Musical ramblings from the manager
In Part 1, we looked at how Ferdinand Magellan (born Fernao de Magalhaes in Portugal) was able to convince King Charles I of Spain to appoint him the Captain General of an expedition to the Spice Islands. Magellan was convinced one could sail west, find a strait that would deposit his ships at the […]
The date: September 6, 1522. Location: Sanlucar de Barrameda, Spain. “As the ship came closer, those who gathered onshore noticed that her tattered sails flailed in the breeze, her rigging had rotted away, the sun had bleached her colors, and storms had gouged her sides. A small pilot boat was dispatched to lead the […]
When my wife and I were still in dating mode, we used to commute on alternate weekends (she was working in Marquette and I was in Ontonagon). My habit of borrowing albums to transfer on to cassette tapes provided me with my road music. My vehicle’s radio was strictly AM, so my stash of cassettes […]
In August of 1964, the kids who worked as volunteer crossing guards for the Marquette Area Public Schools were rewarded with a trip to the Upper Peninsula State Fair in Escanaba. We were told to wear our iconic Safety Patrol belts to gain free entry to the fair, but it seemed unnecessary as we […]
A while back, we covered how the ups and downs of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (FTV: 1974 – 12-25-19) led to the normalization of huge venue concerts. These mega-events were quite common up until the COVID-19 pandemic pulled the rug out from under the music industry. At that time, I promised to take […]
On October 19, 2018, my wife and I were on the way to Houghton in the late afternoon when we happened to notice one of the cars from the Lake Superior Performance Rally (LSPR) traveling in the other direction. They were headed toward the Friday evening starting point of their weekend rally. Just for […]
After reading Cormac O’Brien’s book, Secret Lives of the U.S. Presidents – What your teachers never told you about the men of the White House (Quirk Books – 2009), I thought it might be interesting to examine some of the ‘one and done’ U.S. Presidents. We ended Part 1 with the death of #11 (James […]
Being an election year, the above title will give some the wrong idea right off the bat. While I have my political opinions, it has been a cardinal rule of mine to not spend time trying to convince anyone else that what I think about politics is ‘right’ while their opinions are ‘wrong’. When […]
We have entered the ‘July hiatus’ – meaning I may finally get through all the junk that got stashed in the studio when I retired on July 1, 2018. I have actually made great progress during the COVID-19 shutdown – it seems like it is easier to get things done when you are the only […]
Growing up only two blocks north of the tennis courts located at the Marquette Senior High building gave me plenty of opportunities to play tennis. There were four more courts between the NMU dorms and the National Guard Armory just north of our house and many public courts sprinkled across town. Taking two free […]