I first encountered Ayn Rand 's ideas in 1964. But it was five years later, after graduating from college, when I really immersed myself in her novels and philosophy.don hauptman ayn rand This was the Vietnam War period, and conscription had not yet ended. I wound up in the U.S. Navy for the next four years. Wherever I was stationed, I searched for fellow Objectivists. They weren't always easy to find. I often experienced a sense of intellectual isolation. I identified with writer Eric Hoffer, who read Nietzsche and Montaigne while toiling as a longshoreman and migrant field worker. I was assigned, not to a ship, but to a U.S. Air Force base in Bremerhaven, Germany. The accommodations were modest but comfortable, resembling a college dorm. But there was no laundry room. For that amenity, we had to traipse to another building.

Aug 20, 2010

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3 min