“The James Dean You Didn’t Know†is the story of Jimmy Dean and the author, Herbert Wolff – first as students at UCLA, and later reuniting in friendship, discovery and ambition while living in New York City. (Both vignettes are also published and available on Kindle in Wolff's longer work, “Wait! I'm Not Finished....â€)
For three generations after his tragic death, Jimmy Dean remains a source of wonder and legend. The U.S. Postal Service even put out a commemorative stamp…the same as they did with Marilyn and Elvis.
But legends give rise from reality, and in this brief work Herb Wolff writes about instances that only he and James Dean shared. These are a series of small occurrences experienced by these two men while they were in their early 20s, revealing James Dean’s zeal to grasp everything that might fulfill what he believed to be an unfulfilled life.