might not interest…

This might not interest, but I think of my dad on this day.

Relatives tell me he was never the same after the war… prior to war he was a fun guy. After, not. Moody and and withdrawn… more of an SOB. As Trump and our yokel politicians head us into war with China or others, it is worth thinking about.

To reflect, my dad was in General Dolittle’s and his successor’s 15th Air Force headquarters staff in south Italy (which bombed the hell out of the Axis powers from the south). Six bomber wings (B17s and B24s) and two fighter wings (P38s and P51s).

He never talked the war. I think he may have seen some horrors… hundreds of bombers crashing on return (the 15th lost 3,400 aircraft), bullet ridden airplanes and 21,000+ crewmen dead and wounded. In 18 months. It is hard to comprehend these numbers now. I will never know. The picture of my dad below is a favorite of mine, overlooking the  Adriatic from Bari, Italy, where the 15th was based–one of the largest naval bases outside of Pearl. He saw so much, talked so little…

Weird, yes. But then, your dad is weird:)

As a child, as I think my family knows, we had but a few books in the house. Maybe ten. These included the Pope approved Catholic bible (the heretical St. James version was a sin to possess), a few children’s “Golden Books” and the Cub Scout and Boy Scout Handbooks. Maybe a Nancy Drew or two. We did not read much. Mostly we were expected to “do” things.

Then one day in the early 1950s my dad came home with a thirty-two volume, 1933-ish issue of the Encyclopedia Britannica. My jaw dropped. Best, it was put in a custom bookcase in the hall immediately outside my bedroom. At the top of the stairs from the first floor. I spent much of my childhood reading it as I got interested in different things.

I recall each volume was about a thousand pages and weighed five pounds. At the same time I also consumed numerous books related to science or electricity. When Melinda and I wed, I learned for the first time that many people read in bed. For fun, not just to educate themselves. For a while I thought it weird. But it began a new era for this kid.

Childhood

Encyclopedia Brittanica (1933 Edition)

Golden Book of Science (1956) – the one that I think shaped my life.

The Stars – H. A. Rey – ditto, the shaping.

Midsummer Nights Dream – magical to me; got to see the play at the Cleveland Playhouse Theater

Great Expectations – something about it struck me as having been there.

Huckleberry Finn – Just drew me in.

Adulthood (in order of wonder)

Leslie C. Peltier – Starlight Nights

Richard Feynman – What Do You Care What Other People Think? (and the rest of his collection)

George Smoot – Wrinkles in Time

James Lee Burke – The Dave Robicheaux books

James Crockett – The Victory Garden

Oops, I have twelve…

Arthur Conan Doyle – Sherlock, of course

Richard Rhodes – The Making of the Atomic Bomb

Honorable Mentions

Anything by Ian Rankin, Timothy Ferris, Dava Sobel, plus Krakatoa: The Day the World

Exploded – by Simon Winchester, and The Principia by good ole I. Newton

The “book” I’d want on a desert island is ‘the EB.’ The first mentioned above.

Cheers.