This newsletter was sent to everyone on Jim’s email list (2,4xx) on Friday, December 11, 2020. No room in the inn. Anyone familiar with the Christmas nativity story has heard the phrase “no room in the inn.“ The phrase is a short explanation for why Jesus was born in a stable, but over the centuries […]
About Jim Stovall
Jim Stovall, (JPROF.com) a retired journalism prof, is now a novelist, self-publisher, watercolorist, gardener, woodworker, and beekeeper -- among other things. Subscribe to his weekly newsletter at http://www.jprof.com .
Erskine Childers and the espionage novel, sketchbooks, and reader reaction: newsletter, December 4, 2020
This newsletter was sent to everyone on Jim’s email list (2,4xx) on Friday, December 4, 2020. When I was a child I was given piano lessons, but I didn’t take to that instrument very well. After a few years, I stopped, but my mother believed that I should continue to have music lessons of some […]
Erskine Childers’ extraordinary life and death (part 2)
After the publication of The Riddle of the Sands in 1903, Erskine Childers could have settled in to a literary and possibly a political life in London. The book had achieved astonishing success and popularity. The book had also become an important part of the ongoing debate in England at the time about the nation’s […]
Vietnam Voices – This is not a game
Episode Summary Marine Corporal Anthony Joyce describes being out on patrol with his unit soon after getting to Vietnam and realizing that people in the jungle are trying to hurt or kill him and his buddies. Episode Notes Corporal Anthony “Tony” Joyce was with the 1st Battalion 3rd Marines, 3rd Marine Division, 1964-1965. It was […]
Vietnam Voices – Somebody shouted ‘in-coming!’
Episode Summary Marine Captain Jerry Cunningham was assigned to the Marine’s JAG Corps during his tour in Vietnam, but he was rarely far from danger. Episode Notes Even when you were in a non-combat position, you always had to be ready to respond to danger when you were in Vietnam. That’s what Jerry Cunningham found […]
Erskine Childers, an important life and a shocking death (part 1)
Erskine Childers was an English-Irish author and adventurer. As both an author and an adventurer, he lived a life that could be envied. As an adventurer, he began as an English imperialist but became involved with Irish Republicanism and helped the Irish fight against the English. As a writer, he penned a novel that is […]
Vietnam Voices – Attack pilot
Episode Summary Bill Beaty, an attack pilot in the U.S. Navy, tells what it was like to fly bombing missions over North Vietnam in 1970. “I got shot at a lot,” he says. Episode Notes William Beaty retired from the U.S. Navy as a Naval Aviator, serving in-country from November 1970 to June 1971. He […]
Unity and the lack thereof – American style
In the immediate aftermath of political campaigns, the winner (and sometimes even the loser) appeals for “unity,” which often means in real-speak, “I want you to agree with me now that I am in power.” Such appeals, possibly well-meant, rarely have much effect on either supporters or opponents. But it sounds good, and it’s expected. […]
A look inside my caricatures sketchbooks
Most artists (and people like me who are working at it) keep a sketchbook. It’s a place where they can try out ideas that they may have to bring to fruition on a canvas or a piece of watercolor paper. As such, sketchbooks are not generally considered things for public viewing. A lot of what […]
Ed Hoch’s short stories, another presidential memoir, and something new from Vietnam Voices: newsletter, November 27, 2020
This newsletter was sent to everyone on Jim’s email list (2,489) on Friday, November 27, 2020. The small farm where I live is blessed with hundreds of feet of fencerows. They stretch past the barn and around the pasture and by the garden. And they have been neglected for many years. That means that the […]
Richard Tregaskis, the tall guy on Guadalcanal
The Marines that he wrote about on Guadalcanal would tell Richard Tregaskis that if the Japanese captured him, they would probably use him as an “observation post.” They weren’t far from wrong. Tregaskis, a reporter during World War II for the International News Service, was six-feet, seven-inches tall — tall enough to be an observation […]
Thomas More and Thomas Cromwell: the shifting literary views of each man
Few historical figures can claim as many major literary executions and resurrections as Thomas More, venerated saint of the Roman Catholic Church, who was, in real life, executed by Henry VIII in 1536 for his refusal to sign the Oath of Supremacy. That oath would have acknowledged the king, rather than the Pope, as head of the […]
More books about Abraham Lincoln
Decades ago a friend gave me a book on some aspect of the life of Abraham Lincoln. I remember it only because of what the author said in the introduction. The author allowed that yes, there had been so many books written on the life of Lincoln to that point, and now, finally, there was […]
Vietnam Voices podcast – Firefight with the NVA
Episode Summary Army Captain Russ Hanson describes a firefight with a unit of the North Vietnamese Army that occurred in Vietnam in 1969. Episode Notes Army Capt. Russ Hanson served with a field artillery unit, serving two tours in Vietnam. This interview was conducted January 22, 2020, at the Blount County Public Library by William […]
The latest in the uncrowded genre of Presidential Memoirs
The presidential memoir is a publishing genré into which only a few can legitimately enter — although it might be fun to see some imaginative writer pen a fictional presidential memoir that qualified in some other genré, such as a detective story. (The term “fictional presidential memoir” might set some of you wags thinking, “Redundancy?” […]
OED’s word of the year: they couldn’t decide
The year 2020 has done lots of things to us and particularly to the English language. We’re using lots of words, expressions, and definitions that we would not have thought of a year ago. The folks at the Oxford English Dictionary keep close tabs on these things, and usually about this time of year, they […]
The call for unity, a defense of Thomas More, and more about Abe: newsletter, November 20, 2020
This newsletter was sent to everyone on Jim’s email list (2,495) on Friday, November 20, 2020. Thanksgiving is approaching, and I have always particularly enjoyed our national season of gratitude. It is important that we acknowledge what we have been given, even during a year when all of us have seen our lives […]
Vietnam Voices – Incursion into Cambodia
This is the second episode in our podcast series, Vietnam Voices. Episode Summary Billy Minser talks about his Army unit’s incursion into Cambodia and their making contact with the North Vietnamese. Episode Notes Billy Minser spent six months of his year-long tour in Vietnam as a forward observer for an Army combat unit. In […]
Vietnam Voices podcast – A medic goes on patrol
This is the first episode of our new podcast series, Vietnam Voices: Air Force medic Aubrey Moncrief is assigned to a Green Beret unit in 1968 in Vietnam during the Tet offensive. He describes a patrol he was on when two helicopters were shot down and a pilot is wounded. Aubrey Moncrief joined the Air […]
More on William Seward, another walk through the Golden Age, and writing like a rifle: newsletter, November 13, 2020
This newsletter was sent to everyone on Jim’s email list (2,5xx) on Friday, November 13, 2020. Some people cook and bake. Some people collect. Some make things. Some draw and paint, some listen (to music, etc.), some watch (birds, airplanes, insects, old movies, etc.), some read. The list could go on and on, of course. […]
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