11/16/1946 AD born
McKenna was born and raised in Paonia, Colorado, with Irish ancestry on his father's side of the family.
As a youth, McKenna had a hobby of fossil-hunting from which he acquired a deep scientific appreciation of nature. At the age of 14, he became interested in psychology after reading Carl Jung's book Psychology and Alchemy.
At the age of 14, McKenna first became aware of magic mushrooms when he read the article "Seeking the Magic Mushroom" from the May 13, 1957 edition of LIFE magazine. He began smoking cannabis as a teenager.
At age 16 McKenna moved to Los Altos, California to live with family friends for a year. He finished high school in Lancaster, California. In 1963, he was introduced to the literary world of psychedelics through The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell by Aldous Huxley and certain issues of The Village Voice which published articles on psychedelics.
McKenna said that one of his early psychedelic experiences with morning glory seeds showed him "that there was something there worth pursuing."
Lattitude: 38.8675° N
Longitude: 107.592° W
Region: North America
Modern Day United States
