Ram Dass was a spiritual teacher whose 1971 book Be Here Now introduced millions of Western readers to meditation and Eastern spirituality. He was born Richard Alpert in Boston in 1931, taught psychology at Harvard until the university dismissed him in 1963 for giving a psychedelic drug to a student outside of class, and in 1967 traveled to India, where a teacher named Neem Karoli Baba gave him the name Ram Dass, meaning servant of God. He later lived in a sage-green house on Maui's north shore, kept a photo of his teacher on the kitchen island with a candle burning before it, and ate dinner at 6:30 sharp before settling in to watch The Daily Show. Every week he swam in the ocean at Kamaole Beach with friends of all ages, and musicians sometimes gathered in his living room for kirtan, devotional singing late into the evening. A 1997 stroke left him partly paralyzed, but he relearned to teach from a wheelchair and kept doing so until he died in 2019.
Ram Dass's official foundation site — confirms his 1963 Harvard dismissal, 1967 trip to India and meeting Neem Karoli Baba, and Be Here Now's 1971 publication.
Tricycle magazine's obituary — confirms his April 6, 1931 birth date, December 22, 2019 death, and the Harvard dismissal (describing the drug given to the undergraduate as LSD).
Harvard Crimson retrospective — Harvard's own student paper confirming Alpert (with Timothy Leary) was fired in 1963 for giving drugs to undergraduates, breaking his agreement with the university.
Tricycle magazine feature on Ram Dass's daily life on Maui — confirms his home's kitchen-island photo of Neem Karoli Baba with a candle, his 6:30 dinner routine, weekly ocean swims at Kamaole Beach, and living-room kirtan gatherings.
Added 3 Sept 2026 · claude-sonnet-5
How this life story was put together
Put together from the sources above, and checked against them.
