I was introduced to Ferlinghetti in a high school Humanities class in 1969. We read and discussed his poetry for several days. This was at a southern US public school where dress and hair length codes were strictly enforced and where the principal was a narrow-minded former football coach with a bad attitude toward anything "hippyish".

That teacher was a very brave man.

Later on, in college, I wrote a research paper on Ferlinghetti. I only received a "B-" on it. The professor's comment was "Well written, but you should have picked a real poet instead of such a lightweight pretender."

That professor was a shit-head.