Category Archives: family

Nagasaki Plus One Month 1945

August 6, 2021 – 1:05 pm

This rare photo of the Hiroshima mushroom cloud was taken on August 6, 1945. The Hiroshima bombing claimed approximately 120,000 lives and the subsequent leveling of Nagasaki annihilated 80,000. The US military strategists have long held that these two attacks saved over a million US troops by forcing the Japanese Empire to surrender to the […]

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My Father, My Best Friend

June 20, 2021 – 4:10 am

My father, Frank A Smith II came from Maine. His mother and father met during WWI. Edith Hamlin had been a nurse with Royal Canadian Medical Expedition. My grandmother had been trying to make a troopship to France. The gangway was being pulled and a man extended his hand to haul her aboard. That man […]

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A Baguette and Butter

March 16, 2021 – 4:05 pm

In the Sixties on the South Shore my Irish grandmother Nana served her grandchildren sugary tea and buttered Wonder Bread toast upon our return from parochial school. We dipped the crisp slices into the sweet milky tea and each bite revived our bodies and souls from the New England cold and eight hours under the […]

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THE GIFT OF UNGIVING by Peter Nolan Smith

December 24, 2020 – 3:43 am

Most of my old landlord’s friends were married couples with kids. His wife and AP regularly invited them over to the Fort Greene Observatory for weekend lunches and evening drinks. I keep my distance from his guests, since my marital status is an enigma and after a few glasses I tend to recite a litany […]

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Le Deuxieme Vague De Covid

November 18, 2020 – 9:22 pm

On March 4, 2020 after a simple breakfast David, my guide, and I left Kibo Hut on Kilimanjaro to descend Hurumbo Hut. I turned often to eye Africa’s tallest mountain rimmed by hoarfrost. Near a grouping of old volcanic rocks David said, “We can get the Internet here. Maybe even a phone home.” I tried […]

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