Robert Winters – Cambridge City Council Candidate – 2025
Cambridge Municipal Election - Tuesday, November 4, 2025
The Rest of the Story (even if you didn’t ask)
I have the complete run of the National Lampoon Magazine. I also created the National Lampoon Covers page. [This may at least partially explain my iconoclastic sense of humor.] I also have an extensive collection of Underground Comics - especially the works of artist Robert Crumb and the complete run of Harvey Pekar’s American Splendor graphic novels. I have always believed that comedy and satire are at the cutting edge of American culture - whether it’s Lenny Bruce, the Lampoon, George Carlin, Saturday Night Live, South Park, or Dave Chappelle.
I attended one of the earliest performances of the National Lampoon’s off-off-Broadway show Lemmings while a high school senior. This was a preview performance just for young journalists – which I was not, but my high school newspaper provided the tickets. The show was produced by former Harvard Lampoon and National Lampoon writer/editor Tony Hendra and featured such performers as Christopher Guest and John Belushi who absolutely blew me away with his impersonation of Joe Cocker (that he would later famously perform with the real Joe Cocker on Saturday Night Live). The attendees were invited to talk with the cast after the show and, unlike just about everyone else there, I knew just about everything about the National Lampoon and asked most of the questions and even suggested a song that I though should have been in the show. [You might think that was pretty arrogant for me to do that, but Tony Hendra’s response was priceless. He actually agreed with me, but said it was Michael O’Donoghue’s song, and they had a major falling out. His language was a bit more caustic.] We were then invited to sit down one-on-one with cast members, and because I was the one asking most of the questions, I was able to choose John Belushi. I got to sit and talk with him at length two years before Saturday Night Live premiered and John was chosen as one of the original Not Ready for Prime Time Players.
A couple of months after my Belushi encounter, I was caught in the middle of a bank robbery, and the bank robber had his gun trained on me while everybody was screamng. I was also covered in pastels at the time. I played it very cool. If you want to hear the rest of the story, you’ll have to talk to me personally (and maybe promise me your #1 Vote).
A year later I was arrested for armed robbery along with two friends in Clovis, California. It was a case of mistaken identity, but there’s a good story that goes along with it. Again, you might really have to promise me that #1 Vote if you want to hear the rest of that story.
Then there’s the story some years later when I hitchhiked from Flagstaff to the Grand Canyon for a day hike – the same day that my doppleganger had escaped from the Coconino County Prison. People who saw me hitchiking north from Flagstaff called it in and while I was having a delightful hike down into the Grand Canyon there was a dragnet in Northern Arizona looking for me. I have no idea if my doppleganger was able to escape due to the massive search for me. I was briefly arrested and quickly released while hitchhiking back to Flagstaff in the Town of Bedrock (and yes, there was a Flintstones Theme Park there). There’s even more to that story as well.
I drove a 1979 VW Bus from 1986 through just a few years ago (actually two different VW Buses and a 1973 Beetle before that). My longest solo cross-country trip in my first Bus lasted 50 days and included attendance at two mathematics conferences along the way (Boulder, CO and Ithaca, NY) and well as hikes in the Rocky Mountains, the Cascade Mountains, Yosemite National Park, Yellowstone National Park, and the Grand Canyon.
Speaking of buses, my very first cross-country trip was in the Gray Rabbit, an old Greyhound Bus with all the seats removed and replaced by mattresses. I literally floated across the United States on a mattress. I even continued on to their home base in Eugene, OR and spent a week in a commune.
I am the webmaster, Board member, principal walk leader, and publisher of the Towpath Topics newsletter for the Middlesex Canal Association.
I used to be the Chair of AMC Local Walks and did most of the scheduling of hikes in the Blue Hills, Middlesex Fells, and elsewhere in the Greater Boston area. I'm content with my weekly Fresh Pond walks and my near daily Central Square walks these days.
I was a rent control tenant who was able to buy the triple-decker in which I lived (366 Broadway). I have been a landlord in that same building for 40 years.
I also have a Ph.D. in Mathematics and currently teach Multivariable Calculus, Linear Algebra, and Ordinary Differential Equations courses at the Harvard Extension School and the Harvard Summer School. I have previously held various faculty positions at Boston University (1 year), Wellesley College (14 years), Harvard University (8 years in the Harvard Mathematics Department, 25 years with the Harvard Extension School, and 27 years with the Harvard Summer School), Brandeis University (1½ years), and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (9 years).
Here’s a sampler of pieces posted on the CCJ Forum [all postings listed here]:
Robert Winters
366 Broadway, Cambridge, MA 02139
Tel: 617-661-9230
Robert@rwinters.com