Others have ably told Savannah’s story, and this is as good a jumping off point as any for the many resources out there. My own memories are of when the ship was at Patriots Point in the 1980s and early 1990s. The museum had designs on being large back then, and as opportunities came along the museum took them. Savannah was one such opportunity. There were ambitions for parts of the ship to become hotel and recreation space, exhibit space and so forth. For more reasons than I care to go into here, that never happened. Savannah was also a white elephant in a collection of fighting ships, and who’s going to be interested in a big merchant ship when there’s a larger ship next door with airplanes parked on top, right? I remember being aboard Savannah and having the ship pretty much to myself, which was eerie and kind of sad. The ship never got the TLC she needed, which is a shame because hers is a huge, historic story. But, for the kids (big and small) who made up most of the museum’s clientele, Savannah was a plate of broccoli while Yorktown and that collection of zoomy airplanes was a king-sized Happy Meal.

There was yet another wrinkle: Savannah still had a nuclear reactor on board, and that obligated the museum to a carefully-regulated regimen of inspections and other requirements. (I have copies of all that paperwork, so…yeah, it wasn’t small.) When you realize that ships of any size are maintenance hogs as it is and that museums only have so much budget to go around…you sort of understand why, when Savannah was due for drydocking and hull inspection in 1994, the museum gave the ship back. The Maritime Administration did what needed doing, and then Savannah was sent to slumber in the James River Reserve Fleet. They couldn’t just sell Savannah for surplus, not with the reactor and all. To make a long story short, Savannah ended up in Baltimore for upkeep, the reactor was pulled out a couple years ago, and now last details are being worked out so that the project can formally end this December. After that, MarAd can dispose of the ship like any other surplus hull.

The preferred outcome of all this would be that Savannah is preserved as a museum. A lot of interior and exterior work has been done throughout this process that would make it a turnkey project. The reactor is gone, of course, but the ship feels like a living thing again, right down to the ship’s music system being back in working order, playing music the passengers would have heard back in the day. Modifications have been made in machinery and reactor spaces that make them the perfect setting for science exhibits (you can walk through the containment vessel!). Not to mention, there’s so much furniture and art still aboard. The ship’s a time capsule in all the best ways. It’s the polar opposite of what happened with poor old United States, where so much was just gone (and butchered) and the ship was a shell. Savannah‘s ready to go, thanks to a lot of work and a lot of people who have cared.

That’s the most-wanted outcome. Savannah, Georgia wants the ship and seemed like a lock until a wrinkle came up that may or may not be resolved by December. There’s interest in keeping the ship in Baltimore but a permanent berth there will be a couple years in the making. And, unfortunately, the owner of the current pier wants the ship gone in December. Some things need to happen fast to get Savannah an interim berth. Otherwise, it’s entirely possible the ship goes back to the James River Reserve Fleet, a lot of loving work goes to ruin, and the ship ends up sold for scrap or reefed. The Association has a video in which Jim Delgado spells out the stakes, and when Jim Delgado speaks, it’s worth listening. This is important enough that I’ll let you watch it before we continue.

All of this means that all of us have a lot on our minds, including the possibility of the unthinkable…and while I’ve got too many memories of what happened to the Big U for me to not not worry, today is a chance to see the ship again, be amazed by what’s been done, and have a grand time in the company of folks who love this ship as much as I do.

Once you’re aboard, you’ve stepped into another era. Someone once described the ship as a cross between Star Trek and Mad Men, and it’s apt. This ship is alive in a way I’ve never seen before, and members of the Association and people involved in the decommissioning are on hand, telling stories and sharing information. One gentleman is telling stories of his days in the nuclear Navy. When he talks about his own interview by Admiral Rickover, I immediately stop and listen in. This gentleman’s interrogation by the Kindly Old Gentleman wasn’t the wringer that others went through (and there’s tons of Rickover stories here), but no way was I going to miss a firsthand account. 

After a little bit, we’re summoned into the ship’s lounge for a presentation about the ship’s status and future, and then there’s a few moments for some Association business. We get to see the video that I linked above. There’s a moment when a lady whose father served aboard Savannah donated a plaque she found in his collection, commemorating the ship’s port call in South Korea. And then it’s time for lunch in the veranda bar. There’s deli sandwiches, boxes of pizza, what looks like spaghetti or lasagna in big aluminum pans. It’s a really generous spread. I help myself to a big slice of cheese pizza and a can of root beer, then plop down at a table. I never thought I’d have a meal aboard this ship; yet here I am, and life is good. After that, I roam around the deck just aft, then come inside and buy a few things from the souvenir shop, do a little more exploring and take some pictures.

Out aft of the bar, one of the docents is talking with someone and I join the conversation, sharing recollections of the Patriots Point days and how much better things look now. Off in the distance, we can see what’s left of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, and after all I’d seen and read from far away, the reality was chilling to see in person. 

The docent and I head down one deck, and we happen into a former crewman who’s helping out today. One thing leads to another, and this gentleman gives me a private tour of the ship. We spend probably the next 90 minutes going anywhere and everywhere, from former cabins and dining areas and the kitchen spaces, to the reactor spaces (including a walk through the reactor containment vessel) and engineering spaces.

There’s also a visit to the control room, where they will let you touch one button, and it’s a lot of fun to mash:

Along the way, my guide’s telling me stories and sharing anecdotes, at one point proudly pointing out a bracket he was told to make and that’s still there. We have the best time going through everything, and I’m listening and asking questions and cracking the occasional joke, and knowing the ship as well as he does, I get to see some things the average visitor doesn’t. It just couldn’t have gone better.

We end up back in the purser’s lounge, resting after more of a workout than we realized, but it was so worth it. After talking for a little bit, it’s time for me to depart. I give him profuse thanks for the tour, then head toward the gangway. As I leave the ship, I pat her on the side and tell her to keep her courage. I seriously want to go aboard the Liberty ship John W. Brown, moored across the pier, but time’s not on my side right now. I’ve got to get to the train station for the next leg of the journey, and after shotgunning a bag of M&Ms and a Coke Zero, I set off.

Back through the tunnel, toward the airport, to the train station from which I departed last June. I park the car, grab my messenger bag, and head trackside. I park myself on a bench and get caught up on messages. A little wren flits around near my feet, scavenging for little bits of stray food. I talk to the little one for a moment; it’s nice to have a friend while I’m so far from home. A northbound train pulls up, and most of the people waiting trackside board it. A few moments later comes my ride. When I booked this trip, I decided to live a little and try out the next-generation Acela, and here we are.

As it turns out, I don’t have a seatmate on this ride, and so I can sort of relax. We’re slow leaving Baltimore, but out on open stretches we get to going pretty fast, and between that and the pretty nice seats it’s a pleasant ride. There aren’t as many stops with the Acela, and between that and the faster speed you do notice it’s a shorter trip time-wise. Not mind-bendingly fast, of course, but the ride is less of a time sink.

Along the way I write in my travel journal and listen to some music. I hadn’t much been in the mood to listen to music on this trip, but now that some pressure was off, I felt like it. Since it’s a train trip, I had to start with “Driver 8,” and followed it with “Can’t Ignore The Train” – realizing that I’d heard the train and couldn’t resist its call to a wider world, and here I am speeding toward the big city. Then the recently-reissued 10,000 Maniacs Unplugged album took me the rest of the way, and not having listened to it in forever, I’d forgotten how good that record is. Natalie and the guys made my heart full, serenaded me the trip long, until we disappeared into the tunnel leading to Penn Station. From there, guided by muscle memory, I threaded my way to the subway station and a ride to my hotel downtown.

More to come….

I also grew up in a tiny, cloistered rural town, raised by a conservative family. The music our parents listened to was always country music. Which was fine, and there’s so much of it I love deeply, but it also meant I missed a lot that was happening in other genres because I never really got to explore. My first exposure to a lot of hit songs was through Weird Al Yankovic’s parodies. I missed a lot of what my peers were experiencing. I didn’t discover R.E.M., for instance, until I was in my first year in college and Out Of Time had been out for a while. We also didn’t have cable, so “music television” to me was whatever was on that week’s Hee Haw. I didn’t have MTV until my first apartment in graduate school, and by then MTV wasn’t MTV any more. To this day, if somebody is watching videos from yesteryear, there’s this aching sadness, the feeling that I missed out on an entire era.

It also meant I discovered some acts just a little too late. In 1993, the group 10,000 Maniacs had a huge hit with its version of “Because The Night,” recorded during the MTV Unplugged special. It was played to the point of becoming audio wallpaper. I didn’t really know anything about the group, aside from when David Letterman would ask Paul Shaffer if all 10,000 of the Maniacs would be there. Lack of familiarity meant I didn’t pay attention to musical guests, which meant I missed out on these four guys performing upbeat rock music while their frontwoman, who twirled a lot, sang bookish lyrics about Very Serious Topics in an accent and cadence that defied description. But when I got interested, I got interested, and then captivated.

The joke was on me, though, for the band and the singer had gone their separate ways. That didn’t stop me from making up for lost time. I bought all the CDs, which prompted lights to go on in my head (“Oh! That’s who did that song about the days you’ll remember!” And yet when you hear it a year and a half after it was a thing, there’s that ache again, the ache of the thing you missed out on). I even went to independent music stores (remember those?) to hunt down bootleg CDs of live performances and demos and expanded singles and anything else I could find. The day Natalie Merchant’s first solo album hit the stores, I went to the Musicland (remember those?) at our little local mall and gladly paid the list price for the CD. After all the anticipation, I found it…well, different. Beautiful, yes, but it’s sorta difficult to dance to songs about earthquakes and deceased wives and a seven-year relationship that ended in betrayal and that sort of thing. (Although “Jealousy” is a lot of fun, especially the single version.) But even if it wasn’t what I expected or exactly my cup of tea, I seethed at the snide review in Rolling Stone. How dare they!

Be that as it may, Natalie intrigued and influenced me. Along with early R.E.M., her music has been the soundtrack of my life, providing joy when things were good and solace when life was difficult. Her off-stage work, including volunteering her time and resources for educating young people, nudged me into volunteer work and very likely toward my own career in education. In many ways, her example made me want to heed my better angels. She has shown how to accept advancing age with wisdom, and her example is why I don’t dread the silver I’m starting to see in the mirror; if she can do this, so can I. And I remain captivated by her art. To this day, if one of her songs comes on while I’m in the car, I’ll sing along. (Dick Smothers once told an interviewer, “In my head, I sing like Sinatra. The problem is, nobody can hear it.” Replace Sinatra with Natalie Merchant and you have what I’m up against, and it’s why I don’t sing unless I’m alone.) And knowledgeable readers have no doubt noticed my habit of working her lyrics or phrasings into my writing. For so many reasons, I remain loyal to her.

What of the Maniacs, though? Well, when the record label opted to go with Natalie and not the band, they had to find their own way, and I lost track. But they kept going. Sometimes they’d release some new stuff; sometimes they’d play some gigs or go on tour. Over the years, as with any family, changes have happened: comings and goings, things that did and didn’t work, the whole thing. The band has had different lead vocalists, different guitarists…over four and a half decades, stuff will happen. Saddest of all was the death of lead guitarist Robert Buck in 2000; his distinctive guitar work added so much to their music’s character. But despite the challenges, the band’s still with us. They’re not selling out arenas or appearing on the big-name talk shows, but they are still playing, still touring when they can, and have a devoted fan base that will buy the tickets and fill the house and sing along and dance and have a wonderful time. And in return, the audience will get a couple hours of music performed by artists who are playing their hearts out and sure do look like they’re having fun doing it. Their fans love them, and they love us, and…well, ’tis sweet to be remembered.

I’ve never been much of a concert-goer. Some of it is that music is a very personal thing to me, and I still bear scars from when people have ridiculed my musical preferences. That’s exacerbated by the logistical hassles of getting to and from the show, the antics of other concertgoers, and all the other things that could go sideways and ruin the experience. And growing up cloistered meant I just never got in the habit of going to things. Even when I moved away to graduate school, and there were at least three venues in town that routinely brought world-class entertainment, I couldn’t break the habit. (And it cost me. Not going to see Tori Amos at the Township in 1997…oh, that remains a regret.) At some point, it became kind of a stupid point of pride. The closer I got to my 50th birthday, the more stupid it seemed.

In late 2022 I found out that Natalie Merchant would perform in Greenville. She’d not had much cooking the last few years (and there were reasons), but she had a new record coming along. With what she’d meant to me for so long, and with her being so close to home, it would be ridiculous not to go. In a way, it would be a way for the me of nearly three decades before to have a moment, to thank her for what she’d meant to me. On the day tickets went on sale I splurged and got the best seat I could, which was pretty close to the stage. I thought, “Okay, I’ll do this, close that chapter and move on with my life.”

Oh, boy, was I mistaken. If anything, that night in April 2023 reminded me of so much that the years had let me forget. It was a sweet, profound evening. (And although she has an image as a very serious person – and yes, she can be – she was not only very charming, but at several points was a hoot. Hearing her imitate The Count from Sesame Street was not on my bingo card, but it happened.) It was one of the best things I’d done for myself in a long time, and it made me glad I heeded the voice that said “this is ridiculous. Go.” And happily I re-upped in the Natalie Merchant Marines, this time for the duration.

A year or so later, while goofing around the social media feeds, I came across a group dedicated to the Maniacs. When I saw a couple of the band members commenting from time to time, I had to join. There was a radio documentary series that told the story of the band’s formative years, and I devoured each new installment. There was talk of new touring dates. I was hoping that maybe they’d come to Athens for a show at the 40 Watt, a trip I’d gladly make. But imagine my surprise when the August 2025 swing included the Newberry Opera House. Yep, a venue about a mile from where I work. The day tickets went on sale, I leapt. Front-row center? Sold American.

Throughout the summer the little envelope with my ticket sat on the counter, a bittersweet reminder since the show would be on the last day before I had to go back to work. Life went on, though, and soon that day was here. From my collection I got out a T-shirt from the “Our Time in Eden” days, one I’d found in a record store in the mid-’90s. I never imagined wearing it to a Maniacs performance, but…30 years on, here we go.

I was at the Opera House early enough. It was a reasonably pleasant evening, and I sat outside with some of my fellow patrons who were waiting. Out the corner of my eye I saw my colleague Warren driving past and figured he must be here for the show, too. Sure enough, he was, and I walked up to meet him. With him was his longtime friend Will, who was wearing a Maniacs T-shirt, and I knew I was among friends. (Since this post went live, Warren has written his own account of the evening, and I’m very happy to recommend it. You can also visit Will’s most enjoyable blog here.) The three of us talked for a couple minutes and then headed on in. While Warren and Will went to the will-call window, I walked over to the merch table for the obligatory souvenir. Instantly I fell in love with a T-shirt based on the Maddox Table trademark, and closed the deal on one in no time.

There was some kind of delay in starting the show, but in time the band members took the stage. Having known them mostly from pictures taken in the ’80s and early ’90s, it took a moment to place them. (The guitar player in the back took me a minute before I happily realized, “Holy crap! John Lombardo!”) But the moment the show started, age vanished. They played with a vigor and joy that was timeless. So many of the little things I remembered from countless playings of their first five CDs were there, as emotionally powerful as the original. If I’d closed my eyes, I’d be back in the early ’90s.

Of course, there had been two key personnel changes since 1993. Mary Ramsey has been the most enduring lead vocalist. She has made the lead role her own, and you fall in love not only with her vocals and her stage presence, but with her charming, down-to-earth, funny vibe. She is also an amazing violinist, which not only adds to the songs but gave us an extended solo at one point that was electrifying.

Ben Medina was playing lead guitar tonight, and although his guitar work sounds so much like Robert Buck’s, it’s still his own. He’s a true craftsman. What’s more, it’s fun watching him play, as this peaceful look comes across his face and he is one with the music. It added to the joy of the evening.

And what an evening, with songs spanning the band’s career. Most of the selections were from the band’s catalog up to 1993, along with a couple newer songs and some covers. “Because the Night” also made an appearance, of course, and Mary invited us to join in the chorus (and added a sweet “Because the night…belongs to you!” before the instrumental interlude).

Some of the songs were surprises, and I wasn’t expecting “You Happy Puppet” to be in the set, especially in this neck of our deep-red woods. It was a wonderful tour of the band’s catalog, and as Dave Letterman would say, they tore the roof off the place. There were people dancing in the aisles and at their seats. It was pure joy. Later in the show, bassist Steven Gustafson drifted from the stage to one of the wings, playing and swaying along with folks dancing nearby. The energy and love in the house was going both ways, and it turned into a big party. So many people were so happy. It was so beautiful to see.

As it happened, keyboardist Dennis Drew was celebrating his birthday that day. Steven had us all join in a chorus of “Happy Birthday,” and then said it was a tradition that if a band member had a birthday, they got to sing. So Dennis sang a song that’s been written for next year’s album, a really neat song about life in a small town. It fit so well with our own small town, and given that the band’s hometown is a good bit like our town and a few others nearby, smaller working-class cities that have had to adapt to changing times, it was especially apt.

For me, the evening was one song after another that I knew by heart, that I’d sung along with countless times over the decades, and it was so much like being in the car with my iTunes playlist going that it was oddly comforting. I happily sang along, although with the sound system in front of me I was mercifully inaudible. But I was caught up short during a break between songs when I heard several people in the audience start to sing lyrics that were strange to me, but somehow hauntingly, vaguely familiar. I felt once again like that kid who missed out on something. Mary picked up the lyric, then the band launched into an otherworldly cover of The Cure’s “Just Like Heaven.” And once again, as I watched the band perform this song I didn’t know as if it was one of their own, and as I heard the others in the audience sing along, I was simultaneously mesmerized by the glory of the moment and saddened anew by what I’d missed back in the day, this great secret I’d missed, and it ached.

All too soon it was over. The band left the stage, and Steven said they’d see us in the lobby. I met up with Warren and Will, and on the way out we compared notes about what we’d seen. In the lobby we chatted for a little while longer, talking about the Maniacs and other topics, and then the guys set out to find something to eat. I was thankful I had bumped into them, for it made me so happy to share this evening with friends who got it, to whom I didn’t have to explain it.

By that time some of the band members were in the lobby. Now, I have a “don’t bother people unless there’s a need” policy, especially when it comes to well-known people. Some of it is upbringing, some of it is respect, and some of it is shyness. (You can understand why I didn’t last that long as a reporter.) In my mind, I’d wrestled with what to do if I bumped into any of the band members. I finally decided to just see what happens.

As it turned out, I had nothing to worry about. The band members I saw were happy to sign autographs, pose for pictures, and mingle. Steven Gustafson was nearby when I was talking with Warren and his friend. He was signing a record for someone, and chuckling a bit about the aches and pains of being in a band while you’re getting older. I waited my turn, then gathered up my courage and thanked him for coming. He shook my hand and thanked me when I thanked him for all the joy he had brought me the last few decades. It was a very sweet moment. Dennis Drew was nearby. “You were sitting in the front row!” he said with a big smile. “How did we sound?” (“You were great!” I fan-girled in response.) We shook hands and I thanked him, too. John Lombardo was on a bench, and I went over to thank him. He shook my hand and was very touched when I shared what their music meant to me, and we had a brief but very warm visit. It made a beautiful evening more so.

I didn’t see the others, and although I’d have liked to have spoken with them, I figured it was a good enough evening. I needed to get home anyway. I kind of floated back to my car, still quite unable to believe I’d actually met three members of this band I’d loved so long…and glad to find out they were just a group of folks who love to make music and have fun doing it, were fortunate enough to make it this big of a thing, and the fun is what keeps them doing it. After this night, I hope they keep having fun for a long, long time.

For about three hours I’d laid all the problems and perils of my life, not to mention the world at large, aside. But now it was all waiting: the headlines, the chores, the meetings waiting for me next week. And against it, I would have to process this fantastic experience I’d just enjoyed, and since nature afflicted me with the power and pain of experiencing things very deeply, that kind of decompression can be an ordeal. But it was a bargain I’d gladly make again.

I hope the Maniacs will come back to town, and I hope I get to meet them all again, but I have no way of knowing if that’ll happen. I may never get to see Natalie Merchant again, and I doubt I’ll ever meet her (and I’m sure if I did, I would get out maybe three words of gibberish before hilariously fainting dead away). But, if nothing else, I can go the rest of my life knowing I’d had a moment to thank three of the folks whose artistry added joy to my happy moments and soothed me when times were hard, who have provided so much of my life’s soundtrack.

Others I’ve said have said it more eloquently, but I’ll say it again, and from my own experience: when the performers who mean something to you come around, give yourself the gift of going to see them. Buy the best tickets you can. Buy the T-shirt. Enjoy the show. And if you get the chance to thank them in person, do it. Let them know what their work has meant to you, while you have the chance. Don’t be one of the “well, I coulda” types. If you don’t…well, you’ll regret it.

The first of my many adventures came the day after graduation. A friend of mine who spent a half-century at one of the big television networks has an amazing collection of rare materials that he collected throughout his career. He’s now at the point where he has to figure out what to do with it, and I agreed to come up and have a look.

But there’s a catch: he lives near New York City. And right now, I don’t feel like flying anywhere. To make a long story short, I drove to his home not far from Manhattan. It was a long drive, yes, but the drive through the New Jersey suburbs wasn’t anywhere as bad as I thought it would be, and the time I spent with my friend and his wife, and lunch at a local diner with one of his lifelong friends (another network veteran) was most enjoyable. When it was time to leave, I could not believe it when I looked out the window of my car and saw the Manhattan skyline off to my left. It was surreal, but it was really happening.

One of the better parts of driving versus flying is that it let me do things my own way, not tied to any schedule but my own. This gave me a chance to spend the night in Camden, where I could wander around the refurbished RCA factory that evening, and spend part of the next morning wandering around the battleship New Jersey, now very nicely preserved as a museum ship.

Across the Delaware were some stunning views of Philadelphia. It’s a city I love, for a lot of reasons. But a couple times I looked down the waterfront and thought of a landmark that’s no longer there, and my heart ached just a bit. Afterwards, it was over to Bala Cynwyd and a quick visit with an old friend, and then back home, with one more night en route to give my aging carcass some rest.

I didn’t have that long to be idle, for late the next week I was off to Huntsville for further business: a meeting with a former student who’s now one of the senior folks at a television station there, and a visit to the Space and Rocket Center the next morning with a couple friends. It was my first visit to Huntsville since 1988, and a lot has changed at the Space and Rocket Center since then. As long as I could stop thinking about how long it had been, it was an enjoyable visit.

A couple of weeks, themselves full, passed before it was time to set out yet again. My friend who works at ABC in New York invited me up to spend another morning with him as he worked on Good Morning America. As if that wasn’t enough, ABC has decamped from its longtime West Side campus to a new facility at Hudson Square, and my friend offered to show me around the place. How could I say no?

This time, I wasn’t doing all the driving. I’d only have to take myself as far as Baltimore, and Amtrak would do much of the rest. So last Friday, bright and early, I made the I-77 to I-81 trip for the third time in 11 months, and it never gets any shorter. Happily, I was spared lengthy delays en route and made much better time than I anticipated. The next morning, I packed a smaller bag for an overnight trip, drove to the train station next to the Baltimore airport, and prepared to ride the rails.

I’ve traveled by rail a few times before – the Alaska Railroad from Fairbanks to Anchorage, and New Jersey Transit from Port Jervis to Penn Station on my first trip to New York a long time ago – but it’s the first time I’d traveled by Amtrak. On a whim I bid on an upgrade and, for a few dollars more, ended up in a Business Class car that was less than half full. The trip was about three hours and went without incident. Had I not been kind of keyed up, it would have been a good chance to take a nap. Instead, I listened to some music and wrote a little in my journal, looked out the window and occasionally took some video footage of the passing landscape, footage that I may edit into a little film if I can get myself to follow through.

The scenes outside got busier, the skyline I’d seen from my car last month came into view, and before long we disappeared into darkness and emerged into the station. Up an escalator and into Moynihan Train Hall, a lovely adaptation of an old building for a new use. I’ll never know what it was like to emerge into the old Penn Station (although I do know what it’s like to emerge into the depressing current one), but what I saw as I came up the escalator gave me an idea of what the old one was like. I got a quick bite to eat, and then realized I had to kill a couple hours before my hotel was ready for check-in.

You would think I’d be resourceful enough to figure that out. Unfortunately, it’s mid-June. Prime tourist season. On a Saturday. The sun is out. And it’s hot out. Hot. We were in the throes of the heat dome, in a concrete and asphalt canyon. I tried to figure out where to go and what to do, and decided to default to what I knew. Thus began an ill-advised hike the 15 blocks to Rockefeller Center, where I knew I could fritter away the time before my 4 p.m. check-in. At 42nd Street, I took a side trip to pay my regards to Patience and Fortitude.

This was made all the more interesting by a very large tour group of teenagers from another country, and I had to weave my way past and through them to get to my next stops. Seven blocks later, the Channel Gardens beckoned, and ahead of me the familiar monolith of 30 Rock.

I wheezed through the revolving doors into that dark, glorious lobby with all its glorious air conditioning. Down into the concourse, I hoped to find a place to sit and rest…only to find there were none, except for the patrons of various eateries. After a while I gave up, figured I could catch the subway downtown, and vamp there until 4 p.m. But the subway entrance I was promised on the map wasn’t there; construction on that corner blocked off the entrance. After running myself ragged, I took shelter in a building’s public concourse, and then bought a bottle of water in the building’s coffee shop. A cheery barista rang the sale up for me, and we traded lighthearted comments about the hellish conditions outside. It didn’t take me long to drain the bottle, and I soon yielded my seat to a family and headed onward.

Finally, a subway station! Unfortunately, the entry area was cramped, with few turnstiles, and some of the folks exiting the line weren’t exactly using situational awareness. I didn’t realize I was standing in the path of the cashier’s window, and a guard instructed me to move away. By this point, tired and fed up, I semi-hollered that I was waiting for the people leaving the turnstiles to figure out what they were going to do. I paid my fare and went onward. It was the first time I’d lost my temper with anyone while visiting Manhattan, and I felt kind of badly about it. On the other hand, it’s Manhattan, the place where the F-word is used the way most people use “and.” In the grand scheme of things, it’s a minor sin.

The E Train took me south, and after my stop, I emerged at a place I’ve known about all my life, but whose meaning forever changed one awful morning.

My hotel was right next to the World Trade Center site. Professor Mondo had mentioned it after his visit a few months back, and when I saw some surprisingly good rates I booked my stay there. After a little homework, I realized it was a hotel that’s etched into my memory for another reason: on the afternoon of Sept. 13, 2001, CBS aired some footage from inside its ruined, dust-covered lobby, showing the abandoned computer screens still going, and the flashing warnings at the control consoles near the check-in desk. That scene, its own version of Ray Bradbury’s “There Will Come Soft Rains,” has haunted me ever since. (You can see that footage at approximately 15 minutes into this link. It’s not in the original context in which I saw it, but it’s the same images.) And now, here I was, in the very building where it happened.

As it happens, the hotel is being renovated. The lobby was closed, and we were shunted to a side entrance. The check-in desk was now on the fourth floor, in what looked like a repurposed meeting room. And there was a line out in the hallway. The two clerks on duty were obviously swamped, and not all the rooms were ready; the two men in front of me were very unhappy about this, and were trying to demand some kind of compensation. I braced for similar news and was already trying to figure out how I would handle it, but my room was ready to go. Back around to the elevators I went, and I punched the button for my floor…only to realize it was an elevator where you have to present your keycard to select your floor. I realized this just as the other passenger in the elevator was about to help me. We kind of chuckled about it, and I used my standard line about “they do that just to cross up those of us who are up here from the country.”

Once inside my room, I collapsed on the bed. I was soaking wet, sore, tired. But the view out my window was not what I expected. Directly ahead of me was the Oculus, One World Trade Center…and the first of two giant square holes, their outlines ringed in black. There weren’t any words for it, and throughout the evening I’d keep coming back to that view.

After cooling down for a while, I changed shirts and set out again. The memorial was my first stop…all the names along the outlines. It really reminded me of my first visit to the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, and how nothing about the scope of the lives lost had ever really got to me until I saw the size of the Wall and how small the names were. That’s all I can compare this to. You have to see it to really get it.

Down into the Oculus I went, both to look around and to find a bottle of water, which I finally found at a Hudson News store. There wasn’t much time to drink it, or much of a place to relax with it. (Tourist season, remember?) Instead, I hoofed it back up and out. I’d wanted to visit the Brooklyn Bridge, since a very dear friend of mine grew up in Brooklyn, and…well, I was nearby. Unfortunately, everybody else in the entire world had the same idea that afternoon, and the pedestrian lane of the bridge was solid humanity. I noped out and headed for a Duane Reade store, where I bought provisions for the evening.

Then it was back to my room for a much-needed shower that almost made me feel like a human again. I spent the evening looking out the window at that unforgettable view, doing a lot of thinking about what happened there, and how everything forever changed that day. I was simultaneously amazed by what was before me, and haunted by the horrors that had played out here nearly a quarter-century ago. And since Fate has a wicked sense of humor, just before bedtime I learned that we’d bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities. Tomorrow was going to be interesting. But I got out a book I’d brought and did some reading, hoping to get my mind off things. It worked well enough.

I had a decent, if truncated, night’s rest, beating my alarm by about an hour, and was up and out by 5:30. My friend was expecting me at 6:30, and I wanted to give myself some extra time in case anything happened en route. I left the hotel, wandered through the World Trade Center site and took some photos, and then started walking north. Even in the early morning hours, it was getting hot and sticky, and by the time I got to Hudson Square I was spent. The front desk checked me in, my friend came down and greeted me, and up we went to start the day’s fun.

For the next three hours I got to see professionals at work, and there’s kind of a vicarious thrill that comes with it. You’re watching this stuff happen in real time, and yet the people you’re with have done this so much and for so long. It makes me think of really good doctors performing surgery, responding to the unexpected with calm wit and trained hands. The breaking news from the night before threw a curveball into the proceedings, and it was interesting to be there when the network went to a special report. But it got done.

After the morning’s duties were done, my friend and I went just about everywhere we could inside ABC’s new facility. To say it’s impressive is an understatement, and in some places I felt I’d stepped ten years into the future. It made me wish we had something similar where I work, but since I don’t have anywhere near the resources Disney could pour into this facility, it ain’t happenin’ soon. Oh, well. But as much fun as the tour was, it was as much fun to spend time with some of the folks my friend works with. I learned long ago that the people who like what they do are eager to share what they know with you, if you’re genuinely interested in it. It’s opened many a door, and many a friendship, for me, and this trip reminded me of how valuable that is. Now, when I come to New York, it’s not for a tour so much as it is to be with friends again, friends who happen to work in the teevee business.

Noon came and went, and we had to part ways. For me, it was one more ride on the E back to Moynihan Train Hall, and then the train to Baltimore. I had a quick bite, spent some time writing in my journal, and then off to the very full Amtrak 87. It was scorching hot outside, and our take-no-crap conductor reminded us all at every stop to be safe and stay hydrated if we were getting off. The heat also messed with our progress, and outside Aberdeen, Maryland we were stopped for about 20 minutes due to heat issues. In due course, though, we were on our way, and I was back at BWI soon enough. From there, it was a not-too-lengthy drive to my hotel for the night.

The final morning of this trip, I was up in plenty of time to get ready, and then I headed east to Norfolk and a visit to the battleship Wisconsin, now moored as a museum ship at Nauticus.

There’s not as much to see on the self-guided tour as there is aboard New Jersey, but I also got to see some areas aboard Wisconsin that I couldn’t see aboard New Jersey, either. It was already getting really hot, and less than an hour later I was headed back across the river for Newport News and The Mariners’ Museum.

This was kind of a sentimental journey. The last time I was at The Mariners’ Museum was August 1991, when my family took a vacation to Newport News so I could do some research about s/s United States. As will tend to happen, a place gets frozen in your mind as it was the last time you saw it. Since then, the museum has changed a lot, and it’s going through some renovation now. It’s not a bad thing, and indeed there were a good many things I remember from back then that I was happy to see again. Maybe, though, it isn’t the changes that sadden you as much as the realization of how much time has passed. What seems like yesterday was nearly 34 years ago.

Driving through Newport News itself reminded me of this. I remember when we crossed the James River Bridge that first day back in 1991, and how I looked down the river at Newport News Shipbuilding and then down the waterfront, to the Big U languishing down at the CSX coal pier. USS Enterprise was in the shipyard, in the midst of an overhaul, and that I wasn’t expecting to see. Now Enterprise is at that yard again – that huge cube of an island can’t be mistaken for anything else – but this time, it’s the long goodbye. A few hundred yards away, though, a new Enterprise is under construction in a graving dock.

It wasn’t the ships that I was really thinking about. It was the time that had passed, how 34 years is the blink of an eye, and how no one knows where the time goes. That’s what was really in my head as I took one last look behind, then set a course for Emporia and then the long drive back to home, and the future. I got home later that night, much to the gratitude of two cats, one of whom was relieved to finally have his Emotional Support Human back home.

And after a month or so of travel, I’m thankful for all I’ve been able to do and see, but I need the rest. There may be short trips here and there over the next month, but none of the multi-state extravaganzas for a while, although I am hoping there will be a conference in the cards for me come September. For now, though, I need a break, and there’s plenty for me to see after here.

Here’s the November 24, 1958 Life magazine. I really should have done this one last week, I know, but better late than never. This is a favorite: on the cover is the awesome Kim Novak with a cat, billboarding a story about Bell, Book and Candle. I love Kim Novak, I’m a cat mom, and Bell, Book and Candle is among my favorite movies (and sometimes the older of our cats, who tends to stay close to me like a familiar, gets called Pyewacket – but, as any cat parent knows, any cat accumulates about 50 names in addition to their official name). What’s not to love?

Well, okay…as we’ll see, there’s not much to the story about Bell, Book and Candle. But we can still have some fun with this issue. Let’s commence:

It’s 1958, so we’re going to see recurring themes. Remember, in this era America was under a constant cloud of cigarette smoke and floating on a sea of booze. Here you see the oft-forgotten Kool penguin mascot – in the first panel, the poor little one is in peril. If you can actually feel pity for a cigarette mascot, I do here.

Meanwhile, King Sano cigarettes – with the fancy new filter, because filters were the big new thing – has as its mascot former diplomat John S. Young. “Time and again, in today’s tense situations, I see important people under pressure lighting up this new ‘soft smoke’ cigarette,” the ad quotes Young as saying. Hey, we’re dealing with the H-Bomb and guided missiles, the new space race, the Middle East, Berlin, the Congo, Quemoy and Matsu, and this smoldering situation in Vietnam…but hey, if it means boom times for the coffin-nail business, it’s all for the good, right?

It’s after hours at the agency and the boys at Sterling Cooper are letting their crew cuts down! And not only did they get Hughes Rudd to stop by and tickle the ivories, but their piano has a gigantic hand emerging from it. I’m especially amused by the line “Clear Heads Agree Calvert Is Better,” when nobody’s head is going to be clear after a while.

(And any booze under the “Calvert” brand reminds me of what racer Buddy Shuman reportedly told a woman who wondered how he got the courage to drive a car so fast on track: “I take ‘er through the straights and Lord Calvert takes ‘er through the turns.”)

Get plenty of Planters Cocktail Peanuts for the holidays. That can remained more or less the same into the 1980s. I remember this because we always had a can in the snack cupboard. My dad ate them a lot, and they were the definition of store-bought peanuts when I was a kid. The first time I tried dry-roasted peanuts, on a visit to my grandfather’s summer home, I thought they were exotic.

The ability of flooring to hold up to high heels was an important selling point in the ’50s and ’60s. There’s one in particular I remember where it implied a woman was jumping up and down on the flooring, on the points of her heels. Which you can completely see happening. (And you wouldn’t at all see someone like that being taken away for their own safety.)

Reader’s Digest Condensed Books were such a staple for so long. My grandfather’s summer home was lined with them. He never read them, I don’t think, but he’d just pay for them when Reader’s Digest would send them for approval. Now, of course, you can’t give them away.

The dream/fantasy scenes in the Maidenform ads never fail to crack me up (and bring to mind the MAD Magazine version that mashed up a Maidenform ad with Nude Descending A Staircase). And, of course, once you’re back from your space-age makeover, get back to work in the kitchen with all your spiffy General Electric appliances. The man of the house is gonna need something to settle all that Calvert Reserve from the office party.

“I dreamed I got out of a Chrysler automobile in my Maidenform bra! The only hooter holster with The Forward Look!”

And a neat, space-age decanter for Old Forester, just in time for the holiday season. It reminds me of a Palmolive bottle for some reason. And once it’s drained (which, if your husband’s a Sterling Cooper employee, won’t take long) it would likely make a dandy vase for the happiest flowers in town. hic

Okay, there’s a ton of automobile ads in this issue. Which is appropriate, since the cars of that era are best measured in gross tonnage anyway. Let’s handle most (if not all) of them now:

Holy crap, were the Lincolns up to 1960 these massive ingots of automobile. I’ve been aboard aircraft carriers before and these give me the same impression of overwhelming size. And yet I am captivated by them. Of course, the real challenge if you own one of these monsters now is finding parts for it. (Contrast this with what the Lincoln Continental became for the first half of the 1960s: one of the most beautiful automobiles ever.)

If the USS Lincoln is beyond your means (or perhaps too spendy), there’s always Mercury. It’s interesting when you compare how cars looked in 1950, still trying to get accustomed to a postwar world, then to sort of a happy medium in the mid ’50s…only to become rolling Las Vegas by 1959.

By comparison, the 1959 Ford, which would seem like wild styling any other year, is positively sedate by comparison. Then again, you could always buy this heartbreaking work of automotive genius:

The “Olds sucking a lemon” look is toned down for 1959, but the E-Car is already suffering headwinds and has only a model year left after this one. Somebody in our hometown had a ’59 Edsel that, when he was done with it (or when it was done with him), he just parked it in his back yard. By the time I was of age, the weeds had started to grow up around it and the paint had oxidized and all that. One day when I was 9 or 10, I got to sit in it for a minute when nobody was home. I wanted so much to buy that car and fix it up. Obviously, it didn’t happen. (There were reportedly many offers made to him for it and he refused to sell. Eventually it was hauled away, and I have no idea where it ended up. I probably wouldn’t want to know, anyhow. But I’ve had a soft spot for the 1959 Edsel ever since.)

If all that’s going on at the House of Henry, then what’s the General up to?

Wide-Track Pontiac for 1959! The choice of my father’s father, who loved them big ol’ Pontiacs. Art Fitzpatrick and Van Kaufman became well-known for their Pontiac ads, which artistically enhanced the “wide track” effect and made Pontiacs seem four lanes wide.

Meanwhile, over at Chevrolet:

The famous “bat wing” Chevy for 1959. Cadillac’s fins went upward to their highest for 1959, but Chevrolet extended them outward. There’s a story – and I’m not sure how true it is – that the 1959 Chevy’s radical departure from the boxy 1958 design was because the Chevy designers found out about Chrysler’s “Forward Look” and this was their response. The outcome was a car whose looks you either love or hate. My maternal grandmother’s response was the latter. When my grandfather brought home the family’s new 1959 Biscayne sedan, she said, in a quote that has lived through the generations: “Hewie, that’s a biscuit and you’re gonna eat every bite of it!”

Oh, and on the adjoining page is a story about people learning how to hunt, sometimes with tragicomic results. It includes this picture:

Yep, some farmer had to paint COW on the side of a cow. Note that it’s in Pompano, Florida. I used to live a couple miles from there. There weren’t any cows there, let alone room for them. There’s probably rows and rows of houses there now.

Theme song for the article:

But the real action at GM is taking place in the GMC Truck Division, with Operation High Gear in full swing:

I’m having fun imagining a race like this at the then-new Daytona International Speedway. Especially with the high banks and everything. Wheeee!

There’s a GMC truck for every need! Pickups! Delivery vans! But this is the one I really like:

It looks like somebody who’s resigned themselves to having to wear braces, but they’re kind of philosophical about it. “Oh, well, it could be a lot worse,” sighs the new D860. Automotive designs of the ’50s were so expressive.

Meanwhile, here’s another word from the folks at Dodge:

It (and an ad that repeats claims that Listerine would eventually have to retract) is adjacent to part of a story about Brigitte Bardot’s sister, who has a beauty all her own:

And that is adjacent to a story about fashionable flooring from Johns-Manville! Asbestos is the wave of the future!

Back to what the folks at Chrysler are up to, though. The infestation of beetles from West Germany has disturbed the automakers enough to prompt countermeasures:

What’s not mentioned is that Chrysler had wanted to enter the European market, and did so by buying part of Ford’s share in Simca (which Henry Ford II, when he wasn’t fictionally sitting awkwardly in a race car, was said to have regretted). That, and the name instantly makes me think of Latka’s girlfriend on Taxi. I can’t see it without imagining Andy Kaufman pronouncing it.

Studebaker (whose motto is starting to become a more insistent “what have we got to lose? We’ve gotta try something!”) is thinking along similar lines, and brings us the cute little Lark:

The Lark (which was a reworking of some existing designs) sold well the first couple years. Unfortunately, when Ford (with the Falcon) and GM (with the Chevrolet Corvair and Pontiac Tempest) got in on the act, sales dropped. Soon after, so did Studebaker.

But if you really want to go places:

The Boeing 707 is here! And American Airlines invites you to fly on the big, fast new Jet Flagship! (This page has some history on this exact airframe, and you can see another image from the same photo shoot that yielded the picture in this ad. You’ll see that some retouching was involved. You’ll also find out about its unhappy ending.)

Boeing’s in on the act:

Given her expression, I can’t help wondering if he’s said something highly inappropriate. I also can’t help wondering if that’s his wife, or, ah, “his wife.” It’s the late ’50s, so…the odds are decent, on both counts. (That’s not a typo at the bottom, either: there was a Boeing 720, a slightly downsized 707 variant meant for airlines that wanted to serve shorter routes. It was a stopgap before something like the beloved workhorse 727 was ready.)

But this week Life also brings us the other side of aviation:

The fiery aftermath of an accident at New York’s Idlewild Airport (now John F. Kennedy International). A Super Constellation on a training flight became uncontrollable when a propeller malfunctioned during takeoff. The plane smashed into the empty Trans-Canada Viscount seen here, only about 10 minutes before passengers would have boarded. Believe it or not, nobody was killed. (Read more about it here.)

What else is in the news? The famous Boston political boss James Michael Curley died, and Life covered his sending-off. It was a big deal in Boston.

King Hussein of Jordan, 23 at the time, eluded an attempt by Syria to take him out. Given that my memories of King Hussein are of an older statesman trying to broker peace, it’s always jarring to see him as a young man.

The Hope Diamond was sent to the Smithsonian Institution…by registered mail, insured for $1 million (which came to fees of $145.29 for postage, registered mail service and insurance). Harry Winston, it was said, felt sending it by the post office would avoid the ballyhoo of armed guards, couriers and so forth.

There’s supposed to be a curse associated with the Hope Diamond. When I was at the museum a quarter-century ago, there was a long line waiting to look at it. I knew of the curse and, even if I’m not really superstitious, didn’t feel like waiting in line to tempt fate.

Holy cow, now there is a news flash! I really must stop wearing my monocle while reading these things.

Brief story about a leopard cub taken in by a family in Uganda. It was all fun and games and cuteness and sweetness until the leopard’s instincts started to come in, and the little cub wasn’t so cute any longer, so…off it went to a zoo. (Reminder: don’t mess with nature.)

The leopard’s story is in between a Botany 500 ad (yes! It did exist outside the game show universe!) and a Schick electric shaver ad. Where Remington famously shaved the fuzz off a peach in its commercials, Schick instead uses analogies to cactus quills and toy balloons, promising it can handle any kind of skin.

The Polaroid Land Camera! A miracle it was for the day: pictures in only 60 seconds. Now it seems so quaint.

Next to it is a piece about Amedeo Modigliani, who work was encountering a renaissance. There’s several of his works, but many of them are nudes, and although I don’t have an issue with that, we do try to be a family blog.

T. S. Eliot, now 70, has a new wife and a new play, The Elder Statesman. (Maybe he’s also got the Hotpoint 6-Cycle Washer, too!) They threw an afterparty, and given that I think of Eliot as writing rather heavy work, it’s odd to see him so happy:

In between material about The Elder Statesman, you can read about the exciting underwear that may get you a Love Letter. Or you can order the World Book Encyclopedia in time for Christmas. I’ll always insist one of the wisest things my parents ever did was buy a World Book set when my brother and I were really young. I grew up with World Book, seemed to always have a volume pulled down off the shelf, and it made me want to go out and learn more and see the world. So much that I have, so much that I have done with my life, I owe to that. I am grateful.

And you can’t have T.S. Eliot without having a cat around, as we see here. Around him, you can shop for a Sheaffer pen set (which is interesting, given that I’m a Parker 51/61 fan) and delicious Cracker Barrel cheese from Kraft. (That’s much better if you say it in the mellifluous voice of Ed Herlihy.)

It’s Beefaroni night! “Fixed just as Italian children might be eating it near Rome.” Yeah, I’m certain. Because you know that 11-year-olds are daydreaming about being on the Via Veneto.

Or you can always make them Plantation Ham with martinis made with Seagram’s Golden Gin. Notice how the ham is a pretext to make martinis. Heck, the entire decade seems like a pretext to make martinis.

An Alpha-Bits ad, which brings to mind two favorite gags:

1. “Brian! There’s a message in my Alpha-Bits! ‘Oooooooooo!'”
   “Peter, those are Cheerios.”
2. “Raymond…I could have eaten a box of Alpha-Bits and CRAPPED a better interview!”

Next door is the start of an article about Eileen Farrell, who had a long and versatile career and just seems like she was a really neat person.

The article about Bell, Book and Candle is…well, after the cover, it’s a letdown, though we do get some neat pictures. The one at the top right, with Gillian and Pyewacket, is a keeper. (“Witch and helper” might describe a picture of me and Smokey, who is often my Pyewacket.)

Another reason I love Bell, Book and Candle: Ernie Kovacs.

“S.O.S. Pads! See us at the Kitchen Debate next year!”

The Army’s big mirror was a big solar furnace done as an experiment, made of 356 mirrored sheets. That’s prospectively at least 2,492 years of bad luck if they break. eek.

And it’s helpful the Vitalis guy is also an underwater salvage expert, because, as it happens:

Life looks into the realm of people trying to cash in on underwater salvage. One of them has an idea to raise the wreck of the liner Andrea Doria, which had gone down a couple years before: just seal the portholes and pump air into the hull. He’s even got a proof-of-concept model, which he demonstrates for Life‘s inquiring eye:

Not only do I love the look on his face, but look at the model playing the part of Andrea Doria: it’s the flat-bottomed Revell model of s/s United States. (Note: if an “ingenious plan” has been rejected by a big salvage firm, there’s likely to be a reason. Maybe he didn’t use Vitalis?)

Now that we’ve handled much of the news, let’s have a drink! I miss the way advertisements used to have original art in them, but something like this ad is just so darn evocative:

Meanwhile, Carling’s Black Label gives the strong impression that the people who produce television programs are getting gassed while they’re doing it:

Maybe you’d prefer an entire stadium full of orange juice?

Or if you can’t come out and say “Honey, I need you to buy me a sewing machine” (because, after all, it’s 1958 and your full-time job is to stay home and tend house), here’s ways you can hint for it, like you’re a 9-year-old who leaves a Red Ryder BB gun ad inside your parents’ magazines:

Let’s have more booze! Here, it’s as if Roger Sterling was channeling Old Scratch at the end of The Devil and Daniel Webster.

Ancient Age always cracks me up, for the only alcohol in our house growing up was a small bottle of it kept at the very back of a cabinet, on a high shelf. It had been a gift from my dad’s boss, who usually gave everyone at the sawmill a bottle of booze for Christmas. Dad, being a strict teetotaler, almost always gave his to someone else. This one, he had kept. It was there for the sole purpose of making the cough medicine our old family doctor taught my parents to make (part bourbon, part honey). Many was the night my brother or I, having contracted some kind of horrible respiratory illness as we tended to in our young days, would be sleepless and sore, our throats raw from terrible persistent coughs. One treatment from the bottle of booze medicine would soothe our throats and get us to sleep.

Something delicious:

The thing I love most is how they really dolled Elsie up. Given that I grew up in the country and had many occasions to be around actual cows, it’s a hoot.

This looks like a nightmare in the ad, but, oh, would I be all over it like that little kid in the corner:

Alas, at my age, I now know I’d be in the same predicament that our Buster Keaton-esque mail carrier would be in here. But if I could meet Speedy, that would be nifty. (It’s a shame we lost Speedy when he fell off that fishing pier so many years ago.)

And you know that Patti Page is a stickler for perfect spark plugs! (She wrenches her own Oldsmobile, ya know. While wearing the gown. That’s why the car’s in the studio.)

Okay, it’s not the Carousel, but what can be?

“Can you bring me my Chap Stick? My lips hurt REAL BAD!”

“Children, in a time before Ikea, we had these things called furniture manufacturers! And they built furniture that was meant to be passed from generation to generation! But, then….”

And, in the spirit of the approaching holidays, we close with an appeal for you to give booze…

…and cigarettes. Because, after all, it’s 1958.

Yesterday I had the urge to go back in time, and a URL in my browser’s history popped up and took me to the Sept. 23, 1957 issue. It has an amazing picture of Suzy Parker on the cover:

Suzy Parker was a top model of the day, her name immortalized in a Beatles tune. I first became aware of her because she modeled for Revlon and sometimes appeared in the live commercials on The $64,000 Question. Later she was married to Bradford Dillman, who I remember most for playing Dirty Harry’s officious superior in two movies.

I mean, look at her. Wow.

This week in September 1957 brought more than just a look into Suzy Parker’s world. There was a neat feature in which a photographer took modern-day photos with one of Mathew Brady’s cameras. I was especially interested that the famously grumpy John Foster Dulles was an agreeable sitter, for a comparison with William Seward’s portrait.

There’s a big feature about the American court system, featuring portraits of prominent jurists.

If you’re into duck hunting, there’s a photo feature on favored hunting sites:

Robert Frost went to England:

…and quiz show champion Charles Van Doren reflects on his experiences as a winner on Twenty One and whether the quiz show craze helps or hinders education. Two years later he would testify before Congress about how the whole thing had been rigged. It’s interesting to read this piece, knowing what was to come and knowing how his life was going to change after his confession.

As another sign of the quiz show craze, here’s this ad that fulminates against the federal electric utilities. (This post goes into the campaigns of America’s Independent Electric Light and Power Companies, and features some really strident ads that imply that government utilities are but the vanguard of creeping socialism that will take away your freedoms, your Bible, etc.)

In consumer goods, Columbia was promoting its big new stereophonic systems under the “Listening in Depth” campaign. I mean, look at that glorious monster spread over two pages. Columbia Records backed this campaign with a really awesome LP that featured samples from various stereophonic albums, but also had some bespoke tracks. (The special version of Duke Ellington’s “Track 360” started with the sound of a train traveling from the left channel to the right channel. If you’re wearing headphones, the train travels through your head. It’s fun!)

Not to be outdone, RCA is not only promoting its own sound systems…

…but is also promoting the washer-dryer systems it’s producing through its partnership with Whirlpool.

And let’s not forget Philco. Otherwise, they might make various threats. (As they did when they complained NBC’s Today program being broadcast from the RCA Exhibition Hall was unfair competition; as they did when Philips tried to do business in the United States, which prompted the birth of the “Norelco” brand name. Although many, many years later Philips bought what was left of Philco, and that’s why you see “Philips” more and seldom see “Norelco.” So there.)

Schlitz urges you to go bowling! Enjoy a Schlitzframe! Have some Schlitzfreshment! Be a Schlitzer! Get Schlitzfaced!

Colgate reminds you that the real reason you’re striking out on the romantic scene isn’t your personality, your clothes or any other cause except your HORRIBLE BREATH:

Mutual of New York can not only set you up with affordable insurance, but also with inspiration for song titles!

Conn – the same folks who brought you Mr. B Natural (and all the important debates pertaining thereunto) – promises that you’ll be playing music the very first day! (But Conn very carefully doesn’t promise how well you’ll play.)

Chrysler Corporation is promoting The Forward Look, although it conveniently elides any commentary on what will happen if your car ends up being possessed. Or any guarantees about its durability should it be stored in a below-ground time capsule for 50 years.

While these guys are eyeballing each other’s cars, Sputnik is only a couple weeks or so from being sent into orbit. (And to add to the quiz show craze, that same comparison is the opening scene to the movie Quiz Show. Which – as if that’s not enough – prominently featured another Chrysler product!)

If you need an outboard motor, throw renowned all-around lovable guy Carl Kiekhaefer some business:

All this, however, means I’m burying the lede. The big story is Little Rock, the integration of Central High School, and the role of Gov. Orval Faubus. Life sent a photographer down, has this lengthy up-close piece about Faubus, talks to his family.

Meanwhile, real people are suffering. The Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth was beaten with fists and a chain; Dorothy Counts was threatened and gave up her attempt to attend a Charlotte school; a bomb exploded in the library of a Nashville school because a young Black student had been enrolled there.

Life‘s editorial page examines the events of the week. The second piece got my attention, and it’s why I’m writing about this today. And it’s not because of the legal aspects of it. It’s because the last two grafs touch on the role of the human heart.

It’s interesting to reflect on this same passage 67 years later. For the past few weeks, we have been sorting through the aftermath of the 2024 election. There are those who feel vindicated. There are those who feel distressed. As nauseated as I am by what modern political discourse has devolved into, I’m in neither camp. Instead, historian that I am both by inclination and training, to me it’s the cycle repeating itself. It’s nothing new. Yes, the methods and the media have changed, but the fundamentals haven’t.

Something else that hasn’t changed: the fact that it comes down to what’s in the heart and the conscience of each of us. No election, no referendum, no regime can alter the reality that each of us must answer to ourselves – can we live with the person we see in the mirror? – and we also have to answer to an authority higher than any governor or president or king or overlord, and someday we’ll have to answer for how we treated one another in this life. We have to answer to that voice in our heads that keeps us from being able to sleep if we’ve wronged somebody else. Some folks will be able to meet that test. Other times, though, I’ve felt like the traveler in this song, unable to believe the inhumanity humans willingly visit upon other humans:

We hear a lot about the horrible things that happen. News, as I teach my students, isn’t when the river remains within its banks. But what we don’t see anywhere as often are the little acts of kindness, charity and goodness that take place when nobody’s looking. Yes, the people who say horrible things and do cruel acts and scream the loudest are going to get the attention, and to some extent they’ll set whatever the perception is. But what we don’t see are the everyday acts of goodness: the extended hand, the kind word when it’s needed, the gentle moments of human connection that remind us we’re all occupants of this same life and this same little marble that’s drifting somewhere in the great vastness of space.

I don’t get to choose my students. I have to take who comes my way, no matter their race, creed, color, background, politics, identity…you name the variation and I’ve encountered it in my classroom in some way, shape or form. I’m obligated to set all that aside and treat every one of them the best I know how. That’s not only as a professional, but also as a human being. I have to be able to look back on my day and not regret what I said or what I did. That, and I have never discounted the possibility that God sent someone my way because there was something I needed to learn from them.

Anybody who thinks they know how the next four years, let alone the next decade, will go is fooling themselves. Nobody knows. Some of it will involve things that are in our hands, but so much of it won’t be in our hands. What is always within our hands, though, is how we treat one another. I’d hope that underneath all the loudness and tumult that hearts haven’t hardened, that there’s still a fifth column of decency that remains at work, even if we seldom hear about it.

Or, as a couple of more recent observers would remind us: be excellent to each other.

The ocean liner United States has been a long-standing fascination for me. It started innocently enough, during my senior year in high school. I had befriended the head librarian as soon as I started attending the school and became a library assistant during my senior year. (It tells you everything about me that I had closer relationships with some of my teachers and with the librarians than I had with most of my classmates.) During my senior year, she let me and a friend eat lunch in a work room in back of the library.

Along the back wall of this room were bound volumes of most of the original run of Life magazine, and several years of Time from the late 1940s and early 1950s. More often than not I’d spend part of my lunch hour with some of those volumes pulled down, and I’d happily leaf through these little time capsules, losing myself in another era: not only the stories of what was in the news then, but the photography and the ads. Spend enough time immersed in those ads and you find yourself longing for products that haven’t been offered in forever.

One day I was looking through the June 1952 issues of Time, and one cover stuck out: a ship’s captain, brow furrowed with responsibility, watchful gaze fixed on something in the distance; behind him was a porthole with frolicking vacationers visible, as bon voyage streamers fluttered by, a mildly surreal mash-up of the sort Time covers of the day specialized in. “Commodore Manning of the ‘United States,'” the caption read.

As I looked inside to see what the story was, I couldn’t feel the hook being set. I started reading about this amazing ship and all the modern features, including some the Navy didn’t want to disclose (and which, I’d learn in time, had to do with more than just claims of national security). Then throughout other issues, the advertisements, breathless with anticipation, from United States Lines about the ship’s entry into service. Then to the coverage of the ship in Life.

Inevitably I started wondering: what happened to this ship? It’s what I tend to do when I find out about marvels from the past; some itch makes me wonder what became of them. Nowadays, you could just pull out your smartphone and have the ship’s entire story at your fingertips. But in 1991, a “smartphone” would have meant Don Adams talking into his shoe.

Somehow I found out the ship was still around. There had been plans to convert the ship into a cruise liner, but nothing had happened. The ship was languishing away in Virginia and hadn’t been to sea since 1969. I got interested in writing about the ship and planned to go to Virginia to do some research at the Mariners’ Museum, and hoped to get some photos of the ship while I was there. But since I was the baby of the family, my parents said no. Eventually we worked something out (oh, was that a story) and it became a hastily-arranged family vacation that turned out to be pretty nice, probably the best vacation we took together. We took a harbor cruise and I saw the big ship with my own eyes. I’d been aboard big ships before, having been to many a ship museum, but there was something about seeing this ship up close, in person. The ship was still powerful, looked fast and majestic just sitting there, but so sad: faded, rusted, abused, neglected.

I got involved in the nascent efforts to save the ship from being scrapped, which really picked up when a federal court put the ship up for auction. There were all manner of strings being pulled, but to no avail, and in April 1992 we prepared for the worst to happen at auction. Instead, a Turkish-based group bought the Big U. Two months later the ship went to Turkey, and from there to Sevastopol for drydocking and to have the asbestos-laden interiors stripped out.

Well, the plans went nowhere, and the owners had begun selling parts of the ship for scrap (which is why, among other things, the lifeboats and davits were gone). Another eleventh-hour rescue and the ship ended up in Philadelphia in 1996. The following year, a friend and I went up over Memorial Day weekend to see the ship. When her dad retired from the Air Force in 1962, they got to travel back home from England aboard the ship. She still remembers watching Birdman of Alcatraz in the ship’s theater.

Years passed and various plans came and went, and the ship dodged various brushes with doom. At one point it seemed tantalizingly like the ship would get converted to go back to sea again, but that didn’t work out. At another point, plans for the ship’s refurbishment and preservation seemed so close. But that, alas, was not to be. And then, the owner of the pier where the Big U was moored got tired of this big ship being there, and more legal wrangling ensued. Alas, we know how it ended; with sale to a Florida county that will scuttle the ship as the world’s largest artificial reef.

Back in July, we didn’t know how this was going to turn out, although since January, when the word about the pier situation really started getting dire, I had been bracing for the final act happening sometime this year, and I had a feeling the ship was running out of lives. The e-mails from the ship’s preservation organization were sounding more concerned than usual.

There had been occasional opportunities for guided tours aboard the ship, but they often involved more money than I had available, or they required some kind of “in,” such as being a former passenger. But in mid-year, the Conservancy opened things up: for a minimum donation, you could go aboard. I thought the odds of me getting a slot were long, but I figured I’d regret if I didn’t try, and so I sent an inquiry. To my surprise, I got the first date I requested. All I had to do was make the donation, which happened moments later. Then came all the logistics: oh, crap, I gotta plan a route, book hotel rooms, get a timeline together, etc., etc. Which, all of that came together, but since I do tend to fret, it got interesting.

The morning of July 19, I loaded up the car and set out. On any trip this size, I’ll usually spend about the first 20 minutes wondering why am I doing this crazy thing? and then, at a certain point, something will shift and I’ll ease into travel mode. Certainly by the time I was on I-77, I was ready to go. My trip followed much the same route my friend and I had taken in 1997: I-77 to I-81, and then on to the Pennsylvania Turnpike to Philadelphia. It was hours and hours and hours of travel, with TCM’s splendid podcasts about Pam Grier and John Ford keeping me company much of the way. Since I had started out early, though, I was able to make it across the Pennsylvania line and spend the night in Chambersburg. The next morning, I was up early, got on the Turnpike and it was on to Philadelphia. Mission-driven person I am, I was there at 9:15 for the 10 a.m. report time, and killed a little time at a Lowe’s near the rendezvous point. Across the busy four-lane street from us, there was the Big Ship. It had been so long. I was glad to see my old friend again, even if my heart broke a little more.

There was a group of about 20 that morning, from various places; some of us were experienced with old ships, while some were just curious about this big old ship they kept seeing from the Walt Whitman Bridge. One was an artist who had become fascinated with the ship and was making a repeat visit to take pictures for her projects. Eventually all were accounted for, and we made a convoy over to the pier, and parked where we could. I was finally up close with the ship, and I could scarcely believe it. There’s my car, all of a sudden, parked alongside s/s United States.

We got out of our vehicles and stood pierside, then walked around for photo opportunities. I was overawed. This is so big, I kept thinking. But that cut two ways: yes, the ship was a marvel, but only up close could I really appreciate how much damage the years had inflicted: the mangled railings, the busted portholes, the streaks and pocks of rust. In a heartbeat, my awe turned to sadness: This is so big. The vastness of the job was suddenly so apparent, like a giant hole had consumed me and all I had to dig out with was a toy shovel and pail. I had the feeling you’d need probably a billion dollars to truly do this project right. It was a billion dollars I didn’t have.

Every so often, the inevitable becomes heartbreakingly clear and you have to brace for it. It’s a feeling I knew in early 2019 when the veterinarian at the emergency clinic told me that our senior cat’s heart was giving out and that I was about to lose my bestest buddy of 15 years, and I suddenly had to make one of the most heartbreaking decisions I’ve ever made. It’s a feeling I knew not two weeks into this year when I got the phone call that my mother, who had been in the hospital but seemed okay when I visited two days before, was in the ICU and was crashing quickly. It’s the feeling that you’re about to have to let go of something you have loved so dearly for so long, that last-minute happy endings don’t exist outside Hollywood, and even the first glimmers that maybe it’s all for the best, that the unforeseen costs of answered prayers could end up worse than just doing the right thing and, as a friend of mine often says, letting go and letting God. It’s the coldness of reality grabbing you by the collar.

Now, granted, this is different because a 990-foot ship will never love you back. But, still, when you’ve invested 33 years into caring so deeply about something…yeah, this hurt.

In time our tour guide led us down the pier to a metal gangway. After all these years, it was about to happen. Up and over, and I’m aboard. “We meet at last,” I tell the ship, giving a gentle pat as I step aboard, into a crew area called Times Square. A couple of men who help take care of the ship greet us. There’s some paperwork we have to sign (of course), and we’re all given flashlights since there’s a lot of areas without lights ahead, and after a briefing we set off.

(Side note: Some of what I’m about to cover was also covered by Steven Ujifusa, author of A Man And His Ship, in this post a few days ago. Check it out, as Steven got coverage of a few areas I mention here but didn’t get pictures of.)

First we have to climb a spiral stair up, and then we emerge into…vast emptiness. Where passenger cabins once were, now there are outlines of where walls used to be. Light streams in from the cabin ports. The stubs from where the toilet and bath plumbing used to be stick up from the decks. The ship’s decor and many other artifacts were auctioned off in 1984 and are now scattered among hundreds of museums and private collections, and good luck ever getting all that stuff back; much of what was left, notably the marinite asbestos panels that made up walls and other interior divisions, was gutted in 1994 during the yard period in Sevastopol. For the most part, we’re touring an empty hull, communing with ghosts. Here and there, there are signs of what once was – the different patterns on the decks that corresponded with which class you were in (first, cabin or tourist). It’s like finding little traces of a lost civilization. It made your heart hurt. At one point, in a now-denuded lounge, I embraced one of the countless structural stanchions that shoot up through the public spaces like trees. Very quietly, I whispered: “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” If it’s true that ships have souls, I hope that ship heard me.

There’s something else I haven’t mentioned. If you’ve been aboard enough ships, you know they have a distinct smell. Just about every ship I’ve been aboard has had some variant of that smell, even active Navy ships that are well-maintained. It’s a mix of grease, fuel oil, sweat, stale air and who knows what else. It’s hard to describe, but the closest thing I’ve found is the smell of old color-printed magazines that have sat in storage for a long time; a pungent, slightly mildew-y, slightly ashy smell that gets your attention. Now imagine that on a ship that hasn’t been climate-controlled in decades, neglected and open to the elements. Even through a KF94 mask I could pick up that smell. It soaked into my hair and my clothes, and even days later I could detect the smell in that mask. It became poignant.

Some of the public areas were evocative. At one point we went into a little room that looked out over what had been the first class dining room, where everybody who was anybody would have dined back in the day, wearing their absolute best, the truly important folks getting invited to sit at the table with the Commodore (or with the captain when the Commodore wasn’t at sea). The tables were long gone; only the sockets remained from where the table legs were secured to the deck. The little compartment we were in, one deck up, was a loft where the musicians had once played. And now we looked out over an empty dining room; the best we could do was reconstruct the scene in our minds.

Elsewhere on the tour, we visited what had been the first class lounge. You could still make out where the musician’s platform had been, and the circular dance floor, though worse for wear, was still evident. I was likely to never get another chance, so when no one was looking, I did a quick Natalie Merchant twirl on the dance floor and rejoined the group.

Eventually we emerged on deck. Once upon a time we’d have been walking on green-colored weather decks covered in Neotex. But over the years the Neotex gave up, crumbled away. Some of it rests as little gray-green flecks of gravel collected in nooks and crannies, while some larger pieces hold on. The temptation was strong to pick up a little piece of it and slip it into my pocket as a souvenir. But…my conscience told me it wouldn’t have been right. The only thing I felt was right to take was photographs, and so I did.

We explored other areas: where the lifeboats and davits once were, now it’s just a long and open run of clear deck, with beaten-up railings along the edges. The pilothouse, where the ship was guided on record-breaking voyages and through stormy seas, is now empty. Atop the pilothouse, you could look up close at the giant forward funnel, whose last sheets of weather-beaten paint from the final yard period 56 years ago are hanging on for dear life. Brave souls could try to climb up the foremast, but my dread of heights kept me a live coward instead of an vertigo-plagued hero.

We explored aft, too: overlooking one of the giant propellers now resting on deck; a good view of the aft railing that was bent in Sevastopol; the shoots of green that have grown in nooks and crannies; the rust that has eaten away at unprotected metal. Then the vacant promenade deck, once all full of life, but now empty and ghostly, empty light fixtures now hanging down.

Back inside and back down to Times Square we went. The tour had already gone longer than expected, but there was more to see. As we waited for the next leg of the tour, there was a cooler with iced-down bottles of water and Gatorade, and we were welcome to help ourselves. I hadn’t had anything in hours, and walking around this unventilated ship on a humid summer day had worn me low. It took me no time at all to drain a bottle of Gatorade.

Then we were off to visit one of the engine rooms; once a forbidden area, now we were merrily climbing through it, exploring things, finding wonders hidden in the dark mustiness. Along the way, I’d look up and see paint hanging down in giant sheets from the overhead, or see where cables and wiring had been chopped out. I got to thinking about the hundreds of miles of wiring and cabling that would have to be replaced, the countless passages and corridors and nooks and crannies that would have to be scraped and repainted…well, there went my heart hitting the deck once more.

The last stop on the tour was the swimming pool. When the ship was new, this kind of became famous, with the stylized flags spelling out “Come on in – the water’s fine” on the bulkhead at the rear of the pool. Well, the pool basin was still there, but the flags and a whole lot else were long gone. Some in the group climbed down into the basin, while I was content to soak in the ambience from above. I’ve never learned how to swim, anyway, and with my luck I’d have found a way to go under in a dry pool.

And with that, the tour was over. We threaded our way back up to Times Square and our tour guide gave each of us a folder with some information and a sticker, our souvenir of the visit. I waited behind to let others go ashore first, and to thank the gentlemen who had helped us while we were aboard. But then I had a moment of panic: I couldn’t find my glasses. I looked everywhere in Times Square, unable to remember where they might be. At last I thought to check the top of my head; sure enough, I was still wearing them. Yeah, it was a brain failure, but in its way, it gave me a private moment with the ship. On the way out, I gave a bulkhead a gentle, loving pat, told the Big U to keep her courage, and reluctantly joined everyone else on the pier.

There was time for a few more pictures, and we lingered and talked for a little while, and then the convoy headed out. The two men who had hitched a ride over with me met back up with me, and I delivered them to their vehicle, wished them well on their ride back to Virginia. And then I gave our ship one last, loving look as I drove away. I looked up at Uncle Walt’s bridge, with “Song of Himself” gamboling through my head, then pointed my car the other direction, toward I-95 and the hotel room that awaited me in North Carolina.

That night, as I prepared for bed, the smell of that ship was still with me: in my clothes, in my hair. As, too, were the tangled emotions: wishing I could pick the Big U up, take that ship home with me; trying to cope with the likelihood that the ship could well be torn apart in a ditch in Brownsville, or that the ship that Mr. Gibbs designed to never sink would meet that very fate. But even with all that, I could know that, even if the worst did happen, at least I had this day.

Given what I know now, I’m glad I had it.