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Remembering George

Title slide with photo of George Gorgan

Last Wednesday we held the funeral for George Grogan at Norris Funeral Home in Stuart. His burial at the Oakwood Cemetery in Martinsville. I was asked if I would make my remarks available, so I’m posting them here. George grew up in Martinsville, where after a stint in the Army, worked for the Post Office. After retiring, he moved up on the mountain and became a beloved member or our community. The location of the funeral in Stuart made it easier for friends from both Martinsville and Meadows of Dan to attend.

The Eulogy: Memories of George

George Grogan
George obituary photo by Norris Funeral Homes

We lost a good man. George came from a small family. Having no children of his own, George Grogan loved and doted on his nephew and niece, Trip and Elizabeth. He gave them other names, “Dude” and “Sug.” He taught them to swim and ride a bike. George took the two of them to the beach and to the pool in the summer. In the winter, he took them sledding. Instead of building traditional snowmen they’d fashioned dinosaurs and dragons and use food coloring to make them more life-like. (There must have been a little bit of Calvin, as in Calvin and Hobbes, in George). He taught Elizabeth how to drive in Oakwood Cemetery, where we will intern his body this afternoon.

As Trip recalls, he was the best uncle anyone could ask for. After all, how could you go wrong with an uncle who joked his Christmas present for you made the list of the top ten most dangerous toys that year! Or when helping Liz with a leaf collection for school, they collected 32 instead of the minimum requirement of 10, far overachieving the rest of the class. Or who took you to all the top movies as they were released. 

George almost always arrived at Mayberry Presbyterian Church before or as I arrived on Sunday morning. He’d bring with him a delicious dish for the brunch after church—sometimes a sweet dish but often some kind of grits. I joked with him about the need to spice up his grits with jalapenos. “No,” he firmly insisted. But he did relent enough to make grits with pimentos the next week.   

One Sunday, I brought jalapenos poppers: peppers stuffed with cream cheese and wrapped in bacon. I planned to egg on George. The joke was on me. He wasn’t in church that Sunday. It turned out this was one of his stays at New River Valley Hospital. I wrapped up two of the poppers in foil and took them up to George at the hospital that afternoon. “Get those out of here,” he laughed as he rose up from bed and pointed to the door. A nurse gladly took them off George’s hands.   

While I couldn’t tease George into exploring spicy food, he was a wonderful cook. And while George may have seemed set in his ways, he was open to change. As a mail carrier who walked throughout the city of Martinsville, George had a great dislike of dogs. They were his nemeses. I don’t know what it is about dogs, but their DNA seems to contain a distrust of mail carriers. 

But after he retired, someone needed a volunteer to dog sit a Lab. George, wanting to be helpful, agreed, and fell in love with the dog. From then on, he always had a dog. The last, which also shows his humor, being Knucklehead. It took me a while to realize that was the dog’s name, not just what he was called. 

Another area in which George held firm was politics. As one friend said, George was one of five people in Patrick County who would admit to being a Democrat. And there was that bumper sticker which left no question as to where he stood. But that aside, Geoge was always civil even to those with whom he disagreed. He never condemned others. George showed us how to be respectful in a world filled with hate. We need more people like George in our world. 

Chicken George sign

George enjoyed joking around and having a good laugh. Who else would relish in nicknames like “Chicken George,” as the sign Mike Gillette made which he proudly displayed on his house. George always had a flock of chickens. Mike also made a sign that read “Chicken Crossings.” Motorist didn’t always abide by the sign as George lost several chickens to traffic on DeHart Road. 

Trinity, a longtime friend , confided to George about leaving a pot of water on the stove. The water boiled, leaving a ruined dry pot. Geroge reassured Trinity that it won’t get any better with age. Charlie runs the kitchen at Poor Farmers. George started his day with coffee and a sausage biscuit from there. Charlie shared a story about George making her an origami ring out of a dollar bill . Then he proposed with it. 

George enjoyed walking the hills around Marby Mill and Rocky Knob with his dog and always appreciated running into friends. Beth Ford tells about how she could never remember his dog’s name. They’d met up on a trail and she called the pooch, Bull Shirt, which bought laughter to George. 

Beth also told me about working the polls in Meadows of Dan and how George would always stop by mid-day on election day with a treat he’d whipped up in the kitchen. He acknowledged and thanked them for their hard work and a long day that starts before sunrise and ends long after sunset. 

This past election, just a few weeks ago, George came in to vote. Exhausted and not doing well, he still wanted to do his civic duty. Beth said they were willing to take a folder with a ballot inside to his car, but he insisted on coming in. He then sat down to catch his breath, smiling at everyone. He allowed her to bring over a ballot. After he voted, he said, “Thank you so much for this.” And those were the last words she heard from her friend. 

Bob Potter tells about running into George at the Dollar General. He was heading into the store with a plate of cream puffs he’d made to give to the cashier on her birthday. 

George was always present to help with Pancake Days and VFW spaghetti dinners. He was up early to grab coffee at Poor Farmer’s Market and to exercise with the morning stretch class. George was laid back and really wanted what is best for our community. 

He was also a caring and nurturing man. He loved his mother so much that on his birthday, he’d send her flowers to thank her for giving him life. And in her later years, after she was confined to a wheelchair, he took care of her. He also helped take care of his older sister during her last days. And even while he was sick during the last months of his life, George took things in stride. 

George's garden
George’s garden. George wasn’t up to doing work here this spring, but he did have his onions in.
George's home
George’s home seems quiet without the clucking of chickens

There’s a lot more that could be said about George. He was an incredible gardener and often supplied fresh flowers for Mayberry Church or brought extra produce to share. I encourage you to share your stories of George with each other today, to honor this gentle giant of a man. 

We will miss him. The best way we can honor George is to learn from his demeanor, to care for others, and to jump in and help our communities thrive. 

Be like George button
Through the effort of Barbara Wagoner, Be Like George buttons will soon be available at Mayberry Church and in the Meadows of Dan community.

Homily for George Gorgan’s Funeral

For my homily this afternoon, I want us to look at the 23rd Psalm, a hymn of confidence which acknowledges the hurt and the pain in our world. But it also reminds us of God’s presence in times of trouble. Listen, as I read the Psalm from the King James Version. 

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to life down in green pastures: He leadeth me beside the still waters. he restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou annointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. 

The author of the Psalm, credited to be the shepherd king David, knew from experience God supplied his needs. He experienced first-hand God’s mercy. Using rich metaphor’s, God is compared to a shepherd who leads his flock to fresh green grass and still waters where the sheep might be able to get a drink. George was a shepherd to his chickens, caring tenderly for them. 

Just as the grass and the water restores the bodies of the sheep after a long trek through the desert, the Psalmist experienced such nourishment from God after treks through the desert of life. The God who restored his soul is the same God who restores our souls. Like a good shepherd, God revitalizes our lives when everything seems hopelessly chaotic. God as our companion can transform every situation.

Now this does not mean there is no hurt to be felt in the world. The Psalmist recognizes the deep dark valleys we must cross. A shepherd, experienced at leading his flock up through canyons and gorges, knows of the importance of being there beside his sheep. Where the trail narrows and the cliffs rise steeply on both side, danger lurks behind every bend. But the sheep remember yesterday’s taste of fresh grass and clear water, and trusting the shepherd, move forward in the face of danger.

Likewise, George experienced much trouble over the last few years as his medical challenges grew. George knew his time was short. I saw him last Thursday. He remained in bed and acknowledged the end was near but was okay with it. He trusted his Savior. I saw him again on Monday. He seemed to be doing better. He remained at peace, Although his energy remained low, at times he laughed at something said. His dog, Knucklehead, remained at his feet. At this point the decision was made that he’d be moved into hospice, which happened later that evening. 

In the Psalm, an interesting stylistic shift occurs in the third verse. God is no longer spoken of in the third person as in the beginning of the Psalm. The author realizes during journeys through the valley of the shadow of death that God, like a shepherd, has become more real and more present. Instead of saying, “God is with me,” the Psalmist addresses God in the first-person present tense: “I fear no evil for you are with me.” The author admits, at times like this, he hurts and is afraid, but God is so close that he can address God intimately.

Having acknowledged God’s deeds in the past, the green grass and the still waters which provide of nourishment for our bodies and souls and having experienced God’s presence in a time of trouble, the Psalmist concluded this song with a statement of confidence in God’s future. “Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”

We can be comforted in God, not because of any myth which denies the existence of pain, but because God promises to be present with us when we suffer. God the Father, having experienced the death of his Son Jesus Christ, knows our pain and promises to be there with us. God the Son, as a man named Jesus, experienced death and knew what George experienced last week as he left this life. Jesus promised we would never be alone. God’s spirit is here with us, just as God’s spirit was present with George, as they moved him to hospice where he would die a day later.  

God’s presence can help us cherish our memories and come to terms with George’s death. Amen. 

George on the back row on Pentecost 2025
George, at his place on the back row at Mayberry Church, Pentecost Sunday 2025. Thanks to Beth Almond Ford for sharing this photo.

To view George Grogan’s obituary at Norris Funeral Services, click here.

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April Readings

Book covers for April readings

Edward Abbey, The Fool’s Progress: An Honest Novel

Cover of "The Fool's Progress"

 (1988, New York: Avon Books, 1990), 513 pages.  

This is my third time reading The Fool’s Progress, but it’s been 35 years since I last read it. I had felt it was Abbey’s best novel, but I am no longer sure. I do plan to reread The Monkey Wrench Gang. This time through The Fool’s Progress, I found myself repulsed by the narcissistic, misogynistic, xenophobic, and racist views of the protagonist, Henry Holyoak Lightcap. The harsh language, especially in the first 40 pages, turned me off. I almost quit, but glad I didn’t. The book, in my opinion, gets better and many of Henry’s extreme views seem to taper especially after his marriage to Claire.  Warning Spoilers: If you want to read this book, you might want to skip my review as it contains spoilers.

This novel is somewhat autobiographical. There are many parts of the novel which Abbey drew from his own life including military service at the end of World War 2, serving as a MP in post-war Italy, tramping around the country during a summer in high school, his time working seasonal jobs as a ranger and a fire lookout, and his relationship with a plethora of women. But it’s also fiction. After all, Abbey is from the coal country of Western Pennsylvania, not the coal country of West Virginia.

As the novel begins, Henry’s latest wife has left him. He goes into a rage and then decides to head across country, from his home in Arizona to Stump Creek, West Virginia.  He wants to see, one more time, his brother Will. Driving a dilapidated old truck with a dying dog riding shotgun, he heads across country. Henry mostly sticks to backroads. He stops along the way to see friends. To finance his trip, he sells a gun to one friend who is in the pawnshop business. But he’s also not above using his defunct credit card (in the days before the internet) to buy gas. And if that fails, he has another “gas credit card,” a long flexible rubber hose.  

As he travels, we learn more about Henry’s life and the country through which he drives. We sense his love for this country. Abbey often makes lists for his protagonist, of the trees, the flowers, the animals, music, books and authors, etc.  Henry is a lover of creation. About halfway through the book, Abbey begins to drop hints that the dog and the truck are not the only thing dying in this novel. But it’s only near the end that we learn of Henry’s serious illness. The end of the book leaves the reader wondering how much of what happens is real or is a vision in Henry’s mind as he dies. 

While Henry flunked at becoming an academic, he continues to read philosophy and poetry. His musical taste varies from “country” and “western” to classical. Henry also has a keen sense of vision of what goes on around him. We see bits of both of his parents in Henry. His mother, the Presbyterian organist, and his father, an agnostic anarchist. Henry carries on a debate with a deity he can’t seem to believe in. But also can’t cast away.  Henry could be modelled on Mark Twain. As Edgar Lee Masters said of Twain:: “he threw out the Bible, but it seemed to be attached to a rubber band and was likely to bounce back into his lap at any time.” 

Another character I found myself pondering in this story is Henry’s older brother, Will. Two years older, Will found himself fighting in Europe in the Second World War. When he came back to West Virginia, Will insisted on farming (and living) the old way. He shunned electricity and indoor plumbing and preferred to use horses for farming. I found myself comparing Will to the author Wendell Berry, who also prefer to live a simple farming life. Both Abbey and Berry studied under Wallace Stegner at Stanford University. 

The big change in the book comes with Henry meeting Claire. He’s a middle-aged seasonal ranger in Arches National Park and she is a 19-year-old music student. After Henry’s crazy courtship, they marry. In the story, both appear incredibly happy.

Then, a truck crash in the mountains, claims her life. While the grieving Henry recovers in the hospital, her monied family takes their newborn child. His mother-in-law protects the girl from Henry with an army of lawyers. Henry now lives knowing he has a daughter he will never see (except, perhaps, in dying visions).  This part of the book doesn’t seem to come from any real-life experiences of Abbey, but it does hint at his idealism. It also, too me, seems to draw his earlier novel, Black Sun. Love, for Abbey is fragile and can be easily lost. Often, he was to blame. At the death of Claire, I found myself wondering what would have happened if the two of them settled down as a family. In a way, her death was convenient for Abbey, an unconventional anarchist with a romantic streak. 

If you want to read this book, I encourage you to first read Desert Solitaire, which I reread last year. 

Malcolm Guite, The Word in the Wilderness: A Poem a Day for Lent and Easter 

Cover for "Word in the Wilderness"

(Norwich, UK: Canterbury Press, 2014), 192 pages. 

Every day through Lent to Easter (and the week after), Guite provides a poem along with a couple pages of reflection. The style is like a later book of poems he collected for Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany..  Guite wrote many, maybe half, of the poems. Other authors include George Herbert, John Donne, W. B. Yeats, S. T. Coleridge, Dante, Czeslaw Milosz, John Davies, G. M. Hopkins, among others. The commentary links the reader to scripture and theological understandings behind the poetry.  The commentary also provides insights into the style of poetry. I enjoyed these readings and recommend them for anyone looking to grow deeper in poetry and the meaning of Lent and Easter. 

Eric Goodman with Kaveh Zamanian, Mother of Bourbon: The Greatest Whiskey Story Never Told 

Cover for "Mother of Bourbon"

(New York: Post Hill Press, 2025), 298 pages

Mary Murphy married John Dowling when she was just 14 and he nineteen years her senior. Mary’s parents made the arrangements. John was a successful cooper (maker of barrels) and was beginning to invest in Kentucky’s infant bourbon business. Mary, who had finished the third grade, worked at her father’s store.  Both were children of Irish immigrants who had moved to America to escape the potato famine. In the pre-Civil War years, America wasn’t friendly to Irish Catholics.  

It shocked Mary, at first, that she didn’t have a say in the marriage. She also didn’t like the idea of moving away from her family but consented. In n time Mary and John become partners in an expanding whiskey industry.  Their main distillery was Waterfill and Frazier, but they also own part of a distillery with John’s brothers.  And their family began to grow.

John Dowling died in 1903. Upon his death, Mary inherits the business, but soon it’s in threatened. The bank refused to supply the credit and suggested they sell the business. Also, the broker for the business quit. Mary quickly reorganized, takes her business to another bank. She also found another broker, Henrich Hiensohn, a German Catholic who continued to work with Mary until prohibition. 

After the war (World War 1), the Midwest experienced the second rise of the Kul Klux Klan. This group not only went after African Americans, of which Mary was suspect as she employed and treated them fairly, but also Catholics.  Mary reached out to a relative of one of her employees whose son was lynched. Prior to the Klan’s rise, Mary’s namesake (Mary Bond, who had married a Protestant) became a prominent leader within women in Kentucky who attempted to get revisionist books on the Civil War into the school system. Mary and her daughter fell out, but with the rise of the Klan, her daughter admitted to being wrong. The Klan activity also played into Probation as many distillers were Catholic. 

Prohibition presented another challenge. Not being granted a medical exemption, Waterfill and Frazier ceased operations.  Working with Hiensohn, they sold most of their barrels before prohibition. She also had many barrels moved into the basement of her large home, paying taxes on the liquor before prohibition took effect so that it was legal. But this didn’t stop their troubles. After a few years, Mary’s youngest son, Emmett, came back from school at Harvard. He loved to party. He also, unknown to his mother, sold some bottled whiskey to a man in town who was a known for selling illegal liquor. The revenuers raided the family home one night and everyone who living there arrested. They were all released on a $5000 per person bond. 

Much of the book centers on the trials which took place. The book was hrown at the family, with charges not just of bootlegging but conspiracy. The first trial ended in a mistrial, with 10 jurors voting for conviction and two for acquittal. The second trial resulted in a conviction which was appealed but overruled. At this time, the sisters were fined $100. Mary Dowling’s received a fine of $10,000. But most troubling was her two boys living at home, Johnny and Emmett, who received a prison sentence. 

Mary certainly felt the revenue agents took advantage of her. While it later came out that Emmett had sold a few bottles of liquor, this didn’t rise to a conspiracy, nor did it involve the entire family. Everything had been done legally in her eyes. Furthermore, not only had the government confiscated her liquor, but the warehouse where they stored it burned. Rumors circulated that government agents sold the liquor. The fire covered their tracks. She couldn’t help but to feel that they were after her because she was a successful woman and Catholic. 

During this time, she decided to get back into the liquor business by setting up operations in Juarez, Mexico, across from El Paso. She could legally make liquor there.

Interestingly, Mexico didn’t allow its grain to be distilled. Mary had grain shipped in from the United States. Waterfill and Frazier used 50% corn with a mix of rye and barley.  She found a Mexican partner who provided the land and hired local workers. She hired a descendant of Jim Beam to oversee the running of her distillery.  While she went into prohibition financially well off, she made another fortune with Waterfill and Frazier, SA. This distillery did a large business around the border where bars which were filled with Americans (especially soldiers from Fort Bliss). She also allowed those running the business to sell booze to bootleggers who would bribe the border guards to transport the liquor to sell to speak-easies in the America. 

The employees of the Mexican distillery gave Mary Dowling the title, “Mother of Bourbon.”  That distillery continued to operate until 1984, but after Mary and Emmett’s death, the family ignored its operation.  Oddly enough, the American government had a hand in its demise as it outlawed the sale of bourbon made outside the United States. 

After prohibition took effect, Mary continued to experience sadness. Ida, a daughter who didn’t marry until she was almost 40, died. Then, the next year, John and Emmett died way too young, the same year in which Mary Dowling died.  

I enjoyed this book. The story flowed smoothly. Woven into the last half of the story was a rosary given to Mary by her liquor wholesaler,. Late in their business partnership, he expressed romantic interests. Mary wasn’t interested. The authors used the rosary beads to link to Mary’s own sorrows with her children. This nice touch displayed the importance of Mary’s faith. However, I found myself wondering if it happened or was it just a detail made up by the authors. While Mary Dowling was a real woman who achieved and endured much, with the book being a novel instead of non-fiction, I know the authors had to create a framework and dialogue to make the story more readable.  

I have now read three books by Goodman. In 2019, I read a baseball novel, Days of Awe. In 2020, I read his novel, based on his wife’s parents, Cuppy and Stew.

wBruce M. Metzger, Breaking the Code: Understanding the Book of Revelation 

(Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1993), 144 pages. 

I first read this book in early 2004, when I last taught a class on the book of Revelation. Metzger, an outstanding Biblical Scholar from Princeton, spent part of my last year in seminary on Sabbatical at Pittsburgh. I got to know him a bit during this time as his apartment was next to mine.

Metzger approach is strictly Biblical. He shows how much of Revelation was written in response to was happening within the Roman Empire in the second half of the first century. Even the number of the beast (666) works out to a title of Nero.  A variant number (616) found in some ancient manuscripts matched a variation in Nero’s title.  I used this book as the base for my class, but also drew on a more detailed commentary by Robert Mounce along with Eugene Peterson’s literary commentary, Reversed Thunder: The Revelation of John and the Poetic Imaginaton. 

Alan Gurney, Compass: A Story of Exploration and Innovation

Cover for "Compass"

 (New Yor: W. W. Norton, 2004), 320 pages including index, notes, and bibliography.  

I’ve used and felt myself competent with a compass ever since my grandparents gave me one for my 11th birthday, when I was old enough to join the Boy Scouts. Taking the compass for granted, I had no idea one could write a history of the compass that stretched out to 272 pages of text! Gurney manages to do this by primarily focusing on the use of the compass by the British Royal Navy and commercial ships. I knew that even in the ancient world, it was known that a suspended lodestone was known to point north/south. But I was shocked that it was only recently (last 150 years) that the compass as we know it was perfected. 

The original compass was a dry one, often suspending a thin piece of metal that had been magnetized so that if was free to move and point to the north. Below the pointer, a papers stock which could be moved to correct the heading. This “dry compass” was the main compass of British mariners until early in the 20th Century. Such a compass had a difficult during rough weather or on a ship firing canons broadside.  This led to use of compasses with the lodestone floating on water (or alcohol). Another problem discussed is magnetic deviation. Interestingly, at one time, sailors hoped that correcting the deviation could help them know their latitude. Later problems arouse as ships used more iron in their construction. Earlier, such problems were noticed as the housing of the compass might use nails which affected the needle.  When the who ship was iron, the problem magnified. 

While this book primarily focuses on the British use of the compass, toward the end the author acknowledges the American Navy to be ahead of the British in the late 19th Century. American adopted the floating compass for its navy 30 years before Britain. Through this book, we learn of the various individuals whose work with compasses to increase their efficiency.  While there were interesting parts of this book, I realize it’s not everyone’s cup of tea. The book is only about the role of the compass while on water, nothing about its use on land as in orientating. A good companion to this book is Dava Sobel’s, Longitude, which I read in 2017. 

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Heading to Grand Rapids and Part 1 of the Festival of Faith and Writing

title slide
When I returned home, not only did I get a chair cut, I trimmed my beard!

On Tuesday morning, April 14, after filing an extension for my taxes, I boarded the northbound Crescent, in Danville, Virginia. At Union Station in Washington, DC, I had long enough a break to eat before catching another train bound for Chicago. My destination was South Bend, Indiana, a city I arrived in a little before 8 AM on Wednesday.  I had planned to get a sleeper. When I first looked at this trip, I could have done each leg for about 400 dollars, but after the debacle of airlines and unpaid TSA agents, train travel became more popular. Two weeks later the cost for a sleeper on each leg jumped to 900 dollars (over $1800 total) and I decided I could travel coach. 

The ride was smooth despite some bad storms which caused the train to slow down as it cut through the Alleghenies and through Pittsburgh and Cleveland. There were tornado warnings, but all I saw between naps was a lot of lightning and some heavy rain. Once in South Bend, I had to wait at the station till after 8 AM to call Enterprise Car Rental to come pick me up. They did. And by 8:30 AM, I was on the road. On Wednesday night, I planned to stay with Jerry and Janet, friends who go back to our seminary days, in Kalamazoo.  Knowing they had church duties that morning, I drove to Eckhart hoping to see the New York Central Museum which was beside the train station in the town. It was closed that day, so I drove north to Three River’s Michigan, and spent a few hours in Lowry ‘s Bookstore. 

Stairs inside Lowry’s

For such a small town, this is an amazing bookstore with both new and used books.At Lowry’s, I found a copy of Lucius Beebe’s classic, Mix Trains Daily: A Book of Short Line Railroads. This I will add to my growing collection of Beebe’s railroad books, published in the 1940s and 1950s. After Lowry’s Bookstore  I had a wonderful lunch at Rooster’s Wing Shack next door. Then I drove to Jerry and Janet’s. We spent the afternoon birding in a nature area in Portage, then fixed dinner and spent a lot of time talking.

The three of us are moving toward retirement. Jerry and Janet plan to retire this summer and I plan on retiring after Easter next year.  On Thursday morning, we said our goodbyes. I then headed to Grand Rapids for the Festival of Faith and Writing at Calvin University.  On the way north, taking backroads, I came across one area where a tornado had ripped through the area the night I was on the train.. While the main road was clear, the side roads were blocked and workers were repairing electrical lines. 

I have attended the Festival of Faith and Writing many times. It’s held every even year and Calvin brings in around 60 authors. They don’t have to be Christian, although most are. The one requirement is that the authors write seriously about faith. As with the other years, this year didn’t disappoint. As before, there those authors I wanted to hear and meet. In addition, there were other authors I didn’t know, whom I heard and are now interested in reading their works. 

The festival opened with its first plenary speaker, Laurie Halse Anderson, who writes historical fiction for young adults. I was not familiar with her work, but she has won the Nobel Prize in Children’s literature.  She has written some interesting books around the American Revolution. Her success, she credits, is with doing the research of a non-fiction writer to assure her stories are factual. She also focuses on the “ordinary.” Instead of writing about Washington or Franklin, she tries to bring in the common people, especially women, children, and minorities. Through their eyes, she shows how they perceive the events of the day. She also talked about how writing one book leads to another. Having written about the Revolutionary War, she became interested in a Yellow Fever epidemic in Philadelphia a few years later, which resulted in Fever 1793.  I plan to read that book. 

In addition to four plenary speakers, the Festival offers numerous concurrent sessions throughout the three-day period. The first afternoon, I attended a conversation by two young adult writers (Kate Albus and Dana VanderLugt) discussing the craft of writing fiction and how it can be used to draw younger readers into the past. 

Next, I attended a presentation by Carrie Fountain titled “About a Million Blessings a Day.”  Fountain is a poet who sets out every morning to write a poem. She acknowledges, most are not very good, but she feels the need to get something on paper and overtime has a collection of material with which to work. I enjoyed listening to the poems she recited and came away with an autographed copy of her book of poetry, The Life. Fountain charmed me by asking where I was from when I was having her book signed. She then complementing me on the sound of my voice. The next day a guy I was talking to during a break stopped me in mid-sentence to ask if I read Audible books. I thought he meant listening and I said I generally have one going all the time. Then he said, I don’t mean listening, I mean reading, you have the ideal voice.  I laughed and said it would be ideal until I butchered the punctuation of some word. 

That night, the plenary speaker was Robin Wall Kimmer. The title of her talk “The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World” is also the title of her latest book which I read and reviewed (link above) in January. Of all those authors in attendance, Kimmerer was the one I really wanted to hear. She’s both a scientist and a Native American and draws on both in her books, of which I have read all three. I read Gathering Moss in 2021 and Braiding Sweetgrass (her most popular) in 2024. While Kimmerer titled her talk after her book, it wasn’t a recap of writing. Instead, she presented a thesis around what the writer can do to help heal the world. Her first rule: always begin with gratitude. She encourages writers to help people know their place on earth. For nature writers, she suggests we celebrate the living world, foster kinship, incite wonder, inform, sound the alarm on danger to the planet, seek justice, and defend wild places. She also peppered her talk with startling statistics such as the average American child can identity only 10 plants but knows around 100 cooperate logos.

Kimmerer (in the middle) talking to Debra Rienstra and Kyle Meyaard-Schaap

Kimmerer also spoke of the danger of linguistic materialism, moral exclusion, and how the colonial experiences around the world have damaged native languages which were more earth based. Of all the presenters over the three days, I took far more notes (4 whole pages) on Kimmerer’s talk. Most other talks I only took a single page of notes. After her talk, I checked into my hotel and then walked over to a nearby Olive Garden where I had dinner with a former colleague. MaryMartha served with me when I was the pastor in Hastings (2004-2014), serving as the church’s adult ministry coordinator. Several years ago, when her husband Larry began to decline in health, they moved to a continuing care center on the southside of Grand Rapids. Larry has since died. I enjoyed our late dinner and talk, but was ready to crash when I got back into my room.

  (look for part 2 in a couple weeks) 

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Remembering Harry

Title slide with a photo of Harry, Cedar City's logo, and a photo of Cedar Canyon

Note: Thanks to Lynne, I think I now have all of Harry’s titles correct. It is my hope you gain a sense of how wonderful Harry was. I know I have more photos of him, but could not find them quickly last night. The photo of Harry holding a Clinton/Gore cup was at a dinner. I’m not sure where the cup came from but someone thought it appropriate to serve Harry, a Republican, a drink in it. As you can see, he took the joke well and played along.

Sunday night I received word through a friend in Utah that Harry died. It wasn’t expected. I later learned his death was sudden. Walking down his front steps to greet friends, he collapsed. It was his time. They were unable to resituated him. So many people close to me during my decade of ministry in Utah are now gone. Harry joins a long list which includes the Armstrongs, the Pevelers, the Behrens, Marcia Beck, Des Penny, Jim Case, Christine Winterrose, Pam Burns, Harry’s son David, among others. 

I met Harry on a Monday in late September 1993. I probably met him the day before when I preached at Community Presbyterian Church, but don’t remember it. In a meeting following worship, they voted to called me as their pastor. That Monday, I went to First Security Bank (now Wells Fargo) to set up an account in preparation for my move. Harry, a commercial loan officer at the time, saw me enter. He came out of his office, greeted me like a long-lost friend. Then he introduced me to everyone as his new pastor. He also made sure I was well taken care of by the tellers. From that point, we were friends. But that’s not unusual. Harry was the type of person who became a friend to everyone he met. He also befriended every dog. .

John and Scott on Angels Landing.

I moved to Utah that November.   A few Saturdays later, Scott, another member of the church, organized a climb of Angels Landing in Zion National Park. Harry, Brad, Craig, and John joined us. We made our way up Walters Wiggles to Scout Landing, where the Angels Landing trail breaks away from the West Rim Trail. Soon, we were on a knife edge, with a 1500 or so foot drop on each side. Heights, we discovered, terrified Harry. John and I led him down off the knife-edge and back to Scout Landing. Harry waited for us as we climbed to the top of Angels Landing, which hovers over the valley of Zion Canyon. When the day was over and we stopped for dinner and a beer on our way back. Harry expressed thanks that we had not abandoned him. 

Angels Landing from the Virgin River
Harry and Lynne after their wedding

In February of the following year, I was honored along with the Reverend Ed Kicklighter, a retired Navy chaplain and the former intern pastor at Community Presbyterian, to officiate at the wedding of Harry and Lynne. Harry and Lynne would become close friends. 

In the fall of 1994, I began teaching a year and a half long class to train lay pastors. Harry signed up. We spent much of the class discussing theology and how to handle Biblical text in preparation of a sermon. Harry felt comfortable speaking in front of groups. His faith was strong, but quiet. He showed his faith in how he worked to better the lives of others.

Two years later, the Presbytery of Utah commissioned Harry as a lay pastor.  The presbytery meeting of the commissioning was held at the brand-new church in Layton, Utah. It had been raining hard for a few days. As I stood with Harry before the entire body, asking him the questions for his commissioning, a spot in the roof failed. Suddenly, a torrent of water poured from above, just behind Harry. I paused, then looked at Harry and asked, “Do you need to be baptized?”  Everyone laughed, as members of the congregation ran around grabbing buckets and mops. For the rest of my time in Utah, Harry would preach for me when I was gone and at Presbyterian Churches in Richfield, Delta, and the Methodist Church in Milford. 

Joking with Harry at a dinner in the mid-90s.

During my time in Utah, our families attended parades together and had cookouts and dinners. Harry could take a joke. At one party before the 1996 elections, Harry, a Republican, laughed when he was served a drink in a Clinton/Gore cup.  Around this time, Harry and I both begin to collect Dutch ovens. Soon, we hosted dinners for the congregation and other groups in town.  Harry and I also participated, in competition with each other, in local chili cookoffs.

A few years after I arrived in Utah, Harry left banking and became the director of the Chamber of Commerce. I believe he was instrumental in bringing the Rocky Mountain Oriental Express train to the city. This was the first time since the 1950s that passengers got off a train in Cedar City. This elegant train traveled across the West, stopping at various National Parks. The trains would spend two or three days in Cedar City. While in town, they made excursions to Bryce Canyon, Zion Canyon, and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. Cedar City was also known for its summer Shakespearean and Renaissance Festivals. Working with the city’s mayor, Harry expanded the number of festivals so that every month had a celebration. The city lived up to its title, the Festival City. 

After working with the city for a few years, Harry became the hospital foundation and public relations director for Valley View Hospital. Exciting things were happening as the hospital built a new faculty. As I was on the hospital board, Harry and I got to work together on a project not related to the church.  After I left Cedar City, Harry helped raise funds for a new cancer center.

Toward the end of my time in Utah, I began reading a lot about the area in which I had grown up. My family had moved to Petersburg, Virginia when I was six and then moved outside of Wilmington, North Carolina when I was nine. My backyard in both places endured significant battles toward the end of the Civil War.  Harry was also interested in the Civil War and read the books I read on the fall of Petersburg and the fall of Fort Fisher and Wilmington. Even after I moved, when I would visit, we discussed the Civil War. 

I last saw Harry in the fall of 2018. We toured the congregation’s newest effort, a thrift store on the south end of town which sold furniture, household goods, and clothes. I could sense Harry’s pride at what the church had done and how it served those in the community he loved.  Harry wanted the best for his community and worked hard to serve others. 

Anyone who knew Harry also knew of his love for animals, especially dogs. He and Lynne adopted many dogs and gave them a wonderful home. Over the years, I mainly kept up with Harry and Lynne through Facebook. Seldom was there a post that didn’t include dogs in the pictures. 

Cedar Canyon east of Cedar City
Cedar Canyon east of Cedar City

Harry had moved to Cedar City from Las Vegas, where he had been in banking. Before that, he’d lived in Alaska and had served in the Air Force Intelligence Agency. He told stories of how, as a young man, he traveled first class in Japan to attempt to listen in on communications from Soviet leaders staying in adjacent hotel rooms. And before that, Harry, who grew up in the Philadelphia area, was one of the first “kids” to dance on American Bandstand. 

Sadness often broke into Harry’s life. Long after I left Utah, his son David, who had been in our our group died. Harry, I know, strove to maintain a positive outlook on the future and continued to help others. May he rest in peace and may God embrace Lynne, their dogs, Harry’s daughter, and his stepdaughter and their families in love. 

Harry and Lynne after their wedding
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Reviews of My March Readings

Book covers for those books reviewed

Kiki Petrosing, Bright: A Memoir

(Louisville, KY: Sarabande Brooks, 2022), 106 pages. 

The term “Bright” implies, within an African American context, a mix-race individual. It describes Petrosing. Her mother is an African American and her father an Italian. This is the second book I’ve read by her in preparation to hearing her at this year’s Festival of Faith and Writing at Calvin University in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Click here to read a review of her book on Virginia. 

In this memoir, written as a poetic style, the author struggles with many issues. There’s her Italian grandfather’s suicide, the meaning of poetry, Catholic traditions, and the struggle between being grounded and a life of the spirit. As in the volume of her poetry I read earlier, she deals with Thomas Jefferson (whose slaves gave birth to other “Brights”). She draws in other poets, such as Dante, Shakespeare, and her mentor Gregory Orr. Learning that she teaches at the University of Virginia, I wondered if she knew Orr. Having read some of Orr’s poetry and his memoir, The Blessing, I was expecting this memoir to be prose. But Petrosing does it her way. As I read, I found myself drawn to the glimpses of her life.  

C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

Cover photo for The Screwtape Letters

(1942, New York: HarperCollins, 1996), 209 pages. 

The Screwtape Letters is a classic. In this book, Screwtape, an older demon, writes letters to his young nephew, Wormwood, providing advice as to how he might best tempt his “patient.” The book only consists of Screwtape’s letters, but we learn Wormwood regularly corresponds back through Screwtape’s reference to the letters. The world of Screwtape is different than ours. These are evil spirits and everything is upside down. The goal of the demons is to trap the patient into their world where he will become “food.” 

These letters show how even good things can be used for evil purposes. All is not lost to the demons when the patient joins a church. Other temptations appear. The tempters don’t have to encourage bad behavior. Instead, they just have to draw their “patients” away from God and force them to think highly of themselves and their abilities. 

This is my third time reading this book. I read it first in collage, and again maybe 20 years ago. This time, I read much of the book twice along with parts of a study book on the letters as I lead a discussion on it through Lent. 

Gilbert King, Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America.

Book cover for "Devil in the Grove"

narrated by Peter Frances James (Harpers, 2013), 17 hours and 53 minutes. 

While driving back and forth to Hilton Head and on to the Okefenokee this month, I listened to Gilbert King’s Pulitzer Prize winning history of a shameful event in American history. King winds together several stories, centering around a supposedly rape, to bring to life a tragedy which occurred in the post-World War years in rural Florida.  

At the center of the story is Thurgood Marshall, who led the NAACP’s legal defense fund. As a young lawyer working for the NAACP, Marshall rode trains south to defend African Americans in Jim Crow Courts. His main strategy was to win appeals and to take the case to the Supreme Court, where he had an envious record, winning 29 of his 32 cases before the highest court. Marshall also oversaw the Brown vs Topeka Board of Education which set the stage for the end of segregation. In 1967, long after the Groveland trials, President Johnson appointed Marshall to the Supreme Court where he became the first African American justice. In addition to Marshall’s work on the Groveland case (which came as they appealed), King provides a background into his early years as a Civil Rights lawyer. Like many individuals who seem larger than life, Marshall had his faults. King notes his problem within his marriage, his womanizing, and his love for bourbon. 

Another character at the center of the story in Lake County, where the rape supposedly took place, was Sheriff Willis McCall. He’s the “Devil in the Grove,” a man who ruled Lake County, Florida for decades. McCall protected gambling interests, low wages in the citrus groves, and segregation. He was not above taking the law in his own hands, as the recently opened FBI files showed. 

The case, known as the Groveland Boys, begins with a 17-year-old Norma Padgett and her estranged husband attempting to get back together. Going out for the evening and drinking a lot of liquor, the two found themselves broken down on a deserted road. Two young black men stop to help. When Padgett’s estranged husband disrespects them, a fight ensues. Norma takes off. What happens next is subject to speculation. Padgett’s husband made it back into town, telling the story that his wife’s kidnapping. This might have been to protect himself from Norma’s father, also a violent man with Klan ties. Norma shows up early that morning at a diner and doesn’t seem to have been in any kind of fight or rape. Those who saw her thought she was calm. It appears that at this point, she and her husband collaborate on their story, and a posse starts looking for four black men, even though only two were at the scene the evening before. 

A doctor who examined Norma could not positively say she’d been raped but challenged the idea she had been physically attacked. This information, questioned the legitimacy of the Norma’s story and was suppressed. The defense discovered it only after conviction. Another suppressed piece of information was the young man working at the diner who gave Norma a ride that morning. He noted, in the second trial, how she appeared as if nothing had happened. 

Three of the four charged with the crime were arrested. The fourth attempted to run and was later shot. The three who went to trial were found guilty, two of whom were sentenced to death. and moved to the Florida State Penitentiary. During the appeal, Thurgood Marshall became involved with the case and assisted local attorneys. They won a new trial for the two on death row. Sheriff McCall and a deputy, in separate cars, went to pick up the prisoners and move them back to Lake County for trial. Locking the prisoners together in his car, McCall then took a back road where he supposedly had a flat tire. He said that while he was changing, the two men attacked him and he shot them. The Sheriff called the deputy on the radio. He came, realized Walter Irvin remained alive and shot him again. Irvin, wounded, played dead. When the coroner arrived thinking both men were dead, he realized Irvin was alive and had him transported to the hospital. At this point, the FBI becomes involved. 

The second trial also resulted in a convection and a death sentence. But things were changing in Florida. A new governor, who wanted to protect the state’s booming tourist and agricultural interest, had an attorney friend examine the case. He concluded the men had been framed. The governor pardoned Irvin. The state later exonerated and freed him. Charles Greenlee, who had received a life sentence was also freed. At this point, even the prosector, Jesse Hunter, admitted an injustice occurred and the defendants had been framed. 

Harry T. Moore, another character in this story, headed the Florida NAACP.  On his twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, he and his wife were killed when Klansmen firebombed his home. Moore, who had his own battles with the NAACP along with segregationists like Sheriff McCall. He had been influential in bringing Thurgood Marshall in on the case.  In addition to this, Marshall had to be careful during his time in Lake County. And he also had threats and attempts on his life and safety. 

King had access to NAACP legal defense records as well as the recently opened FBI records pertaining to the case. Drawing on this information, the framing of the Groveland Boys can be easily seen.  I recommend this book, especially as today many in our nation desire to undo the gains America has made in Civil Rights over the past 75 years.  It should remind us that our nation’s hands are not as clean as people often imagine.

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A Trip to the Low Country

Title slide with a photo from inside the church, kayak in the Okefenokee, and a train

Earlier this month I was able to get away for a week to attend the Theology Matters Conference at Providence Presbyterian Church on Hilton Head. In addition, I was able to spend a few days in the Okefenokee, watching trains, and catching up with a few former co-workers. I left home with temperatures just above freezing, worrying that the rain would begin to freeze. Thankfully, by the time I was down off the Blue Ridge, the temperature was much warmer with no chance of ice. As I continued to drive down, with a kayak lashed to the top of my car, I listened to Gilbert King’s,  Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, The Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America. I’ll review the book early in April. 

On the way down, I met Deanie for lunch. During my tenure as pastor on Skidaway, she was an associate pastor and a delightful colleague. We had wonderful Mexican meal at a restaurant just outside of Savannah. We caught up on what’s going on in our lives, with our families, and with friends.  Then I turned east and drove to Hilton Head, passing the never-ending sprawl with countless stoplights which has become the South Carolina Low Country.  I checked into my hotel, then headed over to the church for a low country boil (shrimp, sausage, corn, potatoes and seasoning). 

While at the conference I enjoyed catching up with old friends and making some new ones while listening to the speakers at the lecturers. The weather was wonderful, but like always, the island feels overcrowded. I didn’t even walk out to the beach! This year’s theme was “The Good Shepherd Lays Down his Life for the Sheep.” 

Providence Presbyterian Church Sanctuary. Rev. Dr. Raymond Hylton speaking

While I enjoyed all the speakers, especially the sermons by Raymon Hylton, Pastor of National Presbyterian Church in Washington, DC, the highlight was Andy Dearman. A retired Biblical scholar who did a marvelous job of weaving the Old and New Testament together around the conference’s themes. While I enjoyed the conference, I kept looking out those beautiful windows at the church. From my pew, I could se the tops of magolias, pines, live oaks decked out in Spanish moss, and sweet gum trees. My mind kept being drawn to the kayak on top of my car and what I’d be doing a few days later…

After the conference, I drove down to Skidaway and met with Jim, who is still the Administrator at Skidaway Community Church. This was my first time being back at the church since the January of 2022, when I was there to officiate at the funeral for a friend.  It was great seeing the improvements and hear of the plans for the church’s future. Since I lift, Jim has taken to writing, especially “flash fiction.”  He’s even had a couple of pieces published in a local magazine which often published my work when I was living there.

A good sized gator

I then drove down to the Okefenokee.  I spent two days in the swamp, but was unable to obtain camping reservations inside the park due to the busy season and the low water which cut off some of the canoe trails.  

The first night, I was able to stay in a caboose. Folkston is a great place to watch trains as just above the town two main lines merge which bring trains to and from Florida to the Northeast and Midwest. Especially during the night, the tracks seemed busy, often with two trains, one heading north and the other south, crossing at the same time. The caboose was comfortable for me, with a deck out back where I did some writing and reading as I watched trains. There were four bunks on one end of the caboose, a sitting area in the middle and a small kitchen and even smaller bathroom on the other end. 

Home for a night
My plate: Grilled chicken, chopped
barbecue, collards, and beans

 After spending the day in the refuge, and checking into the caboose and then walked over to Jalen’s Barbecue. Many people will probably pass it by as dump, but their chopped barbecue and roast chicken was wonderful. I just wish I had arrived in time to have had ribs, but they’d sold out. And, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but they had the best collards I’ve ever had. They were not mushy and were quite tasty.  Normally, I prefer turnip greens, but I’d go for collards if they were that good. 

It was weird paddling within the swamp as the water was a couple feet lower than any of my previous trips into the swamp. I mostly paddled Chesser and Mizell Prairies. In previous times, you could paddle across the prairies, but this time the water level kept me in the canals.  I was a little early for flower blooms. But as always, birds were plentiful. Egrets, ibis, sandhill cranes, kingfishers, woodpeckers, and so on. There were plenty of turtles and alligators sleeping along the banks. 

It’s been a while since I paddled my Phoenix Isene Kayak. Lately I’ve mostly paddled my big sea kayak, which is 18′ 6″ long. This boat is 14′ 9″ and weighs (empty) 28 pounds. It was good to be back in this boat.

Sandhill Crane

I spent my second night camping in my hammock at Okefenokee Pastimes, a campground and restaurant just outside the park. I had a Philly Che esesteak Sandwich and beer for dinner as I talked with the new owner of the campground. That night, I slept in my hammock. While it was good to camp, I ran around too much with flip-flops and my ankles were well-chewed by sand gnats!

On Sunday, I set my sights north, heading up 301 to Waycross, and then on US 1 up into South Carolina. Somewhere along the way, I finished listening to Devil in the Grove. It began to rain as I crossed into South Carolina, so I slipped over to the interstate and made it home shortly after dark. 

This wasn’t my first rodeo… Links to past events

Theology Matters, October 2021

Theology Matters, March 2023

Day 1 of a 5 Day Okefenokee Adventure

Days 2 & 3 of a 5 Day Okefenokee Adventure

Days 4 & 5 of a 5 Day Okefenokee Adventure

Another Okefenokee Adventure

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Reading Reviews from February 2026

title slide with covers of the books I read in February and reviewed in this post.

I am on study leave this week. My next post, God willing, will be the sermon for March 15, 2026. I’ll catch up with folks then!

Cover photo for Memorial Days

(New York: Viking, 2025), 207 pages.

On Memorial Day, 2019, on the streets of Washington D.C., Geraldine Brooks’ husband, Tony Horwitz, died of a major heart attack. He was on a book tour promoting Spying on the South.  

I have read several of Horwitz’s books and have loved them all. However, by far, my favorite is Confederates in the Attic, which explores modern day Civil War reenactors. I read the book early in this century. I started it on a cross-country flight and laughed so hard that everyone in the plane around me wanted to know what I was reading. Several of them wrote down the title so they could look it up. Horwitz’s is a master of blending travel and history with humor. After recently reading his first book, One for the Road, I checked to see if he had written anything recent. That’s when I learned of his death and that his wife, also an author, wrote this book. 

This book flip-flops between a narrative on learning of her husband’s death and its aftermath, along with time on an island off Australia (Brooks is a native of Australia). We learn of everything she had to do starting with the time a hospital internist call. She wants to see her husband and immediately takes off for Washington, but that is hard to do because they lived on Martha Vineyard and it’s the height of tourist season. The flights off the island are booked. She catches a ferry to the mainland. She also must take care of their dogs and to call her sons and his mother.  Thankfully, she has caring neighbors.

Catching up with one of her sons is difficult because he was flying to Australia to see her sister. Unfortunately, as her son gets off the plane, the news arrives prematurely in a text from a friend expressing his condolences. The next few months is hectic with all she must do. She discovers she and her sons’ medical insurance is cancelled because it’s in her husband’s name. As a native Australian, she knows American medical insurance lacks compassion. And then, after spending the fall taking care of business and two memorial services, in Martha’s Vineyard and near Washington DC area) COVID hits. 

Her time away in 2023 to West Tisbury, a remote island off Australia, allows her to grieve and to recall her relationship with her husband. We learn how they met and some of their travels as foreign correspondents. We also learn that she left journalism to become a novelist at her husband’s encouragement.  We also learn about grief and death traditions, especially in Judaism as she had converted to her husband’s faith. 

I felt like I was reading about the death of friend as I read this book. I recommend it. And sadly, I only have a few more of Horwitz’s books to savor before I’ll have to start rereading. 

Ronald C. White, On Great Fields: The Life and Unlikely Heroism of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain 

cover for "On Great Fields"

(Audible, 2023), 14 hours and 23 minutes.

At the battle of Gettysburg, Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain’s troops held back the Confederates at Little Roundtop. Late in the afternoon, as his troops ran out of ammunition, he ordered them to fix bayonets. They then changed down the hill, routing the exhausted Confederates. Had this not been successful, the South would have taken the hill, and the battle may have ended differently. But as White shows in this biography of the Maine intellectual, this was only a part of Chamberlain’s story. 

A native of Maine, Chamberlain lived most of his life in the state. He attended Bowdoin College and then Bangor Theological Seminary. He debates becoming a Congregational minister but finds himself drawn to academics. Chamberlain excelled in languages (he mastered 7 languages during his lifetime).  Teaching at Bowdoin, he married Fanny Adams, an adopted daughter of a Congregational minister, and they began a family. He enjoyed teaching and was offered an opportunity to spent two years studying in Europe, but the Civil War interrupted. He joined the war effort in 1862 and led the 20th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment.  

At the beginning of the Petersburg Campaign in the summer of 1864, Chamberlain was wounded on the Jerusalem Road near “Fort Hell.” While the location probably doesn’t mean much for most people, this was in the Walnut Hills area where I lived as a kid from 1963 to 1966. (I should write more about Fort Hell in another post).  Chamberlain almost died. He survived but dealt with the wound for the rest of his life. Miraculously, he returned to the field in March 1865, near the end of the Petersburg Campaign. Again wounded, he remained on the field as Petersburg fell. At Appomattox, Grant gave Chamberlain the honor of receiving the Confederate arms and colors at the “official surrender,” three days after Grant and Lee signed the surrender documents.  

After the war, Chamberlain became governor of Maine, serving four one-year terms, as the state had yearly elections for governor. White hints at the fact Chamberlain and his wife had troubles during this time and she stayed away from the state capital.

After serving as governor, he returned to teaching and later became president of Bowdoin college.  He was also later called on to settle an election dispute over a new governor. While violence was a possibility, he was able to calm both sides and worked out an acceptable settlement. In 1883, he retired from academic. During this period, he worked as a lawyer in New York, as the port surveyor in Portland, Maine, and then involved himself in various businesses including land speculation in Florida. He continued to be interested in the Civil War. Chamberlain became friends with those who fought on both sides, often called to speak and to write articles. He also had to deal with his wife’s health as she became blind late in life.

Chamberlain died in 1914, at the age of 85, partly from an infection of the wound he received in Petersburg. 

White goes into detail as to Chamberlain’s religious and academic beliefs. A solid Calvinist during a time when Unitarianism and Transcendentalism were on the rise in New England, Chamberlain remained close to the church. As for academics, while classically trained, Chamberlain encouraged the school to embrace other disciplines, especially in science. He attempted to make room for such studies at Bowdoin. 

White’s biography of Chamberlain’s life during a time of great change in the United States is a worthy read (or listen) to those interested in such history.  The book is read by the author, who was the Dean at San Francisco Theological Seminary when I was doing my doctoral studies there.   White has published biographies of Abraham Lincoln, U. S. Grant, and two books on Lincoln’s speeches. I also highly recommend Lincoln’s Greatest Speech, which is on the President’s second inaugural address. 

Doris Kearns Goodwin, An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s 

Book cover for "An Unfinished Love Story"

(2024, Audible), 17 hours and 38 minutes. Read by the author with insert recordings of speeches.

Doris Kearns Goodwin is a presidential history. I once heard her lecture and have enjoyed reading some of her books and many of her articles. Her late husband, Dick Goodwin worked within the Kennedy and Johnson administration. After he had moved on, she worked for Johnson. The two of them met at Harvard in the early 1970s. After Dick’s first wife died, they married in 1975. Dick died in 2018. Before his death, Dick and Doris went through the 300 boxes of papers from Dick’s years working with Senator and later President Kennedy, President Johnson, as well as working on the Presidential campaigns of Eugene McCarthy and Robert Kennedy.  The two of their insights provides for a unique review of all that happened in the 60s. 

This was a unique book to hear. Doris Kearns Goodwin read most of the text. But as her husband primarily (but not exclusively) served as a speech writer for the two Kennedys and for Johnson, where speeches were quoted, the Audible book inserts the actual speech. Some of the Johnson speeches I have vague memories of, and it was interesting to hear him again. It was also interesting to hear her husband’s role with phrases like “The New Frontier” and “The Great Society.” 

The early LBJ years were so hopeful. Johnson articulated a vision of “The Great Society.” It promised hope for all Americans, especially the poor and those of African descent. Sadly, our current administration also uses “great” in their logo (Make America Great Again), but I never hear a vision of what a Great America entails. Instead of being forward looking, like LBJs vision, MAGA looks backwards to some mythical place and time which never existed. 

As Vietnam began to consume the Johnson Presidency, many of the President’s advisors bailed, including Goodwin. He left with hard feelings for the two men never talked again. Dick Goodwin went to work for Eugene McCarthy in the 1968 primaries. He told McCarthy that if Robert Kennedy (a friend) entered in the race, he would have to support him. So, after the early good showing by McCarthy and LBJ dropping out of the race, Goodwin moved over to support Kennedy. And after Kennedy’s assassination, he was back with McCarthy for the 1968 Democrat Convention. 

Doris came to work for LBJ late in his presidency. She was picked by Johnson to help him work on his memoirs and organizing his papers. She wanted to go back to teaching at Harvard. He finally agreed with a compromise, which her commutating back and forth between Texas and Boston. Her insight into Johnson was as a broken man whom she came to care deeply. In a way, Doris and Dick had differences with LBJ, which makes the book even more interesting. 

The book is also about the hope they both had in the 1960s. That’s the love story, but it’s also about their love story which didn’t begin until after the decade had ended. I appreciate Doris Kearns Goodwin’s writing. It’s easy to understand and she catches the reader up with the hope the decade began and the tragedy with how it ended. 

While the book is about the 1960s, it also contains wisdom which our world needs today. I recommend it. 

Amy Leach, The Salt of the Universe: Praise, Songs, and Improvisations 

title cover for "The Salt of the Universe"

(New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2024), 221 pages. 

This is the second book I read by Amy Leach.  In 2013, I read her book, Things That Are. Then, in 2014, she was a presenter at the Calvin Festrival of Faith and Writing. As her first book focused on nature, I arranged her to make a presentation for Pierce Cedar Creek Institute on nature and literature. Having found her first book delightful, when I saw this book, I picked it up and thoroughly enjoyed it.  Leach creates wonderful essays by pulling dissimilar things and ideas and mixing them together.

Much of The Salt of the Universe comes from Leach’s background. She grew up in Texas as a member of the 7th Day Adventist Church. She attended 7th Day Adventist camps and college and have worked on their mission field. While she has moved away from the church’s teachings, she remains a vegetarian. This is not because of the teachings of Ellen White, who I learned in reading this book helped solidify the church’s position. Leach draws on scripture and especially Peter’s vision in Joppa to question the church’s fundamentalist view against eating meat.  She also challenges the church’s position on supporting the community over against the individual. Quoting a church president who said, “the individual is nothing,” Leach insists the opposite is true. “The institution is nothing; individual is everything.” 

Her writings encourage her readers to take notice of the world, its wonder and awe. She draws on all her interests to create these essays. As a classical trained musician, she pulls music into her stories. She is obviously well read, drawing on diverse authors from Shakespeare to Jim Harrison, from the Hindu poet Tagore to her favorite poet, Emily Dickerson, and dozens of others. She is also a keen observer of the natural world. Her weirdly mixed concepts that are often dissimilar create delightful essays. 

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The Battle of Moores Creek 250 Years Later

title slide with photo of the bridge and the 250 anniversary logo
My dad paddling in Moores Creek in November 2018

This July, our nation will celebrate its 250th anniversary. But before signing of the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia on July 4th, battles occurred between British loyalist and colonists. Most these battles occurred in the New England states, and in New York and New Jersey. But one small yet significant battle occurred in Eastern North Carolina. This Friday will mark the 250th anniversary of this skirmish.

To raise troops to suppress the rebellion, the British set their eyes on raising an army of 3,000 soldiers from the Scottish Highlanders who had settled in the Sandhills of the Upper Cape Fear River region of North Carolina. Many of these Highlanders moved to North Carolina following the failure of the Scottish Bonnie Prince Charlie to take the British throne in the Jacobite rebellion. After the Battle of Culloden in 1745, under the threat of death, many Scots confessed their loyalty to the British crown and left Scotland. Quite a few of them ended up in the Sandhills of North Carolina. Others, who had not participated in the Jacobite Rebellion also relocated on the promise of free land offered by the frown. 

Cypress knees and ice, February 2010

The British governor of North Carolina, Josiah Martin suggested raising an army of Highland Scots from the Sandhills of North Carolina to help stabilize the Southern Colonies and give the British a base to quell the revolt. Martin hoped to raise an army upwards of 10,000, but his military commanders were only able to raise an army of approximately 1,600. 

In late February, the troops lead by Donald McDonald assembled at Cross Creek (now Fayetteville) to begin their march to the port in Wilmington. The plan was to unite with a larger British force coming to the colony by sea. They found the main road, on the south side of the Cape Fear River blocked at Rock Creek by Patriots led by Col. James Moore. Unwilling to fight as only about half of his new recruits had firearms, McDonald moved his force northeast, crossing the Cape Fear, and then south, along another road which paralleled the Black River. There were a few skirmishes along the way.

Reconstructed Moores Creek’s Bridge

On the night of February 26, the loyalist found a small contingent of patriots camped in from of what known as Widow Moores Creek bridge. They sent a Messager asking the colonist to surrender. They laughed the suggestion off. Thinking they vastly outnumbered the patriots, Mcleod, who assumed command on MacDonald’s illness, planned to attack. 

Two units of patriots had converged at Moores Creek, some twenty miles from Wilmington. The site was considered an ideal location to stop the Loyalists. The swamp around the creek would force the army to stay on the high ground. This allowed the patriots to create an effective field of fire. Col. Alexander Lillington and his unit of 150 men dug in along the eastern approach. These men were whom MacDonald’s scouts had observed on the 26th. What he didn’t know is that Col. Richard Caswell with 850 men from New Bern had dug in on the opposite bank. 

Reconstructed earthworks on the east side of the creek

Thinking there was only a small contingent of men guarding the bridge, Mcleod’s soldiers prepared to attack in the early morning hours on the 27th. After a six-mile night hike on a spooky road running through a swamp with trees draped with Spanish Moss, they prepared to assault Lillington’s forces in the early hours of the morning. Instead, they discovered his camp deserted, but the campfires coals remained warm. 

Col. Mcleod handpicked a contingent of men to cross the creek and to see where the enemy might be hiding. Dawn was just beginning to break, and a fog concealed the lowlands around the water. They carefully crossed the slippery timbers which had been greased with fat.

Road heading through the swamp

Coming off the bridge, they silently made their way through the fog and up the road out of the swamp. Maybe a twig snap. Suddenly, someone ahead shouted, “Who goes there?” “A Friend of the King,” was the response. At that point, knowing the enemy was just ahead, they drew sabers and charged up the road yelling “King George and Broadswords.” They were brave but foolish. But the patriots had dug in. It was a trap.

The patriots held their fire, hiding behind breastworks as the Scots came out of the fog. They charged like William Wallace reincarnated. When only 15 or 20 yards from the line, the patriots opened fire. In addition to their muskets, they were armed with two small canons loaded with grapeshot. With the road flanked on both sides by swamp, the Scots had nowhere to go. McLeod fell first, followed by fifty-some of his handpicked men. The rest of the Highlanders fled. The battle lasted only minutes. Over the next couple of days, they captured 800 or so of the Highlanders. They granted some pardons and went headed back to their farms. But many they banished to Nova Scotia, Florida or the West Indies.

It was a small engagement early in the war. But the battle discouraged the British from trying to conquer the Southern colonies. Their forces moved north where most of the fighting would occur for the next several years. The battle also helped the colonists in North Carolina by providing weapons and supplies. Interestingly, most of their Patriot weapons had been given to them by the British during the French and Indian Wars. That’s a lesson we still haven’t learned from history.

The battlefield is a National Park site. The earthworks are reconstructed. Numerous monuments have been erected, most given by the people of North Carolina in the great monument age (1890-1920). Two of the larger monuments are for Pvt. John Grady, the only death on the Patriot’s side, and for those Scots fighting as loyalists. After 120 years, old grudges died and the state (which after the Civil War entered a Scottish revival era) no longer harbored ill feelings for the losing side. 

In addition to the battlefield trail, there is a small museum with several period weapons. There is also a short “Tarheel” interpretive trail. This trail focuses on the role the longleaf pine played in the development of the “naval stores” industry. Interestingly, all the native longleaf pines have been cut. There are younger longleafs growing, but all the mature pines are loblollies. The battlefield trail takes you along a boardwalk into the swamp around Moores Creek, allowing up close views of a cypress swamp. The water is stained brown from the tannic acid of the cypress trees. These trees also have “knees” that protrude up from the muck. The Spanish moss gives the swamps an eerie feeling. In the summer, there’s a good possibility of encountering snakes and perhaps, if lucky, of seeing an alligator. 

I was last at Moore’s Creek in November 2018, with my father. We paddled up the creek from the Black River. 

Speaking at the Savannah St. Andrew’s Society in November 2019

In 2019, I spoke of this battle at the St. Andrews Society of Savannah annual St. Andrews banquet.  To read this speech, a part of which I used above, go to:  https://fromarockyhillside.com/2019/12/01/st-andrews-talk/

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Remembering Ralph on his 100th Birthday

title slide with photo of Ralph in California Majove Desert and his truck near Hamilton, Nevada

bottle of scotch with a glass of scotch on ice

Last Thursday, February 12th, Lincoln’s birthday, was also the 100th birthday of a late friend of mine, Ralph Behrens. That evening, his son (Rob who lives in Northern Utah) and I each had a Scotch in memory of his dad. 

Ralph and I met at a potluck dinner for Boy Scouts Troop 360. It was late 1993 or early 1994,, shortly after I moved to Cedar City, Utah. Sometime that evening we started talking. Ralph learned of my interest in mining towns as I had written a few journal articles on the Comstock Lode. At the time, I was considering returning to school for another degree. My hope was to write a dissertation focusing on the role the church played in mining camps.

I learned that Ralph grew up in Goler Gulch, a mining community in the Mojave Desert of California. It was a rough place to live during the Depression. Ralph graduated from high school in 1944 and joined the Army Air Corp. He arrived in the South Pacific near the end of the war, but earn a combat ribbon because, as he was fond of say, “some General wanted another metal so they loaded up a bunch of bombs on a 100 airplanes and we flew and blew the hell out of a handful of Japanese on an island we didn’t deem important enough to invade.” 

Shortly after that potluck dinner, Ralph and I started taking regular trips out into the desert. I’m not sure exactly how many trips we made, but we did at least a dozen or so trips in Utah, Nevada, California, and along the Arizona Strip. I even helped Ralph cut and haul wood for several years to heat his house. One trip we didn’t get to make when I was in Utah, but had discussed, was to the Hole in a Wall. In 2006, a couple years after having left Utah, I flew back and the two of us set out to visit this spot. While not an overnight trip, this was the last big trip we took. The next few times I visited, Ralph’s health had declined to the point he could no longer able to travel in such a manner. Ralph died in 2010. 

Ralph, his dog, brother, and father around 1930 in Goler Gulch, CA
Ralph’s dad, Ralph with his dog, and his brother. Goler Gulch, CA, around 1930

The story below I wrote in 2006. I’ve edited it and republished it here. 

We arrive in Escalante around 11 AM. This must be one of the strangest towns in Utah. A few years ago, the Mormon influence remained so strong you had a hard time finding 3.2 beer. Interestingly the town isn’t named after a saint, but a Catholic priest. Father Escalante came through here a century before the Mormons settled this area. He searched of a faster way from Santa Fe to the California missions. At that time only a few small bands of Paiutes lived in this hostile environment, descendants of the Anasazi whose culture flourished here until abruptly disappearing around 700 years ago. As Escalante discovered, travel in canyon country is difficult. It’s easier today, but by modern standards is still difficult.

I hadn’t been in Escalante for five or six years. The town appears prosperous; almost negating the doom predictions of the naysayers who predicted President Clinton’s creation of the Grand Staircase National Monument would be a catastrophic event. The town now has sidewalks with classic streetlamps, several new businesses and a new high school. Ralph pulls up in front of the Golden Loop, a diner. The logo has a cowboy standing tall in the saddle, with the “golden loop” of his lasso falling over the neck of a calf. As it’s not quite time for lunch, we hit the Roan Pony Bookstore next door first. I know right away things have changed in Escalante. 

“Don’t sell too many books to locals, do you?” I quip sarcastically to the salesclerk.

“We sell a few children books,” she replies, “but not many to adults.”

“I bet not,” I say while reading through the titles of books critical of the Mormon faith. She has a couple copies of Fran Brodie’s, No Man Knows My History. It’s a good biography of Joseph Smith, the faith’s founding prophet, and written by a granddaughter of Brigham Young, the faith’s second prophet. It’s been over fifty years since this book came out. Its publication got Brodie excommunicated and the book placed on the church’s blacklist. There are other books critical of the Mormon Church including a few titles by people who have left the church, encouraging others to follow in their footsteps. In another section of the small store are the works by Michael Moore, Calvin Tillian, Al Franklen, and other liberal thinkers. Not only is this Mormon country, but this is also Republican country, and these titles won’t gain her any friends. 

The Roan Pony also features a section reserved for environmental writers, Abbey and McPee and a host of others. The only thing worse than a liberal in this country is an environmentalist. Pick-up trucks all sport bumper stickers critical of environmentalists and nature lovers. “Hungry: Eat an Environmentalist,” reads one. Not too far from here, over on US 89, more than one effigy of Robert Redford has dangled in a noose. It’s obvious the Roan Pony isn’t marketing itself to the locals, but there are now plenty of tourists now flocking in to see this rugged country. I admire the owner. She’s a brave soul. Just having this bookstore in Escalante is akin to Jeremiah of the Old Testament standing up and telling King Zedekiah and his court what they didn’t want to hear. Of course, Jeremiah got thrown into a well.


The Roan Pony advertises a 20% off sale. She’s preparing to close for winter in a few weeks. I pick up a book that’s been on my reading list, Paul Theroux Dark Star Safari, figuring with a 20% markdown, I can support the local economy.

After the bookstore, we enter the restaurant and sit at a table. It takes a few minutes for the waitress to get to us. I order a hamburger and iced tea. Ralph asks for chili and coffee. After a few minutes more she brings out drinks. Then the waiting really starts. After a good fifteen minutes, after I’ve finished my tea and he’s drunk his coffee, Ralph quips: “If they keep up at this pace, we can make it dinner.” Not very happy at the service, I nod in agreement, saying something about them having to catch a cow before they can butcher it. But then the meal comes and the burger is tasty. This isn’t any corn fattened cow, its range fed and you can taste the difference.


As we’re finishing up with lunch, Ralph tells me the problem he’s been having with the lights on the truck. He can’t remember if he got ‘em fixed. I’m sure there was a speck of horror on my face. Ralph doesn’t use this truck much anymore, but he’s always keeps it in good running order. Seeing that we’ve lost an hour between the bookstore and diner, and there is little chance we’ll get back before dark, I heartily agree that we should check the lights out before we leave town. They work!

Ralph then tosses me the key and asks me to drive, complaining of his shoulder. As I maneuver out into the street, I ask if we should top off the tank. He doesn’t think so since the truck has a full 18 gallons reserve tank. We have plenty of snacks and water, just in case. We leave the town and civilization behind.

Just out of Escalante, we take the graveled “Hole in a Rock Road,” which runs southeast. Its fifty-four miles from the point we leave the pavement until the trail dead-ends on an overlook at the Colorado River. In the 19th Century, Mormons used this road to migrate into the Arizona Territory. It was a long and punishing trip. Once they got to the “Hole in a Rock,” an opening in the mountains above the Colorado, they lowered their wagons with ropes down to the ford in the river. The ford is gone; the Glen Canyon dam has flooded this part of the river to create Lake Powell.

Imposing cliffs rise to the right of the road, with bands like chevrons of different colored sediment running nearly the fifty miles. To the left, the country drops off into canyons that lead down into the Escalante River. There are a few signs noting points of interest along the way. There are also a handful of mileage signs which aren’t consistent. After ten miles on the road, a sign says its 51 miles to the end. Then, after only a mile, another sign says its 42 miles, which is about what we expect. Yet just a few miles beyond that sign, another one says we got 46 more miles. 

“You driving backwards, Ralph asks? We don’t place any confidence into the signs.

Hole in the Wall Road, Utah

The first thirty miles of the road is good; or as good as gravel roads in this country get. This is high desert; as far as one can see there are pinion and juniper trees, yellow rabbit brush, and sage. Just off the road, to the west, are acres of unique rock formations known as the Devil’s Garden. Large beige columns of mushroom like sandstone cover the area.

Afterwards, the road continues to lose elevation, and fewer trees are seen until somewhere under 4500 feet, they become non-existent. However, there are flowers: Orange Mellow, Sego Lilies, Snakeweed. It’s a pleasant surprise to find so many flowers blooming this late in the season, but the area has recently had rain as evident by the muddy bottoms in the ravines. Yucca plants are also prevalent, their spring blooms long dried by the sun and wind. Cottonwoods grow in a few washes, an indication of water in this barren land.

at the beginning of the Hole in a Rock road

As we approach the end, the cliffs and the canyons draw closer and the road snakes down into washes, only to wind steeply out of them. Driving is a challenge. The truck has no power steering, and I fight with the wheel while constantly downshifts to keep from burning out the brakes. On a few occasions, I even double clutch the truck into low, to get enough power to climb a steep embankment. We’re swung around at every bend. Driving, I recall the chase seen across slickrock in Edward Abbey’s Monkey Wrench Gang. But we’re not being chased by the Sheriff out of Moab, so I slow down.

It’s getting late in the afternoon, and we both begin to worry about getting back to the pavement before nightfall. Around 4 PM, after having covered maybe 2 miles in the past thirty minutes, we give up. We’re at least 4 miles from the “hole.” I was willing to continue, but I’d been there about 10 years earlier. Ralph had never been out this far. After swearing that it’s the worst road he’s ever been on (and he grew up in the desert Southwest), Ralph suggests we turn around.



Coming out goes faster than going in even though we’re driving into a north wind blowing sand down the road. Whenever we stop and get out, the sand stings my bear legs. As the sun drops closer to the Kaiparowits Plateau, we have one final adventure. I tell Ralph we’re low on fuel in the main tank and he instructs me on how to change tanks. I do and a minute or so later, the truck runs out of fuel. We stop to check things out. The switch has broken. 

“What are we to do now,” I ask? 

“Don’t worry,” Ralph says. “I’ve got my Oklahoma Gas Card,” as he pulls out a flexible tube from behind the seat. Although a toddler when his family left Kansas for the desert, Ralph somehow retained a prejudice against the southern neighbors of his infancy. 

Cliffs with pocket of water from recent rains

For the time being, I switched back over to the main tank and drove cautiously. The needle pegged empty as the sun slips below the mountains. I let out a sigh of relief when we turned back onto the blacktop of Utah Highway 12. A few minutes later, we’re back in Escalante and I pull in under the lights at a gas station. Filling up the main tank, I calculate we had less than half a gallon left in the tank. Had we continued on to the hole in a rock, we’d been out of gas and siphoning it from the other tank before we got back to civilization.

Once back on the highway, I watch the stars appear as we head west, arriving back at Ralph’s home in time for a late but wonderful dinner of short ribs, prepared by Pat, Ralph’s wife. Ralph fixes himself a martini and offers me a Scotch. 

Other stories of traveling with Ralph

Great Basin Mining Trip 

Camp Bangladesh (A humorous look at the two of us as summer camp Scoutmasters)

Goler Gulch (where Ralph grew up)

A 94 year old red head and the mother of Ralph’s childhood friend

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Bodie, California

title slide with photo of road leading into Bodie
The Methodist Episcopal Church in Bodie

In early October, Sandy, a woman I had dated while in Pittsburgh that spring, flew in. She had an interview for a job in California, but before that spent a few days with me. On Friday night, we checked out the bars and nightlife in Virginia City, listening to Murray Mack pound the piano playing ragtime tunes. Then, on Saturday, we went with Victor in his old Bronco and checked out the country around the Comstock.  We were looking for the petrographs, which we never found. Then, on Sunday, after church, we packed up and headed South on US 395, with plans to visit Yosemite from the backside. I don’t remember if someone had suggested I check out Bodie or if I learned about the town on this trip. 

This being in early fall, bursts of yellow aspen dotted the mountains on both sides of the highway. Unlike in the East, where the fall landscape becomes colorful with reds, yellows, and oranges, in the West color shows up in patches up on the hillside. Our first stop was for ice cream at Bridgeport, an old town on the east side of the Sierras. Then we went to Mono Lake, a place I’d wanted to see since reading Mark Twain’s Roughing It late that spring. It was one of several books I read in preparation to moving to Nevada for a year. While at the lake, we saw the unique geological monuments left behind by calcium springs when the water was higher and experienced the brine flies that cover the shoreline. Thankfully, they don’t bite. 

Mono Lake looking toward the Sierras. I took this photo in 2013

As the light began to fade, we headed to Lee Vining where I rented the last hotel room in the town. This older hotel had shared bathrooms, something I was surprised to find in America in the late 1980s.

The next morning, we rose early and drove over the Tioga Pass to Tuolumne Meadows on the backside of Yosemite. Most everything had closed for the season, so after hiking a bit, we had to head back to Lee Vining for lunch. 

After lunch, we drove to Bridgeport, turned east and drove 13 miles on mostly a gravelly wash boarded road. At one point, we crossed a ridge and Bodie stood in front of us with mountains rising behind the town. The town’s old woodened structures and the mill’s industrial complex sheltered under tin, appeared to rise out of the sagebrush. Coming into town, we saw only a few trees, cottonwoods and aspen, nestled in ravines which protected them from the strong winds. We parked, paid our entrance fee as Bodie is now a California State Park, and proceed to spend several hours walking around the old buildings.  

The road leading into Bodie. Parking is below the town and visitors must walk

Bodie shares a few things in common with Virginia City. Both areas were discovered in the late 1850s, just before American fell into the Civil War. But Bodie’s start was slower than the mines along the Comstock.  While Virginia City was remote, it was only 10 miles north of the Pony Express and the Overland Stagecoach route. Dayton, Mormon Station and Carson City, while small towns, were all close, while Bodie had only Bridgeport, which was not much more than a stage stop. And the Southern Sierras are higher and wider than the those around Carson City. So Bodie was harder to reach. 

Warning sign on road to Aurora r

However, 15 or 20 miles east of Bodie sits Aurora, Nevada. It’s discovery also occurred around the same time as Bodie. Aurora had higher grade of ore and in the early 1860s became very prosperous. One of its citizens in 1862, who learned how difficult mining came be, was Samuel Clemens. While in Aurora, he wrote a series of articles and mailed them to the Territorial Enterprise, a leading Nevada newspaper in Virginia City. This lead to a job which didn’t involve a pick or shovel and there, as a reporter, Clemens would begin to go by his nom-de-plume, Mark Twain. Sadly, lacking a high clearance 4-wheel drive vehicle, I never made it to Aurora. 

In addition to its isolation, Bodie sits at 8300 feet, two thousand feet higher than Virginia City. This is harsh territory.  While the Sierras capture much of the snow, it still snows here and there’s little protection from the bitter wind. It’s amazing to consider that once Bodie came into its own in the late 1870s, as Virginia City’s production declined, 10,000 people lived amongst these hills. In those early years, the town developed a mystic as a very violent place. Supposedly, one young girl whose family were leaving Virginia City for Bodie said, “Goodbye God, we’re moving to Bodie.” But such was the life early on in mining camps, which were mostly populated with men. 

Then, as with all mining towns, in the early-1880s, Bodie began to decline. But people continued to mine. In 1932, a young boy started a fire that burned a large portion of the town. Yet, even then, a few hung on, continuing to live and mine in Bodie until World War 2, when the government closed all gold mines as unnecessary for the war effort.  In time, the state of California inherited the town and in the early 1960s created a state park.  

While the state protects the town, private concerns own the rich hills to the south of the town. The mines were located here.. When I visited again in the spring and summer of 1989, I learned a Canadian mining company had its eyes on the potential ore in that hill. California no longer allowed cyanide leaching (a process to remove valuable metals like gold and silver from rock). To get around this, the company proposed to build a ten-mile-long conveyor. This would allow them to transport the ore to Nevada, where such operations are allowed. I don’t know what happened to such plans as California fought it. Such an operation with blasting and heavy equipment would be enough to destroy what’s left of Bodie. 

Bodie’s remaining mill

I would visit Bodie twice more during the year I lived on the Comstock. In late May, my parents visited. We took a two-night trip down to Bodie and stayed in a hotel in Lee Vining. While walking around the ghost town, it began to snow. This ddi not amuse my mother. I knew she didn’t care to share a bathroom with other guests at the hotel. I made reservations before leaving.

On this trip, we left Bodie and took another gravel road to the south, which came out at Mono Lake. Back in the day, train tracks ran down the cuts now used for the road. The train cut along the east side of Mono Lake, then headed into the hills south of the lake. There, east of Mammoth Lakes, a sizable forest consisting of Ponderosa and Jeffrey Pines grew. Lumbering operations cut the trees forr mining timbers, building lumber, and firewood. Kilns converted some of the wood into charcoal. The later found use in heading and in the milling process. The tracks never connected to another railroad and was only used to wood products.  Once the town declined, the train ceased to operate.

After a night in Lee Vining, we traveled over Tioga Pass, across Tuolumne Meadows which still had snow. We then headed down into Yosemite Valley where we spent the second night. The next day, we drove through some of the California mining areas on the western slope of the Sierras, before crossing back over on Sonora Pass and heading north back to Virginia City.

My third visit was late in June. Carolyn, whom I had been dating much of the year, and I took her daughters, Emma and Holly to Bodie and Mono Lake. We camped at Twin Lakes on the eastern slope of the Sierras, before spending the day exploring Bodie.

While I have been back to Mono Lake and over Tioga Pass several times since 1989, I haven’t gone back to Bodie. But I would like to see it again one day. Unlike Virginia City, Bodie is a true ghost town. You’re not allowed to stay there after dark, and the only residents are rangers working for the state. 

The photos were taken at different times. some were slides and others were prints. I have more photos somewhere!

More stories about my time on the Comstock:

Arriving in Virginia City, September 1988

David Henry Palmer arrives in Virginia City, 1863

Virginia City’s Muckers presents Thorton Wilder’s “Our Town”

Doug and Elvira

Matt and Virginia City

Driving West in ’88

Funerals on the Comstock Lode

Sunday afternoon drive to Gerlach 

Riding in the cab of a locomotive on the V&T

Christmas Eve

Easter Sunrise Services (a part of this article recalls Easter Sunrise Service in Virginia City in 1989)

The Revivals of A. B. Earle (an academic paper published in American Baptist Historical Society Quarterly. Earle spent several weeks in Virginia City in 1867)