1889. A tall African American who once was a slave, and his family, leave Evangeline Parish, Louisiana, leaving the dead sharecrop behind and seek their Promise in the Oklahoma Country. Andrew Jackson Johnson, Pa, led his family and 18 others who joined his wagon train and honored him as leader, Blacks and Whites alike, through hate filled and lynch ready east Texas. They suffered attacks that were mostly vocal and passed through most towns with little difficulty. Except Malsomberton. The KKK and like-spirited mob attacked the train at night, in the countryside, and were defeated. Two lives are lost for the people of the train, a grandfather and a good horse. It was Pa's lead horse, Oscar, who ended the battle, and, it was a miraculous moment for that horse. He roughly spoke. Just two words, and only on the anniversaries of that battle does Oscar speak again. At the Sulphur River in northeast Texas they made one-at-a-time crossings. The river was waist high and flowing brisk. Pa helped every family cross, and his own family was the last to cross. Pa dies of a heart attack just as they complete their crossing. I kill off my lead character at about two thirds way through. The core 5 families pull together around Penney Mae Johnson, and her six children, and they finish the Land Run together, realizing Pa's Dream. They are two black Loui. families, two Mennonite white Alabama families and an Arabic Shia family from Ascalon, Ottoman Empire. This story is being told by Oscar on March 15, 1914, the 25th anniversary of the battle with the KKK. Oscar is 38 years old. It is on this one day he can speak and so he does. Telling the gathered family of grownups, children, horse and colts, flycatchers and hummingbirds, from many farms for miles around, the story of their Oklahoma Land Run and the Journey of Dreams they realized because of that quest. It could end gently with the Oklahoma wind and sunset, Indian blankets waving in the wind and "hawks making lazy circles in the sky." It does, and it does not. I double twist the ending, it will make you cry, then you will smile; and that is my intent.
About the Author: I am 66, Born in Topeka Kansas. I began drawing things I could recognize at 5 and have been drawing ever since. At 8 I developed an interest in plants and shortly after, writing blossomed. I began writing poems for the most part, took classes in creative writing, as well as art classes, and of course, Botany. I married at 20, and at 23 I stepped away from college to work at this and that, to have a good marriage and raise a daughter. At 29 I formed a company, Hand And Harvest, and produced art and fine craft, going to many arts and crafts festivals and shows. I won my share of blue ribbons on the way, and made numerous sales. Then 1983 Economic breakdown hit and the sales of my crafts died. Other winds of life changed and I set my arts aside, went to work in horticulture, then back to school for the same. Got my B. S. in Horticulture in 2002. My wife passed in '04, I disabled in '06 and plunged into loss and healing. I did an initial series in collage, of images clipped from Playboy and Penthouse, creating designs with delectable bits. Then, about a month after my wife passed I saw her Angel in meditative vision, and drew it a month later. That began my large series of Angel art, simply titled Angel Images. Over the next three years I produced over 400 angel related pictures, many of which will be displayed here, and sold. After that I did about 300 garment designs-for real women, not the runway rails, and some have been made. No famous label though. I then took on a writing commission and spent the next 7 years composing 11 novels, and 10 other well worked and critiqued pieces from Children's picture book/story to a few screenplays. The writing impetus faded and I have returned to my art, with a series titled Dancing Birds which evolved from drawings of bird pairs flying to anthropomorphized birds dancing to humans in costume with bird mask, and finally no mask. That too came to an end and now I work a series titled trees, which is realism mixed with fantasy.