John Norman Collins, aka Bill Kenyon - The 8mm Muscleman

My search for reliable information to restore the facts of the Rainy Day Murders has been a Sisyphean task.  

Drawing together what is known about John Norman Collins and the "coed killings" in one place is a huge undertaking but long overdue.

My researcher, Ryan M. Place, and I have invoked the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to obtain documents from the Michigan Department of Corrections, the Michigan State Police, and the Washtenaw County Coroner's Office, with several more government agencies pending.

Despite major gaps in the public records, we have discovered some interesting information by scouring through these boxes of government documents. Among the more surprising finds are some items on an evidence log in the Karen Sue Beineman case folder. 

Somewhere in the Michigan State Police vault in East Lansing, Michigan, there are weightlifting photos of John Norman Collins posing for Tomorrow's Man magazine as Bill Kenyon. He appeared in the September, 1969, issue which came out on newsstands at roughly the same time he was arrested for the first-degree murder of Karen Sue Beineman.

***

Tomorrow's Man was a pulp magazine popular in some male circles in the 1950s and 1960s. Under the guise of male physical fitness and weightlifting, the magazine was available on newsstands across the country and was often a young man's first exposure to alternative male lifestyles. Their magazine's motto was "Hunks in Trunks."

This was before gay rights and the lessening of the social stigma against male homosexuality. By the end of the 1960s, American culture underwent a fundamental shift in cultural mores. Tomorrow's Man became obsolete and went out of business. The magazine's back issues are collector's items and very hard to obtain. (See the link below for some of their iconic cover art.)

***

My researcher and I have made an additional FOIA request for the photos of JNC posing for Tomorrow's Man magazine.  These items were not used as evidence in the case, and the Michigan State Police has determined that they have no monetary value.

• two 8x10 black and white stills of Collins posing
• one 8x10 contact proof sheet with twelve poses
• one copy of Tomorrow's Man magazine showing Collins posing as Bill Kenyon
• fourteen color pictures of Collins posing
• and a must see to believe - twenty-five foot long reel of 8mm film of John Norman Collins striking poses.

Last week, I wrote a Michigan State Police detective who has worked on these cases recently. I asked him to suggest to his commander that the state police consider digitizing the 8mm film stock before it fades to nothing and turns brittle in the can. If Ryan and I are successful in obtaining this film, we will post it on YouTube.

At the very least, we hope to secure some decent scans of photographs to include in a photo bank in the true crime book I'm writing, The Rainy Day Murders. The photograph of Collins above is a photocopy taken from a vintage Detroit Free Press article dated August 30, 1970.

http://www.pulpinternational.com/pulp/entry/Assorted-covers-of-Tomorrows-Man-bodybuilding-magazine.html

Five Regrets of the Elderly

Life is a gift and it amazes me how many people don't bother to unwrap the present. Too many people live deferred lives for all sorts of reasons
only to discover in their later years that life has passed them by. These people often become bitter in old age. Some people are lucky enough to get a wake up call and have a second chance at improving the quality of their lives.

Most of us are familiar with the "If I knew then what I know now" cliche. The link below explains the "Five Regrets" most often expressed by the elderly in their final days. Maybe some of us will benefit from the wisdom of the aged and teach these lessons to our children and our grandchildren.

https://apps.facebook.com/theguardian/lifeandstyle/2012/feb/01/top-five-regrets-of-the-dying?fb_source=other_multiline&fb_action_types=news.reads

Cafeteria Style Theology

Finally, something about religion that makes sense to me. Double-click dark blue box.

Zydeco Culture and Gator by the Bay

The music and dance style that sprang out of West Louisiana, known as zydeco, has its roots in Cajun music and the Cajun two-step jig, also called the Louisiana Limp. In 1755, the English, who now owned Canada, expelled the French Canadians for refusing to pledge allegiance to the English crown. Many of these people migrated to Louisiana and became the Cajun people.

Some say zydeco's roots run deeper than that, all the way to Africa from slaves, who held tightly to their music and culture, and to the Caribbean, with rhythms imported from Haiti after a slave rebellion there. Blend in the influences of Les Gens Libres du Couleur (Free Men of Color) and a unique black culture developed in West Louisiana called Creole.

With the addition of the accordion to establish a vigorous, syncopated rhythm and a metal corrugated rub board (once a common wash board), Creole music took off in another direction and a new sound was born. Then, in the 1950s, a blues player named Clifton Chenier added amplified instruments and recorded his music - zydeco music he called it - the local people loved it and it spread.

Modern zydeco music thrives in big cities and small towns across much of America. There is even a group of zydeco dancers in London, England. The basic sound has evolved and been influenced by pop music, hard rock, rap, reggae, and hip hop. The music has a joyful and happy sound, but it can also be bluesy, soulful, and sad. The rhythm is always vibrant and infectious.

This is music that makes people want to get up and dance. The basic foot movement is slow-quick-quick-slow, with or without a rock step. In California, where there is a strong swing dance influence, many dancers use the rock step like in East Coast Swing. Zydeco is more fundamental than swing dancing and easier to do. That is one reason why it is so popular. A person can get out on the dance floor with very little instruction or practice and have a great time.

For decades, Zydeco music was looked down upon by the New Orleans music establishment as bayou or swamp music. Not until Buckwheat Zydeco and Beau Jocque, and others, started making money, getting radio airplay, drawing big crowds, and getting media attention did they invite their country cousins into the New Orleans musical family. But make no mistake about it, the epicenter of zydeco music is still Lafayette and the surrounding area.

In San Diego, we have an active zydeco dance club named Bon Temps (Good Times) that hosts a weekly dance of zydeco and Cajun music, and on the second Saturday of each month, the club gives free lessons and holds dances with a live band. Some of the bands come from Louisiana, while others are home grown like Theo and the Zydeco Patrol, The Swamp Critters, The Bayou Brothers, and the San Diego Cajun Playboys.

Bon Temps organizes a yearly event every May over Mother's Day weekend called Gator by the Bay, which draws over 6,000 people. It is held on San Diego Bay at Spanish Landing for two full days of music and dancing on two large dance floors. One of the 2,160 square foot dance floors is primarily for Zydeco/Cajun performers and the other is for blues, jazz and contemporary music acts.

There is something for everyone. For a taste of Louisiana, the food court serves up jambalaya, crayfish, gumbo, roast turkey legs, and lots more. Throughout both festival days, dance lessons from top instructors in several styles of dancing are given for free.

Not a bad way to spend Mother's Day.  Put the Gator by the Bay festival on your calendar for May 2012. You'll be glad you did. This is a family friendly event.

Laissez les bon temp rouler!

www.zydecoach.com

or www.gatorbythebay.com.

Take Me Back To The Sixties

Take Me Back To The Sixties

As close to being there again as I dare get! Enjoy it along with me.

Michigan Mania - The Ann Arbor Art Fair

On my recent trip to Michigan to promote my novel, Zug Island, I stopped by the Ann Arbor Art Fair held annually in July on the University of Michigan campus. I hadn't been there in over thirty years, so I was anxious to go again.

Despite a punishing heat wave and threats of thunderstorms, the crowds braved the weather and made Michigan's premier art event a success once again. Artists from all over the country come to display and sell their art work, their crafts, and their unique clothing.

"The Ann Arbor Art Fair is my biggest venue of the year," says Jan Kaulins, a  photographer and print artist from Manitou Beach, Michigan. "This is my busiest time and most important event; I've been coming here for longer than I care to admit."

This sample of his work, "Liberty and State - Ann Arbor," was created from nine individual bracketed digital exposures which produced this high dynamic range photograph. The subjects of much of his work feature Michigan and Detroit sights accented with his distinctive flair for color.
                                   
If my memory serves me right, the art work and displays at the Ann Arbor Art Fair have always been top notch, but one thing is definitely better than I remember from the past - the food. The variety and quality of the ethnic fare was better than many sit down restaurants I've been to lately. I can't wait to come back again.

Michigan Artist - Jan Kaulins- link

How Far Seems Shangri-La Now?

Being an author is something I've wanted to do since I was in junior high school. I spent more time in the bookmobile than on the sports field. One rainy Sunday in April, I began reading James Hilton's Lost Horizon and I was hooked. It wasn't a huge novel, and I read it in one day. But it was full of wonderful ideas and strange places to an eighth grader from Dearborn Heights, Michigan.

The novel touched the Shangri-La of my heart and soul. It wasn't until I was older, an English teacher as a matter of fact, that I discovered that this simple novel, which spoke to me on a personal level at age thirteen, was a cautionary and prophetic warning about the coming of World War II, or more accurately, the continuation of World War I. If you haven't read it, do! The restored version of the Ronald Coleman movie is marvelous as well.

Almost fifty years after my first reading of Hilton's classic, I've finally authored and published my own book, Zug Island: A Detroit Riot Novel. I start a summer book tour in Detroit next week. My hope is that I can move readers the way I was moved by Hilton's words those many years ago.

When the Concert Hall Met Tin Pan Alley at the Globe Theater

The Old Globe Theatre in San Diego continues to produce quality shows, season after season. Last week, I was fortunate to usher one of the final performances of George Gershwin Alone before Hershey Felder, author and performer, retires his one-man show Sunday, July 10^th, 2011. He has toured with this show for the last fifteen years, but the performance is not lost to posterity, it has been preserved on video for future broadcasts. Hearing "Rhapsody in Blue" performed live was a moving experience.

Hershey Felder has performed on Broadway, at London’s West End, and over 150 theaters worldwide. He has been a Scholar in Residence at Harvard and is married to Kim Campbell, former Prime Minister of Canada. The man can teach, write, act, perform concert music, and charm audiences with his easy manner and polished performances.

Collaborating for the fourth time with director Joel Zwick (My Big Fat Greek Wedding), Hershey Felder brings his latest work to the Globe stage: Maestro: the Art of Leonard Bernstein on July 22^nd through August 28^th. I am looking forward to ushering this one in a few weeks. George Gershwin Alone and Maestro: the Art of Leonard Bernstein are the last two shows (or movements) in a sonata of four one-man shows called “The Composer Sonata.” Two years ago, I saw the first two shows (movements). Beethoven As I knew Him, the first movement, followed by the intermediate romantic movement, Monsieur Chopin. I will have seen the entire “The Composer Sonata” performed live by its creator. What a thrill!

Don’t miss this show if you are going to be in San Diego this summer and you are a lover of fine music and virtuoso performances. Felder is a musical genius. www.TheOldGlobe.org

Santee Lakes, continued...

Endangered Wood Duck

The beautiful park, with its seven stepped recreational lakes flowing one into the other, is what the general public sees. But the park is only one aspect of the Santee Water Reclamation Project, which began in 1959. Further north, up into Sycamore Canyon, the business of waste water recycling begins.

Used water from Santee residences, not sewage, is pumped into the water reclamation plant where excess flow and sludge is diverted and sent to the San Diego Metro System. The "gray" water is routed to a series of three stabilization ponds with a combined capacity of 40 million gallons. The water, with the help of gravity, works it way through eleven percolation beds, 400 feet long which drain into a French drain.

From there, the water is treated in a chlorination station before it is released into the first of the seven man-made recreational lakes. Once the water works its way through the park, it is pumped into the City of Santee's irrigation system which feeds the commercial Town Center area and also irrigates the Carleton Oaks Country Club.


Historically, many of the American West's worst conflicts were over water rights. That was true 100 years ago, and it's true today. Water Rights is still one of the most contentious issues among the Western states.

Santee Lakes is a successful role model for water conservation with its three use system: household, recreation, and landscape. Check out A&E's Modern Marvels: "Water Conservation" for more information. Saving water is everybody's business because every drop is precious, that's why I'm proud to support my water department's conservation efforts.

The Santee Lakes

Just eighteen miles east of La Jolla on California State Highway 52, Santee Lakes Regional Park lies hidden in gently sloping Sycamore Canyon. The Padre Dam Water District had operated this model water reclamation project for over forty years, and it has been featured on Arts & Entertainment's Modern Marvels: "Water Conservation." 

Santee Lakes is a multi use park. It provides a flyway for a wide variety of water fowl, and the park is involved in a wood duck propagation program. Professional and amateur bird photographers are familiar with the large variety of birds that come through the park following migratory lanes south and then returning north again.

Several of its lakes are stocked with large mouth bass and catfish for local anglers. No fishing license is required, but a day use permit is necessary to purchase at the General Store. Several contests are held yearly with tagged fish and prizes. In my weekly hikes, I see people catching fish with some regularity.

In East County where shade is a scarce resource in the summer, Santee Lakes provides a number of covered picnic areas that can be reserved for group events, and single picnic tables are found throughout the park, with several playgrounds close by for the kids.

The park’s newest addition is a Lion’s Club sponsored Sensory Garden for the blind, while the Kiwanis Club sponsors a Handicapped Fishing Pier. The park also has regulation horseshoe pits, which you don’t see around much these days.

This is truly a community park. Throughout the year, the park holds community events, and in the summertime, Santee Lakes hosts a weekly Friday night movie for families. At the back of the park, there are RV sites with hookups, and a new feature, overnight and weekly rental cabins, some floating on the water.

The Sprayground is the young kids' favorite place to be on hot, sunny days. Water jets shoot city water skyward from the ground surface, only to fall back to earth with a joyful splash. Tipping overhead buckets fill and spill cool, refreshing water on screeching, giggling kids. Makes me want to be young and carefree again.

But even as an adult, I count myself lucky that I live close to the Santee Lakes; I walk around them several times a week. But as wonderful as the park is, the seven, man made recreational lakes are only a part of this impressive water reclamation project. There is a lot more to Santee Lakes than most people are aware.

To be continued…. www.santeelakes.com

Held Up in Arizona, continued.

So the squad car's lights were strobing and throbbing like mad, and I think the patrolman can't be in pursuit of me. I pulled over eventually and wondered what could have been wrong, some equipment violation?

After a long wait of several minutes, a tan clad Highway patrolman approached the cab on the passenger's side and motioned for me to open the door with one hand, his other hand on his service piece.

"It's a good day to die," I thought, as I opened the door.

"What are you doing?" I heard him say.

I shrugged my shoulders. "I dunno."

"You don't know how you are doing?"

"Oh! I thought you said 'What' instead of 'How.' The wind was whistling outside."

Then he held forth, "You need to change lanes away from a patrol car on the shoulder of either side of the road, according to Arizona state law. Didn't you see the sign at the Arizona border?"

"No, there are only a few dozen signs along the highway when you cross over from California. I was looking for the truck weight station pull off," I explained. Then he told me about the $500 fine. That's highway robbery, I thought, but I held my tongue.

"Yes! Arizona has some laws different from the other states," the officer continued. "For instance, if you see anyone carrying a loaded firearm in public, that's legal. If someone breaks into your house, you have the legal right to shoot that person. We follow the constitution in this state."

"I'm glad I live in California," I said.

I have never been Barney Fifed before.

Held Up in Arizona

I never, ever like to use absolute statements, especially three times in the same sentence, but it seems like every time I drive through Arizona, I get a ticket. See my blog post dated May 13th, 2011.

This time, on my way to Tucson from San Diego, I was driving a 10’ Budget moving van. The wind was brisk, and I drove through a dust devil or two, making the truck a bit jumpy. Nothing too serious. My mindset was “Slow Traffic – Keep Right” and “Keep my eyes on the road.”

The Arizona Highway Patrol was out in force on Friday. I saw a forlorn vehicle, pulled over on the side of Interstate Eight, for speeding no doubt, and a patrol car with its warning lights blinking.

“Poor sucker,” I thought as I passed the two cars, confident in my ability not to get a speeding ticket because the truck strained to make it to the speed limit. Then, flash! In the side view mirror, I see the same squad car, lit up like a Christmas tree, in close pursuit.

To be continued....

Balboa Park's Old Globe Theatre

If you ever visit San Diego, do yourself a favor and book yourself some tickets to a play at the Old Globe Theatre Complex. Nestled comfortably in beautiful Balboa Park behind the Museum of Man, it is an attraction not to be missed.

For the last fifteen years, I have had the good fortune to be a volunteer usher for all three of their stages: the Old Globe, their main stage; the White, a theater in the round; and the Festival Stage, an outdoor amphitheater for summer repertory theater.

The Globe's production of August: Osage County, finishing its run on June 12th, is the most profound and disturbing family drama I've seen on the stage since Who's Afraid of Virgina Woolfe? The play reminds me that the family ties that bind, can also strangle.

Late, Late, for a Very Important Date!

I spent Easter Sunday in Tucson, Arizona, at a family gathering, but I was late getting there from San Diego. When I turned off on River Rd., it was virtually empty at 9:20 AM, so I checked left and right for any stray Easter egg hunters or Easter bunnies, then I leaned on the gas pedal and soared to a blazing 51 mph in a 40 mph speed zone.

The Pima County Sheriff pulled a rabbit out of a hat with a photo-enforced, speed camera and earned itself $228.50 from me for 11 miles over. Not a bad payday from an out-of-state visitor. The camera took an excellent picture of me, driving my beloved Altima, and the ticket reminded me to slow down when I get off the freeway.

Every time I drive through Arizona, I get a speeding ticket either coming or going, so my record is intact. I guess my urban driving habits don't translate well in the high desert.