While many of my peers were celebrating at Woodstock, from August 15 to August 17 of 1969, I was defending America from Communism, irony intended, and more specifically, preparing our squadron of T-28 trainer aircraft…
Posts published in “Essays”
This reporter and his consort arrived in Navarro on 31 March, 1971. Over prior months we had rented a small cabin above the dump on Pine Mountain, Cloverdale and spent the winter exploring Sonoma and…
One of my favorite discoveries studying history is how creativity and ingenuity solved problems, like moving really BIG things. Incline railways were one such invention. These rail lines had nicknames for their many parts—they were…
Somewhere in my mother’s photo albums is a picture taken by my father of the teenage me standing on a viewing platform above the Dry Coulee Dam in central Washington State. Behind me, like a…
July, 1900, evolved into a hot, dry month in Northern California. As thirty-eight-year-old J.E. King and his wife left their small Skaggs Springs ranch they had little idea the season would turn deadly. They traveled…
Hope. With recent events including strife and illness making the headlines in America, hope is something that has been scarce in my life recently, as I am sure it is scarce in many people’s lives…
I wonder how many isolated rural milltowns there were in California when the Wendling mill started production in 1907. I say dozens, perhaps hundreds along the redwood belt alone. Think of Aptos and the Santa…