"Please allow to introduce myself…”
–The Rolling Stones, Sympathy for the Devil
I’ve been a communicator since an early age.
“Hey mom, look at this butterfly.”
Journalism
First a (Lowell) high school course in journalism, where Mr. Patterson taught us that we should get the 5 “w’s" and one “h" (who, what, where, when, why and how) in the first paragraph of our news stories.
In the late ’50’s, I ran a newspaper — The Sembach Jet Gazette — on a US Air Force base in Germany. (I changed the format to tabloid style and featured lots of photographs; we got an award for the best newspaper in the USAF in 1959.)
Next I worked for five years as an insurance broker in San Francisco, and then 10 years as a builder.
Publishing
In 1968, Stewart Brand hired me as the shelter editor of the Whole Earth Catalog, during which time I learned the process of publishing books.
In 1970, I struck out on my own, and in a 53-year career, published 39 books, as well as booklets, flyers and posters. You can see the books still in print at: www.shelterpub.com. Also, you an see summary of my publishing career at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lloyd_Kahn
The Next Phase
Now — in 2024 — I’m switching over to communicating mainly through the Internet. The publishing world has changed drastically since I started in 1970 and I need a change. I’ve sold Shelter Publications to AdventureKEEN — a great fit for Shelter. Some of their other publishers are Wilderness Press, Adventure Publications, and Nature Study Guides. Hiking, canoeing, cooking, gardening, backpacking, animals, tracking — all stuff I’m into: adventure. I feel very sympatico with everyone at AdventureKEEN.
They will keep everything functioning and I’ll be able to step away from the (ever-increasing) business and technical details of running a publishing company, and go into a new phase of communicating:
Instagram: a more robust account (and thank you Matty for getting me started)
Substack: a combination email and blog
Youtube: short videos
Email: my irregular GIMME SHELTER newsletter (now going out to about 6000 people)
To see my latest newsletter (February, 2024), describing recent events in my life, go to: lloydkahn.com/gimme-shelter-february-2024
No More Blogging
I’ll probably quit blog posts — begun 19 years ago, over 5000 posts, (and thank you Eszter for getting me started).
However, if you want to see what I’ve been up to for the past couple of decades, click on the “Topics” button at the top of my blog:
Yeow, I just counted and there are almost 200 topics!
(Actually, Substack will become my blogging platform.)
Real Books
I still love hold-in-your-hands “hard copy” books, and will produce one every year or so. It looks like the first one will be Learning to Build: Adventures in Building, and this time I will be an author, not publisher.
Some of My Topics on Substack
Adventures, Fitness, Music, Aging, Travel, Camping, Skateboarding, Swimming, Mountain Biking, Surfing, Building, Architecture, Gardening, Foraging, Hunting, Cooking, The ‘60s, San Francisco, Baja California.
So here I am , feeling my way along with Substack and truthfully, I’m a little nervous. But also excited — the chance to write, as I can’t do on Instagram, and to have my photos displayed in a larger format than smartphone-dinky.
I’ve always had this compulsion to communicate. I’m curious and find the world endlessly fascinating and invariably want to share my observations.
With all the bad news surrounding us with these days, I’m gonna focus on good news, on interesting people, on fun, on the glass half-full. I want to take you along, riding shotgun with me, through my adventures in life.
If you subscribe (it’s free), you’ll get all my posts in email form.
Note: clicking on the headline will give you the post on your browser.
If you want to support my work, you can sign up for a premium subscription ($5 per month, or $50 per year), which will allow access to special things, such as chapters of my unpublished latest book on growing up in California and my take on the ’60s — titled LIVE FROM CALIFORNIA: The ’60s, Before and Beyond (not available yet).
"I love the life I live and I live the life I love."
–Muddy Waters (written by Willie Dixon)
