Today I have the pleasure to introduce you to
Astraea Press author JL Salter. He’s recently released his novel The Overnighter’s Secrets and is currently busy “blogging”
away in this “web world”. Through FB and his very interesting posts on
his website he shares with other Authors, I’ve become to
appreciate Jeff’s knowledge, but also his witty nature. So there’s no doubt in
my mind, that his new novel is well worth the read – but I’ve decided to dig a
little bit deeper into Jeff’s past! He mentioned that he was stationed in Greenland, and
that tickled my fancy!
Welcome to my humble blog, Jeff!
JLS ANSWER:
Thanks, Iris. We’ve been
razzing each other, for several months, across 4 or 5 time zones. It’s good to finally meet you in one spot.
First of all,
congratulations on your current release. Well done! But before I ask you about The
Overnighter’s Secret, tell me about your time in Greenland.
JLS ANSWER:
I
should begin by HOW I got there. It was a standing joke in the Air Force
at that time -- during the Vietnam Era -- that if you screwed up, you were
often warned, "You wanna get sent to Thule?" In other words it
was a very UN-desirable location ... and it had a reputation along these
lines: if you were sent there, you either screwed up really badly ... or
you ticked off somebody very ‘high up’.
So,
with that as the background --- I was assigned to the Information Office (i.e.,
Public Affairs) of a Tactical Air Command base in New Mexico. In my very small 'shop' (within the info
office) of FOUR enlisted men, two had already been sent to Da Nang and one to
Thailand. [This was in 1971-72, when
S.E. Asia was still quite 'hot'.] We got
replacements, of course, but I was the only guy left (of that original quartet)
who had not received a remote tour assignment.
Naturally I assumed I'd go to 'Nam --- or thereabouts.
One
of my primary assignments was working on the base newspaper, of which I
eventually became editor. For part of that time, I wrote a satirical
column called "Poor Kodac's Almanac" and one of those columns made
fun of the base Civil Engineer Squadron ... which was sort of a running joke on
military bases at that time. [You know, like how long it took for them to show
up, and whether they’d fix it the first time, etc.] Anyhow, to make a long story short (too late),
the full colonel in charge of that C.E. Squadron complained bitterly to my boss
-- a Captain -- and vowed to get even. Within a few months, I had orders
to Thule. True story. Those initial orders were cancelled.
But later I got a new set of orders to Thule, for a different time
period. I've always said that I was sent to Thule because I ticked off a
colonel in the C.E. Squadron at Cannon AFB NM.
Despite
the horror in everyone’s faces when my destination was announced, I was
pleasantly surprised to be sent to a place with no bullets or mortars or
rockets being fired at me ... as it had been with my buddies. And I'm a pretty "solitary" guy
anyhow ... so being in an isolated place didn't really bother me.
Now,
that's more than you wanted to know, since your question was about my TIME at
Thule. To answer this question, I should explain that the base was run by
Danes, who outnumbered the American military by some 3-1. The Air Force
personnel rotated in for their 12-month duty, but many of those Danes stayed
there for years. It was clear who ran things and to get anything done you
needed to get along with the Danes who held all the key positions. I wish
I could remember how many military were there, but it's a dim picture now,
after some 40 years. Let's say it was 248 AF guys (and TWO WAF – i.e.,
female -- officers) ... amidst some 750 Danes.
The
weather was atrocious for most of the year, as you can imagine, being 930 miles
from the North Pole, and about 700 miles above the Arctic Circle.
The
chief "entertainment" for most guys was getting drunk and/or doing
drugs. Let me say, quite honestly, that I did NOT do any drugs and most
of those guys thought I was pretty square. But I know how they got a lot
of their stuff, like hash --- it came over from Copenhagen with the Danes who
rotated back home for leave.
I
did drink a bit here and there, but for the most part, I just went to movies at
the base theater nearly every time the show changed ... and played a lot of
ping pong. I also wrote a LOT of poetry.
I like the story about you
“ticking” off a Colonel. Not sure why, but an image of “Hawkeye” comes to mind.
;-). For someone who has an ignorant knowledge about the US Military and
related matters, why would they station US troops in Greenland? What was the
significance?
JLS ANSWER:
We had troops in
northwest Greenland as part of the Distant Early Warning System, known as the
DEW Line. It was primarily a ring of
radar stations which were supposed to allow us to alert Washington of incoming
ICBMs (missiles) coming from the Soviet Union over the polar cap. I’ve never seen this in print, but I was told
that even if our Thule radar detected an approaching missile, Washington would
have only a couple of minutes of warning before the ICBMs hit their assigned
targets. In fact, on the day I landed at
Thule, I was informed that the DEW line system was obsolete. Not at all the comfort I needed at that
point.
To create this
base, America needed a treaty with Denmark, which owns Greenland. That treaty was very specific – no nukes, for
example – and in order to get the most advantageous spot, inside a cusp of
North Star Bay, an entire village of Eskimos had to be relocated. So the spot where Thule was created was
formerly Qanaq ... and its native inhabitants were all relocated some 30 miles
farther north, along that coast.
Remind me later to
tell you about the nuclear disaster near Thule just about three years before my
arrival.
Don't tease! Tell us now J
JLS ANSWER:
Sometime in 1969,
about 3 years before my tour of duty there, a B-52 flew out of Thule on a
routine training mission. Against the
treaty stipulations, they had LIVE nuclear weapons on board. I think it was 6-8 total, but I’m not
sure. Anyway, there was a fire in the
cockpit or some other emergency situation and the B-52 crashed, just about
10-12 miles from the base. Some of the
nukes were recovered intact. One or two –
that were NOT intact -- were scraped off the floor of North Star Bay with a
midget submarine. Contaminated debris
from the bay (and some from the nearby permafrost, I think) was bulldozed into
numerous specially-lined cargo containers and shipped to the U.S. for disposal.
Besides being caught
breaking the treaty protocol (and contaminating the bay and coastline), at
least one – maybe two – of the nukes were allegedly NEVER recovered. There are still scientific papers and legal
papers about this affair, which I’ve seen described as the worst accidental
American military nuclear disaster ever.
Some of the on-going concerns include:
contamination of the animal life which those Eskimos rely upon for food,
rumors of birth defects among some of the natives, residual health issues among
some of the Danish crews who helped with the clean-up.
Yes, cold indeed at those
places. My daughter interviewed her uncle a few months back who went several
times to the Antarctica for a year, and he told her a few interesting bits.
Tell us, were you fortunate enough to see the Aurora Borealis? Did you get to
swim in the cold water? I believe it’s tradition in the northern countries to
have a quick dip.
JLS ANSWER:
We never saw even a
hint of the Northern Lights. The way it
was explained to me was that we were too far north to see them. That makes sense when you learn that these
‘lights’ are actually reflections off the atmosphere, and you have to be
farther south to see where the reflection ‘bounces’.
Let me tell you
about the water. We were given numerous
safety briefings, of course, about the severe weather and conditions. One detail which sticks in my mind is that if
you were ever unlucky enough to fall into North Star Bay – in the parts of the
year when it was not frozen over – that you would last approximately TWO
minutes before you could no longer function.
And after you could no longer function, you’d just sink and drown.
But during the
spring thaw, I did see some water running toward the bay from a melting glacier
at a higher elevation. I thought I at
least ought to FEEL how cold it was. So
I did. I thought my hand would freeze
solid and shatter into a thousand pieces!
Gosh that was COLD. I still can’t
fathom how water that cold could still be liquid.
I can’t believe you missed
out on the Northern Lights!
Yes, I have heard about the
danger of“dipping” into the water. Brother in law was game enough to do it, and
I can remember him saying that the guys at the edge constantly warned him of
not“swimming” out of reach.
Tell us about Thule. About
any difference to your “hometown” or where you had lived at the time.
JLS ANSWER:
I’d
been a southern boy for most of my life (except for a year in Iowa) ... so I
was pretty accustomed to warm weather and humidity. Very little of either at Thule. Also we were told that there were NO insects
at Thule, because they couldn’t survive in that climate. I think that was a myth, however, because I
got bitten all over by SOMETHING when we were sunbathing on a glacier one
adventurous summer afternoon.
The
ground up there was frozen solid, called perma-frost. So there was no ‘soil’ such as we’d know
it. No trees in that part of Greenland
either, so the tired old joke about “a girl behind every tree” was doubly
sick. The only plant life was some tufts
of (what I’d call) weeds which somehow managed to grow in the perma-frost.
The
only wildlife near our base was the Arctic Foxes, which hung around the Chow
Hall, hoping for treats. We were warned
not to feed them, but lots of guys did.
When
I get time, I can tell you about my ascent to the top of Mt. Dundas, the annual
Eskimo Sledge Race, Operation Julemand, my flight to Point Alert, my flight to
the Coast Guard station at Cape Atholl, my climb to the crow’s nest of a
gigantic icebreaker ship, and the base exchange facility which stayed open only
long enough to be completely renovated ... and then was closed.
No polar bears?
Living across the road from
Dundas Place – tell us about your ascent! No doubt an achievement in this kind
of territory, but are we talking about a “high” mountain here?
JLS ANSWER:
We
never saw any bears, but I know they had seals and narwhale up there because I
purchased some of the hand-made artifacts at a tiny store which featured
products from the nearby natives.
For
that region, the 600+ foot Mt. Dundas was a prominent feature. As Spring weather hit, it was tradition for
the Base Commander and a safety team to ascend Mt. Dundas to replace the rope
(for the final 35 ft up the steep part) and generally check out the place. My CO, a captain, was invited and I was
allowed to tag along. We also had a few
security police and other interested parties.
Later in the season, I went back up with a few buddies for my second
ascent.
There was a rock on top which had been
carved like a woman’s torso ... that was the closest I got to a woman for the
entire time I was there.
Considering that you
were stationed there a few years back. Tell us about the communications to
the “mainland”, family, friends, wife (?).
JLS ANSWER:
Great
question. A big plus was that each
person stationed there was allowed a full 30 day leave at some point during the
year ... to go home. I had that leave
and was also given a Temporary Duty (TDY) to go to the Pentagon and receive a
newspaper award from the Air Force Chief of Staff. Interestingly, both the paper I’d left (in
NM) and the paper I went to (Thule’s) won in their own divisions for that
year. I went as representative for
Thule, but I think I may have actually won for my work on the NM paper. Anyhow there were only 8 or 10 of us there,
so it was quite an honor.
Communication: I wrote, and received, a lot of letters. At one point my wife sent me about a dozen
small cupcakes, individually wrapped.
Apple cake, as I recall. They
were sealed so well that they lasted several days after they made that long
journey. Best apple cake I’ve ever
tasted.
We
were allowed to place FREE long distance calls through some sort of military
phone network. They were called “Morale
Calls”. But the reception was terrible, you
had to schedule them in advance, and then wait for the operator to call you,
and then hope that happened to catch your loved one at home. I found it way too cumbersome. So the several calls I made to my wife were
placed collect: from the Thule operator
to the operator at Cornerbrook Newfoundland ... and then to Louisiana. It went on my in-laws’ phone bill. When I was home on leave before my next
assignment, I gave my F-I-L a check for those collect call charges, but he
refused to take it.
Does the military
station still exist nowadays?
JLS ANSWER:
I
believe Thule AB is still there, though it’s no longer with Aerospace Defense
Command ... and most of the other units are different. It was in 21st Air Division when I
was there. I bet they still have that
mysterious “detachment” which (I believe) was present solely to check radiation
levels ... but I can’t prove it.
[Side
note: I was one of three nominees from
21st Air Division for 1972 Outstanding Airman of the Year and the
only nominee from the 21st Air Division for 1972 Information
Technician of the Year. I was also decorated
with the Meritorious Service Medal for my work at Thule. At that time the MSM was quite rare for buck
sergeants.]
CONGRATULATIONS !!!
Okay, finally
… tell us about your book, which has been released by Astraea Press.
JLS ANSWER:
I
think “The Overnighter’s Secrets” is
a great story (romantic suspense) with memorable down-to-earth characters ...
plus some cool action scenes. But I’m
still awed by how it began.
In
April last year, I was in the garage of my friend, who thought I’d be
interested in the contents of an antique overnighter (suitcase) which he’d
acquired about 16 years previously from some dumpster divers in CA. I thought, “Why not?” and we looked through
those items. My friend swears I was only
the second person who’d ever seen those belongings.
At
first, I assumed it was just whatever clutter happened to be in that particular
dumpster. But soon, we perceived there
were groups of items: programs and playbills from Vaudeville productions all
over the country; an elaborate family album with very large photographs; a
diary from 1955; photos from an Asian country; photos of what looked like stage
plays or silent movie sets. Plus many
other things, like legal documents and newspaper clippings.
With
the deductive skill of detectives, we began to find threads which connected a
name from the diary to a child’s name on the back of an album photo, to a
different name on the back of a silent movie ‘still’. Then the Rosetta
Stone — a legal document which connected all those name variations to a
single person! The actress Lizette Thorne, who starred in some
four dozen silent films and was in the same movie company with Charlie Chaplin
during 1916, was the common factor among all those mementoes.
Fast
forward several weeks. After I’d
conceived of a fictional plot which could USE such a find (and had written over
70,000 words on that new novel ms.), I came into contact with Lizette’s granddaughter!
We corresponded extensively ... and my
friend readily turned over Lizette’s personal items to that granddaughter.
Blurb:
When Beth left suddenly, it broke two hearts ... but she’d
had no choice. Shane, a rugged, ex-Airborne biker, handled it badly ... but so
had she. Three years later and 2000 miles away, she desperately needs her
ex-lover’s protection from a violent menace with ‘bad history’ who’ll do
anything to reclaim a mysterious suitcase Beth possesses.
Long before
Shane acquired that overnighter, a ‘silent movie’ actress kept secrets there ...
and now several lives are in jeopardy. An ambitious female state senate
candidate hires a ruthless investigator to eliminate potential campaign
‘problems’ like her dark family secret — a bizarre 1889 murder.
Is Beth’s
terrifying ordeal simply because she unwittingly possesses the overnighter’s
secrets? Or is it due to the meth-fueled dumpster-diver’s ‘unfinished
business’?
Shane will likely return to California after he resolves this
Tennessee ‘situation’ ... so Beth struggles to resist her reawakened feelings.
But before she can sort out their renewed relationship ... Beth is kidnapped! To
rescue her Shane enters an obvious trap in a dilapidated hotel. Only with Beth’s
help can both survive the violent struggle against her kidnappers.
Thank you so much, Jeff, for taking your time recounting your time at Thule. It was indeed very interesting to read! And again, congratulations on your Meritorious Service Medal! And your book sounds just as fascinating! I look forward to reading it soon.
PS - and only 99c until the end of this month at Amazon ;-)
.
