My father’s great-grandfather James Steele Hanks was born in 1809–Thomas Jefferson was the president of the United States and Dolley Madison was the queen of Federal City society. I can never quite wrap my brain around how young the United States is when I think about that fact. My children knew their great-grandfather–he was 90 years old when my oldest…
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Amazing Internet Research: Helen Keller
I read Helen Keller’s biography, The Story of My Life, as a child and was inspired by her persistence in overcoming her profound handicaps. Helen was blind and deaf. Many people have enjoyed the stage play and the movie, The Miracle Worker, about Helen Keller’s meeting with Teacher Annie Sullivan and Sullivan’s determination to turn Helen from an animal into a child with dignity. Helen was…
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How to Like a Do-Gooder–in Spite of Yourself
How do you react to a do-gooder? I spent many hours during the end of the last century, hunched in the dark before an antiquated machine with a big hand crank. An eye-glaring microfilm machine light shone through plastic strips with faded squibbles, throwing down shadows before me to make out. After reading microfilm for hours my eyes often hurt, but…
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Putting a Story to a Face
Let’s put a story to a face. Take a look at the woman to the left. What color is her hair? What type of woman do you think she is? Tall? Agile? Efficient? Industrious? Is she wearing glasses? Is she, perhaps, some sort of ancient librarian? When you write historical fiction, you often choose your characters based on photos–or in…
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What to do with Grief?
Even though he’d been ill a long time and it was not unexpected, when I got word my father had died the grief left me numb and shocked. Indeed, my brother expressed it best: “How did that happen?” Even in the midst of the sadness, I felt a touch of humor: “Well, you remember he’s been sick for seven years?” He’d lost…
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Fort Delaware and the Civil War
Civil war fans often overlook Fort Delaware. It rises out of the mist of the Delaware River dividing Delaware from New Jersey. The fort is a row of granite buildings on the very slight elevation of Pea Patch Island–so named because a ship ran aground there two centuries ago and dumped a cargo of peas. The war of 1812 raised concern in…
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