The first day of a “Beat Generation” literature class, Strickland walked in fitting the bill for what kind of teacher one would envision teaching the course. He wore flannel, boots, baggy jeans and had a braided pony tail that hit halfway down his back. He looked like a character right off the pages of “On the Road” by Jack Kerouac, and once he told the class about his journeys during his younger years, the students realized that he is.
Michael Strickland’s early adulthood was slightly different than most, unless half of Elon is hitchhiking up to Montreal for a weekend fueled by Kerouac readings.
Growing up Strickland had an obvious liking for books.
“I was a reader from early on,” he said. “Reading about other places made me want to experience them.”
Born in 1954 and raised in Polly Island, S.C., he developed a strong interest for one of the more controversial writers of the time, Jack Kerouac. Kerouac’s rambling narratives and philosophies on living a raw life sparked a revolution amongst the underbelly of 1950’s America, a revolution that may be best encapsulated by “On the Road,” his most famous novel.
Strickland can attest, saying that at 16 years old, he was influenced to pick up a rather daring hobby.
“Hitchhiking, I attribute that to reading On The Road,” he laughed. “Literally, within of couple of weeks I started hitchhiking. It just began from there, I even got in this train thing for several years.”
The “train thing” was not nearly as casual as he made it appear. He bought an Amtrak student pass that lasted 90 days and made sure every day counted.
“I had an arbitrary rule to never stay more than three days in one place,” he said with a grin. ”Even if I was having a great time, I would get up, walk to the train station and see where it was going and say ‘Alright, take me there.’”
His travels took him all over the southwest United States, up to Canada and south to Mexico. An appropriate excerpt from “On the Road” would be, “There was nowhere to go but everywhere, so just keep on rolling under the stars.”
In between his travels, Stirckland got his education at Naropa Institute in Boulder Colo., a college where he studied under the likes of Alan Ginsberg, Gregory Corso and William Burroughs. Once he graduated, he found himself in a state many often do: antsy.
“Literally, for years I could not sit still in one place, I’d just get antsy, start freaking out,” Strickland admits.
He loved to study, but never found his undeniable passion during his time in school, leaving him with few options in the white collar world.
“After college, the thought of getting a job where I had to put on a suit and go to an office, I couldn’t even fathom,” he said. “I’ve always been big on having other skill sets, and all along the way I learned construction skills and woodworking skills. When I got out of college, for years, I did woodworking. All sorts of carpentry, but I specialized in cabinets and bars out of exotic woods.”
He points to this outlet as a saving grace, a guide during a transitional period from a nomadic beatnik to a part of the American workforce.
Luckily for Elon students, Strickland found his way into teaching, a field that he unconsciously prepared himself for throughout life with the many lessons learned and experiences earned from his travels.
Patrick Lyon, a sophomore at Elon, attended Strickland’s Winter Term class and came away a changed man.
“He blew me away,” Lyon said. “First thing, he casually mentions that he studied under Alan Ginsberg and Gregory Corso. That alone is incredible, but his ability to communicate with students is uncanny, because he speaks from experience [that] we are reading about in the novels he assigns.”
Lyon continued to praise Strickland’s ability to push conceptual boundaries with students, questioning social norms and taboos, like government control and drug use.
Jared Fitzgerald, another sophomore, agreed completely.
“[Strickland] broadened my mind plain and simple,” Fitzgerald admits. “We got into a deep talk about how the millennial generation is anesthetized by social media and consumerism, something that I never ever thought about. I mean I’m 20 years old, I have never had to think that deep, and that’s definitely something I loved about taking his class.”
Being able to share his stories with students links Strickland’s two worlds, scholar and adventurer, together, making him a breed of teacher that is rare in today’s education field. To quote the prophetic Kerouac, “The best teacher is experience,” something Michael Strickland has plenty of.