Dear Friends and/or relatives,
What you have here is an attempt to blog my memoirs. I tried to get them published but it soon became obvious that today’s publishers fall into three rough categories:
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Those that do publish but tell new writers they “do not accept unsolicited or unagented material.” (Elsewhere on their websites they tell you what they do accept: hefty government grants.)
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Vanity Press. They are eager to publish your scribblings – for a price. I have met sheepish people with two-car garages full of their products.
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Plucky but shaky little companies that are still too proud or too small to fit either of the two above-mentioned categories.
“Ramblings of An Also-Ran” is in frank imitation of “And Now . . . Here’s Max,” by the iconic Canadian broadcaster, Max Ferguson. It was originally published by MacMillan in 1967 and was reprinted by HarperCollinsCanada in 1980.
Just as there will never be another Max Ferguson, there will never be another “And Now . . . Here’s Max.” The book is simply hilarious: it won Canada’s premiere award for humor writing in 1968. And for people in the business, it still stands as one of the best and most accurate chronicles of a unique era in Canadian broadcasting.
Max Ferguson’s broken-down cowboy, Rawhide, was riding high on the Canadian airwaves the year I started in radio. And when ol’ Rawhide hung up his saddle for keeps, I was still in the field – thoroughly bloodied but not unbowed.
I like to think that “Ramblings Of An Also-Ran” picks up where “And Now . . . Here’s Max” leaves off. It may even add a few details and a Western Canadian perspective.
To start reading my “Ramblings,” please go to the right of your screen to click on ‘Foreword.’
But please – oh, please! – let me know how it strikes you.
August 15, 2009 at 4:37 pm |
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August 1, 2010 at 2:57 am |
Hi – I really enjoyed reading your blog. It brought back so many memories of that August in 1955 when indeed I did complete the swim after my second try. After my failed first attempt a radio station (CKRC?) offered a $1,000.00 prize to anyone who would sign up with them to attempt a successful crossing. The Tribune offered me the same money if I gave them the exclusive on the story and didn’t sign up with the radio station. They secretly picked me up on the night before the swim and and spirited me away to a friend’s cottage in Grand Marais. 5 men had signed up with the station; we all started about the same time (in the dark) at different points – no-one but the Tribune knew I was swimming. The 5 were taken out one-by-one, but I finished in the unremarkable time of 15 hours. Kevin Lilly swam there and back the next year in about 13 hours!!!
January 25, 2012 at 3:00 pm |
Max Ferguson’s “And Now… Here’s Max” is back in print:
http://sybertooth.ca/publishing/and_now_heres_max.htm