Drugs in the trunk? Not Hunter S. Thompson!

We’ll never know says his friend, novelist Hank Phillippi Ryan

Before she was a famous novelist and television investigative reporter in Boston, Hank Phillippi Ryan worked at Rolling Stone magazine’s Washington Bureau writing “Capital Chatter,” a column that had “everything you wouldn’t read in the Washington Post.” Chatter included stories ranging from backroom deals on Capitol Hill to Susan Ford’s high school prom (the daughter of then-President Gerald Ford.)

While working at the magazine, she met the legendary Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson, who in 1971 had taken up residence in a house near Rock Creek Park in D.C. (charging it to the magazine, of course). He was working out of the D.C. bureau along side Ryan and numerous journalists, and was covering the 1972 presidential campaign (an effort that resulted in his blockbuster book Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ‘72).

Frank Mankiewicz, campaign manager for Democratic candidate George McGovern, described Thompson’s book on the race as the “most accurate and least factual” of the campaign.

Thompson’s flame-throwing writing style was fueled by narcotics and alcohol. His antics were either legendary or myth, depending on who you believed.

“He was wonderful and charming,” says Ryan, “and a really good friend…His public persona was crazy and wacky. His private side was as a hardworking writer.”

Few writers took as many chances as Thompson, and Rolling Stone’s Publisher Jann Wenner gave him plenty of leeway to challenge established thinking. And he generously shared his vision of writing with the young Ryan.

“He taught me how to go for it and be brave and let it all out and not to conform to what people thought you should write,” she says.

She went on a speaking tour with Thompson once and, “It was like being on a tour with a rock star.” She says he readily enjoyed the attention and admiration.

While riding with him in his car in the rain in downtown Washington—just as the city was constructing its new Metro System—Thompson’s car began to slide on one of many large steel plates covering the subway construction project deep below the street.

“He was not the safest driver I’ve ever encountered,” Ryan says with a hint of a smile in her voice.

“I hope we don’t get into a crash,” Thompson yelled to her while grabbing the wheel. “If the cops ever find all of the drugs in the trunk, we’ll going to be in trouble.”

“Part of me thought he was kidding and part of me didn’t,” Ryan says. “I never found out the truth.”

He managed to control the car and his secret is safe to this day.

Years after her near-drug experience with Thompson, Ryan left Washington and Rolling Stone in 1975 and applied for her first television reporting job at a station in Indianapolis. She had no broadcast experience but lots of moxie. After her interview concluded, the male manager asked her why he should hire her. Without hesitation she replied, because the station had no female employees, and its broadcast license was up for renewal the following year.

She got the job.

Be brave, let it all hang out, not conform?

Thompson, no doubt, would approve.

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I’m Rick Pullen, former investigative reporter, magazine editor, and author of the best selling thriller Naked Ambition, its sequel Naked Truth, and a stand-alone thriller The Apprentice. I’m also a magazine columnist and feature writer. Currently, I’m working on another novel and a non-fiction book about many of the authors who appear in Idol Talk.

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