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.

 

My grandfather, Harper S. Wooddell was a very good story teller. He lived an interesting life, and enjoyed talking about his life growing up on the top of Allegheny Mountain, in Pocahontas County, West Virginia. He was born in a log cabin that was built by his father around 1870. One of 13 children, Harper moved off the mountain as a young man and went to work for the B&O Railroad as a railroad policeman. He retired decades later as a lieutenant of detectives in the Clarksburg office. Harper was also a great deer hunter. His stories of hunting are amusing, and insightful.

My recently published book, Here’s Another Story is an edited collection of Harper’s stories, with a few from my grandmother, Ruby. It’s an enjoyable read, and contains many family photos, as well as scenic images of the old Wooddell Farm on the mountain.

If you like stories, then Here’s Another Story is a good book for you.

 

 

 

Many people are afraid of death. I would guess that the main reason for religion is because of that fear. People want to think there is more to life than just the life we have here on earth. They invent religions to fool themselves into thinking there will be something more. Life after death. As an editorial researcher at National Geographic, I came across belief after belief of life, or whatever, after death. At one point, one of our contract photographers hired me as a freelancer to do advance research on the Ways of Death. We even got a grant from a west coast woo-woo group to help pay for my research. It was going to be a big coffee table book on how people around the world celebrated, observed, or believed in death, or life after death, or whatever you will.

I’m just sleeping. Photo by Jim Gurganious

Occasionally, when I’m passing through a cemetery, I lie down and check out the view. Not that I want to be buried in the cold cold ground. No worms crawling in and out for me, no sir. Cremation, and then my ashes can be buried up there on the Wooddell Farm in the corner of the old family cemetery. But I do recommend checking out the view in a cemetery sometime. The people there don’t mind. They are dead.

As a writer who is aging, I worry a lot about the many book projects I have started that are not yet finished. Those will be my legacy – if I finish them, and get them published. As I realized the other day, Dashiell Hammett is not writing or publishing anything new. One can read his entire body of work in a week. And then read them again, and again. That is a legacy. My work is cut out for me. I have to stop taking so many naps, no matter the location.

As for my beliefs? I believe in gravity. It really works. And fairies and unicorns, because fantasy!

Me and the unicorn. Photo by Kat Forder