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From the Vaults

Musical ramblings from the manager

FTV: Walking with Levison Wood

       Where to begin?  On the back cover of his 2015 book Walking the Nile (Grove Press) Levison Wood is described as a “writer, photographer, and explorer.  He served in Afghanistan as an officer in the British Army Parachute Regiment.”  His resume is expanded some on the back of Walking the Americans (2017, also printed […]

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FTV: Fernao de Magalhaes – Part 2

       In Part 1, we looked at how Ferdinand Magellan (born Fernao de Magalhaes in Portugal) was able to convince King Charles I of Spain to appoint him the Captain General of an expedition to the Spice Islands.  Magellan was convinced one could sail west, find a strait that would deposit his ships at the […]

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FTV: Fernao de Magalhaes

       The date:  September 6, 1522.  Location:  Sanlucar de Barrameda, Spain.  “As the ship came closer, those who gathered onshore noticed that her tattered sails flailed in the breeze, her rigging had rotted away, the sun had bleached her colors, and storms had gouged her sides.  A small pilot boat was dispatched to lead the […]

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FTV: David Crosby

       A while back, we covered how the ups and downs of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (FTV:  1974 – 12-25-19) led to the normalization of huge venue concerts.  These mega-events were quite common up until the COVID-19 pandemic pulled the rug out from under the music industry.  At that time, I promised to take […]

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FTV: Rally Time

       On October 19, 2018, my wife and I were on the way to Houghton in the late afternoon when we happened to notice one of the cars from the Lake Superior Performance Rally (LSPR) traveling in the other direction.  They were headed toward the Friday evening starting point of their weekend rally.  Just for […]

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FTV: One and Done – Part 2

  After reading Cormac O’Brien’s book, Secret Lives of the U.S. Presidents – What your teachers never told you about the men of the White House (Quirk Books – 2009), I thought it might be interesting to examine some of the ‘one and done’ U.S. Presidents.  We ended Part 1 with the death of #11 (James […]

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FTV: One and Done – Part 1

       Being an election year, the above title will give some the wrong idea right off the bat.  While I have my political opinions, it has been a cardinal rule of mine to not spend time trying to convince anyone else that what I think about politics is ‘right’ while their opinions are ‘wrong’.  When […]

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