Kerouac and The Breakfast Club

While reading an obituary for actor Paul Gleason, best known for his role as Principal Richard Vernor in The Breakfast Club, I came across this sentence:  "Gleason decided he wanted to become an actor after watching Elia Kazan’s 1961 movie Splendor in the Grass together with his friend, author Jack Kerouac."  I couldn't let this go without a little research, so the vast Google archive gave up the source of the friendship through half of a cached article in Orlando Magazine entitled "Jack Kerouac & The Boys of Summer."  It seems that while Kerouac was in Orlando hiding from friends and the public he took to hanging out at an Orlando baseball field where Gleason was trying to make it as a professional baseball player.  After a while, the two became friends:

Kerouac and Gleason shared several common bonds. Both were standout college football players, Kerouac at Columbia University and Gleason at Florida State University. After a few drinks, the men reverted to their college days. “We used to get down in the dirt and go one on one,” Gleason says. “Sometimes we didn’t stop until someone drew blood.” They also shared a deep admiration for the baseball player Kerouac always referred to reverently as “Number 9”-Ted Williams.

Later in life, Gleason turned to writing poetry.  I can't find any Internet evidence of his verse but it would be interesting to see if Kerouac's pomes were an inpiration for Gleason's writings.