H-XM-2001

Christmas Greetings 2001

Make Do: At Christmas time year 2000, those of us here, took in the movie CAST AWAY. This was interesting and rekindled thoughts I used to have as a kid – I especially liked Robinson Cruso. So I began a “Make Do” story, on which I spent a great deal of time, making sketches and writing as if the proposition was real. The proposition was: you are reborn, in your birthday suit, at the site where you were really born, only you are now 40 years old and “reborn” taking with you only the knowledge you carry in your head – the time is summer before Columbus discovered America. The name of the game is to survive on your own, then to upgrade what the Indians could do before arrival of people from Europe. You have the remainder of your life to prepare those about you. Can you, with today’s knowledge, advance those about you to be more advanced than Columbus from 1500 Europe?

The story begins with my awakening on buffalo grass, it’s summer, the day growing hotter – and nobody in sight. The shock of how did I get there turned to reasoning of where was I – there are few places where you have buffalo grass and no mountains in sight. The weather was nice but reason said a first task was cover myself from the sun. Tall grass along a creek was uprooted to provide covering for feet and body. Necessity forced immediate actions – I soon realized I was on my own – there was no help. Thoughts focused on recollections from youth on how early settlers did things. Having built bows and arrows, set traps, explored the area in youth were very helpful. Knowledge of astronomy, surveying & geology permitted me to determine where I was. I found I could feed and cloth myself by making do with the natural abundance and improvising. I began building a sod house for protection during the coming winter. Finding rocks and making cutters was an early need, making fire became important – I took time to design and build a “weighted top” to spin and apply heat at a point to start a fire. I searched for and found clay for making a pot – glue was one of the first things I manufactured. In time I found there were many things I could do – spend hours trying to determine how to do the next important thing. It took so much time to do even little things – I had to focused on essentials, reducing each task or device to it’s simplest form. In time I found there were many things I could do – given enough time. But I soon found I was blocked by location and the time period. I could not apply things I knew, I needed iron to make cutting tools and for magnetism – I needed copper for wire and bearings. Finding flint like rocks was like finding gold. I became very dependent on clay, for pots, pipe, pulleys – to mix with sand to make fire brick. I made charcoal, bellows and used brick to focus very hot “cutting torch” heat to cut timber. I determined how to make felt and paper, how to make thread and rope, how to tan hides and make cloths. Knowledge of chemistry became very important. I knew I could keep warm and safe in a cave and get clean water from spring or well. I could achieve a comfortable state of existence – even fireplace, inside toilet and running water.

There were no cows, pigs, horses, donkeys, chickens – there was no wheat, oats, barley, rye. Training buffalo to be work animals seemed a daunting endeavor – wagons and plows were designed for manual labor. I became very aware that a human being is a universal, programmable machine, no wonder persons learned it was foolish to kill in battle if you could acquire a slave.

I did not meet Indians until after I’d become quite self sufficient. This helped with the story line as they became curious with what I had when they discovered me. The story then entered a completely new phase – during which I became very aware that democracy and free enterprise were after Columbus inventions. Much time was spent trying to convert Indians from hunter gatherers to farmers and manufacturers – it was a real challenge on how to stimulate their interest in learning new things and transitioning into a productive community. It was necessary to “invent” a money system and create a social system to satisfy human needs and still provide incentives for invention and development. I realized one lifetime would not be enough to lift hunter gatherers to a more modern world – I could not recall enough, even if I’d had a set of encyclopedias – it required R&D to determine how to do achievable things we often take for granted. It was necessary to establish a people system that would advance itself.

The Make Do story became an excellent method of understanding history and the evolvement of society. I would highly recommend having high school students write such story segments. It would cause them to think, appreciate what they have and develop a conviction of the need for further education. Students should present their solutions to problems and be questioned and graded by fellow students. They should be permitted to study what’s known today for them to solve problems of a prior time.

To make progress it was necessary to have the help of other people, it became evident a critical mass of people was required to make an advanced society work. Education was a first necessity to establish a democratic social structure and free enterprise system. I had to invent clay black boards, chalk, paper and pencils. I chose to use English and begin with how to read and write – to build a dictionary, constitution and define customs and laws. It was important to make it a fun participatory thing, so curiosity, pride and reward could be applied to learning. I found it essential to separate church and state and to allow time for Arts & Entertainment. We mixed what they knew with what I knew. I taught them songs, how to make musical instruments. I taught sports, painting and how to do plays – always encouraging them to innovate and teach each other.

The need for a kind of money became obvious, there was no solution without it. Money and taxes are the life blood of a society, making it possible to care for the young, elderly & sick while the able bodied do the work. Government became important to maintain law and order, provide for infrastructure and defense, and importantly to provide for Research & Development. Money was measured in man-hours with people, government and business accounts kept by the Secretary of the Treasure. Arithmetic and book keeping were taught. Democracy and the free market economy were essentials. The rule of law governed these and the laws of nature determined winners and losers. People were required to work, but were free to believe as they wish and follow their desires for Arts and Entertainment.

Sanitation methods were made mandatory. Biology was taught and disinfectants made and used – but we never advanced beyond first aid and applications of their known cures – in part because of my limited knowledge.

It soon became evident that there were limits on how far today’s knowledge could advance a prior society. Large scale farming and commerce required animal power. It took a long time to develop metal technology to that of Columbus time. Once machines could be achieved, society could reach a level known during the Civil war. Then things hit a brick wall, I could not apply things I’d learned because sophisticated technical means were not available. I knew how to make electric motors, build a radio, build a computer, make a gasoline engine and rocket motors – but with inadequate infra structure I was doing well to make clear glass, a steam engine, Portland cement, etc.

I dropped the story because of my insistence on reality – a story based on fiction could have proceeded further – but soon it would become a story of real history of real inventions and technology. We are living on the frontier of man’s experiment of Making Do with the resources of Mother Earth.

To our Home in Oberlin KS: We drove to Oberlin and stayed in our home there in anticipation of High School alumni and visiting with friends.

Dinner at Eileen’s: Cousin Eileen (Landau) Laid put on a dinner for family at her place. Darrell had a good visit with Lloyd Emerson, who was married to Virginia (Landau), Eileen’s sister – Virginia died in 2000 from cancer.

Alumni Banquet: In addition to attending the Alumni Banquet Darrell met with his class at the High School dining room were the girls had prepared a dinner. Clocks engraved “DCHS 1941-2000” shown in the photo, were given to those there. The engraving was done by DHLImaging operated by David and Mary Landau San Diego.

Memorial Day: Brother in Law George Brown was there, having bought apartments and moved into one, after Darrell’s sister Phyllis died. He and Cecilia Kump helped decorate graves Memorial Day. Later George and Cecilia were married, it came as no surprise as they had known each other for some 40 years – they were already family, and everyone was very pleased.

Dinners at Landaus: Mary & Julia put on a dinner for some of Mary’s class mates at our house and later for other friends including George Brown and Cecilia Kump.

(Photo of these dinners, intended to be inserted, seem to have been left on computers in KS.)

Seldon KS Book Binders: Darrell kept his printer busy printing 19^th BG History and a collection of his own stories. These were taken to Chris Koeperich at their Book Bindery in Seldon KS. Six 19^th BG History books and one “From Oberlin and Back”, Darrell’s book, were bound. These books were taken to the AGOM reunion in San Diego and 19^th BG reunion in Atlanta GA.

The 19^th History covers 1940 through 1946 with Korean period still pending. The “Oberlin-Aerospace” book covers 1923 to 1970, with 1970 and on pending.

AGOM reunion: We attended the AGOM reunion in San Diego, Darrell is an Honorary Member, as the 19^th BG History includes many of their stories.

August Echo-Gram test: I went for regular physical, Dr Whittaker said I had a heart murmur and sent me for an Echo-Gram test. Test leads are place on the upper body and the operator selects those applicable for a given set of readings. Selected sensors read echos from “ping” sounds, focus on a given place can read depth by adjusting echo delay time. Audio of blood flow sounds can be placed in sync with the visual image – which can be seen by the patient. A cooperative operator and curious patient can provide on the spot graphic information. Of my four heart valves three worked and sounded just fine – however the fourth, the main output to the body, was badly obstructed by calcium – calcium being dense was readily illuminated on the monitor. The audio image was fine for three valves but ratty to see and hear for the clogged valve. A few days later I met with Dr Santori who said the valve was 7/8 blocked! I felt fine so long as I didn’t do anything that demanded oxygen. After evaluating my current condition he agreed it would be OK to go to the planned family reunion in St Louis and the 19^th reunion in Atlanta – so long as I didn’t over extend myself. I took comfort in his appraisal “your body seems at least 5 years younger than your age”. I arranged to meet him in November when we returned. Having observed the monitor during the test I knew I had a problem – there was reason why I felt chest pains after modestly heavy exercise.

Bobbitt Reunion St Louis: We attended the Bobbitt family reunion in St Louis in Sept. during which the cousins spent some time at the Morris home. They have a lovely three level home, shown in the photo, with a small creek in their back yard. Alan grows bees, and traps critters along the creek, later releasing them out in the country. They feed the local wild life and are rewarded by a family of raccoons that come up on their back porch to partake in a cat food feast. While there we toured the St Louis Arch and the Budweiser brewery.

WTC 9-11: We stayed over as Judy and Alan Morris house guests an extra day, scheduled to fly from St Louis to Santa Ana CA at noon Sept 11 -- thus it was that we watched the unbelievable events of airplanes crashing into the World Trade Center towers – followed by the towers collapse. For all of us, life has not been the same since. I found myself glued to the TV with my mind trying to grapple with it’s full meaning. At first I was amazed the towers absorbed the impact – I was late in anticipating the collapse, but huge amounts of fuel ablaze heated the steal beams, their collapse was inevitable. After the collapse and the impact had sunk in – my thoughts changed from pessimism to optimism – I was convinced those people had not died in vain. The world had long been in need of facing up to terrorism.

Good-Bad Moslems: From 19^th BG history of Moros in the Philippines and a class in world religions I was well aware of how there were good and bad Moslems – I knew we had to enlist the good ones to counter the bad ones. I’ve since been pleased the US has done what I hoped they would. We have learned to handle criminals in regular society – hopefully, nations are learning to handle the terrorist equivalent on a global scale. There are always some, victims who pay the ultimate price. The war against gangsters and terrorists is no game – of those doing battle to make things safe, some will die – I’m pleased with the outpouring of support – and not just on Memorial Day or in Christmas & New Years prayers. It’s important that each generation learn the lesson of patriotism and the worth of sound values. Our world of imperfect people have always managed to cope with flaws and build a better society – those people did not die in vain.

19^th BG Reunion Atlanta GA: In November we attended the 19^th BG reunion in Atlanta. We very much enjoyed meeting many, once unknown and now very good friends. We bought a copy of a painting of Clark Field setting which we are going to present, along with a large map of Philippine-Java-Australia operations in 1941-42, to the March Field Museum in CA.

Wood Working: I decided that while I was still functioning OK that I should consume some of the tree wood cluttering the patio, storage room and garage. I proceeded to make the full size desk shown and modify the secretary desk as shown. This was very tedious work because the boards once perfectly shaped had since warped. A person has to be a real nut to do something like that. I was well into the task when it was found Mary is very allergic to Carob tree sanding dust.

Great Bend Plaques: I arranged for two bronze plaques for the B-29 memorial at Great Bend KS – these pay tribute to the 28^th Sqd Ground crews and to Bob Nelson, Mineapolis Ks and Lynn Barnett Colby KS who were killed in 1945.

Computer Network: I periodically upgrade my computers, in part just to keep up with the state of the art – it’s a weakness of mine as you can see. There are 7 computers, LAN connected.

Comp rm #1	Comp rm #2	Patio #1	Patio #2	Patio #3	Mary #1	Laptop
P3-1000 I815	P2-800 I815	AMD-800	P4-1500-I845	P4-1700 I850	AMD-600	P450-233
133 mhz	133 mhz	100 mhz	133 mhz	400 mhz	100 mhz
2000	1999	2000	2001	2001	1999	1998

Top row location; second row CPU kind and speed + mother board chip set; third row bus/RAM speed; forth row year assembled. (There are also three machines in Oberlin.) As you can see the CPU clock speed and motherboard bus speeds keep going up. These also require faster RAM, Video cards and hard drives to keep up. The prices keep dropping where the new systems with better performance cost less than the prior system. This applies to all except the Pentium 4 with 850 mother board with uses the new high speed RAMBUS with a more costly RAM.

Meeting with Dr Ott, heart surgeon: Upon our return from Atlanta I met with Dr Santori, who rechecked my condition and arranged for me to meet with Dr Ott. Mary went with me to see Dr Ott, and we were both favorably impressed. As usual I was full of questions and he responded with excellent answers and explanations. After going over the options it was decided that I have a “tissue” valve with a hard ring vs soft ring. I found these are manufactured using tissue from a cow which has been processed to remove protein to avoid rejection. By use of one with built in hard ring, it cuts surgery time to one vs two hours. Calcium build up is the cause of present valve failure. The new valve he said should last 20 years (better than I’d been told before), that the new valve failure mode is stress fatigue from constant flexing. He said the ratty sound is cause by several turbulent flow vortexes about the three flapper valve – not from multiple frequency dangling particles – the calcium build up is hard and he sometimes has to break it free in order to install the new valve. He said I would be put on a machine and my body and blood cooled during the operation. The day before I will have an angio gram to determine the need for any bypasses – and bypass surgery will be done at the same time if needed. I’m to call after New Years and set up a time for the operation. I’m not looking forward to this surgery, as for the most part I feel great – and I don’t expect to feel better after. I only hope I feel as well. I’m convince my dad and many others I’ve known died of this kind of problem. Only recently have they been able to do this kind of operation with high success rate.

Gold Brush Awards Dinner: Mary, Julia and I attended the Garden Grove Art Guild dinner at which one of Mary’s paintings won 1^st prize. That group of not so young “girls” obviously enjoy participating in the craft and sociability of their guild.

Indirect heating – an Unlikely Fire Place: I put our ex-refrigerator, now on the enclosed patio, to work. I set it on coldest and placed a termite infected log inside for decontamination. The heat from the log and termites was pumped out to heat the room – refrigeration pumps 4x more heat than energy consumed. It “burns” heat from the wood, and the wood is recyclable, after giving up heat in the “white Christmas fireplace” – things are not always what they seem.

David and Mary: David & Mary in San Diego and sister Marjorie in Houston TX have kept the internet channels busy with audio, video and text communications via their computers. They share experiences, technical and non-technical, as they fix their computers and develop their Home Page projects. They have become experts while enjoying the process.

Monica and Brian: The Bluff’s have continued to upgrade their home in Huntington Beach. Their style is perfection in what they do – and have fun doing it. Monica has become an expert on termites in their condo complex. Brian does a neat job of setting up his computers, at home and at work.

Julia and JR: Julia keeps us informed of JR’s adventures, flying his boss’s 40 million dollar airplane, quite literally all over the world. They were recently in Mongolia, and are in Singapore at the moment.

End of Christmas letter 2001: These letters always seem as if you’ve been guests in our house – it’s always a pleasure to enjoy your company for a spell. Thoughts of you bring happy memories -- we wish each of you the best for a:

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year.