The title say it all, and I’ve got a lot of ground to cover so let’s just get on with it!

Burroughs was born on February 5, 1914, which would make him 100 years old today!
But he passed away on August 2, 1997
The S. in William S. Burroughs stands for Seward
Burroughs is actually Burroughs II
Burroughs’ father’s name was Mortimer Perry Burroughs
Mortimer ran a gift shop called Cobblestone Gardens
The II comes from his grandfather
William Seward Burroughs I was the founder of the Burroughs Adding Machine company
William S. Burroughs II named his son William Seward Burroughs III
Burroughs’ mother’s name was Laura Hammon Lee
Burroughs’ pen name was William Lee
Burroughs’ maternal grandfather was a minister
In the ’60s, Burroughs joined and left the Church of Scientology
In 1993 he became a member of the Illuminates of Thanateros
Laura Hammon Lee’s family claimed to be related to Confederate General Robert E. Lee
Burroughs’ uncle was Ivy Lee, the founder of modern PR
His family was not very affectionate
He was born in St. Louis, Missouri and lived on Pershing Avenue in the Central West End section of St. Louis
He attended the private school John Burroughs School, named after the naturalist
Burroughs was class of ’31
Burroughs’ first publishing achievement was at the school when his essay “Personal Magnetism” was published in 1929 in the John Burroughs Review
He didn’t graduate from John Burroughs School
On its website, John Burroughs School calls William S. Burroughs a “controversial author”
After John Burroughs School, he attended Los Alamos Ranch School, an elite boarding school in New Mexico
Another famous author later attended Los Alamos Ranch School: Gore Vidal (born 1925)
At the boys boarding school, Burroughs kept a diary about his attachment to another boy at the school
Burroughs was a virgin through high school
Burroughs dropped out of Los Alamos too
Next up, he went to Taylor School in Clayton, Missouri
From there, he went to Harvard to study art
At Harvard, he was part of Adams House
Back home on summer break, Burroughs became a cub reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch
His beat? Police docket
Surprisingly, he hated the job and refused to cover gruesome stories
That summer he lost his virginity
He shed his virginity to a female prostitute
It was back at Harvard that he was introduced to gay culture when he traveled to New York City with his wealthy Kansas City friend Richard Stern
Stern was apparently a bit like Neal Cassady when it came to driving: he drove so fast that Burroughs wanted to get out of the car once
Burroughs graduated from Harvard in 1936
After he graduated, his parents gave him $200 a month
After Harvard, Burroughs went to Vienna to study medicine
There he became involved in the gay subculture
He also met his first wife there, Ilse Klapper, a Jewish woman fleeing the Nazis
Burroughs and Klapper were not romantically involved, but he married her in Croatia so she could move to the US
After they divorced in New York, they remained friends
By 1939, he had become so obsessed with a man that he severed his own finger — the last joint of his left little finger, to be exact
In 1942, Burroughs enlisted in the US Army
When he became depressed that he was listed as 1-A Infantry instead of officer, his mother called a family friend, a neurologist, to get him a civilian disability discharge due to mental instability
It took five months for him to be discharged, and he waited at Jefferson Barracks, near his family home
Afterward, he moved to Chicago
In Chicago, the Harvard grad became an exterminator
The Burroughs family was friends with another prominent family, the Carrs
William S. Burroughs II was eleven years old when Lucien Carr was born
During primary school in St. Louis, Burroughs had met David Kammerer, who was three years older than him
Kammerer had been Carr’s youth group leader and become obsessed with him, following him to the University of Chicago
When Carr fled to Columbia University in New York City, Kammerer followed — as did Burroughs, who moved a block away from Kammerer in the West Village
Carr met Allen Ginsberg at Columbia and introduced him to Burroughs and Carr
Burroughs met Joan Vollmer Adams around this time, and he moved in with her
In the summer of ’44, Carr killed Kammerer with his Boy Scout knife, and then went to Burroughs — Kammerer’s friend — for help
Burroughs flushed Kammerer’s bloody pack of cigarettes down the toilet and told Carr to get a lawyer and turn himself in, but instead Carr sought out help from Jack Kerouac
Burroughs and Kerouac were arrested as material witnesses, but Burroughs’ father posted bail for him (Kerouac married Edie Parker to get bail money)
Burroughs became involved in drugs around this time, becoming addicted to heroin
When Burroughs got arrested for forging a prescription, he was released to his parents in St. Louis
When he was finally allowed to leave, he went back to New York City for Joan Vollmer Adams, and together, with her daughter, moved to Texas
It was Joan who gave birth to William S. Burroughs III in 1947
After Texas, the family moved to New Orleans
Around this time, Burroughs was arrested after police found letters at Ginsberg’s place that incriminated him
Burroughs, Joan, and the kids went on the lam to Mexico
In Mexico, Burroughs decided to go back to school: he studied Spanish and the Mayan language at Mexico City College
He studied under R. H. Barlow, a homosexual from Kansas City who commit suicide through overdose in January 1951
He also decided to take up a game of William Tell. It didn’t go so well: he shot Joan in the head, killing her
He only spent 13 days in jail, after his brother bribed authorities to let him out while he waited for trial; witnesses were also bribed so Burroughs would appear innocent. Either way, Burroughs skipped town
Burroughs considers his killing of Joan to be the beginning of his life as a writer; he wrote Queer at this time
Queer was not published until 1985; Burroughs’ first book was actually Junkie, published in 1953 — four years before Kerouac’s On the Road came out
Burroughs III went to live with his grandparents in St. Louis; Joan’s daughter, Julie, went to live with her maternal grandmother
Burroughs himself went down to South America in search of the drug yage
From there, he moved to Palm Beach, Florida, with his parents
His parents paid for him to travel to Rome to see Alan Ansen
They didn’t hit it off romantically, so Burroughs left for Tangier, Morocco