During my older sister’s annual visit last fall, three shoe boxes came into the house with her luggage. After the usual greetings and settling in, she opened the Florsheim boxes to reveal a postcard collection. In an effort to clean out her Tennessee Victorian, a closet shelf having collapsed the week before, she decided she didn’t want them anymore: would I be interested in them? History is always a bit surprising, especially when close to one’s personal narrative. Imagine the archaeologist who digs up an artifact that totally alters the theory he has been working … Continue reading Writing History’s Happenstance by Fred Wilbur →
I remember the moment I knew my grandmother’s mind was slipping away. My cousin leaned in to give her a kiss and say goodnight. “Goodnight, Dahh-ling,” she replied as only she could, and then, to no one in particular, “Who was that?” Granted, the woman had nine kids and eighteen grandchildren, and she may have had a rum punch or two, but still, it struck me. Two years later, a few days before Christmas, I sat with her on a bench under a blanket and a blue winter sky in the field behind the old Virginia … Continue reading What We Forget by Tom Coates →
It was just about a hundred years ago that Martha dropped dead. She was found on the floor of her cage at the Cincinnati Zoo and that was that – the end of the last known passenger pigeon on the planet. One lifeless bird signified the extinction of a species whose population once numbered in the billions, perhaps the most abundant bird in the world. They were large, grayish pigeons, not flashy, not exotic, yet in descriptions, something about them evoked the language of magic or mythology: the golden-green iridescence that lit up their plumage, … Continue reading The Pigeons and the President →
[frame align=”right”][/frame]Sometime after Streetlight published the 5th issue, I met Browning Porter. The staff of SL had just heard bad news. Our printer Lexis Nexis was pulling the plug. It was during the financial crash of ’08 and we were a bit stunned. What to do to keep the magazine alive? None of us had the stomach for knocking on doors with our tin cups. Someone thought to call Browning. (He had not been active on the magazine since I had joined the staff). After more than a few meetings, plotting and paper, he helped … Continue reading How To Start A Magazine →
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