WELCOME TO MONK: THE MOBILE MAGAZINE.
Monk began in April 1986 when Mike, Jim, and their neurotic cat Nurse loaded up their worldly possessions, including sundry wool sweaters, into a rented U-Haul and fled San Francisco because they couldn’t afford the rent. They landed on John Deming’s back lawn in Paradise, California. After being mistakenly hired as “gardeners” for two months, they earned enough money to purchase their first vehicle, the beloved “72 Ford Econoline van,” from which they began compiling a newsletter dubbed “The Monthly Monk.” Their purpose was to stay in touch with friends and family while not looking like a couple of sleazy bums wandering through America. Only three months into the journey, all hell broke loose, and they were up to their ears in “growing subscriber interest.” Their “monthly” newsletter, already three months late, was wisely renamed Monk: The Try-Quarterly. They would “try” to come out quarterly.
As The Monks traveled throughout the Lower 48, Monk took on a power of its own. By March 1987, it went national, becoming the world’s first mobile magazine, supported by courageous advertisers and a devoted public. The Monks set a new goal of searching the entire continent for their lost cat Nurse.
Monk was written from the road about life on the road. In each issue, The Monks described their latest encounters with the lucky victims of their latest pitstop: everyone from artists to housewives, clowns to visionaries, and occasionally, real live monks. They were a gentle tickle in the side of the earnest seeker, the frazzled clerk, and the burned-out healer. They sought out the inner child and prankster in all of us, though they could be quite inspiring, offering a uniquely personal take on the land and its people. They were also useful. Thousands of readers used Monk to teach dogs how to fetch.
But the magazine was just the hard copy of a more expansive vision: The Monks’ living cells interacting with each other, the planet, and the sentient beings they met along the way. They were a traveling show, publishing house, and monastery all rolled into one. Only through Monk could readers not only live vicariously through the adventures of The Monks but join them for the drive. And many did.
Now, nearly 25 years since its last print incarnation, Monk has grown far beyond a rare and treasured heirloom. It has entered mythic status as evidence of a pre-Internet America few today have experienced. As resident in-monastery philosopher Jim Monk recently opined, “Monk was pre-digital, fully human, non-AI. It was imperfect, roughhewn, real. You had to have it postal mailed to you or quickly grab it on a newsstand before it sold out. As today's billionaire CEOs sing the praises of their computer-engineered ‘content solutions,’ in truth, they’ve lost the connection to what is truly human and good.
With the mid-90s Faustian bargain that came with the Internet and the rise of a detached, dopamine-driven, techno-sphere, the hunger for a slower, kinder, pre-digital connection has grown apace. Smartphones, smartwatches, game consoles, social media, and search engines are now so interwoven into our lives that we are, in effect, ‘bowling alone.’ Lots of sugar, no nutrition. Monk is the antidote to all that.”
If you still hunger for the authentic amateur and the real America, we invite you to, at long last, buy your untouched Monk back issues here. Many are extremely rare, but they are worth every penny.
As always, please drop us a line to let us know who you are, where you are, and what’s been going on.
To fans and friends old and new . . . The Journey Continues.
With love,
The Monks
