Novel Ideas

  Now that I've written and self-published nine novels, someone asked me which one was my favorite. I guess "The Morning Mist Mystery" is my favorite, primarily because it is fast-paced, about everyday people doing crazy things, and the only murder mystery in the group. 

My second favorite one was "The Wedding Photographer," since I was able to write about topics close to me, namely photography over the years, and the unending challenges met by wedding photographers. It featured a wide cast of characters as diverse as lawyers, farmers and historians, in addition to the aforementioned wedding photographers. 

My third favorite novel has to be "Cajun Gold," a slapstick adventure in southwest Louisiana, with a wacky cast of Cajun characters. Throw in a sledge hammer, welding torch, and offbeat bank robbery, and it's a circus.

My fourth favorite story is "Going Knots," which explores how a love of knots gets a New York stockbroker through his mid-life crisis. It's a little more complicated than that with its crusty Maine marina background, but balances out with an overview of how art galleries sometimes get really desperate. 

My latest novel, "The Imaginary Bookstore," explores imagination, prejudice, and unexpected far-reaching revelations from small town interactions.

The rest of the list involves mainly science fiction stories:

"The Time When" is a novel that proposes that Nikola Tesla had a time machine, and a present-day print shop manager and his grandfather's home health nurse figure out how to use it. Probably the less said about that storyline, the better. 

Another science fiction book is "Mind Pivot." This one is set in a college and involves a student research paper into the "fight or flight" defense mechanism. Let's hope this story never actually becomes reality, because it's both scary and fascinating. 

There is also a collection of short stories, poems and essays called "Smatterings." These have been written over the past 50 years. Some are humorous, some are thought-provoking, and some are weird. A blend of science fiction, observations, and goofiness. 

"The Gaffery Perspective" unveils surprising new viewpoints about health and well-being, while its sequel, "The Gaffery Momentum," talks about time manipulation. The two books blend together well, tying up a lot of loose ends, but I'm currently updating them so Perspective is not available at this time. 

Non-fiction

I have also put together a large number of non-fiction books about the people and places in St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana. For more information about those, CLICK HERE. 

Maps

If you're into maps, you might want to check out my collection of hand-drawn "bird's eye view" maps produced over the past four decades. They are printed in "The Pictorial Maps of Ron Barthet." Included in that collection is a bonus section featuring Posters from Imaginary Festivals and Conventions. 

Submarine Razorback

 I visited the submarine "Razorback" docked on the river in Little Rock, Arkansas, recently. Here are some pictures. Click on the images to make them larger.

Rear deck

Diving planes wheels

Christmas lights board 

Propellers

Torpedo room

The Portal

Jack Larison sat on the couch in his living room, waiting for the portal to open. He was a little anxious, not because there was about to be a dimensional opening in his apartment, but because he had spent his last five dollars buying the clicker.

The man on the street who sold him the clicker told him that when he pressed the button on the clicker three times, pausing slightly between each click, a portal would open to another world, a better world, one which would be so much more to Jack’s liking than the awful place he was now living in.

Not that Jack’s life had been that bad. He had a job most of the time, although he was recently fired for screaming at his boss. Jack was relatively mild-mannered, but once in a while he did have to let off some steam.

The man who sold him the clicker said that it was an incredible device, built from plans devised by Leonardo DaVinci, perfected by Nikola Tesla, and tested extensively by Howard Hughes. With a pedigree like that, there was no doubt the device really worked, Jack concluded.

Basically, the clicker would open a circular portal, about eight feet in diameter, providing access to a wonderful place located in a dimension not far from our own. But this new dimension had solved all of its problems, and everyone there was satisfied with their lives and their surroundings.

Jack was a little concerned about how long it was taking for the portal to open, since he had clicked the clicker about 15 seconds ago. He decided to wait a little longer before getting upset. He was ready to get out of this crazy unforgiving world and go live in one where everyone had their own apartment, free rent, free food and free entertainment.

The guy who sold him the clicker said that this other dimension provided everything one needed, transportation, a good job, free time entertainment, lectures about how to be a good citizen. Jack was especially interested in that one: he had been trying to tell his neighbors how to be good citizens, but they had just ignored him.

Moments before Jack was about to utter a curse word and toss the clicker against the wall in anguish, there was an odd glow stirring the air. Slowly a swirling spiral appeared, gradually getting larger and larger, until it became eight feet across. Then the glow subsided, and the portal clearly appeared. Jack could see through it now, and he was a little surprised to see a man standing beyond it, looking at him, also holding a clicker.

The man was just as startled to see Jack sitting on his couch.

“Who are you?” the stranger on the other side of the portal asked hesitatingly.

Jack blinked. “I’m Jack. Who are you?”

The man answered, “My name is Glorossen. Is that, is that a clicker in your hand?”

Jack held the clicker up so the other guy could see it. “Yes. And you have one, too?”

The other guy nodded. “Someone I met in the park here sold it to me for five leshorments.”

Jack puzzled. “What’s a leshorment?” he asked.

“It’s what we call money,” Glorossen replied.

Jack nodded, then he stood up.

“Well, this is supposed to be some kind of dimensional portal to a place where everything is free and life is easier and nobody argues with anyone else,” Jack said.

Glorossen sadly nodded. “Yes, I have lived here all my life, and it is the dullest place. Everybody gets the same amount of leshorement, a very small free apartment, and is assigned a job that is the most boring thing imaginable. You can't disagree with anyone here because we are all told what to think.”

Jack blinked. “You are told what to think?”

Glorossen nodded.

“That would be great,” Jack said. “That means that everyone thinks the same, there’s no disagreements, nobody argues…”

“Yes, that is what it means. No discussions, no chance to ask questions, just going to the same dull job everyday, getting paid very little…”

“But the food it free…” Jack said.

“Yes, but it taste awful. No flavor, no spices,” Glorossen responded. “I wanted to find a place where I could do the kind of work I wanted to do, maybe start a business, make as much money as I wanted to, you know, contribute to making the world a better place.”

Jack laughed. “Good luck with that, buddy. I’m looking for a place to just settle in, get free food, a steady job, my own apartment rent free. That’s the kind of life for me.”

Glorossen sighed. “Well, come on over, then. You can have it all. I’d rather live somewhere where there’s a chance to do better, help other people, make up my own mind about things.”

Jack stepped through the portal and entered Glorossen’s apartment, and then Glorossen stepped through the portal and entered Jack’s old apartment. The edges of the portal were beginning to waver, and the opening was beginning to grow smaller.

“Well, I guess I won’t be needing this any longer,” Jack said, now standing in his brand new rent-free apartment. He tossed the clicker back through the portal where Glorossen caught it.

“You sure?” Glorossen said as the portal got smaller.

“I’m super sure,” Jack answered. “This is great. I’m going to love it.”

Gloroseen looked around his new surroundings and smiled. This place was so much bigger, so much more colorful. He was really looking forward to going outside and meeting people, talking with them. He knew he had to get a job to make money, but he was also pretty sure he would be starting his own business of some kind, once he found out what people needed and wanted.

The portal opening was only about two feet across now, and Jack was breathing a sigh of relief. He had found what he had been looking for. The walls of the small apartment were gray, however, so the first thing he would be doing was painting the walls.

“Man, a good coat of paint would really brighten up this place,” he told Glorossen moments before the portal closed.

“Sorry, that’s the color they dictate. All the walls have to be gray. There is no choice,” he explained, as the portal diminished into a point, then disappeared.

Jack snorted. "What kind of idiots would require that all walls have to be gray?" he said out loud. 

 

Frostop Memories

 I was driving through LaPlace the other day, and I saw that they still had a Frostop restaurant, so I stopped in for a frosty mug of root beer. Here are some pictures. I took some of them, and the rest came from their website. 

Click on the images to make them larger. 

The owner told me that while Hurricane Ida put them out of business for just three weeks, it totally destroyed their revolving giant mug of root beer sign outside. So they had to build another one from scratch. It turned out looking pretty good. 

Frostop Drive Ins were a popular fast food stop a few years back. There were Frostops in Mandeville, Slidell, Bogalusa and Bay Saint Louis, MS. It featured "Lot-O-Burgers" , "ButterBurgers" and root beer in a frosted mug. 

According to Wikipedia, the first Frostop root beer stand was opened in 1926 in Springfield, Ohio by L.S. Harvey. A chain of franchise locations was established, with the biggest growth following World War II. The Frostop drive-ins reached their peak in 1958 with locations concentrated mostly in the American midwest and deep south, but found from New York and Florida to California and Washington state.

Here is the full menu from the Frostop in LaPlace, LA. 

Click on the images to make them larger. 

See also this link:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frostop

The Talladega Speedway

 In the late 1980's I worked as editor of the weekly newspaper in Pell City, Alabama. The mayor of Pell City one day invited me to take a tour of the Talladega Superspeedway, which was about 13 miles from Pell City. He served on the board of the Superspeedway and wanted to show me the race car museum, the speedway itself, and the infield where people would camp during the regularly scheduled races. 

We drove over and were met by the executive director of the operation, and he gave me a guided tour of the museum which detailed the history of the speedway, the races, the car drivers, and the wild goings-on of race day crowds.

We then got into a pace car and did a couple of laps around the speedway itself, sometimes reaching speeds of up to 110 miles per hour. The curves were banked so that helped to keep us on the track. 

I was impressed with the history of the facility, the fanatical loyalty of the thousands upon thousands of race fans over the years, and the professionalism with which the people in charge keep it all going. It takes a lot of expertise to run an operation which involves high speed races and thousands of screaming fans in the stands. I won't go into the infield shenanigans because what happens on the Talladega infield stays in the Talladega infield. 

Links of interest

https://www.talladegasuperspeedway.com/

A map of the superspeedway

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4qyLPkQcfQ

When Something's Wrong

Every year over the past 30 something years I've drawn a cartoon map of the Chef Soiree event, not a big deal, just a drawing of a bunch of cartoon people eating  cartoon food listening to good music. It involves three days of intensive drawing, computer graphics and proofreading. But this year I was unable to draw the map, because something stopped me in my tracks. A heart attack.

There's nothing like planning your day out, lining up your drawing sessions, scheduling numerous  trips to get the rough draft scanned and digitized, wrapped up with  hours of detail work on the computer. Then your chest starts hurting and you realize something is wrong. 

At 1:30 p.m. on March 5 I left a meeting at the Youth Service Bureau office (home of the ChefSoiree)  with an armful of sketches, lists, and instructions. By the time I had crossed the street and gotten into my car, I noticed that my chest was sore all the way across. Not hurting, just a growing soreness. 

As I drove home I began to recognize the situation. There wasn't any pain in the left arm, there wasn't any "elephant sittting on my chest." I kept driving. At the red light at Lee Road and Collins, I sat in traffic mulling it over.

The pain wasn't bad, it would probably just  go away after a few minutes. Before I got too far from the hospital however, I thought it would be a good idea to just park for a while and see what the soreness did. I even thought of parking in a nearby church parking lot to wait it out. 

But then I thought, well if it is a heart attack, and I died while sitting in my car in the church parking lot, it would look bad for the church. So I decided to turn around and go park in the hospital parking lot and wait it out. 

I made a quick U turn in the parking lot of a business on Lee Road. At a moderate speed I drove down Columbia to Jeffferson, then on to 21st Avenue, down to Tyler and southward towards the hospital. No "elephant sitting on my chest" pain yet. 

I stopped at a restaurant on Tyler, went inside and splashed some water on my face in the bathroom. I did not look good. Then I got back into my car and drove  to the red light at 11th and Tyler and had to wait for what seemed forever to turn left and head for the emergency room parking lot. Luckily, there was one spot open. I pulled in, turned the car off and was just going to sit there and see what happens. 

A hospital shuttle bus pulled up behind me and stopped. After a few seconds, I realized the driver was waiting for me to exit the car, so instead of sitting in my car to see if the pain got any worse, I got out, climbed aboard the shuttle and headed for the emergency room entrance. I figured I could just sit in the waiting room.

For some reason I went to the desk instead, told them I had chest pains and gave some indentification. By this time I was hunched over and holding my hand against my chest.  They told me to sit down. A few seconds later someone from the back came for me, and I was taken into an initial exam room. Vital signs, an ekg, and quick examination. I was sent back to the waiting room. I started charging my cellphone at one of the charging stations. 

Another person then came to get me. This time I was taken all the way into the emergency room, and within a minute I was being prepared for emergency heart surgery. Just before I was wheeled away down the surgical suite corridor, however, a second EKG came back better than the first, and the brakes were put on the "emergency heart surgery" express train. A third EKG a few minutes later came back slightly better.

So within the next three  days I underwent the usual battery of tests for heart function and blockages. On Friday another round of chest soreness came and the whole scenario was repeated. This prompted a decision to move me from a regular room to an adult critical care room. Three days later I had heart bypass surgery to open up four blocked arteries. 

So the moral of this story is: when it's obvious that something's wrong, don't sit in you car in parking lots to see if it goes away. 

Take The Time

 Today's weird word is "take."

The word take means to reach out and grab something, pulling it towards you - such as to take a book. This does not apply to the word "cake" however, for when someone or something "takes the cake," it means an unexpected turn of events, not necessarily appreciated.

The word "overtake" means to move from behind to in front of someone else, usually in a race of some sort. But it could mean to be overwhelmed and shocked, such as when "overtaken by grief." To undertake means to begin a huge project or set off  a long journey, but don't call someone who does so an undertaker. That means something entirely different.

Take is a very useful word. For instance, you can take a call, take a bribe, take a tumble, and my personal favorite, take five, which means to chill out for five (or ten) minutes. The concept of taking made it into the fifth amendment of the U.S. Constitution by outlawing the taking possession of or controlling the use of private property without just compensation. 

So let's take a moment to appreciate the word take and all of its meanings. It complicated, but worth the effort to take it all in. 

Up In The Air in an Autogyro

Back in the 1960's, my dad and I would drive out Morrison Road in Gentilly east of New Orleans and sometimes we would see several gyrocopters taking off and landing on the old highway that was parallel to the new road. The gyrocopters looked like large tricycles with propellers attached to them in the back and overhead, but when they took off, they gained altitude quickly and headed into the sky. That was more than 50 years ago.

 When the chance came to fly in a new streamlined autogyro, I grabbed my camera and headed for Hammond Airport. Stephen Rastanis has a couple of autogryos based over there at the Autogyro of Louisiana facility, and he teaches folks how to fly them.

 The basics are pretty simple. In a fixed wing aircraft, a propeller pushes the airplane forward and air rushes over the wing and lift is created. In a helicopter, a motor turns the rotors around, and lift is created and the copter can go straight up.

 In an autogyro, however, lift is created by the helicopter-like rotors going around, but the rotors are not powered. Instead, there is a propeller that pushes the aircraft forward and lift is generated by the rotors being pushed forward through the air. There is no power applied to the rotors while the autogyro is in flight.

 This creates remarkably stable air flight. The autogyro cannot stall, and if the engine suddenly quits for some reason, the aircraft starts slowing down, and the rotors gradually lower the craft to the ground. A good autogyro pilot doesn't require much space to land in. Any amount of crosswind actually provides more lift to the rotors, so landing is even gentler. 

We took off on the runway, using less than half of it before being zoomed away far above the treetops. The autogyro, when fully fueled, can run for four hours at speeds up to 100 mph. It is quite maneuverable, capable of sharp turns, steep dives, or, in a good wind, just sitting still in mid-air. 

 While autogyros are very popular in Europe, they haven't caught on bigtime in the States yet, even though they have been featured in James Bond movies and (I am told) the Little Orphan Annie movie. 

 They call them "the motorcycle of the sky" and that descriptive phrase fits well, since it’s an open-air cockpit and one gets to wear a helmet (with headphones and microphone.)

 Once you are strapped into the seat and the engine revs up, it's not scary or breath-taking, just a unique way to get up high enough to see some distance, check out the landscape, rivers, houses, and stores, and fly in a way for which there is no comparison. 

 

Hammond High School from the air

Wal-Mart Distribution Center

Campground on the interstate south of Robert

Hammond Airport

 

 

 

 

Countdown Clock

 Several years ago Hudson's Bargain Center had a countdown clock for sale, a big digital read-out clock that counted down the days, hours, minutes, and seconds. I knew it would come in handy and bought one. I've used it several times for big events and deadlines, and I've loaned it to friends for their big day countdowns: things like retirement, graduation, weddings, etc. 

In between uses I set it for a countdown a few years from now and let it run in my house. It has medium bright red digital numbers so it makes a good night light. Well, that and it makes a good conversation piece. 

"What's that?"

"Oh, that's my countdown clock."

"What's it counting down?"

"Nothing important..."

"But it's got 708 days, 14 hours, 32 minutes and 29 seconds on it..."

"Yes, it does."

"What happens in 708 days and 14 hours?"

"We'll just have to wait and see."

I'm thinking of resetting it for 345 days, 11 hours, 6 minutes and nine seconds. That means the countdown will end sooner. We won't have to wait as long to see what happens.

The Remarkable Mr. DeWald

 Sometimes when I'm doing research for a blog article, I get sidetracked on a rabbit trail that leads down an entirely different path. The Tammany Family blog post about Aviation in St. Tammany was one of those projects that led to something else.

That something else was actually one of the main characters in St. Tammany Airways, the company that started in 1928 and contributed to major advances in airmail delivery across the South. The operations manager for St. Tammany Airways, beginning in 1927, was William DeWald.When I began looking into the aviation career of DeWald, both before he joined St. Tammany Airways and after he left the company, I came upon an individual who was highly-esteemed in early aviation. 

So here is an outline of events that chronicle his life and accomplishments. Although there seemed to be some confusion about what his middle initial was, a description of his life and career was easy to follow. In 1912 and 1913, he was racing cars. He began flying in 1916, but in 1918 DeWald was sent to Camp Lee, VA, after being drafted into World War I.

In 1920, after the war, we find him flying for the government airmail service,"the pilot of the first airmail plane to land at Ak-Sar-Ben field in Omaha." 

Click on the images to make them larger. 

The establishment of air mail service between Omaha and Chicago was a big accomplishment, and he was a part of it. 

He apparently was willing to take risks in making sure the airmail got to its destination in time. 

The lack of enough pilots for the fledging airmail service resulted in some pilots being overworked, in addition to the lack of enough planes to go around. 

DeWald did take enough time off, however, to get married in 1920.

Moving the mail on schedule resulted in many mishaps, downed airplanes among them, but DeWald took it upon himself to drop badly-needed spare parts by parachute to those in need. 

Articles appeared in several newspapers telling of the parts dropped by parachute.

Another high-risk innovation was flying after sunset. When the schedule fell behind, DeWald was ready to take off at dusk and land at night, a risky maneuver at that point in aviation. 

Again, newspaper articles told of his daring flight. 

He also took part in activities held by the Aero Club, a group of pilots in the newly-established government airmail service.

DeWald almost became legendary as an early airmail pilot.

In 1921, he was working for Huff-Daland Co.

He was also instrumental in providing a cross-country flight for fresh vegetables, from farms in New Jersey to restaurants on Long Island and in Masssachusetts. That was ground-breaking, air transport for farm goods.

He was even linked to the Admiral Byrd flight over the North Pole in 1926.

In August of 1927, newspapers nationwide reported that he had gone missing during a seaplane flight from Norfolk, VA, to New Orleans.  

After 24 hours of concern, he was found safe east of Pensacola. His fuel had run out, he said.

The inaugural flight of privately-contracted airmail routes for St. Tammany Airways began in 1928, with DeWald serving as operations manager.

DeWald became well-known as he flew around the Southern states promoting aviation and the building of airports. 

As St. Tammany Airways grew, he became their spokesman.

But he continued to pilot aircraft on key airmail routes.

He attended aviation conferences and gave speeches.

In 1929 he was working with the Fokker Aircraft Corporation.

In many articles and photographs, DeWald became the face of progress in aviation. 

See also:

https://postalmuseum.si.edu/dewald-william-n

According to an aviation memorabilia vendor on E-Bay (who was selling early Airmailed envelopes), "William N. DeWald was a test pilot for the first flight of the world's largest single engine aircraft. The envelope shown below is a "flown First Flight cover" signed by DeWald and bearing the C.A.M. 29 FIRST FLIGHT stamp, canceled in Houston, Texas Jan 13, 1929 and backstamped twice, Springfield, Ill, Jan 24, 1929.

"William DeWald was born in 1893, served as an engineer and was head of the experimental department at Stutz (an early racing car builder). He was a Reserve Military Aviator, trained at Miami, and served with the United States (1917-19).

"DeWald was appointed a U. S. Air Mail Service pilot on April 9, 1920, and assigned at College Park MD, followed by appointments to Cleveland OH and Omaha NE. He resigned in August of 1920, and flew official air mail on the Omaha-Chicago route before actual service began.

"He flew air mail for St. Tammany & Gulf Coast Airways, Inc. in 1928, followed by a job for Southern Air Transport in 1929. He was on the first flight of the Fairchild Model 95 XC-31 USAAC cargo aircraft, the first purpose-designed military cargo aircraft and then the world’s largest single engine aircraft, at Hagerstown Airport MD, in 11934.

Flying Early Airmail Routes Was Dangerous Work

"The U. S. Air Mail Service was formed as a branch of the Post Office Department under the Second Assistant Postmaster General in 1918 and flew air mail until it was disbanded in 1927. There weren't very many pilots involved and the lives of many of them were cut short! 

"In the later twenties, the movement of air mail was placed in the hands of contractors. There were two distinct groups of airmail aviators and flew under distinctly different circumstances."

The seller, AviationBookseller.Com, then asks "What makes the pilots of the U.S. Air Mail Service so interesting, more than ninety years after the service was disbanded?"

"The answer lies in the kind of men they were, in their acceptance of significant risk in every undertaking, and their single-minded focus on a career in aviation. These men were to the children of the twenties what astronauts were to us in the sixties, railroad engineers were to the children of the nineteenth century and explorers were to still earlier generations. Their lives simply reeked of adventure! 

"When pilots signed up for the Air Mail Service they were required to agree to fly fixed routes in literally any kind of weather. And to do it in antiquated open-cockpit planes with only the most basic of instrumentation, which most knew from their Great War flying to be dangerous under the best of circumstances.  Yet applications far, far outnumbered the available jobs and the pilots, day after day, accepted their flight schedules and did everything in their power to deliver the mail to the next air mail field on a fixed schedule. 

"By the time air mail flying was placed in the hands of contractors and Contract Air Mail pilots were licensed by the Post Office Department, things had changed dramatically for pilots. Aircraft were purpose-built for air mail, radio had been introduced, weather was much better understood, pilots were carefully selected and trained and the risks of flying were better understood by the executives managing the air mail routes."