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decision to move to the Bay. Brinkley says the decision was an easy one. ?We loved it out on the Bay, bike riding and jogging along the coast, going to the Fire Dog Saloon to eat wings and drink beer?oh, going to the Bookends bookshop?it became a nice community for us to live in. The Mississippi Coast is one of the great unknown, beautiful places in America, and I?ve traveled all over. It?s just gorgeous. Just look at downtown Bay St. Louis and the train that cuts across the Gulf and just the beautiful oak trees everywhere.? Tammy Brinkley adds, ?I think one of the most beautiful things I?ve experienced being here is a feeling of being part of this community from day one. I was immediately embraced here. When you work in New Orleans and live here, you have the best of both worlds.? Tammy met Doug at Hofstra. They were married last September at Our Lady of the Gulf Catholic Church in Bay St. Louis. Doug proposed to Tammy in Atlanta, at the Martin Luther King Memorial, by the Unity Poem. President Carter sent them a congratulatory fax. Doug had developed a rapport with the former president when he worked on his book on Carter?s post-presidency years. He traveled with him to Haiti and to Israel to meet Arafat and was given unprecedented access to Carter?s papers.
Ambrose offered this assessment on what attracts not only writers but also other artists to Bay St. Louis: ?It has just about everything going for it, from my, and from Doug?s point of view. It?s an easy drive over to New Orleans, an easy drive over to the Gulfport Airport . . . and there are wonderful restaurants right in Bay St. Louis so you don?t have to go all the way over to New Orleans for a good meal. It has a lovely ambiance fitting of a small fishing village. Nobody ever bothers you. There are no problems with almost anything. It?s a very comfortable town, and an awfully good place to live.?
Both Ambrose and Brinkley say that they are aware of a forthcoming novel from singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffet (Margaritaville) that is set in Bay St. Louis. Buffet has worked on the novel in the Bay and visited the Hancock County library for research. Still, even more interesting was the revelation that the somewhat infamous gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson lived in Bay St. Louis on Beach Boulevard for a short time, about a year ago, under the assumed name Ray. Thompson wrote Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which was made into a movie with Johnny Depp as Thompson. Ambrose says he and Brinkley persuaded Thompson to finally settle elsewhere because, as Ambrose says, ?I don?t think the Bay was ready for Hunter,? who is notorious for eventually causing a stir wherever he resides. Brinkley?s interest in popular culture and road literature?such as Thompson?s and certainly Kerouac?s?led him to work with Thompson as editor of a volume of Thompson?s letters, titled The Proud Highway, published in 1997.
Right: Brinkley and Hunter S. Thompson work on Thompson?s book of letters, The Proud Highway, which Brinkley edited. The Proud Highway was published in 1997.
FALL 1999