Get the message from the title? Plain and direct, like the foil stamp on its black leather cover. The late author’s son contacted us some years ago asking if we would produce a commissioned memoir of his retired/retiring father. As excerpted from the preface:

“[My son] came up with the idea of this book and masterminded the project, probably as a way to keep me busy and out of the office. Kitty Axelson-Berry interviewed me in 2014 and then met with me in 2017 for a manuscript review. As always, I was cooperative and, I’m told, charming.”

It was a never-a-dull-moment project in which Kitty (former president of Modern Memoirs, now herself retired) interviewed Bradford at his home in Texas for many hours, over numerous days, family stories cascading from his memory and captured on tape. These tapes were transcribed and edited to create his first-person memoir, in his own voice. A natural storyteller, Bradford was a humorous and good-natured person to work with, often chuckling at his own impromptu nicknames for Kitty, me, and others in the office.

One of our primary goals at Modern Memoirs is to preserve the voice of the narrator/author (unless instructed otherwise by the client). Our greatest compliment is to hear family members say, “That sounds just like my father/mother/grandfather/grandmother...” when they read the book. This goal of authenticity requires very close attention to tone and nuance when editing, and I daresay this is what sets our specially trained “sensitive editors” apart from most other editors. Bradford’s book held to our goal. Two excerpts follow:

“…generally Dad didn't hunt too damn hard. One time, my brother and I had an opportunity to take him turkey hunting in San Angelo. We arranged in advance to be in just the right spot, and sure enough, a flock of turkeys came in. Well, we waited and waited, and there was no shot. Finally, we figured out that Dad was asleep. So then we threw rocks at him, kept on throwing rocks at him until he woke up. Then he started shooting, and brought several down.”

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“Here's a story, shows a difference between here and out your way. My wife and I were invited to go to New York, out to Long Island there, and to stay at the home of some big clothing designer—very nice, a swimming pool and all that. Across the street was a 200-acre potato field. The other guests went bananas over the potatoes. 'Oh, isn't that wonderful having all those potatoes!' they'd say to me. So what? I see these things every day at home. I don't need to go all bonkers over a potato field.”

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Memory Lane Stroll December Question:

Is there an ancestor of yours that you wish you knew more about?

(Click on the link below and provide your answer for a chance to be featured in the next newsletter.)

Staff responses:

Megan St. Marie: All of them! I’m fascinated by genealogy and grateful to my dad for his extensive research into our family tree. To date, the site he maintains includes over 44,000 names.

Sean St. Marie: Both of my grandfathers, Alfred R. St. Marie and Charles Joseph Sheridan, Sr., died before I was born, so I’d love to get to know them.

Ali de Groot: Henrietta Loewus and Samuel Phillipson, my mother’s grandparents, who I didn’t know until recently were Jewish.

Liz Sonnenberg: My great-great-grandparents Adolph and Victoria (Bourdeau) Roberts, who emigrated from Canada to Connecticut before moving again to Minnesota.

Nicole Miller: My grandmother, Ettie Louella Hawkins Liberty, my mother's mother. She died before I was born and was an artist like myself.