Category Personal
Left Behind
Some childhood memories just won’t go away. This is one I can’t forget: My brother had his first car at 15, and when he was old enough to drive, he had his second, a Chevy Bel Air, blue and white. He drove to school, out on dates, and on Sundays he drove his car to […]
The Schwabl
Many, many years ago, in the early 1960s, I dated a young woman whose older brother was something of a legend. While a student at a college that shall remain nameless (RPI), a member of an anonymous (Delta Tau Delta) campus fraternity, he was awakened one Saturday morning by a model airplane enthusiast flying his […]
Patience
It was the summer of 1963. I was 15 years old, a Boy Scout, just in from a week on the trail at Philmont Scout Ranch in Cimarron, New Mexico. We had a day to kill in Tent City, the base camp, before the bus took us back to Buffalo, N.Y. I was drinking a […]
Accidental Self Destruction
War is a dangerous pastime, and the enemy is not the only hazard. This was brought home to me recently when I was researching four young men from my village who died in the war in Vietnam. One was just 19 years old, and the news reports said he was killed in action while on […]
The Origin of Dirk Wagstaff
As a writer I’ve only used two pseudonyms: “Evan Nescent” back in the ‘70s and more recently, “Dirk Wagstaff,” which came into being after the collision of two movie memories. Fans of the Marx Brothers will recall that Professor Wagstaff was Groucho’s character in Horse Feathers. Groucho had many wonderful names: Wolf J. Flywheel in […]
My Aunt Mary Meets Big Bertha
Big Bertha I didn’t know my Aunt Mary. She was my grandfather’s sister, and he never said a word about her. But I do know that in May of 1916 she helped out at a 10-day bazaar raising money for the widows and orphans of German soldiers who had fallen in battle in the Great […]
The Bears’ Den
One of my favorite parts of the Pittsburgh Zoo is a shadowy doorway between the bear pits, with an inscription showing the dates for their start and completion, 1936-1937, and crediting the Works Progress Administration. I’ve read that this exhibit was the first effort at the zoo to do more than cage the animals, to […]
Passing the Torch
In 1968, my fraternity brother, Bud Shulman, and I, felt it was time to teach our younger brothers how to tap a keg of beer. The lesson, almost a sacred ceremony, took place in the kitchen of the Delt house at 115 College Place on the Syracuse University campus, a dry campus, but what of […]
Why Grandma Hated Catholics
I grew up in a family that taught its children to distrust and dislike Roman Catholics. My father’s father believed that if John F. Kennedy became President, the Pope-o-Rome (one word) would relocate to Washington D.C., and rule the nation. I believed his attitude came from his rural Baptist background, a distrust of The Other, […]
Park Winship Writes
“Dear Cousin Mae, Just a few lines to let you know that I am still living now. How are you all feeling now? I trust this will find you all well now. Park Winship, Ellicottville, N.Y.” Posted to Mrs. Mae Cummings of Ripley, N.Y., in Ellicottville on August 12, 1918, at 10 a.m. * * […]
Faithful Readers 