Jerry Garcia was born and raised in Northern California. He was named after the composer Jerome Kern. Jerry lost his middle finger on his right hand at the age of four while chopping wood with his brother. When he was five his father died. As a teenager he learned to play the guitar and dropped out of high school. He served briefly in the U. S. Army and later befriended Robert Hunter, who was to write most of the lyrics for Grateful Dead tunes.
He played in various country and bluegrass bands and eventually hooked up with Bob Weir and some other musicians and formed what would eventually be known as the Grateful Dead.
The Grateful Dead were well known in the San Francisco Bay area and were the symbol of the hippie culture and psychedelic music. Jerry's home at 720 Ashbury was a hangout for the Dead, musicians from other bands, hippies, fans and party animals. The Grateful Dead and its leader epitomized the love, peace, drugs, and sex of the hippie scene.
They were known more as a live band than a studio recording band and played at the Monterey Pop Festival during the Summer of Love and were also at Woodstock.
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