The Illustration Friday website suggests “midsummer night” as this week’s inspiration. My son and I experienced Niagara Falls for the first time at the same time. My wife, whose parents took their three children on numerous family vacations, saw the renowned natural spectacle in her youth. I went on my last furlough with my parents …
At 16 years old, Larry Fischer was institutionalized for attacking his mother with a knife. He was diagnosed with severe paranoid schizophrenia and manic depression (now known as bipolar disorder). After his release from a mental hospital in his late teens, Larry lived on the streets of Los Angeles. He became a street performer serenading …
In 1939, retailer Montgomery Ward was looking for a gimmick to drum up business for the upcoming Christmas holiday. In the past, they had distributed free coloring books to children and decided to produce a book of their own to save money. They assigned in-house copywriter Robert May to come up with an appealing holiday …
This week’s Illustration Friday challenge word is “launch”. Some of the first-year NASA recruits were a little more ambitious than others. (HERE is another illustration, from a few years ago, that fits the challenge too.)
After his 1917 discharge from military service, West Virginia-born Harry R. Truman moved to Riffe, Washington. In 1926, he became the caretaker of a lodge on the shore of Spirit Lake. The lodge was a popular spot for hunters and fishing enthusiasts looking for rustic accommodations in a remote wooded area. Harry was a cantankerous character who took in …
Gus Dudgeon worked his way from tea boy to sound engineer at Decca Records in the middle 1960s, where he worked on The Zombies hit “She’s Not There” and John Mayall’s Blues Breakers with Eric Clapton. By the end of the 60s, he produced albums by Ten Years After, The Bonzo Dog Band and a …
My father’s low tolerance for other humans kept my parent’s accumulation of friends to a minimum. There was one couple with which my parents maintained a close relationship and that was Jack and Myrna. They’d go out to dinner regularly. They’d visit each others homes, sometimes including a few other couples so the men could …
Dick Shawn was a difficult performer to peg. He was an film actor, a stand-up comic, a singer, a voice actor and a stage actor. And he did them all well. But he never achieved the fame for his performances that he really deserved. He actually became more famous for the circumstances surrounding his death. Born Richard …
US presidents. What a bunch of fuckers. Literally. A larger collective of men who can’t keep it in their pants never existed. Take a look at this list: Declaration of Independence author and third President Thomas Jefferson fathered six children with Sally Hemmings. a slave he inherited from his wife. When beloved 32nd President FDR died in …
Continue reading ‘from my sketchbook: nan britton and carrie phillips’ »
This week’s Illustration Friday challenge word is “shadows”. “There is a fifth dimension, beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man’s fears …
