A friend asked for book titles that referenced the coronavirus.

“Goodnight Covid19”

In the great green hospital room,
there was a ventilator,
and a bedpan and bowl full of mush,
“hush” said the little old nurse,
goodnight Covid19,
goodnight room so green,
goodnight ventilator and yucky bedpan,
goodnight to all bowls of mush everywhere

It’s impossible to catch up on a blog. I’ve been so busy doing other things – writing fiction books under my pen name, building model ships, working on downsizing my library and papers, and simply living the life of a retiree that I’ve forgotten to post in my blog. Now that we are self-isolating to avoid catching the dreaded covid19, I probably have time to do some blog posts that are worthy. – DW

A few decades ago, while on a research assignment for National Geographic books, I met Herb Anderson, one of the builders of the atom bomb. He was living in a ranch house just outside of Los Alamos. Despite all the success that he and his fellow scientists had in nuclear physics, recievi9ng awards, and congratulations of his peers and high government officials, one thing he didn’t have was good health.

Anderson’s breathing was difficult and labored from berylliosis, which he’d gotten during his work as a scientist. He was on oxygen 24 hours a day, walking around his house on what seemed an endless tether connected to his oxygen tanks. If he went out, which was rare, he had to take a portable tank with him.

Dr. Anderson told me that he’d chopped beryllium by hand on the day the news of the discovery of fission had been hand delivered by Niels Bohr to the laboratory of Enrico Fermi in New York’s Columbia University. Working as Fermi’s laboratory assistant, they reproduced the fission experiment that day — the first fission to be created in the US. From there, the eventually went to Chicago and created the first nuclear pile. That, by the way, was the subject of Dr. Anderson’s Phd dissertation, the official report on building the first nuclear pile.

Beryllium is a terrible poison to all humans. Compared to asbestos it is much stronger, and more of a killer. Which is why it must surely be a sin to expose more workers to such poisons today. It’s one thing for a scientist in his lab to experiment with such materials in the hectic days of science of the 1940s to defeat the Nazis.

It’s something else to ruthlessly expose workers to beryllium today in order to save money for the corporations and their stock holders. That is what the Trump administration is trying to do, abettors of the crime of exposing workers to deadly illness.

So why is the Trump administration bent on doing exactly that? What is it, Mr. Trump? Do you think the world has forgotten what it is to poison workers for greed? Will that make America great again?

Mysteries and Suspense. The novel I’m crafting has all kinds of fun stuff in it. Secret messages. Escapes on dirigibles; a gunfight in a snowstorm. I’ve been honing my knowledge of mystery and spy fiction in preparation for writing this book The works of Eric Ambler, though not read a lot these days, ought to be read more often. Helen McInness, the same. “Above Suspicion,” and “Assignment Brittany” were two of my favorites. And it shouldn’t surprise anyone that the fascists get their asses kicked, one way or another in her wartime novels. As is right and should be.

Forward momentum, as one of my favorite fiction characters says, is vital. I’m happy to say that this morning I passed 30,000 words in my historical fiction manuscript.

The adventure and suspense builds as my characters ride the steamer B. S. Ford from Queenstown to Baltimore, arriving on a very cold December night after a harrowing journey that began on a dirigible departing New York City, landing at Cape May, New Jersey, and then enduring a grueling steamer passage across the mouth of the Delaware Bay in a snow storm.

In September I served as editor and publisher of Kat Forder’s EC Stories: Flood, Recovery, and Community. It’s a wonderful look at the people who helped restore Ellicott City after the flood of 2018.

Life moves on with relentless pressure, and I forget to update my page here about my writing and photography. This year, I’ve published a couple books of my own creation, and one by Kat Forder.

In the spring, it was Steam Locomotives: Nineteenth Century Engineering, a heavily illustrated book with original drawings and artwork from the best engineering of the century.

Followed by a small book of my family stories, mostly as told by my grandfather, Harper S. Wooddell, railroad detective and skilled hunter in West Virginia. “Here’s Another Story: Wooddell Family Tales” It’s also available on Amazon, for those with an interest in such material.