Timothy Leary

Leary was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, an only child{{cite news |last=Mansnerus |first=Laura |title=Timothy Leary, Pied Piper of Psychedelic 60s, Dies at 75 |series=Obituary |work=The New York Times |date=June 1, 1996 |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9500E0DD1E39F932A35755C0A960958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all |access-date=July 11, 2008}} in an Irish Catholic household. His father, Timothy "Tote" Leary, was a dentist who left his wife Abigail Ferris when Timothy was 14.{{sfnp|Higgs|2006|p=17}} He graduated from Classical High School in Springfield.{{sfnp|Greenfield|2006|pp=7, 11–12, 18}}

Leary attended the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, from 1938 to 1940. He received a Jesuit education there, and was required to learn Latin, rhetoric, and Greek.{{Sfn|Greenfield|2006|p=20}} Under pressure from his father, he left to become a cadet in the United States Military Academy. In his first months at West Point, he received numerous demerits for rule infractions and then got into serious trouble for failing to report rule breaking by cadets he supervised. He was also accused of going on a drinking binge and failing to admit it, and was asked by the Honor Committee to resign. He refused and was shunned by fellow cadets. He was acquitted by a court-martial, but the silencing continued, as well as the onslaught of demerits for small rule infractions. In his sophomore year, his mother appealed to a family friend, United States Senator David I. Walsh, head of the Senate Naval Affairs Committee, who investigated personally. The Honor Committee quietly revised its position and announced that it would abide by the court-martial verdict. Leary then resigned and was honorably discharged by the Army.Peter O. Whitmer, Aquarius Revisited: Seven Who Created the Sixties Counterculture That Changed America (NY: Citadel Press, 1991), 21–25 About 50 years later he said that it was "the only fair trial I've had in a court of law".{{sfnp|Greenfield|2006|pp=28–55}}

To his family's chagrin, Leary transferred to the University of Alabama in late 1941 because it admitted him expeditiously. He enrolled in the university's ROTC program, maintained top grades, and began to cultivate academic interests in psychology (under the aegis of the Middlebury and Harvard-educated Donald Ramsdell) and biology. Leary was expelled a year later for spending a night in the female dormitory and lost his student deferment in the midst of World War II.

Leary was drafted into the United States Army and received basic training at Fort Eustis in 1943. He remained in the non-commissioned officer track while enrolled in the psychology subsection of the Army Specialized Training Program, including three months of study at Georgetown University and six months at Ohio State University.{{sfnp|Greenfield|2006|p=65}} With limited need for officers late in the war, Leary was briefly assigned as a private first class to the Pacific War-bound 2d Combat Cargo Group (which he later characterized as "a suicide command ... whose main mission, as far as I could see, was to eliminate the entire civilian branch of American aviation from post-war rivalry") at Syracuse Army Air Base in Mattydale, New York.{{sfnp|Leary|1983|p=144}} After a fateful reunion with Ramsdell (who was assigned to Deshon General Hospital in Butler, Pennsylvania, as chief psychologist) in Buffalo, New York, he was promoted to corporal and reassigned to his mentor's command as a staff psychometrician.{{sfnp|Greenfield|2006|p=65}} He remained in Deshon's deaf rehabilitation clinic for the remainder of the war.

While stationed in Butler, Leary courted Marianne Busch; they married in April 1945. Leary was discharged at the rank of sergeant in January 1946, having earned such standard decorations as the Good Conduct Medal, the American Defense Service Medal, the American Campaign Medal, and the World War II Victory Medal.{{cite web |url=http://pabook.libraries.psu.edu/palitmap/bios/Leary__Timothy.html |title=Timothy Leary |publisher=Pabook.libraries.psu.edu |access-date=May 19, 2014 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141028072448/http://pabook.libraries.psu.edu/palitmap/bios/Leary__Timothy.html |archive-date=October 28, 2014}}

As the war concluded, Leary was reinstated at UA and received credit for his Ohio State psychology coursework. He completed his degree via correspondence courses and graduated in August 1945. After receiving his undergraduate degree, Leary pursued an academic career. In 1946, he received a M.S. in psychology at the Washington State College in Pullman, where he studied under educational psychologist Lee Cronbach. His M.S. thesis was on clinical applications of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale.{{cite web |title=WSU - Myths and Legends |publisher=Washington State Magazine |date=2010 |url=http://wsm.wsu.edu/s/index.php?id=793#a3 |access-date=January 13, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151208095736/http://wsm.wsu.edu/s/index.php?id=793#a3 |archive-date=December 8, 2015 |url-status=live}}

In 1947, Marianne gave birth to their first child, Susan. Their son, Jack, arrived two years later. In 1950, Leary received a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of California, Berkeley.{{cite web |title=Timothy Leary Papers 1910 - 2009 |publisher=New York Public Library |date=2009 |url=http://archives.nypl.org/mss/18400 |access-date=January 19, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160116034624/http://archives.nypl.org/mss/18400 |archive-date=January 16, 2016 |url-status=live}} In the postwar era, Leary was galvanized by the objectivity of modern physics;{{sfnp|Leary|2000|p=13}} his doctoral dissertation (The Social Dimensions of Personality: Group Process and Structure){{sfnp|Leary|1950}} approached group therapy as a "psychlotron"{{sfnp|Leary|2000|pp=13–15}} from which behavioral characteristics could be derived and quantified in a manner analogous to the periodic table, foreshadowing his later development of the interpersonal circumplex.

Leary stayed on in the Bay Area as an assistant clinical professor of medical psychology at the University of California, San Francisco; concurrently, he co-founded Kaiser Hospital's psychology department in Oakland, California, and maintained a private consultancy.{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XP02AQAAMAAJ&q=%22timothy+f.+leary%22+%22university+of+california,+san+francisco%22&pg=RA4-PA24 |title=Announcement of the School of Medicine - Fall and Spring Semesters, 1950 - 1951 |publisher=University of California Medical Center |access-date=May 19, 2014 |year=1950}}{{efn-ua|name=The Friday Project|{{harvnb|Higgs|2006|p=18}}: "In 1954 he became Director of Psychology Research at the Kaiser Foundation Hospital, and published nearly 50 papers in psychology journals."}} In 1952, the Leary family spent a year in Spain, living on a research grant. According to Berkeley colleague Marv Freedman, "Something had been stirred in him in terms of breaking out of being another cog in society."{{sfnp|Greenfield|2006|pp=68–77}}

Leary's marriage was strained by infidelity and mutual alcohol abuse. Marianne eventually died by suicide in 1955, leaving him to raise their son and daughter alone. He described himself during this period as "an anonymous institutional employee who drove to work each morning in a long line of commuter cars and drove home each night and drank martinis ... like several million middle-class, liberal, intellectual robots".{{cite book |last=Torgoff |first=Martin |title=Can't Find My Way Home: America in the Great Stoned Age |publisher=Simon and Schuster |year=2004 |isbn=0-7432-3010-8 |page=[https://archive.org/details/cantfindmywayhom00torgo/page/72 72] |url=https://archive.org/details/cantfindmywayhom00torgo/page/72}}{{sfnp|Leary|Ginsberg|1995|p=4}}

From 1954{{efn-ua|name=The Friday Project}} or 1955 to 1958, Leary directed psychiatric research at the Kaiser Family Foundation.{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gIU3AAAAMAAJ&q=kaiser |title=Current Biography - Volume 31 |publisher=H. W. Wilson Company |access-date=January 8, 2016 |year=1970 }} In 1957, he published The Interpersonal Diagnosis of Personality, which the Annual Review of Psychology called the "most important book on psychotherapy of the year".{{sfnp|Stevens|1983|p=186}}

In 1958, the National Institute of Mental Health terminated Leary's research grant after he failed to meet with a NIMH investigator. Leary and his children relocated to Europe, where he attempted to write his next book while subsisting on small grants and insurance policies.{{cite book |last1=Conners |first1=Peter |title=White Hand Society - The Psychedelic Partnership of Timothy Leary and Allen Ginsberg |publisher=City Lights Books |year=2010 |isbn=9780872865358 |page=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780872865358/page/22 22] |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780872865358/page/22 }}{{sfnp|Stevens|1983|p=187}} His stay in Florence was unproductive and indigent, prompting a return to academia.

In late 1959, Leary started as a lecturer in clinical psychology at Harvard University at the behest of Frank Barron (a colleague from Berkeley) and David McClelland. Leary and his children lived in Newton, Massachusetts. In addition to teaching, Leary was affiliated with the Harvard Center for Research in Personality under McClelland. He oversaw the Harvard Psilocybin Project and conducted experiments in conjunction with assistant professor Richard Alpert. In 1963, Leary was terminated for failing to attend scheduled class lectures, though he maintained that he had met his teaching obligations. The decision to dismiss him may have been influenced by his promotion of psychedelic drug use among Harvard students and faculty. The drugs were legal at the time.{{sfnp|Stevens|1983|p={{page needed|date=July 2021}}}}

Leary's work in academic psychology expanded on the research of Harry Stack Sullivan and Karen Horney, which sought to better understand interpersonal processes to help diagnose disorders. Leary's dissertation developed the interpersonal circumplex model, later published in The Interpersonal Diagnosis of Personality.{{sfnp|Leary|1957}} The book demonstrated how psychologists could use Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) scores to predict how respondents might react to various interpersonal situations. Leary's research was an important harbinger of transactional analysis, directly prefiguring the popular work of Eric Berne.{{cite news |title=Timothy Leary, Pied Piper Of Psychedelic 60's, Dies at 75 |newspaper=New York Times |date=June 1, 1996 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1996/06/01/us/timothy-leary-pied-piper-of-psychedelic-60-s-dies-at-75.html?pagewanted=all |access-date=January 7, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151208134906/http://www.nytimes.com/1996/06/01/us/timothy-leary-pied-piper-of-psychedelic-60-s-dies-at-75.html?pagewanted=all |archive-date=December 8, 2015 |url-status=live}}{{cite magazine |title=She Comes in Colors |magazine=Playboy |publisher=HMH Publishing Company Inc. |date=September 1, 1966}}

File:TimothyLeary-LectureTour-OnStage-SUNYAB-1969.jpg during a lecture tour in 1969]]

On May 13, 1957, Life magazine published "Seeking the Magic Mushroom", an article by R. Gordon Wasson about the use of psilocybin mushrooms in religious rites of the indigenous Mazatec people of Mexico.{{cite magazine |title=Life on LSD |url=http://www.life.com/image/50711262/in-gallery/50751/life-on-lsd |url-status=dead|magazine=Life |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101026205242/http://www.life.com/image/50711262/in-gallery/50751/life-on-lsd |archive-date=October 26, 2010}} Anthony Russo, a colleague of Leary's, had experimented with psychedelic Psilocybe mexicana mushrooms on a trip to Mexico and told Leary about it. In August 1960,Cashman, John. "The LSD Story". Fawcett Publications, 1966 Leary traveled to Cuernavaca, Mexico, with Russo and consumed psilocybin mushrooms for the first time, an experience that drastically altered the course of his life.Ram Dass Fierce Grace, 2001, Zeitgeist Video In 1965, Leary said that he had "learned more about ... [his] brain and its possibilities ... [and] more about psychology in the five hours after taking these mushrooms than ... in the preceding 15 years of studying and doing research".

Back at Harvard, Leary and his associates (notably Alpert) began a research program known as the Harvard Psilocybin Project. The goal was to analyze psilocybin's effects on human subjects (first prisoners, and later Andover Newton Theological Seminary students) from a synthesized version of the drug, one of two active compounds found in a wide variety of hallucinogenic mushrooms, including Psilocybe mexicana. Psilocybin was produced in a process developed by Albert Hofmann of Sandoz Pharmaceuticals, who was famous for synthesizing LSD.{{cite book| last1 = Sandison | first1 = Ronald|title = Psychedelia Britannica - Hallucinogenic Drugs in Britain| publisher = Turnaround| page = 57| date = 1997| isbn = 1873262051}} 'Psilocybin...was synthesised in Dr Hofmann's laboratory in 1958.'

Beat poet Allen Ginsberg heard about the Harvard research project and asked to join. Leary was inspired by Ginsberg's enthusiasm, and the two shared an optimism that psychedelics could help people discover a higher level of consciousness. They began introducing psychedelics to intellectuals and artists including Jack Kerouac, Maynard Ferguson, Charles Mingus and Charles Olson.Goffman, K. and Joy, D. 2004. Counterculture Through the Ages: From Abraham to Acid House. New York: Villard, 250–252

Leary argued that psychedelic substances—in proper doses, a stable setting, and under the guidance of psychologists—could benefit behavior in ways not easily obtained by regular therapy. He experimented in treating alcoholism and reforming criminals, and many of his subjects said they had profound mystical and spiritual experiences that permanently improved their lives.{{sfnp|Leary|1969}}

The Concord Prison Experiment evaluated the use of psilocybin and psychotherapy in the rehabilitation of released prisoners. Thirty-six prisoners were reported to have repented and sworn off criminality after Leary and his associates guided them through the psychedelic experience. The overall recidivism rate for American prisoners was 60%, whereas the rate for those in Leary's project reportedly dropped to 20%. The experimenters concluded that long-term reduction in criminal recidivism could be effected with a combination of psilocybin-assisted group psychotherapy (inside the prison) along with a comprehensive post-release follow-up support program modeled on Alcoholics Anonymous.{{sfnp|Metzner|Weil|1963}}{{sfnp|Metzner|1965}}

File:TimothyLeary-LectureTour-SUNYAB-1969.jpg

The Concord conclusions were contested in a follow-up study on the basis of time differences monitoring the study group vs. the control group and differences between subjects re-incarcerated for parole violations and those imprisoned for new crimes. The researchers concluded that statistically only a slight improvement could be attributed to psilocybin, in contrast to the significant improvement reported by Leary and his colleagues.{{cite web |url=http://www.maps.org/news-letters/v09n4/09410con.html |title=Dr. Leary's Concord Prison Experiment: A 34 Year Follow-Up Study |publisher=Maps.org |access-date=May 19, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140322200535/http://www.maps.org/news-letters/v09n4/09410con.html |archive-date=March 22, 2014 |url-status=live }} Rick Doblin suggested that Leary had fallen prey to the Halo Effect, skewing the results and clinical conclusions. Doblin further accused Leary of lacking "a higher standard" or "highest ethical standards in order to regain the trust of regulators". Ralph Metzner rebuked Doblin for these assertions: "In my opinion, the existing accepted standards of honesty and truthfulness are perfectly adequate. We have those standards, not to curry favor with regulators, but because it is the agreement within the scientific community that observations should be reported accurately and completely. There is no proof in any of this re-analysis that Leary unethically manipulated his data."{{cite web |url=http://www.maps.org/research/ralphmetzner_concord_follow-up.pdf |title=Reflections on the Concord Prison Project and the Follow-Up Study |publisher=Maps.org |access-date=May 19, 2014 |url-status=bot: unknown |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140505094936/http://www.maps.org/research/ralphmetzner_concord_follow-up.pdf |archive-date=May 5, 2014 }} Archived from the original on July 24, 2016.{{cite news |last=Doblin |first=Rick|title= Dr. Leary's Concord Prison Experiment:A 34 Year Follow-Up Study|work=Journal of Psychoactive Drugs |issue=4 |pages=419–426|date=1998|volume=30 }}

Leary and Alpert founded the International Federation for Internal Freedom (IFIF) in 1962 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to carry out studies in the religious use of psychedelic drugs.{{cite web|url=http://www.timothylearyarchives.org/international-federation-for-internal-freedom-statement-of-purpose/|title=International Federation For Internal Freedom – Statement of Purpose|publisher=timothylearyarchives.org|date=March 21, 2009|access-date=September 24, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170823073645/http://www.timothylearyarchives.org/international-federation-for-internal-freedom-statement-of-purpose/|archive-date=August 23, 2017|url-status=live}}{{sfnp|Lee|Shlain|1992|p=36}} This was run by Lisa Bieberman (now known as Licia Kuenning), a friend of Leary.{{cite web |url=http://www.lycaeum.org/drugs.old/hyperreal/millbrook/ch-04.html |title=4: Sir Dinadan the Humorist |publisher=Lycaeum.org |access-date=May 19, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131224122442/http://www.lycaeum.org/drugs.old/hyperreal/millbrook/ch-04.html |archive-date=December 24, 2013 |url-status=dead }}{{sfnp|Higgs|2006|p=50}} The Harvard Crimson called her a "disciple" who ran a Psychedelic Information Center out of her home and published a national LSD newspaper.{{cite web |url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=134589 |title=Court Finds Lisa Bieberman Guilty Of Violations of Federal Drug Laws | News | The Harvard Crimson |publisher=Thecrimson.com |date=November 18, 1966 |access-date=May 19, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080225080415/http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=134589 |archive-date=February 25, 2008 |url-status=live }} That publication was actually Leary and Alpert's journal Psychedelic Review and Bieberman (a graduate of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard, who had volunteered for Leary as a student) was its circulation manager.{{cite news|last=Hiatt|first=Nathaniel J.|url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2016/5/23/trip-down-memory-lane/|title=A Trip Down Memory Lane: LSD at Harvard|newspaper=Harvard Crimson|date=May 23, 2016|access-date=September 24, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170919105932/http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2016/5/23/trip-down-memory-lane/|archive-date=September 19, 2017|url-status=live}}{{cite web|last=hanna|first=jon|url=https://www.erowid.org/culture/characters/bieberman_lisa/bieberman_lisa_biography1.shtml|title=Erowid Character Vaults: Lisa Bieberman Extended Biography|publisher=Erowid.org|date=March 28, 2012|access-date=September 24, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170925132326/https://www.erowid.org/culture/characters/bieberman_lisa/bieberman_lisa_biography1.shtml|archive-date=September 25, 2017|url-status=live}} Leary's and Alpert's research attracted so much attention that many who wanted to participate in the experiments had to be turned away. To satisfy the curiosity of those who were turned away, a black market for psychedelics sprang up near the Harvard campus.{{sfnp|Weil|1963}}

Other professors in the Harvard Center for Research in Personality raised concerns about the experiments' legitimacy and safety.{{cite journal |last=Davidson |first=Sara |title=The Ultimate Trip |journal=Tufts Magazine |date=Fall 2006 |url=http://www.tufts.edu/alumni/magazine/fall2006/features/ultimate-trip.html |access-date=March 15, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304021804/http://www.tufts.edu/alumni/magazine/fall2006/features/ultimate-trip.html |archive-date=March 4, 2016 |url-status=live }} Leary and Alpert taught a class that was required for graduation and colleagues felt they were abusing their power by pressuring graduate students to take hallucinogens in the experiments. Leary and Alpert also went against policy by giving psychedelics to undergraduate students and did not select participants through random sampling. It was also ethically questionable that the researchers sometimes took hallucinogens along with the subjects they were studying. These concerns were printed in The Harvard Crimson, leading the university to halt the experiments. The Massachusetts Department of Public Health launched an investigation that was later dropped but the university eventually fired Leary and Alpert.

According to Andrew Weil, Leary (who held an untenured teaching appointment) was fired for missing his scheduled lectures, while Alpert (a tenure-track assistant professor) was dismissed for allegedly giving an undergraduate psilocybin in an off-campus apartment.{{sfnp|Weil|1963}}{{Cite web |last1=Russin |first1=Joseph M. |last2=Weil |first2=Andrew T. |date=January 24, 1973 |title=The Crimson Takes Leary, Alpert to Task |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1973/1/24/the-crimson-takes-leary-alpert-to/ |access-date=2022-04-07 |website=The Harvard Crimson}} Harvard President Nathan Pusey released a statement on May 27, 1963, reporting that Leary had left campus without authorization and "failed to keep his classroom appointments". His salary was terminated on April 30, 1963.New York Times, December 3, 1966, p. 25

Leary's psychedelic experimentation attracted the attention of three heirs to the Mellon fortune, siblings Peggy, Billy, and Tommy Hitchcock. In 1963, they gave Leary and his associates access to a sprawling 64-room mansion on an estate in Millbrook, New York, where they continued their psychedelic sessions. Peggy directed the International Federation for Internal Freedom (IFIF)'s New York branch, and Billy rented the estate to IFIF.{{sfnp|Lee|Shlain|1992|p=97}} Peggy persuaded her brothers to let Leary rent a room at the mansion.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/02/us/peggy-mellon-hitchcock-dead.html|title=Peggy Mellon Hitchcock, Who Helped Timothy Leary Turn On, Dies at 90|first=Penelope|last=Green|newspaper=The New York Times|date=May 2, 2024|accessdate=May 3, 2024}} Leary and Alpert set up a communal group with former Psilocybin Project members at the Hitchcock Estate (commonly known as "Millbrook"). One of the IFIF's founding board members, Paul Lee, a Harvard theologian, a participant at Marsh Chapel and a member of the Leary circle, said of the group's formation:

{{Blockquote|text=There was a big discussion about whether to go underground with it and make it a kind of secret initiation issue, or go public. But Leary was an Irish revolutionary and he wanted to shout it from the rooftops. So it went that way. It simply became a tsunami.{{Cite web |title=Timothy Leary Turns 100: America's LSD Messiah, Remembered By Those Who Knew Him |url=https://www.vice.com/en/article/timothy-leary-lsd-acid-history/ |access-date=2022-07-16 |website=Vice.com |date=October 23, 2020 |language=en}}}}

The IFIF was reconstituted as the Castalia Foundation after the intellectual colony in Hermann Hesse's 1943 novel The Glass Bead Game.Chevallier, Jim. [http://www.chezjim.com/ovum/castalia2.html "Tim Leary and Ovum - A Visit to Castalia with Ovum"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160604120540/http://www.chezjim.com/ovum/castalia2.html |date=June 4, 2016 }}, Chez Jim/Ovum, March 3, 2003{{sfnp|Lee|Shlain|1992|p=98}}{{cite web |url=http://wrldrels.org/profiles/LeagueForSpiritualDiscovery.htm |title=League for Spiritual Discovery |last=Lander |first=Devin |date=January 30, 2012 |work=World Religions and Spiritualities Project |access-date=September 24, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170118050115/http://wrldrels.org/profiles/LeagueForSpiritualDiscovery.htm |archive-date=January 18, 2017 |url-status=live }} The Castalia group's journal was the Psychedelic Review.{{sfnp|Lee|Shlain|1992|p=98}} The core group at Millbrook wanted to cultivate the divinity within each person and regularly joined LSD sessions facilitated by Leary.{{sfnp|Lee|Shlain|1992|p=98}} The Castalia Foundation also hosted non-drug weekend retreats for meditation, yoga, and group therapy.Ulrich, Jennifer. [https://www.nypl.org/blog/2012/06/04/transmissions-timothy-leary-papers-psychedelic-show "Transmissions from The Timothy Leary Papers: Evolution of the "Psychedelic" Show"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170924224659/https://www.nypl.org/blog/2012/06/04/transmissions-timothy-leary-papers-psychedelic-show |date=September 24, 2017 }}, New York Public Library, June 4, 2012 Leary later wrote:

We saw ourselves as anthropologists from the 21st century inhabiting a time module set somewhere in the dark ages of the 1960s. On this space colony we were attempting to create a new paganism and a new dedication to life as art.{{sfnp|Stevens|1983|p=208}}

Lucy Sante of The New York Times later described the Millbrook estate as:

the headquarters of Leary and gang for the better part of five years, a period filled with endless parties, epiphanies and breakdowns, emotional dramas of all sizes, and numerous raids and arrests, many of them on flimsy charges concocted by the local assistant district attorney, G. Gordon Liddy.{{cite news |last=Sante |first=Lucy |title=The Nutty Professor |series='Timothy Leary: A Biography,' by Robert Greenfield |work=The New York Times Book Review |date=June 26, 2006 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/books/review/25sante.html?pagewanted=all |access-date=July 12, 2008 |url-access=registration |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120509165407/http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/books/review/25sante.html?pagewanted=all |archive-date=May 9, 2012 |url-status=live }}

Others contest the characterization of Millbrook as a party house. In The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, Tom Wolfe portrays Leary as using psychedelics only for research, not recreation. When Ken Kesey's Merry Pranksters visited the estate, they received a frosty reception.{{sfnp|Wolfe|1989|p=99}} Leary had the flu and did not play host.{{sfnp|Higgs|2006|p=78}} After a private meeting with Kesey and Ken Babbs in his room, he promised to remain an ally in the years ahead.{{sfnp|Leary|1983|p=206}}

In 1964, Leary, Alpert, and Ralph Metzner coauthored The Psychedelic Experience, based on the Tibetan Book of the Dead. In it, they wrote:

A psychedelic experience is a journey to new realms of consciousness. The scope and content of the experience is limitless, but its characteristic features are the transcendence of verbal concepts, of spacetime dimensions, and of the ego or identity. Such experiences of enlarged consciousness can occur in a variety of ways: sensory deprivation, yoga exercises, disciplined meditation, religious or aesthetic ecstasies, or spontaneously. Most recently they have become available to anyone through the ingestion of psychedelic drugs such as LSD, psilocybin, mescaline, DMT, etc. Of course, the drug does not produce the transcendent experience. It merely acts as a chemical key—it opens the mind, frees the nervous system of its ordinary patterns and structures.{{sfnp|Leary|Alpert|Metzner|2008|p=11}}

File:Timothy Leary (1969 press photo).jpg

Leary married model Birgitte Caroline "Nena" von Schlebrügge in 1964 at Millbrook. Both Nena and her brother Bjorn were friends of the Hitchcocks. D. A. Pennebaker, also a Hitchcock friend, and cinematographer Nicholas Proferes documented the event in the short film You're Nobody Till Somebody Loves You.{{cite web| last = Pennebaker| first = D. A.| title = You're Nobody Till Somebody Loves You| publisher = Pennebaker Hegedus Films| url = https://phfilms.com/films/youre-nobody-till-somebody-loves-you/| access-date = February 3, 2018| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180204124446/https://phfilms.com/films/youre-nobody-till-somebody-loves-you/| archive-date = February 4, 2018| url-status = live}} Charles Mingus played piano. The marriage lasted a year before von Schlebrügge divorced Leary in 1965. She married Indo-Tibetan Buddhist scholar and ex-monk Robert Thurman in 1967 and gave birth to Ganden Thurman that same year. Actress Uma Thurman, her second child, was born in 1970.

Leary met Rosemary Woodruff in 1965 at a New York City art exhibit, and invited her to Millbrook.{{cite news| title = Timothy Leary's Wife Drops Out| newspaper = Village Voice| date = February 5, 2002| url = https://www.villagevoice.com/2002/02/05/timothy-learys-wife-drops-out/| access-date = September 27, 2017| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170928150149/https://www.villagevoice.com/2002/02/05/timothy-learys-wife-drops-out/| archive-date = September 28, 2017| url-status = live}}{{cite news | last = McLellan | first = Dennis | title = Rosemary W. Leary, 66; Ex-Wife of 1960s Psychedelic Guru | newspaper = Los Angeles Times | date = February 9, 2002 | url = https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2002-feb-09-me-leary9-story.html | access-date = September 27, 2017 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150503151636/http://articles.latimes.com/2002/feb/09/local/me-leary9 | archive-date = May 3, 2015 | url-status = live }}{{cite news | last = Sward | first = Susan | title = Rosemary Woodruff – LSD guru's ex-wife | newspaper = SF Gate | date = February 9, 2002 | url = http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Rosemary-Woodruff-LSD-guru-s-ex-wife-2876113.php | access-date = September 27, 2017 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170928103348/http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Rosemary-Woodruff-LSD-guru-s-ex-wife-2876113.php | archive-date = September 28, 2017 | url-status = live }} After moving in, she co-edited the manuscript for Leary's 1966 book Psychedelic Prayers: And Other Meditations with Ralph Metzner and Michael Horowitz.{{cite web | last = Hoffmann | first = Martina | title = Rosemary Woodruff Leary – Psychedelic Pioneer | publisher = MAPS Bulletin | date = 2002 | url = https://www.maps.org/news-letters/v12n2/12253hof.html | access-date = September 27, 2017 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170710001312/http://www.maps.org/news-letters/v12n2/12253hof.html | archive-date = July 10, 2017 | url-status = live }} The poems in the book were inspired by the Tao Te Ching, and meant to be used as an aid to LSD trips.Chevallier, Jim. [http://www.chezjim.com/ovum/castalia3.html#jean "Jean McCreedy and Psychedelic Prayers"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170928150008/http://www.chezjim.com/ovum/castalia3.html#jean |date=September 28, 2017 }}, Chez Jim/Ovum, March 3, 2003 Woodruff helped Leary prepare weekend multimedia workshops simulating the psychedelic experience, which were presented around the East Coast.

In September 1966, Leary said in a Playboy magazine interview that LSD could cure homosexuality. According to him, a lesbian became heterosexual after using the drug.Marwick, Arthur. The Sixties: Cultural Revolution in Britain, France, Italy, and the United States. Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 312.{{cite magazine| title = Playboy Interview: Timothy Leary| magazine = Playboy| date = 1966| url = https://archive.org/stream/playboylearyinte00playrich#page/4/mode/2up| access-date = May 8, 2016| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20171011095538/https://archive.org/stream/playboylearyinte00playrich#page/4/mode/2up| archive-date = October 11, 2017| url-status = live}} "...the fact is that LSD is a specific cure for homosexuality." Like most of the psychiatric field, he later decided that homosexuality was not an illness.{{efn-ua|{{harvnb|Leary|1982|p=256}}: "Since homosexuality has always been a part of every society, you have to assume that there is something necessary, correct and valid - genetically natural - about it."}}

By 1966, use of psychedelics by America's youth had reached such proportions that serious concern about the drugs and their effect on American culture was expressed in the national press and halls of government. In response to this concern, Senator Thomas Dodd convened Senate subcommittee hearings to try to better understand the drug-use phenomenon, eventually with the intention of "stamping out" such usage by criminalizing it. Leary was one of several expert witnesses called to testify at these hearings. In his testimony, Leary said, "the challenge of the psychedelic chemicals is not just how to control them, but how to use them."{{sfnp|Leary|1982|p=144}} He implored the subcommittee not to criminalize psychedelic drug use, which he felt would only serve to exponentially increase its usage among America's youth while removing the safeguards that controlled "set and setting" provided. When subcommittee member Ted Kennedy asked Leary whether LSD usage was "extremely dangerous", Leary replied, "Sir, the motorcar is dangerous if used improperly...Human stupidity and ignorance is the only danger human beings face in this world."{{sfnp|Leary|1982|p=151}} To conclude his testimony, Leary suggested that legislation be enacted that would require LSD users to be adults who were competently trained and licensed, so that such individuals could use LSD "for serious purposes, such as spiritual growth, pursuit of knowledge, or their own personal development."{{cite web| title = Legend of a Mind: Timothy Leary and LSD| publisher = The Pop History Dig| date = 2014| url = http://www.pophistorydig.com/topics/timothy-leary-1960s/| access-date = May 10, 2016| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160324040757/http://www.pophistorydig.com/topics/timothy-leary-1960s/| archive-date = March 24, 2016| url-status = live}} He argued that without such licensing, the U.S. would face "another era of prohibition."{{sfnp|Leary|1982|p=148}} Leary's testimony proved ineffective; on October 6, 1966, just months after the subcommittee hearings, LSD was banned in California, and by October 1968, it was banned nationwide by the Staggers-Dodd Bill.{{sfnp|Stevens|1983|p=431}}

In 1966, Folkways Records recorded Leary reading from his book The Psychedelic Experience, and released the album The Psychedelic Experience: Readings from the Book "The Psychedelic Experience. A Manual Based on the Tibetan...".{{cite web |url=http://www.folkways.si.edu/timothy-leary/readings-from-the-book-the-psychedelic-experience-a-manual-based-on-the-tibetan-book-of-the-dead/documentary-prose/album/smithsonian |title=Smithsonian Folkways - The Psychedelic Experience: Readings from the Book "The Psychedelic Experience. A Manual Based on the Tibetan..." - Timothy Leary |work=Folkways.si.edu |date=March 20, 2013 |access-date=May 29, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150529221650/http://www.folkways.si.edu/timothy-leary/readings-from-the-book-the-psychedelic-experience-a-manual-based-on-the-tibetan-book-of-the-dead/documentary-prose/album/smithsonian |archive-date=May 29, 2015 |url-status=live }}

On September 19, 1966, Leary reorganized the IFIF/Castalia Foundation under the name the League for Spiritual Discovery, a religion with LSD as its holy sacrament, in part as an unsuccessful attempt to maintain legal status for the use of LSD and other psychedelics for the religion's adherents, based on a "freedom of religion" argument. Leary incorporated the League for Spiritual Discovery as a religious organization in New York State, and its dogma was based on Leary's mantra: "drop out, turn on, tune in". (The Brotherhood of Eternal Love later considered Leary its spiritual leader, but it did not develop out of the IFIF.) Nicholas Sand, the clandestine chemist for the Brotherhood of Eternal Love, followed Leary to Millbrook and joined the League for Spiritual Discovery. Sand was designated the "alchemist" of the new religion.Grimesmay, William. [https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/12/us/nicholas-sand-chemist-who-sought-to-bring-lsd-to-the-world-dies-at-75.html?mcubz=0 "Chemist Who Sought to Bring LSD to the World, Dies at 75"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170912102731/https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/12/us/nicholas-sand-chemist-who-sought-to-bring-lsd-to-the-world-dies-at-75.html?mcubz=0 |date=September 12, 2017 }}, New York Times, May 12, 2017 At the end of 1966, Nina Graboi, a friend and colleague of Leary's who had spent time with him at Millbrook, became the director of the Center for the League of Spiritual Discovery in Greenwich Village.{{cite book|last=Forte|first=Robert|title=Timothy Leary: Outside Looking In|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NXqrOQAACAAJ|date=March 1, 1999|publisher=Park Press|page=79|isbn=978-0892817863|access-date=September 24, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160430042452/https://books.google.com/books/about/Timothy_Leary_Outside_Looking_In.html?id=NXqrOQAACAAJ|archive-date=April 30, 2016|url-status=live}}{{sfnp|Graboi|1991|p=207}} The Center opened in March 1967.{{sfnp|Graboi|1991|p=220}} Leary and Alpert gave free weekly talks there; other guest speakers included Ralph Metzner and Allen Ginsberg.{{sfnp|Graboi|1991|pp=222–224}} Leary's papers at the New York Public Library include complete records of the IFIF, the Castalia Foundation, and the League for Spiritual Discovery.Staton, Scott. [https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/turn-on-tune-in-drop-by-the-archives-timothy-leary-at-the-n-y-p-l "Turn On, Tune In, Drop by the Archives: Timothy Leary at the N.Y.P.L."] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170924224924/https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/turn-on-tune-in-drop-by-the-archives-timothy-leary-at-the-n-y-p-l |date=September 24, 2017 }}, The New Yorker, June 11, 2011

In late 1966 and early 1967, Leary toured college campuses presenting a multimedia performance called "The Death of the Mind", attempting an artistic replication of the LSD experience.{{sfnp|Graboi|1991|p=206}} He said that the League for Spiritual Discovery was limited to 360 members and was already at its membership limit, but encouraged others to form their own psychedelic religions. He published a pamphlet in 1967 called [http://www.leary.ru/download/leary/Timothy%20Leary%20-%20Start%20Your%20Own%20Religion.pdf Start Your Own Religion] to encourage people to do so.

File:Timothy-Leary-Los-Angeles-1989.jpg

Leary was invited to attend the January 14, 1967 Human Be-In by Michael Bowen, the primary organizer of the event,{{cite web| title = Human Be-In in San Francisco 1967| work = The Allen Ginsburg Project| date = July 9, 2011| url = http://ginsbergblog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/human-be-in-in-san-francisco-1967-asv8.html| access-date = May 27, 2016| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160630044906/http://ginsbergblog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/human-be-in-in-san-francisco-1967-asv8.html| archive-date = June 30, 2016| url-status = live}} a gathering of 30,000 hippies in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. In speaking to the group, Leary coined the famous phrase "Turn on, tune in, drop out". In a 1988 interview with Neil Strauss, he said the slogan was "given to him" by Marshall McLuhan when the two had lunch in New York City, adding, "Marshall was very much interested in ideas and marketing, and he started singing something like, 'Psychedelics hit the spot / Five hundred micrograms, that's a lot,' to the tune of [the well-known Pepsi 1950s singing commercial]. Then he started going, 'Tune in, turn on, and drop out.'"Strauss, Neil. Everyone Loves You When You're Dead: Journeys into Fame and Madness. New York: HarperCollins, 2011, 337-38 Though the more popular "turn on, tune in, drop out" became synonymous with Leary, his actual definition with the League for Spiritual Discovery was: "Drop Out—detach yourself from the external social drama which is as dehydrated and ersatz as TV. Turn On—find a sacrament which returns you to the temple of God, your own body. Go out of your mind. Get high. Tune In—be reborn. Drop back in to express it. Start a new sequence of behavior that reflects your vision."

Repeated FBI raids ended the Millbrook era. Leary told author and Prankster Paul Krassner of a 1966 raid by Liddy, "He was a government agent entering our bedroom at midnight. We had every right to shoot him. But I've never owned a weapon in my life. I have never had and never will have a gun around."{{sfnp|Krassner|2000|p=304}}

In November 1967, Leary engaged in a televised debate on drug use with MIT professor Jerry Lettvin.{{Citation |title=LSD: Lettvin vs Leary |date=November 30, 1967 |url=http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/7df2a7-lsd-lettvin-vs-leary |work=Open Vault from WGBH |access-date=December 21, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111027114834/http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/7df2a7-lsd-lettvin-vs-leary |archive-date=October 27, 2011 |url-status=live }}

At the end of 1967, Leary moved to Laguna Beach, California, and made many friends in Hollywood. "When he married his third wife, Rosemary Woodruff, in 1967, the event was directed by Ted Markland of Bonanza. All the guests were on acid."

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Leary formulated what became his eight-circuit model of consciousness in collaboration with writer Brian Barritt. The essay "The Seven Tongues of God" claimed that human brains have seven circuits producing seven levels of consciousness. This later became seven circuits in Leary's 1973 monograph Neurologic, which he wrote while he was in prison. The eight-circuit idea was not exhaustively formulated until the publication of Exo-Psychology by Leary and Robert Anton Wilson's Cosmic Trigger in 1977. Wilson contributed to the model after befriending Leary in the early 1970s, and used it as a framework for further exposition in his book Prometheus Rising, among other works.{{efn-ua|{{harvnb|Wilson|2000|p=6}}: "The eight-circuit model of consciousness in this book and much of its future-vision derive from the writings of Dr. Timothy Leary, whose letters and conversations have also influenced many other ideas herein."}}

Leary believed that the first four of these circuits ("the Larval Circuits" or "Terrestrial Circuits") are naturally accessed by most people at transition points in life such as puberty. The second four circuits ("the Stellar Circuits" or "Extra-Terrestrial Circuits"), Leary wrote, were "evolutionary offshoots" of the first four that would be triggered at transition points as humans evolve further. These circuits, according to Leary, would equip humans to live in space and expand consciousness for further scientific and social progress. Leary suggested that some people might trigger these circuits sooner through meditation, yoga, or psychedelic drugs specific to each circuit. He suggested that the feelings of floating and uninhibited motion sometimes experienced with marijuana demonstrated the purpose of the higher four circuits. The function of the fifth circuit was to accustom humans to life at a zero gravity environment.{{sfnp|Wilson|1991|pp=211–213}} Leary did not specify the location of the eight circuits in any brain structures, neural organization, or chemical pathways.{{sfnp|Leary|1977|p=11}} He wrote that a higher intelligence "located in interstellar nuclear-gravitational-quantum structures" gave humans the eight circuits. A "U.F.O. message" was encoded in human DNA.{{sfnp|Leary|1977|p=16}}

Many researchers believed that Leary provided little scientific evidence for his claims. Even before he began working on psychedelics, he was known as a theoretician rather than a data collector. His most ambitious pre-psychedelic work was Interpersonal Diagnosis Of Personality. The reviewer for The British Medical Journal, H. J. Eysenck, wrote that Leary created a confusing and overly broad rubric for testing psychiatric conditions. "Perhaps the worst failing of the book is the omission of any kind of proof for the validity and reliability of the diagnostic system," Eysenck wrote. "It is simply not enough to say" that the accuracy of the system "can be checked by the reader" in clinical practice.{{cite journal |last1=Eysenck |first1=H. J. |title=Review of Reviewed Work(s): Interpersonal Diagnosis Of Personality |journal=The British Medical Journal |date=December 21, 1957 |volume=2 |issue=5059 |page=1478|doi=10.1136/bmj.2.5059.1478-a |s2cid=220136866 |pmc=1962952 }} In 1965, Leary co-edited The Psychedelic Reader. Penn State psychology researcher Jerome E. Singer reviewed the book and singled out Leary as the worst offender in a work containing "melanges of hucksterism". In place of scientific data about the effects of LSD, Leary used metaphors about "galaxies spinning" faster than the speed of light and a cerebral cortex "turned on to a much higher voltage".{{cite journal |last1=Singer |first1=Jerome |title=Review: The Psychedelic Reader |journal=American Sociological Review |date=April 1966 |volume=31 |issue=2 |page=284|doi=10.2307/2090932 |jstor=2090932 }}

File:Leary-DEA.jpg agents Howard Safir and Don Strange arrest Leary in 1972.]]

Leary's first run-in with the law came on December 23, 1965, when he was arrested for marijuana possession.Harvard Crimson. [http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1966/1/3/leary-arrested-on-drug-charge-ptimothy/ "Leary Arrested On Drug Charge"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171215083857/http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1966/1/3/leary-arrested-on-drug-charge-ptimothy/ |date=December 15, 2017 }}, Harvard Crimson, January 3, 1966{{sfnp|Graboi|1991|pp=140–146}}{{sfnp|Leary|1983|pp=234-241}} On December 20, 1965, Leary took his two children, Jack and Susan, and his girlfriend Rosemary Woodruff to Mexico for an month-long vacation to rest and write an autobiography. Two days later they had crossed into Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, in the late afternoon and discovered that they would have to wait until morning for the appropriate visa for an extended stay. They decided to cross back into Texas to spend the night, and were on the US–Mexico bridge when Rosemary remembered that she had a small amount of marijuana in her possession. It was impossible to throw it out on the bridge, so Susan put it in her clothes. On their return from Mexico to the United States, a US Customs Service woman officer searched Susan and found a silver snuffbox with marijuana.{{Cite web |url=https://time.com/archive/6875062/drugs-the-silver-snuffbox/ |title=Drugs: The Silver Snuffbox |publisher=Time |date=1966-03-16 |access-date=2024-12-22 |archive-date=2024-12-22|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241222133146/https://time.com/archive/6875062/drugs-the-silver-snuffbox/ |url-status=live }}{{Cite web |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1966/3/12/leary-gets-30-years-on-marijuana |title=Leary Gets 30 Years On Marijuana Charge |author=Stephen D. Lerner |publisher=The Harvard Crimson |date=1966-03-16 |access-date=2024-12-22 |url-status=live |archive-date=2017-12-10|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171210162307/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1966/3/12/leary-gets-30-years-on-marijuana/ |quote="While the prosecution contended in the indictment that three ounces had been found, a government witness said that Miss Leary carried only 11 grams and the total amount found in the car was less than one-half ounce." }} After taking responsibility for the controlled substance, Leary was convicted of possession under the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 on March 11, 1966, sentenced to 30 years in prison, fined $30,000, and ordered to undergo psychiatric treatment. He appealed the case on the basis that the Marihuana Tax Act was unconstitutional, as it required a degree of self-incrimination in blatant violation of the Fifth Amendment.

On December 26, 1968, Leary was arrested again in Laguna Beach, California, this time for the possession of two marijuana "roaches". Leary alleged that they were planted by the arresting officer, but was convicted of the crime. On May 19, 1969, the Supreme Court concurred with Leary in Leary v. United States, declared the Marihuana Tax Act unconstitutional, and overturned his 1966 conviction.{{efn-ua|{{harvnb|Higgs|2006|p=99}}: "His lawyers took the appeal against the Laredo arrest all the way to the Supreme Court, and on May 19, 1969 succeeded in getting the antiquated marijuana tax law declared unconstitutional."}}

On that same day, Leary announced his candidacy for governor of California against the Republican incumbent, Ronald Reagan. His campaign slogan was "Come together, join the party." On June 1, 1969, Leary joined John Lennon and Yoko Ono at their Montreal bed-in, and Lennon subsequently wrote Leary a campaign song called "Come Together".{{cite web |url=http://oldies.about.com/od/thebeatlessongs/a/cometogether.htm |title=The Beatles - Come Together - History and Information from the Oldies Guide at About.com |publisher=Oldies.about.com |access-date=May 19, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140412224327/http://oldies.about.com/od/thebeatlessongs/a/cometogether.htm |archive-date=April 12, 2014 |url-status=live }}

On January 21, 1970, Leary received a ten-year sentence for his 1968 offense, with a further ten added later while in custody for a prior arrest in 1965, for a total of 20 years to be served consecutively. On his arrival in prison, he was given psychological tests used to assign inmates to appropriate work details. Having designed some of these tests himself (including the "Leary Interpersonal Behavior Inventory"), Leary answered them in such a way that he seemed to be a very conforming, conventional person with a great interest in forestry and gardening.{{cite web |url=http://www.researchpubs.com/books/prankexc2.shtml |title=RE/Search Publications – Pranks! – Timothy Leary |access-date=June 28, 2006 |url-status=bot: unknown |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050328092027/http://www.researchpubs.com/books/prankexc2.shtml |archive-date=March 28, 2005 }} As a result, he was assigned to work as a gardener in a lower-security prison from which he escaped in September 1970, saying that his nonviolent escape was a humorous prank and leaving a challenging note for the authorities to find after he was gone.{{sfnp|Wilson|1991|p={{page needed|date=July 2021}}}}

For a fee of $25,000, paid by The Brotherhood of Eternal Love, the Weathermen smuggled Leary out of prison in a pickup truck driven by Clayton Van Lydegraf.{{cite book |last=Rudd |first=Mark |author-link=Mark Rudd |title=Underground: My Life with SDS and the Weathermen |year=2009 |publisher=William Morrow and Company |location=New York City |isbn=978-0-06-147275-6 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/undergroundmylif00rudd/page/225 225–7] |url=https://archive.org/details/undergroundmylif00rudd/page/225 }} The truck met Leary after he had escaped over the prison wall by climbing along a telephone wire. The Weathermen then helped both Leary and Rosemary out of the U.S. (and eventually into Algeria).{{cite video |people=Brian Flanagan |year=2002 |title=The Weather Underground |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kg7N6lhjZeA | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150519210045/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kg7N6lhjZeA| archive-date=2015-05-19 | url-status=dead|publisher=The Free History Project |access-date=August 9, 2016}}{{cbignore}} He sought the patronage of Eldridge Cleaver for $10,000 and the remnants of the Black Panther Party's "government in exile" in Algeria, but after a short stay with them said that Cleaver had attempted to hold him and his wife hostage.{{sfnp|Leary|1983|pp=304-306}}{{cite news |last=Coleman |first=Kate |title=Acid Trips and Frozen Heads at San Francisco's Trippiest Party |url=https://www.thedailybeast.com/acid-trips-and-frozen-heads-at-san-franciscos-trippiest-party |website=Daily Beast |date=February 18, 2009 |access-date=February 16, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170910035850/http://www.thedailybeast.com/acid-trips-and-frozen-heads-at-san-franciscos-trippiest-party |archive-date=September 10, 2017 |url-status=live }} Cleaver had put Leary and his wife under "house arrest" due to exasperation with their socialite lifestyle.

In 1971, the couple fled to Switzerland, where they were sheltered and effectively imprisoned by a high-living arms dealer, Michel Hauchard, who claimed he had an "obligation as a gentleman to protect philosophers"; Hauchard intended to broker a surreptitious film deal, and forced Leary to assign his future earnings (which Leary eventually won back).{{cite web |last=Rein |first=Lisa |url=https://boingboing.net/2017/08/30/interview-with-timothy-leary-a.html |title=Interview with Timothy Leary Archivist Michael Horowitz |publisher=Boing Boing |date=August 30, 2017 |access-date=February 17, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180217141920/https://boingboing.net/2017/08/30/interview-with-timothy-leary-a.html |archive-date=February 17, 2018 |url-status=live }} In 1972, Nixon's attorney general, John Mitchell, persuaded the Swiss government to imprison Leary, which it did for a month, but refused to extradite him to the U.S.

Leary and Rosemary separated later that year; she traveled widely, then moved back to the U.S., where she lived as a fugitive until the 1990s. Shortly after his separation from Rosemary in 1972, Leary became involved with Swiss-born British socialite Joanna Harcourt-Smith, a stepdaughter of financier Árpád Plesch and ex-girlfriend of Hauchard. The couple married in a hotel under the influence of cocaine and LSD {{citation needed|date=January 2023}} two weeks after they were introduced, and Harcourt-Smith used his surname until their breakup in 1977. They traveled to Vienna, then Beirut, and finally ended up in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 1972; according to Lucy Sante, "Afghanistan had no extradition treaty with the United States, but this stricture did not apply to American airliners." American authorities used that interpretation of the law to interdict Leary. "Before Leary could deplane, he was arrested by an agent of the federal Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs." Leary asserted a different story on appeal before the California Court of Appeal for the Second District, namely:People v. Leary, [http://law.justia.com/cases/california/calapp3d/40/527.html 40 Cal.App.3d 527] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131224110651/http://law.justia.com/cases/california/calapp3d/40/527.html |date=December 24, 2013 }} (1974)

{{blockquote|He testified further that he had a valid passport in Kabul and that it was confiscated while he was in a line at the American Embassy in Kabul a few days prior to the day when he boarded the airplane; after his passport was confiscated, he was taken to "Central Police Headquarters"; he did not attempt to contact the American Embassy; the Kabul police held him in custody and took him to a "police hotel". The cousin of the King of Afghanistan came to see him and told him that it was a national holiday, that the King and the officials were out of Kabul, and that he (the cousin) would get a lawyer and see that Leary "had a hearing". On the morning the airplane left Kabul, officials of Afghanistan told him he was to leave Afghanistan. Leary replied he would not leave without a hearing and until he got his passport back; they said the Americans had his passport, and he was taken to the airplane.}}

Leary's bail was set at $5 million.{{sfnp|Greenfield|2006|pp=436-467}} The judge at his remand hearing said, "If he is allowed to travel freely, he will speak publicly and spread his ideas".and also reportedly declared, "He has preached the length and breadth of the land, and I am inclined to the view that he would pose a danger to the community if released." Jesse Walker (2006) "The Acid Guru's Long, Strange Trip" The American Conservative, November 6, 2006. Facing 95 years in prison, Leary hired criminal defense attorney Bruce Margolin. Leary mostly directed his own defense strategy, which proved unsuccessful: the jury convicted him after deliberating for less than two hours. Leary received five years for his prison escape, added to his original 10-year sentence. In 1973, he was sent to Folsom Prison in California, and put in solitary confinement.{{vague|reason= was he awaiting trial, found guilty, or confined for in-court behavior|date=March 2017}} Nick Gillespie, "[https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/14/AR2006061402139_pf.html Psychedelic, Man], {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170226074050/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/14/AR2006061402139_pf.html |date=February 26, 2017 }}" Washington Post, June 15, 2006 While in Folsom, he was placed in a cell next to Charles Manson's. They could not see each other, but they could talk together. In their discussions, Manson found it difficult to understand why Leary had given people LSD without trying to control them. At one point, Manson said to Leary, "They took you off the streets so that I could continue with your work."{{cite web|url=https://www.rawstory.com/2017/11/he-was-no-hippie-remembering-manson-prison-scientology-and-mind-control/|title=He was no hippie: Remembering Manson, prison, Scientology and mind control|date=November 26, 2017|website=Raw Story|access-date=November 27, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171126164330/https://www.rawstory.com/2017/11/he-was-no-hippie-remembering-manson-prison-scientology-and-mind-control/|archive-date=November 26, 2017|url-status=live}}

Leary became an FBI informant in order to shorten his prison sentence and entered the witness protection program upon his release in 1976.{{cite web |title=Timothy Leary was FBI informer |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/380815.stm |website=BBC World News |access-date=December 25, 2019}}{{cite magazine |last1=Menand |first1=Louis |title=Acid Redux |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/06/26/acid-redux |magazine=The New Yorker |date=June 18, 2006 |access-date=December 25, 2019}} He claimed that he feigned cooperation with the FBI investigation of Weathermen by providing information that they already had or that was of little consequence. The FBI gave him the code name "Charlie Thrush".{{sfnp|Lee|Shlain|1992|p=274}} In a 1974 news conference, Allen Ginsberg, Ram Dass, and Leary's 25-year-old son Jack denounced Leary, calling him a "cop informant", "liar", and "paranoid schizophrenic".{{cite news |last=Fosburgh |first=Lacey |title=Leary Scored as 'Cop Informant' By His Son and 2 Close Friends |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1974/09/19/archives/leary-scored-as-cop-informant-by-his-son-and-2-close-friends.html |newspaper=The New York Times |location=New York, NY |date=September 10, 1974 |access-date=February 15, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180216204642/http://www.nytimes.com/1974/09/19/archives/leary-scored-as-cop-informant-by-his-son-and-2-close-friends.html |archive-date=February 16, 2018 |url-status=live }} No prosecutions stemmed from his FBI reporting. In 1999, a letter from 22 "Friends of Timothy Leary" sought to soften impressions of the FBI episode. It was signed by authors such as Douglas Rushkoff, Ken Kesey, and Robert Anton Wilson. Susan Sarandon, Genesis P-Orridge and Leary's goddaughter Winona Ryder also signed.{{cite web |title=Open Letter from the Friends of Timothy Leary |url=http://www.konformist.com/1999/leary.htm |access-date=July 4, 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090207180329/http://www.konformist.com/1999/leary.htm |archive-date=February 7, 2009 |url-status=live }} The letter said that Leary had smuggled a message to the Weather Underground informing it "that he was considering making a deal with the FBI" and he then "waited for their approval". The reported reply was, "We understand."{{sfnp|Higgs|2006|p=273}} The letter writers did not provide confirmation that the Weather Underground okayed his cooperation with the FBI.

While in prison, Leary was sued by the parents of Vernon Powell Cox, who had jumped from a third-story window of a Berkeley apartment while under the influence of LSD. Cox had taken the drug after attending a lecture by Leary promoting LSD use. Leary was unable to be present due to his incarceration, and unable to arrange for legal representation; a default judgment was entered against him in the amount of $100,000.{{cite news |title=Notes on People |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1975/01/25/archives/notes-on-people-ford-to-name-judge-for-jersey.html |newspaper=The New York Times |location=New York, NY |date=January 25, 1975 |access-date=June 22, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171001165412/http://www.nytimes.com/1975/01/25/archives/notes-on-people-ford-to-name-judge-for-jersey.html |archive-date=October 1, 2017 |url-status=live }}

On April 21, 1976, Governor Jerry Brown released Leary from prison. After briefly relocating to Santa Fe, New Mexico, with Harcourt-Smith under the auspices of the United States Federal Witness Protection Program, the couple separated in early 1977.

Leary then moved to the Laurel Canyon neighborhood of Los Angeles, where he resided for the rest of his life. Unable to secure a conventional academic, research, or clinical appointment due to his reputation, he continued to publish books through the independent press while maintaining an upper middle class lifestyle by making paid appearances at colleges and nightclubs as a self-described "stand-up philosopher".{{sfnp|Higgs|2006|p=256}} In 1978, he married filmmaker Barbara Blum, also known as Barbara Chase, sister of actress Tanya Roberts. He adopted Blum's young son Zachary and raised him as his own. He also took on several godchildren, including Winona Ryder (the daughter of his archivist Michael Horowitz) and technologist Joi Ito.{{sfnp|Leary|Horowitz|Marshall|1994|pp=72-73}}The Godparent: Conversation with Winona Ryder{{cite web| title = It's All Happening Poscast 36, Joi Ito Interview| publisher = It's All Happening| date = 2016| url = http://itsallhappeningshow.com/index.php/2016/04/08/episode-36-joi-ito/| access-date = May 25, 2016| url-status = dead| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160513010012/http://itsallhappeningshow.com/index.php/2016/04/08/episode-36-joi-ito/| archive-date = May 13, 2016}} 'Joi was an integral part of my formative years...he was my dad's Godson....' - Zachary Leary.

Leary developed an improbable partnership with former Millbrook-era foe G. Gordon Liddy, the Watergate burglar and conservative radio talk-show host. They toured the lecture circuit in 1982 as ex-cons debating a range of issues, including gay rights, abortion, welfare and the environment. Leary generally espoused left-wing views, while Liddy generally espoused right-wing perspectives. The tour generated massive publicity and considerable funds for both. The 1983 documentary Return Engagement chronicled the tour and the release of Flashbacks, Leary's long-germinating memoir; biographer Robert Greenfield has since asserted that much of what Leary "reported as fact in Flashbacks is pure fantasy."{{sfnp|Greenfield|2006|p=186}}

On September 25, 1988, Leary held a fundraiser for Libertarian Party presidential candidate Ron Paul.[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vXq4eZQfOY?t=56m27s Timothy Leary and Robert Anton Wilson.] Los Angeles (1988)

:: "On the 25th of September we're going to have, in the room upstairs, a bone fide candidate for the President of the United States. The Libertarian Party, he's running, a man, for president... his name is Ron Paul. Many of you are probably closet Libertarians..." ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vXq4eZQfOY?t=56m27s @ 56:27])Caldwell, Christopher (July 22, 2007). [https://web.archive.org/web/20161116022424/http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/22/magazine/22Paul-t.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all "The Antiwar, Pro-Abortion, Anti-Drug-Enforcement-Administration, Anti-Medicare Candidacy of Dr. Ron Paul."] New York Times. Archived from [https://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/22/magazine/22Paul-t.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all the original.]Gillespie, Nick (December 9, 2011). [https://web.archive.org/web/20161225010951/https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-ron-paul/2011/12/07/gIQAu3vOiO_print.html "Five Myths About Ron Paul."] Washington Post. Archived from [https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-ron-paul/2011/12/07/gIQAu3vOiO_print.html the original.] Journalist Debra Saunders attended and wrote about her experience.Saunders, Debra. [https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2011/12/22/ron_paul_turn_on_tune_in_drop_out_112495.html "Ron Paul: Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out."] Real Clear Politics (December 22, 2011). Archived from [https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2011/12/22/ron_paul_turn_on_tune_in_drop_out_112495.html the original.]

Leary's extensive touring on the lecture circuit continued to ensure his family a comfortable lifestyle throughout the mid-1980s. He associated with a variety of cultural figures, including longtime interlocutors Robert Anton Wilson and Allen Ginsberg; science fiction writers William Gibson and Norman Spinrad; and rock musicians David Byrne and John Frusciante.{{citation needed|date=February 2018}} In addition, he appeared in Johnny Depp's and Gibby Haynes's 1994 film Stuff, which chronicled Frusciante's squalid living conditions at that time.{{cite web| title = Stuff| publisher = Invisible Movement| date = 2014| url = http://invisible-movement.net/release/stuff| access-date = May 25, 2016| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160927095532/http://invisible-movement.net/release/stuff| archive-date = September 27, 2016| url-status = live}}

Leary continued to take a wide array of drugs (ranging from serotonergic psychedelics to the nascent empathogen MDMA and alcohol and heroin){{Cite web|url=http://www.rawillumination.net/2017/08/more-on-timothy-leary-and-drinking.html|title=More on Timothy Leary and drinking}} in private, but consciously eschewed proselytizing substances in media appearances amid the escalation of the war on drugs throughout the presidency of Ronald Reagan. Instead, he served as a prominent advocate for space colonization and life extension. He expounded on the eight-circuit model of consciousness in books such as Info-Psychology: A Re-Vision of Exo-Psychology. He invented the acronym "SMI²LE" as a succinct summary of his pre-transhumanist agenda: SM (Space Migration) + I² (intelligence increase) + LE (Life extension).{{cite book |last1=Conners |first1=Peter |title=White Hand Society - The Psychedelic Partnership of Timothy Leary and Allen Ginsberg |publisher=City Lights Books |year=2010 |isbn=9780872865358 |page=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780872865358/page/258 258] |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780872865358/page/258 }}

File:Ginsberg-leary-lilly.jpg, Timothy Leary, and John C. Lilly in 1991]]

Leary's space colonization plan evolved over the years. Initially, 5,000 of Earth's most virile and intelligent individuals would be launched on a vessel (Starseed 1) equipped with luxurious amenities. This idea was inspired by musician Paul Kantner's 1970 concept album Blows Against The Empire, which was derived from Robert A. Heinlein's Lazarus Long series. While incarcerated in Folsom State Prison during the winter of 1975–76, he became enamored of Princeton University physicist Gerard K. O'Neill's plans to construct giant Eden-like High Orbital Mini-Earths, as documented in the Robert Anton Wilson lecture H.O.M.E.s on LaGrange, using raw materials from the Moon, orbital rock, and obsolete satellites.{{efn-ua|{{harvnb|Leary|1982|p=231}}: "O'Neill's proposal for mini-Earths was obviously the next step in human evolution..."}}

In the 1980s, Leary became fascinated by computers, the internet, and virtual reality. He proclaimed that "the PC is the LSD of the 1990s" and enjoined historically technophobic bohemians to "turn on, boot up, jack in."{{sfnp|Leary|Horowitz|Marshall|1994|p={{page needed|date=July 2021}}}}{{cite web |last=Ruthofer |first=Arno |title=Think for Yourself; Question Authority |year=1997 |url=http://www.geocities.com/arno_3/menu.html |access-date=February 2, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071112225454/http://www.geocities.com/arno_3/menu.html |archive-date=November 12, 2007}} He became a promoter of virtual reality systems,{{cite journal |last=Elmer-Dewitt/Dallas |first=Philip |title=Technology: (Mis)Adventures In Cyberspace |journal=Time Magazine |date=September 3, 1990 |url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,971015-2,00.html |access-date=December 23, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131224134636/http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,971015-2,00.html |archive-date=December 24, 2013 |url-status=live }} and sometimes demonstrated a prototype of the Mattel Power Glove as part of his lectures (as in From Psychedelics to Cybernetics). He befriended a number of notable people in the field, such as Jaron Lanier{{cite book| last1 = Forte | first1 = Robert| publisher = Park Street Press| date = 1999| isbn =0892817860 | title = Timothy Leary - Outside Looking In | pages = 129141}} and Brenda Laurel, a pioneer in virtual environments and human–computer interaction. During the evanescent heyday of the cyberdelic subculture, he served as a consultant to Billy Idol in the production of the 1993 album Cyberpunk.{{cite news |last=Saunders |first=Michael |author-link=Michael Saunders |title=Billy Idol turns 'Cyberpunk' on new CD |url=http://jlrinteractive.com/press/billy-idol-turns-cyberpunk-on-new-cd/ |work=The Boston Globe |publisher=P. Steven Ainsley |location=135 Morrissey Boulevard. Boston, Massachusetts, United States |date=May 19, 1993 |access-date=May 29, 2015 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150530004709/http://jlrinteractive.com/press/billy-idol-turns-cyberpunk-on-new-cd/ |archive-date=May 30, 2015 }}

In January 1989, his daughter Susan, then 41, was arrested in Los Angeles for non-fatally shooting her boyfriend in the head as he slept in December 1988.{{Cite web |date=1990-01-09 |title=Timothy Leary's daughter charged with attempted murder. |url=https://www.upi.com/Archives/1989/01/09/Timothy-Learys-daughter-charged-with-attempted-murder/3211600325200/ |access-date=2024-12-22 |website=UPI |language=en-US}} She was ruled mentally unfit to stand trial for attempted murder on two occasions.{{cite magazine |title=Timothy Leary 1920-1996 |first=Mikal |last=Gilmore |magazine=Rolling Stone |date=July 11–25, 1996}} After years of mental instability, she died by suicide in jail in September 1990.{{cite news |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-09-06-mn-1266-story.html |title=Timothy Leary Daughter Hangs Self in Cell, Dies in Hospital |date=September 6, 1990 |work=Los Angeles Times |access-date=October 6, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141006100725/http://articles.latimes.com/1990-09-06/news/mn-1266_1_timothy-leary |archive-date=October 6, 2014 |url-status=live }}

Although he considered her the "great love of his life", Leary and Barbara divorced in 1992; according to friend and collaborator John Perry Barlow, "Tim basically gave me permission to be her lover. He couldn't be for her what she needed sexually, so it made more sense for him to anoint someone to do that for him."{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nrmWDwAAQBAJ&q=Tim%20basically%20gave%20me%20permission|isbn=9781524760199|title=Mother American Night: My Life in Crazy Times|date=May 28, 2019|publisher=Crown Archetype}} Thereafter, he ensconced himself in a diverse circle of prominent figures, including Johnny Depp, Susan Sarandon, Dan Aykroyd, Zach Leary, author Douglas Rushkoff, and Spin magazine publisher Bob Guccione, Jr.{{sfnp|Greenfield|2006|p={{page needed|date=July 2021}}}} Despite declining health, he maintained a regular schedule of public appearances through 1994.{{efn-ua|{{harvnb|Higgs|2006|p=268}}: "The last 17 months of Tim's life were a flurry of activity. There were records to be made, documentaries to film… and countless personal appearances. A stream of press flocked to his door."}} Reflecting a modicum of political rehabilitation after several failed attempts to adapt Flashbacks as a film or television miniseries, he was the subject of a symposium of the American Psychological Association that year.{{cite book| last1 = Forte | first1 = Robert| publisher = Park Street Press| date = 1999| isbn =0892817860 | title = Timothy Leary – Outside Looking In | page =8 }}

From 1989 on, Leary began to reestablish his connection to unconventional religious movements with an interest in altered states of consciousness. In 1989, he appeared with Robert Anton Wilson in a dialog called The Inner Frontier for the Association for Consciousness Exploration, a Cleveland-based group that had been responsible for his first Cleveland appearance in 1979. After that, he appeared at the Starwood Festival, a major Neo-Pagan event run by ACE in 1992 and 1993.{{Cite web |url=http://www.rosencomet.com/starwood/CircleofAsh/CircleofAsh.htm |title=The Cleveland Free Times :: Archives :: Circle Of Ash |access-date=October 9, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111116082713/http://www.rosencomet.com/starwood/CircleofAsh/CircleofAsh.htm |archive-date=November 16, 2011 |url-status=live }} His planned 1994 WinterStar Symposium appearance was canceled due to his declining health. In 1992, in front of hundreds of Neo-Pagans, Leary declared, "I've always considered myself a Pagan."Quote from CD: Timothy Leary Live at Starwood He also collaborated with Eric Gullichsen on Load and Run High-tech Paganism: Digital Polytheism.{{cite web |url=http://deoxy.org/l_digpol.htm |title=Digital Polytheism |publisher=Deoxy.org |access-date=May 19, 2014 |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140519225833/http://deoxy.org/l_digpol.htm |archive-date=May 19, 2014 }} Shortly before his death on May 31, 1996, he recorded the album Right to Fly with Simon Stokes, which was released in July 1996.{{cite web| title = Timothy Leary / Simon Stokes – Right To Fly| publisher = Discogs| date = 1996| url = https://www.discogs.com/Timothy-Leary-Simon-Stokes-Right-To-Fly/master/349850| access-date = May 25, 2016| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20161027134526/https://www.discogs.com/Timothy-Leary-Simon-Stokes-Right-To-Fly/master/349850| archive-date = October 27, 2016| url-status = live}}

File:Timothy Leary with Ram Dass (Richard Alpert).jpg

In January 1995, Leary was diagnosed with inoperable prostate cancer.{{sfnp|Higgs|2006|p=258}} He then notified Ram Dass and other old friends and began the process of directed dying, which he termed "designer dying".{{cite news |last=Mansnerus |first=Laura |title=Conversations/Timothy Leary; At Death's Door, the Message Is Tune In, Turn On, Drop In |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/26/weekinreview/conversations-timothy-leary-death-s-door-message-tune-turn-drop.html |newspaper=The New York Times |date=November 26, 1995 |access-date=February 21, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180216204803/http://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/26/weekinreview/conversations-timothy-leary-death-s-door-message-tune-turn-drop.html |archive-date=February 16, 2018 |url-status=live }} Leary did not reveal the condition to the press at that time, but did so after Jerry Garcia's death in August. Leary and Ram Dass reunited before Leary's death in May 1996, as seen in the documentary film Dying to Know: Ram Dass & Timothy Leary.{{cite web |title=Dying to Know: Ram Dass & Timothy Leary |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2516424/?ref_=ttpl_pl_tt |website=IMDb |date = August 26, 2016|access-date=February 16, 2018}}{{cite news |last=Turan |first=Kenneth |title='Dying to Know: Ram Dass & Timothy Leary' documents two men and their trip of a lifetime |url=https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-dying-to-know-review-20160613-snap-story.html |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |date=June 16, 2016 |access-date=February 17, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180217202934/http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-dying-to-know-review-20160613-snap-story.html |archive-date=February 17, 2018 |url-status=live }}

Leary's last book was Chaos & Cyber Culture, published in 1994. In it he wrote: "The time has come to talk cheerfully and joke sassily about personal responsibility for managing the dying process." His book Design for Dying, which tried to give a new perspective on death and dying, was published posthumously.{{cite web |last=Mitchell |first=Chris |title=Timothy Leary: Design For Dying |url=https://www.spikemagazine.com/1097dead.php |publisher=Spike Magazine |date=October 1, 1997 |access-date=February 16, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141209112236/http://www.spikemagazine.com/1097dead.php |archive-date=December 9, 2014 |url-status=live }} Leary wrote about his belief that death is "a merging with the entire life process".

His website team, led by Chris Graves, updated his website on a daily basis as a proto-blog. The website noted his daily intake of various illicit and legal chemical substances, with a predilection for nitrous oxide, LSD and other psychedelic drugs.{{cite web |last1=Rothstein |first1=Edward |title=Tuning In to Timothy Leary |url=https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/techcol/0429techcol.html |website=www.archives.nytimes.com |access-date=January 23, 2021 |date=April 29, 1996}} He was also noted for his trademark "Leary Biscuit", a cannabis edible consisting of a snack cracker with cheese and a small marijuana bud, briefly microwaved.{{cite news |last1=Lei |first1=Richard |title=Online, In Pain, The Apostle of Acid Prepares To Truly Drop Out |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1996/03/10/on-line-in-pain-the-apostle-of-acid-prepares-to-truly-drop-out/75a61716-d7c6-4431-b6a7-38654a6b1e31/ |newspaper=Washington Post|access-date=January 23, 2021 |date=March 10, 1996}} At his request, his sterile house was redecorated by the staff with an array of surreal ornamentation.{{citation needed|date=February 2018}} In his final months, thousands of visitors, well-wishers and old friends visited him in his California home.{{citation needed|date=February 2018}} Until his last weeks, he gave many interviews discussing his new philosophy of embracing death.

File:EtoylearyJI1.jpg agents with mortal remains of Timothy Leary in 2007]]

Leary was reportedly excited for a number of years by the possibility of freezing his body in cryonic suspension, and he announced in September 1988 that he had signed up with Alcor for such treatment after having appeared at Alcor's grand opening the year before.{{cite news |last=Darwin |first=Mike |title=Dr. Leary Joins Up... |date=September 1988 |publisher=Alcor Life Extension Foundation |url=http://www.alcor.org/cryonics/cryonics8809.txt |access-date=August 24, 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100520015759/http://www.alcor.org/cryonics/cryonics8809.txt |archive-date=May 20, 2010 |url-status=live }} He did not believe he would be resurrected in the future, but did believe that cryonics had important possibilities, even though he thought it had only "one chance in a thousand". He called it his "duty as a futurist", helped publicize the process and hoped that it would work for his children and grandchildren if not for him, although he said that he was "lighthearted" about it. He was connected with two cryonic organizations—first Alcor and then CryoCare—one of which delivered a cryonic tank to his house in the months before his death. Leary initially announced that he would freeze his entire body, but due to lack of funds decided to freeze his head only. Three weeks before his death, Leary changed his mind again and generally refused cryopreservation from both Alcor and CryoCare.{{cite web |last=Platt |first= Charles |title=The Strange Case of Timothy Leary |publisher=CryoCare Report |date=July 1996 |url=http://www.cryocare.org/index.cgi?subdir=&url=ccrpt8.html#LEARY|access-date=2024-11-28 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240221110558/http://www.cryocare.org/index.cgi?subdir=&url=ccrpt8.html#LEARY |archive-date=2024-02-21 |url-status=live}} He requested that his body be cremated, with his ashes scattered in space.

Leary died aged 75 on May 31, 1996. His death was videotaped for posterity at his request by Denis Berry and Joey Cavella, capturing his final words. Berry was the trustee of Leary's archives, and Cavella had filmed Leary during his later years. According to his son Zachary, during his final moments, he clenched his fist and said: "Why?", then, unclenching his fist, said: "Why not?". He uttered the phrase repeatedly, in different intonations, and died soon after. His last word, according to Zach, was "beautiful".{{sfnp|Leary|n.d.}}

The film Timothy Leary's Dead (1996) contains a simulated sequence in which he allows his bodily functions to be suspended for the purposes of cryonic preservation. His head is removed and placed on ice. The film ends with a sequence showing the creation of the artificial head used in the film.

Seven grams (¼ oz) of Leary's ashes were arranged by his friend at Celestis to be buried in space aboard a rocket carrying the remains of 23 others, including Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, space colonization advocate Gerard O'Neill and German-American rocket engineer Krafft Ehricke. A Pegasus rocket containing their remains was launched on April 21, 1997, and remained in orbit for six years until it burned up in the atmosphere.{{cite news |last=Simons |first=Marlise |title=A Final Turn-On Lifts Timothy Leary Off |date=April 22, 1997 |newspaper=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1997/04/22/world/a-final-turn-on-lifts-timothy-leary-off.html |access-date=May 27, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160630021355/http://www.nytimes.com/1997/04/22/world/a-final-turn-on-lifts-timothy-leary-off.html |archive-date=June 30, 2016 |url-status=live }}

Leary's ashes were given to close friends and family. In 2015, Susan Sarandon brought some of his ashes to the Burning Man festival in Black Rock City, Nevada, and put them into an art installation there. The ashes were burned along with the installation on September 6, 2015.{{cite magazine |last=Kimble |first=Lindsay |title=Susan Sarandon Takes the Ashes of Timothy Leary to Burning Man |url=http://www.people.com/article/susan-sarandon-brings-timothy-leary-ashes-burning-man |date=September 7, 2015 |magazine=People |access-date=September 10, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150910020713/http://www.people.com/article/susan-sarandon-brings-timothy-leary-ashes-burning-man |archive-date=September 10, 2015 |url-status=live }}

File:Timothy Leary and Rosemary Woodruff.jpg

Leary was legally married five times, sired three biological children and adopted a fourth child. He also regarded Joanna Harcourt-Smith (his domestic partner from 1972 to 1977) as his common-law wife for the duration of their relationship. His first wife, Marianne Busch, died by suicide.{{cite news | title=LSD ADVOCATE, '60S ICON TIMOTHY LEARY DIES AT 75 | newspaper=Washington Post | date=1996-06-01 | url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1996/06/01/lsd-advocate-60s-icon-timothy-leary-dies-at-75/d853cd36-5bf3-4fbd-8e14-20f9cd3e01e4/ | access-date=2022-03-11}}

• 1945–1955 Marianne Busch (1921–1955)
• daughter Susan{{Cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-09-07-me-694-story.html |title=Leary's Daughter Dies After Hanging: Death: She was in custody after twice being judged mentally unfit to stand trial on charges of shooting her boyfriend last year |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |date=September 7, 1990 |access-date=September 25, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190925194033/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-09-07-me-694-story.html |archive-date=September 25, 2019 |url-status=live}} (1947–1990)
• son Jack{{Cite web|url=https://observer.com/2006/06/a-long-strange-trip-learys-circus-chronicled/ |title=A Long, Strange Trip: Leary's Circus Chronicled |website=The New York Observer |date=June 19, 2006 |access-date=September 25, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190925194030/https://observer.com/2006/06/a-long-strange-trip-learys-circus-chronicled/ |archive-date=September 25, 2019 |url-status=live }} (1949–)
• 1956–1957 Mary Cioppa{{Cite web |url=https://gw.geneanet.org/tdowling?lang=en&n=della+cioppa&oc=0&p=mary |title=Family tree of Mary Della Cioppa |website=Geneanet}} (1920–1996)
• 1964–1965 Nena von Schlebrügge (1941–)
• 1967–1976 (separated 1972) Rosemary Woodruff{{Cite web|url=https://maps.org/news-letters/v12n2/12253hof.html |title=Rosemary Woodruff Leary -- Psychedelic Pioneer By Martina Hoffmann with Friends of Rosemary Woodruff Leary |access-date=September 25, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170710001312/http://www.maps.org/news-letters/v12n2/12253hof.html |archive-date=July 10, 2017 |url-status=live}} (1935–2002){{cite news|last1=Martin |first1=Douglas |title=Rosemary Woodruff, 66, Wife And Fellow Fugitive of Leary |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/16/us/rosemary-woodruff-66-wife-and-fellow-fugitive-of-leary.html |access-date=November 16, 2020 |work=The New York Times |date=February 16, 2002}}
• 1972–1977 Joanna Harcourt-Smith (domestic partner) (1946–2020)[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries/2020/11/06/joanna-harcourt-smith-socialite-author-went-run-timothy-leary/ "Joanna Harcourt-Smith, socialite and author who went on the run with Timothy Leary – obituary"]. The Telegraph. November 6, 2020.
• son Marlon Gobel (1976–)
• 1978–1992 Barbara Blum Chase (1946–){{Cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0153690/ |title=Barbara Chase |website=IMDb |access-date=September 25, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190410000957/https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0153690/ |archive-date=April 10, 2019 |url-status=live}}{{Cite web |url=https://fycharliesangels.tumblr.com/post/28604402094/barbara-leigh-blum-chase-leary-was-the-fifth-wife |title=FY! Charlie's Angels |access-date=September 25, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190925194350/https://fycharliesangels.tumblr.com/post/28604402094/barbara-leigh-blum-chase-leary-was-the-fifth-wife |archive-date=September 25, 2019 |url-status=live}}{{Cite web |url=https://gw.geneanet.org/wikifrat?lang=en&n=blum&oc=0&p=barbara |title=Family tree of Barbara BLUM |website=Geneanet}}
• son Zach (1973–) (adopted){{sfnp|Leary|2019}}

Leary was an early influence on applying game theory to psychology, having introduced the concept to the International Association of Applied Psychology in 1961 at its annual conference in Copenhagen.{{cite book| last1 = Solomon | first1 = David| title = LSD: The Consciousness-Expanding Drug| publisher = G. P. Putnam's Sons| pages = 97–113| date = 1964| isbn = 129929507X }}{{cite book |last1=Conners |first1=Peter |title=White Hand Society - The Psychedelic Partnership of Timothy Leary and Allen Ginsberg |publisher=City Lights Books |year=2010 |isbn=9780872865358 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780872865358/page/113 113–117] |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780872865358/page/113 }}{{sfnp|Leary|1982|p=45}}{{efn-ua|{{harvnb|Leary|1983|p=196}}: "Psychiatrist Eric Berne popularised my concepts of transactional analysis and game theory in Games People Play, making accessible to the public concepts of behaviour-change that had formerly been reserved to the psychological priesthood."}} He was also an early influence on transactional analysis.{{cite news|title=Obituary: Timothy Leary|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/obituary-timothy-leary-1334884.html|author=Morton Schatzman|date=June 1, 1996|work=The Independent|access-date=August 27, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150925115021/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/obituary-timothy-leary-1334884.html|archive-date=September 25, 2015|url-status=live}}{{cite news|title=Libertarian Psychology|url=https://mises.org/library/libertarian-psychology|author=Jeff Riggenbach|date=July 1, 2011|work=Mises Daily|access-date=August 27, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150927132024/https://mises.org/library/libertarian-psychology|archive-date=September 27, 2015|url-status=live}} His concept of the four life scripts, dating to 1951,{{sfnp|Leary|Freeman|Ossorio|Coffey|1951}} became an influence on transactional analysis by the late 1960s, popularized by Thomas Harris in his book, I'm OK, You're OK.{{cite book| last1 = Harris| first1 = Thomas| title = I'm Ok - You're Ok| publisher = Pan Books| date = 1973| isbn = 0-330-23543-5| url = https://archive.org/details/imokyoureok00thom}}

Many consider Leary one of the most prominent figures of the counterculture of the 1960s, and since those times he has remained influential on pop culture, literature, television, film and, especially, music.

Leary coined the influential term reality tunnel, a kind of representative realism. The theory states that, with a subconscious set of mental filters formed from their beliefs and experiences, everyone interprets the same world differently, hence "Truth is in the eye of the beholder."{{efn-ua|{{harvnb|Higgs|2006|p=282}}: "[Robert Anton] Wilson is often credited with creating the phrase 'reality tunnels', but when asked about it, he is quick to give Leary the credit."}}

His ideas influenced the work of his friend Robert Anton Wilson.{{cite news |last=Lattin |first=Don |title=The War on Drugs Halted Research Into the Potential Benefits of Psychedelics - Now it's finally starting up again. |url=https://slate.com/technology/2017/01/the-war-on-drugs-halted-research-into-the-potential-benefits-of-psychedelics.html |date=January 3, 2017 |work=Slate |access-date=January 27, 2020 }} This influence went both ways, with Leary taking just as much from Wilson. Wilson's 1983 book Prometheus Rising was an in-depth, highly detailed and inclusive work documenting Leary's eight-circuit model of consciousness. Although the theory originated in discussions between Leary and a Hindu holy man at Millbrook, Wilson was one of its most ardent proponents and introduced it to a mainstream audience in 1977's bestselling Cosmic Trigger. In 1989, they appeared together on stage in a dialog called The Inner FrontierLesie, Michele (1989) High Priest of LSD To Drop In. The Cleveland Plain Dealer hosted by the Association for Consciousness Exploration,Local Group Hosts Dr. Timothy Leary by Will Allison (The Observer September 29, 1989) the same group that had hosted Leary's first Cleveland appearance in 1979.Two 60s Cult Heroes, on the Eve of the 80s by James Neff (Cleveland Plain Dealer October 30, 1979)Timothy Leary: An LSD Cowboy Turns Cosmic Comic by Frank Kuznik. Cleveland magazine, November 1979.

World religion scholar Huston Smith was "turned on" by Leary after being introduced to him by Aldous Huxley in the early 1960s. Smith interpreted the experience as deeply religious, and described it in detailed religious terms in his book Cleansing of the Doors of Perception.{{sfnp|Smith|2001|p={{page needed|date=July 2021}}}} Smith asked Leary whether he knew the power and danger of what he was conducting research with. In Mother Jones Magazine, 1997, Smith commented:

First, I have to say that during the three years I was involved with that Harvard study, LSD was not only legal but respectable. Before Tim went on his unfortunate careening course, it was a legitimate research project. Though I did find evidence that, when recounted, the experiences of the Harvard group and those of mystics were impossible to tell apart—descriptively indistinguishable—that's not the last word. There is still a question about the truth of the disclosure. Was the drug-induced mystical experience just an emotional jag that messed up some neural connections? Or was it a genuine disclosure, an epiphany?{{cite magazine |author=Marilyn Berlin Snell |url=http://www.motherjones.com/politics/1997/11/world-religion-according-huston-smith?page=1 |title=The World of Religion According to Huston Smith |magazine=Mother Jones |access-date=May 19, 2014 |url-status=bot: unknown |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131208111520/http://www.motherjones.com/politics/1997/11/world-religion-according-huston-smith?page=1 |archive-date=December 8, 2013 }}

File:John Lennon performing Give Peace a Chance 1969.jpg"]]

In the 1968 Dragnet episode "The Big Prophet", Liam Sullivan played Brother William Bentley, leader of the Temple of the Expanded Mind, a thinly fictionalized Leary. Bentley held forth for the entire half-hour on the rights of the individual and the benefits of LSD and marijuana, while Joe Friday argued the contrary.{{Cite web|url=http://www.tv.com/shows/dragnet/the-big-prophet-142783/|title=Dragnet: The Big Prophet|website=TV.com|access-date=February 3, 2020|archive-date=September 28, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180928044103/http://www.tv.com/shows/dragnet/the-big-prophet-142783/|url-status=dead}}

The 1979 musical Hair and the 1967 stage performance it is based on make multiple references to Leary.{{Cite web |url=https://genius.com/Galt-macdermot-the-flesh-failures-eyes-look-your-last-let-the-sunshine-in-medley-lyrics |title=Galt MacDermot (Ft. Caissie Levy, Gavin Creel & Sasha Allen) – the Flesh Failures / Eyes Look Your Last / Let the Sunshine in (Medley) |access-date=May 9, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190717231654/https://genius.com/Galt-macdermot-the-flesh-failures-eyes-look-your-last-let-the-sunshine-in-medley-lyrics |archive-date=July 17, 2019 |url-status=live }}

Leary appears in Cheech & Chong's 1981 film Nice Dreams, featured in a scene in which he gives Cheech "the key to the universe".{{cite web |title=Nice Dreams (1981) |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082163/quotes/qt5101248 |website=IMDb |access-date=December 30, 2020}}

In 1994, Leary appeared as himself in the Space Ghost Coast to Coast episode "Elevator",{{cite web |title=Space Ghost Coast to Coast (TV Series) Elevator (1994) |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0706051/fullcredits?ref_=tt_ov_st_sm |website=IMDb}} and also appeared in an episode of The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. as the character Dr. Milo.{{Citation|title="The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr." Stagecoach (TV Episode 1994) - IMDb|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0505814/characters/nm0495276|access-date=June 23, 2021}}

In 1996, months before his death, Leary appeared in the feminist science fiction feature film Conceiving Ada.Mark Savlov, [https://www.austinchronicle.com/events/film/1999-06-11/139701/ "Conceiving Ada" review], 'The Austin Chronicle', June 11, 1999. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190114044440/https://www.austinchronicle.com/events/film/1999-06-11/139701/ |date=January 14, 2019 }}.

The 1998 movie Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, adapted from Hunter S. Thompson's 1971 novel, portrays heavy psychedelic drug use and mentions Leary when the protagonist ponders the meaning of the acid wave of the 1960s.{{cite web |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120669/trivia?tab=qt&item=qt0471605 |title=Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) : Quotes |publisher=IMDb.com |access-date=May 19, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130623193336/http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120669/trivia?tab=qt&item=qt0471605 |archive-date=June 23, 2013 |url-status=live }}

A 2017 episode of Urban Myths depicts a meeting between Leary and Cary Grant, whom he introduces to LSD.{{cite news |last1=McEwan |first1=Cameron K. |title=‘Urban Myths’ Recap 1×04: ‘When Cary Grant Introduced Timothy Leary To LSD’ |url=https://observer.com/2017/02/urban-myths-recap-1x04-when-cary-grant-introduced-timothy-leary-to-lsd/ |work=The Observer |date=2 October 2017}}

The Psychedelic Experience (1964) was the inspiration for John Lennon's song "Tomorrow Never Knows", on The Beatles' album Revolver (1966).

The Moody Blues recorded two songs about Leary. "Legend of a Mind", written and sung by Ray Thomas on their album In Search of the Lost Chord (1968), begins: "Timothy Leary's dead. No, no, no, no, he's outside looking in". The second was "When You're a Free Man" on the Seventh Sojourn album.{{sfnp|Higgs|2006|p=173}}

Leary recruited Lennon to write a theme song for his California gubernatorial campaign against Ronald Reagan (which was interrupted by Leary's prison sentence for cannabis possession), inspiring Lennon to come up with "Come Together" (1969), based on Leary's campaign theme and catchphrase.{{cite book |last=Lattin |first=Don |title=The Harvard Psychedelic Club: How Timothy Leary, Ram Dass, Huston Smith, and Andrew Weil Killed the Fifties and Ushered in a New Age for America |publisher=HarperCollins |year=2011 |page=13 |isbn=978-0-06-165594-4}}{{cite web |url=http://www.beatlesbible.com/songs/come-together/ |title=Come Together |date=March 15, 2008 |publisher=The Beatles Bible |access-date=May 19, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140726210303/http://www.beatlesbible.com/songs/come-together/ |archive-date=July 26, 2014 |url-status=live }}

Leary was present and sang back-up vocals when Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, recorded "Give Peace a Chance" (1969) during their bed-in in Montreal and is mentioned in the lyrics of the song.{{cite book |last=Perlstein |first=Rick |title=Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America |publisher=Simon and Schuster |year=2008 |page=386 |isbn=978-0-7432-4302-5}}

The Who's 1970 single "The Seeker" mentions Leary in a sequence where the song's protagonist claims that Leary (among other high-profile people) was unable to help them with their search for answers.{{cite magazine |url=http://www.americansongwriter.com/2012/09/the-who-the-seeker/ |title=The Who, "The Seeker" |magazine=American Songwriter |date=September 17, 2012 |access-date=July 23, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150723123727/http://www.americansongwriter.com/2012/09/the-who-the-seeker/ |archive-date=July 23, 2015 |url-status=live }}

While in exile in Switzerland, Leary and British writer Brian Barritt collaborated with the German band Ash Ra Tempel and recorded the album Seven Up (1973).{{sfnp|Higgs|2006|pp=182–185}} He is credited as a songwriter, and his lyrics and vocals can be heard throughout the album.Article, "It's Frothy Man", Mojo, issue #113, April 2003. Commenting on the work of his friend H. R. Giger, a surrealist artist from Switzerland who won an Academy Award for his work on the film Alien, Leary noted:

{{blockquote|Giger's work disturbs us, spooks us, because of its enormous evolutionary time span. It shows us, all too clearly, where we come from and where we are going.|author=Timothy Leary |source=The New York Times{{cite news |last=Martin |first=Douglas |title=H. R. Giger, Swiss Artist, Dies at 74; His Vision Gave Life to 'Alien' Creature |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/14/arts/h-r-giger-swiss-artist-dies-at-74-his-vision-gave-life-to-alien-creature.html |date=May 14, 2014 |work=The New York Times |access-date=May 14, 2014 |url-access=registration |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170921095733/https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/14/arts/h-r-giger-swiss-artist-dies-at-74-his-vision-gave-life-to-alien-creature.html |archive-date=September 21, 2017 |url-status=live }}}}

During the height of rave culture from the 1980s to mid-2000s, recordings of Leary and other psychedelic thinkers speaking were often mixed into electronic music. The Shamen honored him in the song "Ebenezer Goode" on their album Boss Drum.{{cite web |last1=Collin |first1=Matthew |title=Psychedelic Techno Gurus |url=https://daily.redbullmusicacademy.com/2016/04/psychedelic-techno-gurus-feature |website=daily.redbullmusicacademy.com/ |access-date=18 February 2025}}

In 1995, Leary had a cameo at the end of the video for alternative rock group Blind Melon's song "Galaxie".{{cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktZoUHcP0wI |title=Blind Melon – Galaxie |author=BlindMelonVEVO |date=October 12, 2012 |via=YouTube |access-date=January 29, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180224124347/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktZoUHcP0wI |archive-date=February 24, 2018 |url-status=live}}

The Marcy Playground song "It's Saturday", from its 1999 album Shapeshifter, mentions joining Leary "in a cryogenic freeze".{{Cite web |title=Marcy Playground - It's Saturday Lyrics |url=https://www.musixmatch.com/lyrics/Marcy-Playground/It-s-Saturday |access-date=2023-02-11 |website=musiXmatch |language=en}}

In 1973, El Perfecto Comics was organized by Aline Kominsky and published by The Print Mint to raise funds for the Timothy Leary Defense Fund. The comic features 31 underground artists contributing mostly one-pagers about drug experiences (primarily LSD). The front cover and a contributed one-page story are by Robert Crumb.{{Cite web |url=http://comixjoint.com/elperfecto-1st.html |title=El Perfecto Comics 1st Printing |website=comixjoint.com |access-date=September 21, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171205180723/http://comixjoint.com/elperfecto-1st.html |archive-date=December 5, 2017 |url-status=live}}

In 1979, Last Gasp published the one-shot edition Neurocomics: Timothy Leary. "Evolved from transmissions of Dr. Timothy Leary as filtered through Pete Von Sholly & George DiCaprio", it is based on Leary's writings related to life, the brain, and intelligence. DiCaprio collaborated with Leary on the script.{{cite web | last = Lauren | first = Davis | title = Read Timothy Leary's brain-melting comic about space migration and the future of human consciousness | website = Gizmodo | url = https://io9.gizmodo.com/5988180/read-timothy-learys-brain-melting-comic-about-space-migration-and-the-future-of-human-consciousness | date = March 3, 2013 | access-date = February 15, 2018 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180215083840/https://io9.gizmodo.com/5988180/read-timothy-learys-brain-melting-comic-about-space-migration-and-the-future-of-human-consciousness | archive-date = February 15, 2018 | url-status = live }}

{{main|Timothy Leary bibliography}}

Leary authored or coauthored more than 20 books and was featured on more than a dozen audio recordings. His acting career included over a dozen appearances in movies and television shows in various roles and over 30 appearances as himself. He also produced and/or collaborated with others in the creation of multimedia presentations and computer games.

In 2011, The New York Times reported that the New York Public Library had acquired Leary's personal archives, including papers, videotapes, photographs and other archival material from the Leary estate, including correspondence and documents relating to Allen Ginsberg, Aldous Huxley, William Burroughs, Jack Kerouac, Ken Kesey, Arthur Koestler, G. Gordon Liddy and other prominent cultural figures.{{cite news |last=Cohen |first=Patricia |title=New York Public Library Buys Timothy Leary's Papers |work=The New York Times |date=June 15, 2011 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/16/books/new-york-public-library-buys-timothy-learys-papers.html?ref=arts |access-date=December 23, 2013 |url-access=registration |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120424084121/http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/16/books/new-york-public-library-buys-timothy-learys-papers.html?ref=arts |archive-date=April 24, 2012 |url-status=live }} The collection became available in September 2013.{{cite news |url=http://bigstory.ap.org/article/what-trip-timothy-learys-files-go-public-ny |title=What a trip: Timothy Leary's files go public in NY |first=Ula |last=Ilnytzky |date=September 18, 2013 |agency=Associated Press |access-date=November 27, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141207183320/http://bigstory.ap.org/article/what-trip-timothy-learys-files-go-public-ny |archive-date=December 7, 2014 |url-status=live }}

• Grateful Dead
• John C. Lilly
• David Peel
• The Sekhmet Hypothesis
• Zihuatanejo Project

{{Reflist|group=upper-alpha}}

{{full citations needed|date=July 2024}}

{{Reflist}}

{{refbegin}}

• {{cite book |last=Graboi |first=Nina |title=One Foot in the Future: A Woman's Spiritual Journey |year=1991 |publisher=Aerial Press |isbn=978-0942344103}}
• {{cite book |title=Timothy Leary: A Biography |first=Robert |last=Greenfield |year=2006 |publisher=Houghton Mifflin Harcourt |isbn=978-0151005000 |author-link=Robert Greenfield |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/timothylearybiog00gree}}
• {{cite book |last=Higgs |first=John |title=I Have America Surrounded: The Life of Timothy Leary |location=United Kingdom |publisher=Friday Books |year=2006 |isbn=1905548257}}
• {{cite book |last=Krassner |first=Paul |publisher=Seven Stories Press |year=2000 |isbn=1888363924 |title=Paul Krassner's Impolite Interviews}}
• {{cite thesis |type=PhD |last=Leary |first=Timothy |date=1950 |title=The Social Dimensions of Personality: Group Process and Structure |publisher=University of California |url=https://archive.org/details/leary}}
• {{cite journal |last1=Leary |first1=Timothy |last2=Freeman |first2=Mervin |last3=Ossorio |first3=Abel |last4=Coffey |first4=Hubert |title=The Interpersonal Dimension of Personality |journal=Journal of Personality |pages=143–161 |date=1951 |volume=20 |issue=2 |doi=10.1111/j.1467-6494.1951.tb01518.x |pmid=14918048}}
• {{cite book |last=Leary |first=Timothy |title=Interpersonal diagnosis of personality: a functional theory and methodology |url=https://archive.org/details/interpersonaldia00learrich |year=1957|publisher=New York, Ronald Press Co }}
• {{cite journal |last=Leary |first=Timothy |title=The Effects of Consciousness Expanding Drugs in Prisoner Rehabilitation |journal=Psychedelic Review |issue=10 |date=1969}}
• {{cite book |last=Leary |first=Timothy |title=Exo-Psychology: A Manual on the Use of the Human Nervous System According to the Instructions of the Manufacturers |year=1977 |publisher=Star Seed/Peace Press |location=Los Angeles |isbn=0-915238-16-0 |url=https://archive.org/details/exopsychologyman00learrich/mode/2up |access-date=January 27, 2020}}
• {{cite book |last=Leary |first=Timothy |title=Changing My Mind, Among Others: Lifetime Writings|url=https://archive.org/details/changingmymindam00learrich |publisher=Prentice Hall Inc. |year=1982 |isbn=0131278118}}
• {{cite book |last=Leary |first=Timothy |title=Flashbacks |publisher=Heinemann |year=1983 |isbn=0874773172}}
• {{cite book |last1=Leary |first1=Timothy |last2=Horowitz |first2=Michael |last3=Marshall |first3=Vicky |title=Chaos & Cyber Culture |publisher=Ronin Publishing |year=1994 |isbn=0-914171-77-1}}
• {{cite book |last1=Leary |first1=Timothy |last2=Ginsberg |first2=Allen |author2-link=Allen Ginsberg |title=High Priest |url=https://archive.org/details/highpriest00learrich |publisher=Ronin Publishing |year=1995 |isbn=0-914171-80-1}}
• {{cite book |last=Leary |first=Timothy |title=The Politics of Ecstasy |year=1998 |publisher=Ronin |isbn=978-1579510312}}
• {{cite book |last=Leary |first=Timothy |title=The Politics of Self-Determination |year=2000 |publisher=Ronin |isbn=1-57951-015-9}}
• {{cite book |last1=Leary |first1=Timothy |last2=Alpert |first2=Richard |author2-link=Ram Dass |last3=Metzner |first3=Ralph |author3-link=Ralph Metzner |title=The Psychedelic Experience: A Manual Based on the Tibetan Book of the Dead |publisher=Penguin Classics |year=2008 |isbn=978-0141189635}}
• {{cite web |title=It Was Twenty Years Ago Today... |first=Zachary |last=Leary |website=zachleary.com |date=n.d. |url=https://zachleary.com/2016/05/31/it-was-20-years-ago-today/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160601153720/https://zachleary.com/2016/05/31/it-was-20-years-ago-today/ |archive-date=June 1, 2016}}
• {{cite web |last=Leary |first=Zachary |date=January 8, 2019 |url=http://zachleary.com/2019/01/08/private-guided-journeys/ |title=Private Guided Journeys |access-date=September 25, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190925194031/http://zachleary.com/2019/01/08/private-guided-journeys/ |archive-date=September 25, 2019 |url-status=dead}}
• {{cite book |last1=Lee |first1=Martin A. |last2=Shlain |first2=Bruce |year=1992 |title=Acid Dreams: The Complete Social History of LSD: The CIA, the Sixties, and Beyond |publisher=Grove Press |isbn=978-0802130624 |url=https://archive.org/details/aciddreamscomple00leem}}
• {{cite journal |last1=Metzner |first1=Ralph |author1-link=Ralph Metzner |last2=Weil |first2=G.|title=Predictive Recidivism: Base Rates for Concord Constitution |journal=Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology, and Police Science |date=1963|doi=10.2307/1140984 |jstor=1140984 |url=https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5174&context=jclc |url-access=subscription }}
• {{cite journal |last=Metzner |first=Ralph |title=A New Behavior Change Program for Adult Offenders Using Pscilocybin |journal=Psychotherapy |date=July 1965}}
• {{cite book |last=Smith |first=Huston |title=Cleansing the Doors of Perception: The Religious Significance of Entheogenic Plants and Chemicals |publisher=Jeremy P Tarcher |year=2001 |isbn=1585420344 |url=https://archive.org/details/cleansingdoorsof00hust}}
• {{cite book |last=Stevens |first=Jay |publisher=Flamingo |year=1983 |isbn=0586087966 |title=Storming Heaven: LSD and the American Dream}}
• {{cite news |last=Weil |first=Andrew T. |author-link=Andrew Weil |title=The Strange Case of the Harvard Drug Scandal |work=Look |issue=27 |date=November 5, 1963}}
• {{cite book |last=Wilson |first=Robert Anton |author-link=Robert Anton Wilson |title=Prometheus Rising |publisher=Falcon Press |orig-date=1983 |year=2000|isbn=0941404196}}
• {{cite book |last=Wilson |first=Robert Anton |title=Cosmic Trigger |volume=1 |publisher=New Falcon Publications |year=1991 |isbn=0941404463}}
• {{cite book |last=Wolfe |first=Tom |author-link=Tom Wolfe |title=The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test |publisher=Black Swan |year=1989 |isbn=0552993662}}

{{refend}}

{{refbegin}}

• {{cite book |first=Duncan |last=Fallowell |author-link=Duncan Fallowell |title=20th Century Characters |chapter=Timothy Leary, Wonderland Park, Los Angeles |location=London |publisher=Vintage Books |year=1994 |ref=none}}
• {{cite book |title=The Most Dangerous Man in America: Timothy Leary, Richard Nixon and the Hunt for the Fugitive King of LSD |first1=Bill |last1=Minutaglio |first2=Steven L. |last2=Davis |year=2018 |publisher=Grand Central |isbn=978-1455563586 |ref=none}}

{{refend}}

{{Wikiquote}}

{{Commons category}}

• [http://www.timothyleary.info/ TimothyLeary.info – biography, archives, links, and more]
• [http://www.matrixmasters.net/salon/?category_name=timothy-leary/ Lectures from the Leary Archive in audio format] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111002142417/http://www.matrixmasters.net/salon/?category_name=timothy-leary%2F |date=October 2, 2011 }}
• {{IMDb name|0495276}}
• [http://www.artfutura.org/v2/artthought.php?idcontent=10&idcreation=65&mb=6&lang=En "Unlimited Virtual Realities for Everyone!"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110817145103/http://www.artfutura.org/v2/artthought.php?idcontent=10&idcreation=65&mb=6&lang=En |date=August 17, 2011 }}, ArtFutura, 1990.
• [http://archives.nypl.org/mss/18400 Timothy Leary papers, 1910-2009], held by the Manuscripts and Archives Division, New York Public Library.
• {{NYPL Archives & Manuscripts|23932|mss|Rosemary Woodruff Leary papers, 1935-2006}}
• [http://digital2.library.ucla.edu/viewItem.do?ark=21198/zz0002vrj8 Image of Timothy Leary and his wife, Rosemary Woodruff holding a news conference in Los Angeles, California, 1969.] Los Angeles Times Photographic Archive (Collection 1429). UCLA Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles.

{{Timothy Leary|state=expanded}}

{{Chicago Seven}}

{{Ram Dass}}

{{Weather Underground}}

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