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HOWARD DEAN for PRESIDENT
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Like many people, I started life as a baby. 
I was born in Kansas City, MO, on October 17, 1953.
It goes without saying that I was incredibly cute.
 
 
 

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Snappy dresser at an early age --
damn near three years old,
and living in Lubbock, Texas.
Get me the hell out of here...

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 Some old guy dragged a
 pony around town taking
 pictures of little cowboys.
 Did I fit in as a Texas
 Toddler? Or is the
 scarf just a little tiny
 bit too gay?

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Dorothy

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Glen and Dorothy
on the mean streets of Topeka, 194?
 
 
 
 

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Mean old bastard

Parents:

My parents were Lowell and Edna Minton, but they went by Glen and Dorothy. [So perhaps it's in the blood that we re-name ourselves -- ergo, Max.] She was a legal secretary and he was a legal alcoholic. I never understood the relationship. She was very bright and funny; he was brooding and bitter. He became a civil engineer back when it was a civil service job, and they moved constantly around the southern plains -- Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma. Along the way there were three sons. I was, of course, the middle one.

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My father was a mean old bastard. Straight up. He was at one time a KKKlansman -- interesting, since evidence indicates that he was not all that white -- that his people were in fact Melungeons.
 
 
 

Who are the Melungeons? Click here to find out about the African Origins of the Melungeons

Click here to find out about the Jewish origins of the Melungeons

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My mother died when I was twelve years old. Unquestionably, that was the formative event of my life. She was the one from whom I got the qualities I respect in myself -- my intelligence, my talents, and my love of words. And she was the one who -- sometimes-- took my side.

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Brothers:

 
This was my first encounter with Santa.
I was only two years old, but
I knew exactly what I wanted.
I had a very special relationship with my older brother.
[he's the -- uh -- less-cute one on the right.]  
Footnote: I have not talked to him since 1984.

 
 
[Below]
By the time I was six, we had stopped all
the roving from town to town, and settled
[why, God?] in Blackwell, Oklahoma.
 
This is me with my little brother, Johnathan.
whom we called Jonty. He was born when
I was five, and was the person in the family
that I was closest to. He died young in 1984.

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With Jonty, ages 8 and 3

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[right]
Mark [standing, with his hand on my shoulder]
was my father's son from an earlier marriage.
He was my idol -- a glamorous figure who
lived in Europe, New York and Hollywood and
visited every two ot three years. He was 25 years
older than me, and seemed like a Fairy Godfather.
He got me my first library card, taught me to draw,
and took me seriously when I talked about my
childhood hero: Bette Davis. He had an long and
sketchily defined "relationship" with playwright
William Inge, who  based his Pulitzer Prize winning
play PICNIC on the romance between my father
and Mark's mother, Lola.