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Hunter Stockton Thompson was born July 18, 1937 to Jack Robert and Virginia Davidson Ray. A native of Louisville, Kentucky, Thompson attended high school at Atherton High School before transferring to Louisville Male High School where he became a member of the prestigious Athenaem Literary Society. After high school, Thompson joined the United States Air Force where he first began his career as a journalist working as the sports editor for the Eglin Air Force Base's newspaper, The Command Courier. During that time, he also procured work writing anonymously for the local Fort Walton Beach, Florida newspaper The Playground News, as outside employment was against Air Force regulations. In 1958 Thompson left the Air Force and began working as the sports editor for a newspaper in Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania before attending Columbia University's School of General Studies.

Thompson left the United States in 1960 to assume several short-lived positions with newspapers covering Latin America which allowed him to travel to South America and the Caribbean. In 1961 Thompson returned to the United States and wrote two novels, The Rum Diary, which was eventually published in 1998, and Prince Jellyfish, which remains unpublished. After returning to the United States, Thompson married his long time girlfriend Sandra Dawn Conklin in 1963 (now known as Sondi Wright). They divorced in 1980 but remained close friends until Hunter's death. Together they conceived several times, including three miscarriages and two children who died shortly after birth. Their only surviving child, Juan Thompson, was born March 23, 1964. In 2003 Hunter Thompson married his assistant, Anita Bejmuk.

Thompson's big career break came when he was offered an opportunity to write an article on the Hell's Angels for The Nation Magazine. His work, published in 1965, eventually became the critically acclaimed 1966 book Hell's Angels: The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gang, chronicling his experience living and riding with the group. Not long after, Thompson and his family moved to his legendary "fortified compound" in Woody Creek, Colorado, located just outside Aspen, where he would live for the rest of his life.

Thompson was a long time contributor to Rolling Stone magazine where he covered culture and politics. Many of his articles became the impetus for his novels like his most famous work, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1971). In 1998, the book was adapted to a film starring Johnny Depp that repopularized his work. Thompson's life and writing were also adapted to film in the 1980 film Where the Buffalo Roam starring Bill Murray.

On February 20, 2005, Hunter S. Thompson died of a self-inflicted gunshot at his home in Woody Creek.