Jerry Aronson's first encounter with Allen Ginsberg was at The 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago when Mayor Richard Daley famously had the Chicago Police on the streets to keep all the protestors in line.  When all the trouble broke out, Aronson, a young man with a camera documenting the scene, got caught up in the melee.  He had just been thrown to the ground and a Chicago cop was ready to hit him with a billyclub when all of a sudden everything stopped because of the sound of "Ommmm" coming over the loudspeaker. 

It was Allen Ginsberg.  He was on the stage and trying to calm the comabtants by chanting through a megaphone.  The cop, along with everyone else, looked up to try to understand what the strange sound was and where it was coming from.  During that few moments Jerry was able to scramble away with his brains intact.  Years later, when Aronson eventually met Ginsberg for the very first time his first words were, "You saved my life back in 1968!"  The two soon became good friends.

Aronson enjoyed unfettered access and spent years making the documentary movie, "The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg", a phenonemal 90 minute documentary that includes an additional 6 hours of rare and unusual footage including Dylan and Ginsberg at Kerouac's garvesite, Neal Cassady and Ginsberg rapping in the basement of City Lights as well as stories and observations by the likes of Patti Smith, Johnny Depp, William S. Burroughs, Timothy Leary, Hunter s. Thompson, Abbie Hoffman, Philip Glass, Bono, Beck, Joan Baez, Ken Kesey, Paul McCartney, Ed Sanders, Andy Warhol ... even Yoko Ono!