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Posts published in “Essays”

Horse Soldiers [1937]

If you have the time, and the cavalry has all the time in the world, there's no better way to learn how to ride a…

Concourse Contours: Satchmo & the Max Roach Centenary

Louis Armstrong’s trumpet sighs and pleads in counterpoint with the airport announcements. The melody is barely audible but still unmistakable above the thunderous whisper of…

Pinches & The Pictographs

There are people who have lived all their lives in Mendocino County who don’t know where Island Mountain is and have never been to Covelo.…

Commune Colleges

Way back at the start of senior year at our coastal Southern California high school, one of my very best friends Tom said to me…

Vietnam G.I.

Vietnam, G.I. was a first-rate newspaper founded and edited by SP/5 Jeff Sharlet in January 1968. It was an almost-monthly tabloid. This piece is from…

Nixon’s White Cat

It was the winter of 1956. The Vice President of the United States, Richard Nixon, was trying to convince voters that he would be a…

The Great Wave

Bainbridge Island, Washington. It was 1973. I was eight years old and Hollywood was into disaster movies. Somehow, I fibbed my way with a friend…

23 Years To The Finish Line

Some 23 years ago I had some free time and I wanted to serve on a Sonoma County Fair Board. This honor is an appointment…

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