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Thriller fiction and Non-fiction

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Oral histories, capturing memories

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common+valor+cover+low.jpgTomorrow, I’m giving a workshop at the WV Culture Center Archives and History Library on collecting oral histories. I was asked to put on the presentation following the completion of the West Virginia Voices of War documentary project and donation of the original recordings to the archives.

When I began the documentary project, my goal wasn’t to create a documentary. I knew I would do something with the material, but my purpose was to capture veteran’s memories in war. Just a few months before I began the project, my daughter’s great-grandfather passed away, taking his memories of the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the subsequent war in the Pacific with him. It was too late to record him, but I wanted to do what I could to record other’s memories.

As part of the workshop, I’ll be showing selected portions of the West Virginia Voices of War documentary, but I will also be talking the tools you need to record oral histories and discussing some interview techniques.

For years, you needed quality tape recorders and microphones to capture oral histories and needed experience editing sound recordings and controlling audio levels. Today, most of those concerns are gone. You can make high quality recordings with a $200 digital audio recorder or even a free app on your smart phone. There are online sites that can help you edit your recording or upload it for others to hear and to keep it safe. The only thing standing in the way of collecting oral histories today is time.

When conducting interviews, remember to relax. As a newspaper reporter turned freelance writer, I’ve conducted 100s of interviews and I still make mistakes. One time, the battery in the lapel microphone died just after I began the interview and I got nothing. I had to call the gentleman back, head hung low, and ask if I could come back. I got a good interview the second time, but it probably wasn’t as good as the first one. Other times I interrupted trains of thought or laughed, messing up the recording of a great story.

I’m not currently conducting veteran interviews, I’ve moved on to other projects, but I would love to see an army of people with recorders out collecting oral histories of veterans and from families and neighborhood and community leaders. The worst thing that can happen is if we put it off and never get around to capturing anything. When those people are gone, so are the memories of what happened.

Nov. 6:

Eric Douglas will present “West Virginia Voices of War: Oral Histories from West Virginia War Veterans” in the Archives and History Library in the Culture Center in Charleston. The program will begin at 6:00 p.m. and is free and open to the public.

http://www.wvculture.org/history/workshops/douglas110614promo.html

Nov. 11: Veterans Day

You can listen to the broadcast premiere of the West Virginia Voices of War documentary on New Appalachian Radio at 2 and 8 pm.

You can watch the documentary at the South Charleston Public Library at 7 pm..

Halloween: Let me hear you SCREAM!

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The swing ride at Lake Shawnee where a child died in an accident.

A week or so ago, I went to the Lake Shawnee Haunted Amusement Park just north of Princeton, West Virginia with my wife and stepdaughter. Lake Shawnee is a real abandoned amusement park where at least two children died in accidents and where the children of the first white settlers in Mercer County were scalped by Shawnee Indians. There is also an Indian burial mound nearby.

For October, the owners have set up the “Lake Shawnee Dark Carnival”. It is a quick tour of the facility combined with actors guiding you around and trying to creep you out. It was a fun evening, if not exactly what we expected. Afterwards, one of the staff told us that the rest of the year they offer tours where you can hang out and get a feel for the “supernatural” of the place. (If you’re interested in this, follow their Facebook page for more information.)

For various reasons, I’ve been to Mexico, Central and South America more than a dozen times over the last 10 years or so. Many of those cultures celebrate the Day of the Dead (Dia de Muertos). It’s actually a three day observance of Allhallowtide. That includes All Hallow’s Eve (Halloween) Hallowmas and All Soul’s Day. In general deceased children and infants are remembered on Nov. 1 and adults on Nov. 2. While they use skeletons dressed in clothing to represent that holiday, it doesn’t seem to be as much about the “things that go bump in the night” or that scare us. It is a time of remembrance and communicating with the dearly departed. They offer gifts of flowers and food.

That difference got me thinking about why some of us like to be scared. A couple different articles I read talked about the adrenaline rush that comes from it. Your heart beats faster, you feel stronger and more alive. Getting scared allows us to experience the forbidden without getting in trouble for doing it. If you’re reading a scary book, you know you can always close it. If you’re watching a scary movie, you know it will end.

I normally leave writing horror stuff to my colleagues, although for the last couple Halloweens I have written a ‘scary’ story to stretch my boundaries a little bit. Last year, I coerced some writer friends to contribute to a Halloween collection. Everyone wrote short stories and I posted links. We are doing it again this year.

And remember, it can’t be as scary as what you read about the upcoming election…

Here is what we did last year.

And here are the 2014 contributions (check back later for more stories):

Mark Slade

Elizabeth Gaucher

Virginia Moreland

Loren Eaton

Eric Douglas

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My name is Abby

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Copyright ® October 2014

By Eric Douglas

The leaves were beginning to change as Tom, Roy and John headed out for their last camping trip of the year. They had been friends for years; surviving marriages, divorces and everything in between. They knew each other’s issues, like women or booze. But those things didn’t matter; they had each other’s back.

They spent the day drinking beer while they fished in the small lake and talked about whatever was on their minds. Afterwards, heading back to their campsite, they noticed a pretty young woman at the next campsite over. She looked up as they approached their campsite and they waved. Tom’s attention stayed on the woman a little longer than the other two, though. His weakness was women. His fourth wife was half his age and waiting at home. Roy and John knew that wouldn’t mean much to their friend if he stood a chance to spend the night with a new woman.

For the next hour or so, Tom watched the woman and made eye contact a couple times. He got friendly smiles in return. He kept watching to see if the woman had any friends, but no one showed. After dinner, and a few more drinks, Tom decided it was his time to move.

“Hi there,” he said, with the faintest slur in his speech. “My friends and I wanted to know if you would like to join us at our campfire. We don’t want you to be lonely. Are you here by yourself?”

“Hi. Some friends were supposed to join me, but they backed out at the last minute. I love to be out in nature, so I came anyway,” the woman said with an easy smile.

Tom looked her up and down as she spoke and loved what he saw. She is exactly my type, he thought. Nice curves, short curly brown hair and a saucy look to her. I bet she is a lot of fun…

Tom suddenly realized the woman was still speaking to him. And he hadn’t heard a word she said. He stumbled for a second. “I’m sorry. What was that?”

“I said, my name is Abby,” the woman said, smiling. She knew exactly what Tom was doing.

“Hi there, Abby. My name is Tom. Come on over. Let me fix you a drink and introduce you to my friends.”

Tom put his arm around Abby’s waist as he led her to their campsite.

Tom introduced Abby to his friends and got knowing looks from Roy and John. Tom had a way of charming women, especially younger ones, and getting them where he wanted them. They laughed to themselves, although both men were a little jealous. How Tom could find a willing woman in the middle of a campground by the lake when there were no other single women around was beyond them.

After a few drinks, the conversation kept getting sillier and more risqué. Abby giggled at the men’s off-color jokes and threw in a couple of her own.

Suddenly, Abby got serious. “Do you want to hear a ghost story?” she asked.

Roy and John both agreed, but Tom was reluctant. He had hoped to be slipping away soon.

“Only if I can rub your back while you talk,” Tom said with a drunken leer. His magic fingers had gotten him lucky more than once.

Abby didn’t answer Tom; she just stared into the fire for a few minutes. About the time Roy and John were growing uncomfortable at the silence, and Tom was thinking his touch had distracted Abby from the ghost story, she began talking. Her entire demeanor changed as she began speaking. She was quiet and he voice clear and cold. The giggle was gone.

There was a young woman. We’ll call her Gail. She was deeply in love with Rex. Their love affair was magical. Rex treated her like a queen. Most of the time. Every once in a while, he would go to town with his friends and she knew there were women there. She knew Rex was unfaithful when he was away from her, but she told herself that it would all change when they were married. She told herself he was just sowing his wild oats.

In the Spring, the couple was wed and for Gail, everything was perfect. Things were good between the couple…for a few months. And then Rex’s friends came around to get him. She begged him not to go. To stay with her. But he pushed her away and said he would do what he pleased. He told her she had nothing to worry about, but not to wait up. He wouldn’t be home until the next day. Gail fell down crying as Rex left.

 Later, she pulled herself together and decided she wouldn’t give up her man without a fight. She followed Rex to town. She knew where he would be…The Saloon. She hitched her carriage to her horse and rode to town.

Pulling her hat low over her face, Gail entered the bar. It took her a few moments to realize Rex wasn’t there. She saw his friends at a corner table, but he was nowhere to be seen.

Gail told herself that Rex had a change of heart. He had come home to her. Immediately, she rushed to get back home. She didn’t want him to worry. Entering the stable to get her horse and buggy, she heard a sound. At first, she didn’t know what it was. It was a voice. A moan. And then she realized it sounded like Rex. Was he hurt? Had he been attacked?

Moving slowly, Gail pulled a dim lamp from a post and turned up the flame. It threw shadows all around, but there was no sign of Rex.

Maybe I was imagining things. Rex is at home waiting on me, she thought.

Turning back to her carriage, she heard another moan and then a giggle.

Who’s there? she called out Who’s there?

She heard rustling in the loft above her. And then she saw him. It was Rex. A moment later she saw a woman. They were both naked.

In a fury, she ran from the barn, leaving her horse and carriage behind her. She ran and ran, with no direction in mind. She was lost. He hadn’t even taken the woman to a bed. He was rutting in the hay loft like an animal.

Gail had no idea how long she ran when she found herself standing at the edge of a cliff. There was a lake 30 feet below her, lit up by the full moon above. With resolve, she knew what she was going to do. If he wanted other women, he wouldn’t have her any longer.

She was calm as she stepped out into the space in front of her and fell. She hit the water and never resurfaced. Gone.

John, Roy and Abby were all quiet when Abby was finished. Tom was still rubbing Abby’s back and grinning.

John and Roy stared at the fire and then got up quietly to go to their camper. They knew Tom was about to make his move. Abby’s story had disturbed them as well.

When the other two were gone, Tom spoke.

“So, you want to go back to your campsite?” he asked.

“Let’s take a walk down by the lake,” Abby suggested with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes.

“Sure….that sounds good,” Tom said, trying to think of a place he could take the young woman to get her out of her clothes.

The couple walked to the water’s edge, to a clearing where Tom and his buddies had spent the day fishing. Tom sat down on the ground and leaned back against a log.

“Why don’t you join me?” he said, reaching up for her.

“Did you listen to my story?” she asked, ignoring his reach.

“Sure, sure, it was a good one. All spooky and stuff,” Tom said, slurring more. “Now come on. Let’s get it on like that guy in the loft. We’ll do it like animals.”

Abby’s expression darkened further.

“Men like you are the problem. Gail never should have killed herself. She should have killed Rex. That was where she failed.”

“Come on, baby. I just want you. Let’s do this. You know you want it, too,” Tom said, trying to stand.

“I bet that’s what you said to the woman in the loft, too,” Abby said.

“What? What are you talking about? There’s no woman in a loft. Are you some crazy chick? That was just a story,” Tom said, unsteady on his feet. “I just wanna have a good time.”

“What if I told you the women in the story was named Abigail and not Gail. Would that make any difference to you?”

“No, just a dumb story,” Tom said, growing angry. He wasn’t used to getting this close, and spending this much effort, without getting lucky. “And it’s a dumb name, too.”

“Some people shorten Abigail to Abby,” the woman said. “Answer my question. Did you listen to my story?”

Tom was growing angry now. “Just a dumb story.” He lunged toward Abby.

“Not if it’s true.”

The next morning John and Roy found Tom face down in the lake, still wearing his clothes. He had drowned. There was no sign of Abby anywhere. Her tent and camping gear were gone. In fact, there was no sign anyone had been on the camp site at all.

+++++

The divers loaded their gear on the dive boat, excited for a morning out on the reef. Just before the boat left the dock, two guys ran to the boat carrying their gear. They had been out late the night before and were running slow. Climbing on board, one immediately eyed a pretty brunette sitting by herself. She had short, curly brown hair and looked great in her bikini. The first man on the boat glanced down to make sure his wedding ring was still back in the hotel room and then sat down beside the girl. She was younger than he was, but he liked it that way.

“Hi, I’m Joe.”

“Hi there. My name is Abby. Do you like ghost stories?”.

A coal poem: Campfires of the Hunters

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In the fall of 1990, as the United States prepared for the first Gulf War, I was the editor of a weekly newspaper in Matewan, West Virginia. During the buildup, local leaders decided to organize a “Support the Troops” rally. While they weren’t sure about going to war in the Middle East, no one wanted to repeat the mistakes of the past.

Watching the buildup to the midterm election, it seems like we need to take the same approach to the “war on coal”. Most of the political ads tell us that regulations against coal are an attack on coal miners. There are those who suggest anything but blind allegiance to the coal industry is the equivalent of treason. Sorry to say, but it isn’t that simple.

In August, I wrote about a political staffer attacking West Virginia poet Crystal Good calling her a “poverty profiteer”. (You can read that column here.) A few days later another West Virginia poet, Kirk Judd from Morgantown, sent me one of his poems. It’s a great demonstration that the issue is much more complex than 30 second political ads want to make it.

The Campfires of the Hunters

(The economics of controlled harvesting)

By Kirk Judd

At night,
The deer move out off the ridge to graze.
One of the older does raises her graying head to gaze
With silently accepting eyes
Far down the mountain at the blaze
Of the campfires of the hunters.
Tomorrow, they will kill her for food.

 

 They’ll need the meat.
The winter will be long, and cold
And the high cost of fuel for heat
Will cut into the food budget.

 

 The doe does not own the land on which she is killed.
The hunters do not own the land on which they kill her.
The State owns the land.

 

 The State regulates the hunters
And they’ve purchased licenses to avoid fines.
When they’ve finished their hunt,
They’ll return to their homes
And their jobs in the mines.
They mine the coal from under the land.

 

They do not own the coal they mine.
The Coal Company they work for
Does not own the coal they mine.
The Bank owns the coal.

 

 The State sells the mineral rights of the land to the Bank.
The Bank leases the mining rights to the coal to the Coal Company.
The Coal Company mines the coal, and sells it to the Power Company.
The Power Company burns the coal
And produces fuel to run the mines
And to heat the homes of the miners.
The Bank owns a controlling interest in the Power Company.

 

 Now the fuel bills will be so high
Because the Power Company was granted a rate increase.
By the State,
Which sells the rights to the Bank
Which leases those rights to the Coal Company
Which sells the coal to the Power Company
Which is controlled by the Bank and regulated by the State.

 

 The Power Company sells power
To the State, to the Bank, to the Coal Company,
And to the miners.

 

 At morning, the miners come yawning from the shaft,
Dark, minstrel faces
With eyes that have seen
The hunters’ fires.

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Architecture: An idea to revitalize Patrick Street

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 Photos courtesy of Jaime Rinehart and the WVSU Economic Development Center.

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Why is good architecture reserved for the wealthy or for ceremonial spaces?

I heard that question the other night and it’s still resonating in my head. The question was asked by Chelsie Nichelle Bush, a local woman with a degree in architecture. (She is still working on her licenses to be an architect.)

For her senior thesis, Bush focused on what she called “Nothing to Everyone: Investigating the Potential of Neglected Space” and directed her energy at Patrick Street. Bush presented her thesis to a group of 30 or so people interested in Charleston’s West Side at the WVSU Economic Development Center last week.

IMG_5350Most of us use Patrick Street as a way in and out of Charleston and a route to avoid stoplights and evening traffic heading west on the interstate. Bush looked long and hard at that end of the city and said, “What if…?” She spent a year imagining ways to improve Patrick Street.

“I think projects like this are important because it teaches us that we deserve better and that we should demand better,” Bush said.

The area was once home to the Kelly Axe Factory, said to be the largest axe factory in the world, turning out more than 40,000 finished products a day. The factory closed in 1980. (Thanks to mywvhome.com for those details.) The Patrick Street Bridge is a Warren Through Truss Bridge, built in 1930, that is eligible to be added to the National Historic Register.

Some of Bush’s ideas included creating a café space under the bridge, using an abandoned bridge pier as an overlook on the river and planting urban gardens in the underused parking lots along with adding plantings and benches to improve the appearance of the area. She talked about how the street that runs through the parking lot around the car dealerships and Kmart is haphazard and blends into the parking lot so no one knows exactly where to drive. Patrick Street itself is a navigation nightmare.

Bush didn’t mention it, but I’ve heard rumblings about turning the CSX-Train Bridge over the Kanawha into an elevated park, like High Line Park in New York City, an elevated park built on an abandoned freight rail line on Manhattan’s West Side. That park has gained international attention.

Charleston’s West Side struggles with crime and other problems. While I’m not naïve enough to think that cleaning up Patrick Street will solve all of those problems, I do believe that improving the area can lead to greater investment and more positive attention.

There are obvious problems with any idea like this. Some of it is privately-owned property. It takes money to change things. There are politics involved. Nothing like this can happen overnight. But Chelsie Bush deserves a big hand for asking the questions and taking the initiative to get the ball rolling. Which brings us back to the question, why is good architecture reserved for the wealthy or for ceremonial spaces?.

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