Operation Bullpen
Happy New Year! And a Peek Inside the Nelson Mailbag
Posted 12/31/09. One of the great things about having a website is that people write me letters, and some of these people are from the FBI. Fans of Operation Bullpen may recognize the name of Special Agent Adam Lee, who worked on the case in San Diego and helped bust forgers and counterfeit dealers around the country. Lee has since moved east where he is an Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the Intelligence Division in the Washington, D.C. field office. But although you can take the FBI agent out of California, you can't take California out of the FBI agent, as this letter from Adam shows:
Kevin: During a Thanksgiving call from my family in California yesterday, I learned that you have a new book out. When I saw what your most recent work was about, I had to reach out to you; first to congratulate you and to share a quick story about my life with automobiles. As a kid growing up in California—and the son of a 1950s Los Angeles amateur drag racer—I bought my first car, a 1955 Chevy 210 business coupe, at the age of 13. I sold a home built go-kart and bicycle to pay for it. My father and I built the car together and had it ready for my 16th birthday. I drove the Chevy to high school everyday. Building that car with my dad and driving it as a teenager are the fondest memories of my youth. Eventually, I sold it to help pay law school expenses and have missed it ever since.
My love for cars seems to be programmed in my DNA. My son, who is eight, is already a classic car nut. Last year, we bought an old Dodge Charger together and I am teaching him how things work on it. This past summer, we put a fresh 440 in the car and he is always thrilled to hear it roar to life. My boy and I are very close and I am pretty sure he is collecting his own memories in our garage to enjoy later in life.
I am in Washington, D.C., now, as you know. I am living proof, however, that you can take the kid out of California, but you can't take the California out of the kid. Once again, congratulations. I enjoy your work very much and appreciate the subjects about which you write. Thank you once again, too, for your meticulous attention to detail covering Operation Bullpen. Take care, Adam
I am, in fact, a big fan of the entire Lee family. When she was ordering some books from me, Adam's mother Patricia asked for some Wheels of Change flyers so she could include them in her Christmas card mailings. Sweet!
Now, let me briefly share two more pieces of correspondence I recently received. One is from another Operation Bullpen reader who wanted me to sign a copy of his book. He sent it to me in the mail, and I was truly impressed. I have never seen a more well-read book in all my life, as this picture somewhat shows:
I signed this book, and sent a new, fresh copy to him just in case the old one fell apart.
Lastly, back to cars. Both my sons had a wonderful first grade teacher, Mike Mullikin, who gave Wheels of Change to his brother Tim, a self-described "huge car enthusiast." As proof of this, Tim sent me a picture of what is sitting in his driveway:
Says Tim: "From left, the cars are: a red 1962 Ferrari replica, a 1998 Corvette (first year C5 convertible), and a 1973 Corvette Convertible. I am currently adding a 1966 Ranchero and a 1972 Mustang to the stable. Can never have too many wheels." Indeed. You can never have too many wheels, or bottles of champagne in the frig. Pop! Happy New Year, and let’s all have an auspicious 2010.
P.S. Shameless plug: For folks in the Bay Area, I will appear on Denny Smithson’s talk show on KPFA on Monday, Jan. 4 at 3 p.m. For details about this and other Wheels appearances in January, see the News and Events box on the home page.
Happy Thanksgiving! And Notes About NPR, Forgery, Car Songs, and Mary Pickford
Posted 11-23-09. First and last thought: Happy Thanksgiving to one and all! More thoughts about cars, people, forgery, and other subjects:
Tomorrow I am going to San Francisco to be interviewed on The California Report on National Public Radio. It's a taped interview, so it will air in the Bay Area on Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, on KQED-FM 88.5 FM at 4:30 p.m./6:30 p.m./11 p.m. It airs on different channels and times around central and northern California. Consult the listings for your area here.
Last week I did an interview with Jeff Figler
of the Sports Byline Radio Network, which broadcasts to 700 stations
and 178 countries around the world through the Armed Forces Network.
This was about Operation Bullpen, my book on forgery which continues to
draw attention. (To the right is one of the gang's forgeries; all four sigs of John, Paul, George and Ringo are bogus.) I think the interview aired last
Friday but I'm not quite sure. As soon as I find out I'll update
this post.
I'm looking forward to my next round of book talks in southern California. Wherever I've gone, everyone has been very generous and welcoming, but I've got to give a special shout-out to Steve Fjeldsted, director of the South Pasadena Library where I will speak Dec. 3. Before my talk, Cottage Industry, a rock band, will play car and road songs for a half hour. Steve asked me for my favorites in this genre, so I chose three from the Beach Boys: "Fun, Fun, Fun," "Li'l Deuce Coupe," and "409." After the band's set, Steve will show a movie clip from "Bullitt," the famous chase scene with Steve McQueen burning rubber in a Mustang over the hills of San Francisco. Then comes my slide show and talk. For details on this show and my two other appearances next week in Riverside and Burbank, see the box to the left.
When you write a book, it's a little like hibernating in a cave. In the case of Wheels of Change, I hibernated for close to three years, mainly writing and reading and researching inside the walls of my office with occasional forays out into the world to see historic car spots, visit car shows, and drive the roads of the state. So it's especially nice to get out of my cave and see and talk to people. At the Pasadena Museum of History last week, I signed a book for a fellow who lived in the house in Pasadena where Walter Murphy had lived. Murphy was one of the great automobile coach builders of the 1920s, designing, among many other cars, the luxurious Doble Series E, one of the most beautiful steam automobiles ever made. I wrote about Murphy in Wheels of Change, and it was a thrill for me to meet someone with that close of a connection to him.
The next night, at the monthly meeting of the Mustang Owners Club of California Club at Du-Par's Restaurant in Granada Hills, a movie camera operator, now retired, introduced himself. He had worked on "The Godfather," explaining how he helped shoot the scene in which Sonny (James Caan) gets murdered, riddled by bullets in his car at the toll booth. A number of vintage cars are used in that scene, and one of them nearly ran over the operator (whose name, unfortunately, slipped past me) as it made its getaway.
At the San Diego Automotive Museum on Saturday, I spoke in the main showroom surrounded on all sides by gleaming old machines that once roamed the roads. Among the friendly faces I met there: Kenn Colclasure and Dee House of the museum, and Bernadine Bogdanovs, event coordinator for the Wheels on Reels film festival, which is devoted to the ongoing love affair between movies and cars. The films were shown at the Mary Pickford Theatre in Cathedral City next to Palm Springs. Mary Pickford and her husband Douglas Fairbanks both loved cars (especially Doug), and here is a picture of Mary with her Pierce Arrow, one of their many deluxe rides. Riding in back, Mary spoke to her chauffeur through a speaking tube that ran from the back seat to the front.
