Michael Nesmith - Biography

Biography

Nesmith was born at St. Joseph's Hospital in Houston, in 1942. He was an only child; his parents, Warren Audrey Nesmith and Bette Nesmith Graham, divorced when their son was four. He and his mother moved to Dallas, to be closer to her parents, sister, aunts and grandmother. Bette took temporary jobs ranging from clerical work to graphics design, and developed very good secretarial skills, including shorthand, and, auspiciously, touch typing. When Nesmith was 13 his mother invented a typewriter correction fluid later known commercially as Liquid Paper. Over the next 25 years she built the Liquid Paper Corporation into a multimillion dollar international company which she finally sold to Gillette in 1979 for US$48 million. She died a few months later at age 56.

In 1949, Nesmith, at the age of six, was enrolled in the Dallas public school system. Self-described as an indifferent student, he nevertheless participated in choral and drama activities during his years at Thomas Jefferson High School in Dallas. He began to write verse poetry. When he was 15 he enrolled in the Dallas Theater Center teen program, where he featured in several plays.

Before graduating from high school, Nesmith enlisted in the United States Air Force in 1960. He completed basic training at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, was trained as an aircraft mechanic at Sheppard Air Force Base in Wichita Falls, Texas, and then permanently stationed at a Strategic Air Command base near Elk City, Oklahoma. While in the Air Force, Nesmith obtained a G.E.D. and was discharged under honorable conditions in 1962. He enrolled in San Antonio College, a community college in San Antonio, where he met John Kuehne (later to be known as John London) and began a musical collaboration. The duo won the first San Antonio College talent award performing a mixture of standard folk songs and a few of Nesmith's original songs. He met another SAC student, Phyllis Ann Barbour, whom he later married.

While in college, Nesmith began to write more songs and poetry and after he and Phyllis married in 1963, the two of them decided to move to Los Angeles so Nesmith could pursue his songwriting and singing career. At the time, Phyllis was pregnant with their first child, Christian DuVal. Nesmith began singing in folk clubs around Los Angeles and had one notable job as the "Hootmaster" for the Monday night hootenannies at The Troubadour, a West Hollywood night club that featured new artists. Here Nesmith met, socialized, and performed with many different members of the burgeoning new L.A. music scene. Randy Sparks from the New Christy Minstrels offered Nesmith a publishing deal for his songs. It was while working at this publishing house that Barry Friedman, also known as the Rev. Frazier Mohawk, brought the ad for The Monkees TV series auditions to Nesmith's attention. In October 1965, Nesmith landed the role as guitar player "Mike" in The Monkees TV series, which required real-life musical talent (writing, instrument playing, singing, recording, and performing in live concerts in The Monkees musical band. The Monkees television series aired from 1966 until 1968 and has developed a cult following over the years.

When The Monkees TV series ended in 1968, Nesmith enrolled part-time in UCLA and studied American History and Music History. Michael and Phyllis's second son, Jonathan, was born in February 1968. Nesmith's third son, Jason, was born in August 1968 to Nurit Wilde, whom he met while working on The Monkees TV series. In 1969, Nesmith formed the group First National Band with Kuehne, John Ware and Red Rhodes. Nesmith wrote most of the songs for the band including a single entitled "Joanne" that received some airplay and was a moderate chart hit for seven weeks during 1970, rising to number 21 on the Billboard Top 40. The First National Band has been credited with being among the pioneers of country-rock music.

Phyllis's third child, and Nesmith's fourth, daughter Jessica, was born in September 1970. Circa 1972, Nesmith started the record label Countryside Records with Jac Holzman, the founder of Elektra Records. Also, in 1972, Nesmith and Phyllis were divorced and he moved to Carmel, California. In 1974, Nesmith started Pacific Arts Records and released what he called "a book with a soundtrack" entitled The Prison as the company's first release. In 1976, he married Kathryn Bild. In 1988, following the ending of this second marriage, he returned to Los Angeles where he had met Victoria Kennedy. They moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, in 1992 and then returned to Carmel, California, in 2000. They were married in April 2000 in Monterey, California. They separated in 2011 and Kennedy filed for divorce.