"I liked Hemingway's succinct way of saying things. I tried to take his style. I began to realize almost from the start that anyone could describe a room and a person in it in 4,000 words. But how many could do it in 40 words? This was the whole game for me." Journalist and columnist Jim Bishop

Happy “liberal arts professor helps save the Union” day to all who celebrate

OTD in 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act. Here is a photo of LBJ handing a pen to Martin Luther King, Jr, at the signing ceremony. As the caption says, this was "the strongest civil rights legislation since Reconstruction Days."

"Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit drinking." On this day 46 years ago, "Airplane" was unleashed on an unprepared populace. www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaXv...

"He seemed about halfway nuts at the time.” rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2023/03/the-...

“I thought there was no one like Ernie Pyle, except maybe Ernest Hemingway and Stephen Crane. Those writers had the greatest influence on my own writing.” Wallace Terry, Vietnam War correspondent

“None of us got where we are solely by pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps. We got here because somebody--a parent, a teacher, an Ivy League crony or a few nuns--bent down and helped us pick up our boots.” Thurgood Marshall, born on this day in 1908

"And afterwards, men in tall hats and gold watch fobs will thump their chests and say what a brave charge it was." www.youtube.com/watch?v=hL82...

OTD in 1937, pilot Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan disappeared over the Pacific Ocean while attempting to make the first round-the-world flight at the equator. Purdue University's Research Foundation funded the Lockheed Electra Earhart flew. rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2020/07/land...

"I love to write. But it has never gotten any easier to do and you can't expect it to if you keep trying for something better than you can do." Ernest Hemingway, who died on this day in 1961

"I’m looking to be shot any time I step out of my car. If I die, it will be in a good cause. I’ve been fighting for America just as much as the soldiers in Vietnam." Medgar Evers, born on this day in 1925

OTD in 1943, Charles Hall of Brazil, Indiana, became the first African American pilot, and Tuskegee Airman, to shoot down an enemy aircraft in World War II, blasting a German Focke-Wulf 190 out of the sky while escorting B-25 bombers in his P-40 fighter on a mission over southwestern Sicily.

“If your writing doesn't keep you up at night, it won't keep anyone else up either.” James M. Cain, born on this day in 1892

Copy still available. Hint: Kurt Vonnegut went there.

#writershelpingwriters #authoradvice #writingadvice #writingcommunity

Giveaway time! An advance reader’s edition of my Wallace Terry biography, to be published in October by the @unmpress.bsky.social, to the first person to name the high school he went to, becoming the first Black editor of its daily newspaper.

"Never forget that you are one of a kind. Never forget that if there weren't any need for you in all your uniqueness to be on this earth, you wouldn't be here in the first place." R. Buckminster Fuller, who died on this day in 1983

“They didn’t call it ‘on the job training’ or ‘internship;’ they called it ‘breaking the kid in.’ That’s what it was. After a week I was there alone. That’s how I became a reporter.” rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2019/07/the-...

“Remember, it is no sign of weakness or defeat that your manuscript ends up in need of major surgery. This is a common occurrence in all writing, and among the best writers.” William Strunk Jr., born on this day in 1869

Fall 2026 catalog from @unmpress.bsky.social has a nice spread for my Wallace Terry bio coming in October. dhjhkxawhe8q4.cloudfront.net/new-mexico-u...

Always love to talk about Ernie Pyle. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e...

Working at the Saint Bonaventure archives this morning reviewing materials from the Jim Bishop papers for my William Manchester book. Some great stuff including letter from Jackie Kennedy and Bishop’s account of his dealings with the Kennedy family.

"Books are the one element in which I am personally and nakedly acquisitive. If it weren't for the law I would steal them. If it weren't for my purse I would buy them.” Harold J. Laski, born on this day in 1893

On this day in 1886 at Indianapolis's Plymouth Church, authors gathered to form the Western Association of Writers. rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2012/04/gath...

“We live in a world which is full of misery and ignorance, and the plain duty of each and all of us is to try to make the little corner he can influence somewhat less miserable and somewhat less ignorant than it was before he entered.” Thomas Huxley, who died on this day in 1895

Doing some editing on a partial chapter for my William Manchester project. Research trip this week to Saint Bonaventure University archives.

“I wonder if those sons of bitches holding up war production back home wouldn’t change their minds if they could look at this.” Robert Sherrod, “Burial in the Aleutians,” “Time” magazine, on this day 1943 rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2024/06/deat...

". . . a man as American as the courthouse yard in the square of an Indiana county seat.” Wendell Willkie of Indiana receives the GOP presidential nomination at the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia on this day in 1940 rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2019/06/the-...

"I can remember virtually every day because I lived my life with such intensity. I knew that any day I could be killed. . . . I went to where the action was because I felt that's the only way I could fully tell the story." Wallace Terry, war correspondent rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2026/06/preo...

"You're taking a descent into hell when you enter war. . . . There's no clean way to fight a war." Wallace Terry, Vietnam War correspondent youtu.be/un5qtddoSUo

“I was aware of a new and dreadful sensitivity to the dangers of war—an acute, nervous state that made the sounds of incoming shells or enemy machine-gun fire crushing and unbearable.” #NationalPTSDAwarenessDay rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2021/12/rich...

"I had no regrets about my own suffering in that war, or the blood I shed in it. I was honored to be in it with men I respected so greatly." War correspondent Richard Tregaskis #NationalPTSDAwarenessDay

“No one here knows what it is I have seen, what I have experienced, what I owe those whom I left. . . . And no one asks. For one split second, I want to go back.” Wallace Terry, Vietnam War correspondent #NationalPTSDAwarenessDay

“The history of progress is written in the blood of men and women who have dared to espouse an unpopular cause, as, for instance, the black man's right to his body, or woman's right to her soul.” Emma Goldman, born on this day in 1869

“oh god it's wonderful to get out of bed and drink too much coffee and smoke too many cigarettes and love you so much” Frank O'Hara, born on this day in 1926

"We did a lot of walking, running and crawling, machinegun fire and shrapnel snapping just overhead. There was action everywhere, and no telling where the fire was going to come from next.” rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2024/10/cove...

"We don’t turn back, whatever we suffer. We will make history tonight.” OTD in 1945, war correspondent Richard Tregaskis joined the crew of a B-29 Superfortress for its first mission over Japan rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2022/01/rich...

"The test of a civilization is in the way that it cares for its helpless members." Pearl S. Buck

Grumman's F6F Hellcat fighter, the favorite plane of Hoosier ace Alex Vraciu, first flew on this day in 1942. “The Hellcat gave us not only the speed, range, and climb to compete successfully against the Zero,” Vraciu noted, “but it could dictate the rules of combat.”

"All of the arts, poetry, music, ritual, the visible arts, the theater, must singly and together create the most comprehensive art of all, a humanized society, and its masterpiece, free man." Bernard Berenson, born on this day in 1865

"In a mood of faith and hope my work goes on. A ream of fresh paper lies on my desk waiting for the next book. I am a writer and I take up my pen to write." Pearl S. Buck, born on this day in 1892

“In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” George Orwell

“I have a great risk of meeting a fool at home, but the candidate who travels cannot escape him.” Benjamin Harrison, who received news of his winning the GOP presidential nomination on this day in 1888 rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2020/06/hes-...

". . . “a mass of burned, broken buildings, great craters—some of them so old the grass had grown back into them—and the streets glitter with broken glass that crunches and protests under the thick soles of advancing Americans.” rayboomhower.blogspot.com/2023/06/char...

Thursday giveaway time! A comp advance reader's edition of my Wallace Terry biography to be published Oct. 6 by the @unmpress.bsky.social to the first person to name what civil rights leader was godfather to Terry's oldest son.

Teach the children quietly For some day sons and daughters Will rise up and fight while we stand still songoftheday.ca/2025/07/25/s...

“A scrupulous writer, in every sentence that he writes, will ask himself at least four questions, thus: 1. What am I trying to say? 2. What words will express it? 3. What image or idiom will make it clearer? 4. Is this image fresh enough to have an effect?" George Orwell

Hilton U. Brown, a young reporter for the "Indianapolis Evening News," found himself in an enviable position on this day in 1888—one, in fact, that any journalist in America would have aspired to be in.

“Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.” George Orwell, born on this day in 1903

“Books are not made for furniture, but there is nothing else that so beautifully furnishes a house.” Henry Ward Beecher, born on this day in 1813 (Beecher was a minister in both Lawrenceburg and Indianapolis, Indiana)