Boho Coureur des Bois

French fur trappers and traders may constitute the first Bohemians. Young men left France and went on a voyage in the New World seeking pelts, that were fashionable back home, that would make them wealthy. Often they married, or paired, with Native Americans and produced a peoples called the Metis. My childhood sweetheart come from the Metis. Marilyn’s great grandfather was a Frenchman surnamed Geoffrey. My great grandmother, Mary Heil, was full-blooded Cherokee, but I am thinking she might have been Metis. Mary Magdalene Rosamond had high cheekbones like Marilyn. I suspect her husband, Royal Rosamond, saw her as a half-breed, a name applied to the Metis. Here is a photo of Bonnie and June in Indian garb.

In 1966, I attended ‘The Gathering of the Tribes’ in Golden Gate Park, with my childhood friend, Nancy Hamren. Here the idea that we Hippies are tribal was presented.  I believe this…