Good piece. You ought to gather up the material and write a 400-page book and the then-and-now theme.
I would like to read such a book. Write it, Grinning.
#27 & 29. I just don’t have the time to write a book. However, I do long commentaries here at FR so much of what I have just written has been posted before.
There is a book coming out in April in which I played a major part for the research and directional guidance of several chapters concerning the POW/MIA issues of the Vietnam war, and I recently finished a major piece for a Vietnam history magazine that came out last Fall.
Right now I have to write a chapter for that same organization’s “Yellow Cover Yearbooks” on the Vietnam War so my time is really taken up until the end of Spring. Plus my wife will kill me if I write another book or even part of one since my office and living room look like the File Rooms of an archives (Lots of material scattered in many boxes since I worked on the book about John Kerry and the Swiftboat Veterans back in 2004. Had lots of good material we used over the years in other books and publications so I couldn’t put it away - It’s nice to be liked, if only for my files but my wife doesn’t appreciate it. Have to keep the matches away from her).
Some of the best writing on Baltimore was by Roger Simon(s), a Balto Sun columnist who really covered the “street” and if I remember correctly, was the inspiration and/or writer for the show “Homicide: Life on the Streets” which starred Yaphet Kotto (who lived in Baltimore)etc.
Also, the author of the book used in “The Wire” was from Baltimore. Might have been Simons too.
Just for fun, if you have seen the movie “Hairspray” about 1960’s teenagers trying to integrate a local tv station’s daily dance show, it was based on some real incidents. I was on the Buddy Dean Show twice, and actually got to dance with the beautiful and talented Linda Scott (”I’ve Told Every Little Star”, “Don’t Bet Money Honey”, etc.)for about 7 seconds.
Life was good in those days.