When our family lived in Durham, North Carolina, for the second time between the years of 1963 and 1971, we lived in an area that was a boyhood dream. In our back yard, less than 20 yards from the house, was an old log cabin with remnants of a linoleum floor and a covered hole in the wall that was once for a stovepipe. The cabin had been a dwelling at one time. Just across the street, was the eastern boundary of Duke Forest, in which my neighborhood friends and I had a network of paths and forts extending almost to Orange County to the east.
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Secrets of Gimghoul Castle
Some of our family’s happiest times were while living in North Carolina for the second time from 1969 to 1971. Our close friends, the Booth family, were instrumental in the creation of many of those fond memories. Bob Booth Sr., head of the Durham Chamber of Commerce, his wife Barbara, a native Tarheel, their intellectually gifted elder child Susan, and Bobby Jr., who was my age, were extremely knowledgeable of the region which included neighboring Orange County to the west, the location of Chapel Hill. One of the enigmas of Chapel Hill, the college town home of one of the three oldest public universities in the country, the University of North Carolina, was a place known as Gimghoul Castle.
Continue readingPath of the Wright Brothers
Having just wrapped-up The Wright Brothers by one of my favorite authors, David McCullough, many parallels stood out between Orville, Wilbur and myself, as the movement of our family during my formative years followed the path of the Wright family.
First Flight – colorized photograph by John T. Daniels at Kitty Hawk in 1903, one of the most famous photos of all time.
Carolina On My Mind
I have very fond memories of North Carolina, having spent six of the first
eleven years of my life in Durham, all but two school years prior to Junior High there, and after ten years of being an only child, was blessed with a little sister while there.