [[material witness]] in the murder of David Kammerer, who allegedly had been stalking Kerouac's friend [[Lucien Carr]] since Carr was a teenager in St. Louis. William Burroughs was also a native of St. Louis, and it was through Carr that Kerouac came to know both Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg. Carr said Kammerer's homosexual obsession turned aggressive, finally provoking Carr to stab him to death in self-defense.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web |last=Miller |first=Becky |date=2021-11-22 |title=We're All Boring Compared to the Beats |url=https://www.theblueandwhite.org/post/we-re-all-boring-compared-to-the-beats |access-date=2024-06-08 |website=[[The Blue and White]] |language=en}}</ref> Carr dumped the body in the Hudson River. Afterwards, Carr sought help from Kerouac. Kerouac disposed of the murder weapon and buried Kammerer's eyeglasses.<ref name=":1" /> Carr, encouraged by Burroughs, turned himself in to the police. Kerouac and Burroughs were later arrested as material witnesses. Kerouac's father refused to pay his bail; Kerouac then agreed to marry [[Edie Parker]] if her parents would pay the bail. They married on Tuesday 22 August 1944 in the Municipal Building, with two detectives as witnesses, before Kerouac was returned to his cell in the Bronx City Prison (their marriage was annulled in 1948.)<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{harvnb|Knight|1996|pp=78–79}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=25 August 1944 |title=Honor Slayer Faces Trial in Second Degree |url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/443334922 |work=[[The New York Daily News | Daily News]] |pages=307}}</ref> Kerouac and Burroughs collaborated on a novel about the Kammerer killing entitled ''[[And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks]]''. Though the book was not published during their lifetimes, an excerpt eventually appeared in ''Word Virus: The William S. Burroughs Reader'' (and as noted below, the novel was finally published late 2008). Kerouac also later wrote about the killing in his novel ''[[Vanity of Duluoz]]''.

Later, Kerouac lived with his parents in the [[Ozone Park, Queens|Ozone Park]] neighborhood of Queens, after they had also moved to New York. He wrote his first published novel, ''[[The Town and the City]]'', and began ''[[On the Road]]'' around 1949 when living there.<ref>{{cite web|author=Fenton, Patrick |url=http://www.wordsareimportant.com/ozonepark.htm |title=The wizard of Ozone Park |work=Dharma Beat |year=1997 |access-date=May 27, 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080225101624/http://www.wordsareimportant.com/ozonepark.htm |archive-date=February 25, 2008 |url-status=dead }}</ref> His friends jokingly called him "The Wizard of Ozone Park", alluding to [[Thomas Edison]]'s nickname, "the Wizard of Menlo Park", and to the film ''[[The Wizard of Oz (1939 film)|The Wizard of Oz]]''.<ref>{{cite news|author=Kilgannon, Corey|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/10/nyregion/10ink.html|title=On the Road, the One Called Cross Bay Boulevard|work=[[The New York Times]]|date=November 10, 2005|access-date=April 29, 2008|archive-date=May 15, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130515215509/http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/10/nyregion/10ink.html|url-status=live}}</ref>