Tag Archives: Arthur Frederick

Trade shows: Writing for industry gatherings

On several occasions I’ve been hired to attend and write about trade show gatherings. In this example, I was hired by the annual Fuel Cell Seminar & Exposition, which met at Disney World near Orlando, Fla. in 2011. In this case, the group was looking for someone to do interviews and attend sessions, and then turn out  stories for an industry newsletter. These assignments can be fun, and sometimes they are good revenue generators. This example is one of the newsletter stories.

Industry leaders optimistic about fuel cell industry’s future

In spite of the sluggish economy and reductions in financial support by the federal government, a number of fuel cell industry leaders we spoke to were surprisingly upbeat about the future.

During the 2011 Fuel Cell Seminar & Exposition at Disney World in Orlando, Fla., we asked a number of attendees one simple question: Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future of the industry? Here is what they had to say:

MORRY MARKOWITZ, Executive Director, Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Energy Association: “I am very optimistic about the future. My background, both in the electric utility industry and the automotive industry,  has given me the foundation to understand the past, present and future of this industry, and I think the future is very bright.

“On the mobile side, the fuel cell vehicle is the only zero-emission vehicle that is on the horizon that will be able to exactly replicate the current driver’s needs in driving an automobile by having the range that it needs of 300-400 miles per tankful, being able to refuel in two-to-five minutes, and to be able to do that hopefully in multiple places.

“On the stationary side, the simplicity and reliability of fuel cell technology will provide a bridge for our current system of centralized generation of transmission lines having to go through vast areas and distribution lines that are increasingly vulnerable to weather  and even some future activities, both by nature and manmade.

“The idea of the simplicity and availability of fuel cells is an appropriate bridge for those technologies.”

SAM LOGAN, chief executive officer, LOGAN Energy Corp., Roswell, Ga.: “In the shorter term, the industry is going to be bucking the headwinds of the really difficult economy.  And coupled with that is the diminished ability of the government to provide the kinds of appropriated funds for product improvements, manufacturing improvement and deployments. Continue reading →

News coverage: writing about the environment

Since I spent so much time working as a journalist in Maine, it shouldn’t be too much of a surprise that writing about the environment was an almost-daily assignment. A lot of Maine people consider themselves to be environmentalists, and newspaper editors knew that and loved to get environmental stories from the wire services. Back in the 70s, power generating projects tended to be huge. In Maine, there were two big proposed power generating projects — the Passamaquoddy project, which was to generate power from ebbing and flowing tides; and the Dickey-Lincoln Hydroelectric project, two dams that would have flooded thousands of acres of forest land in northern Maine. I wrote scores of stories about both, mostly Dickey-Lincoln. Neither project was ever built.

By ARTHUR FREDERICK

AUGUSTA, Maine (UPI) – The head of the Maine Natural Resources Council told the legislative Committee on Energy Wednesday that the proposed Dickey Lincoln Hydroelectric Project could result in more than 30,000 acres of exposed mudflats during several weeks of the year.

Clifford Goodall said the hydroelectric project is flawed because the area would not have enough water to operate efficiently.

The Dickey Lincoln dam would create a long, slender lake instead of a lake concentrated in one area, and dropping the level of the lake to make room for spring runoff waters would result in 33,600 acres of exposed mudflats.

“Hydroelectric projects require water, and there just isn’t that much water up there,” Goodall said. “Passamaquoddy has the water. Dickey Lincoln has practically none.”

“If you’re going to dam up all this water in the spring, you have about a 10-month span in which you are going to let it out,” he said.

Continue reading →

Offbeat stories: Halloween rent-a-cats

Spending 12 years writing for United Press International certainly honed my interest in finding offbeat and unusual stories, especially if they meshed somehow with a particular holiday or news event. As Halloween approached in the early 90s, I decided to call the local Humane Society to see if there were any black cat-related things going on. Sure enough, I found this story –people calling the Humane Society to see if they could rent black cats for their Halloween parties.

Pet adoptions have been a little slow at the Humane Society of North Pinellas, but the phone has been ringing off the hook with calls from people who want to rent cats for Halloween parties.

But even though the Humane Society has about 50 cats, none of them are for rent, not now and not ever, according to Rick Chaboudy, the Humane Society’s director.

“I think people are getting into more elaborate Halloween parties and they try to think of everything,” Chaboudy said. “We try to explain we don’t do things like that – it would be a tremendous amount of stress on the cat, plus we don’t want to give the impression we approve of activities like that.

“We are here to find permanent homes for our cats, not to rent them out as decorations.”

For some cats, particularly black ones, the season can be dangerous.

Connie Goy suspects that someone tried to skin her black cat, Calvin, alive as a gruesome Halloween prank.

When Mrs. Goy returned from the grocery store Thursday afternoon, she found Calvin lying in a pool of blood in the garage. Her other cat, Hobbes, was at his side, meowing and tapping Calvin, who was still alive, with his paw.

“Hobbes was . . . meowing real loud like, `He’s hurt. Can you do something?’ ” said Mrs. Goy, 30. “I started crying.”

One of Calvin’s hind legs had a precise cut, 1 inch long, according to the veterinarian, Dr. Gursaear Singh. It had severed an artery in his right leg. Mrs. Goy and her husband, David, rushed Calvin to All Pet Care Hospital & Animal Inn where he was recovering Friday.

The cut, Mrs. Goy said, was too exact for Calvin to have injured himself.

“About this time of year you never know. It’s just sad that there are people that would do such a thing,” Mrs. Goy said. “It makes me sick.”

The interest in using the Humane Society as a sort of Rent-A-Cat agency is a fairly new twist, Chaboudy said. Calls inquiring about renting cats have been steadily increasing during the past few Octobers. About a half-dozen such calls have come into the Humane Society during the past week, he said.

“It has to be black, and they seem to think if they call early enough they can reserve one,” he said. “And it’s funny – some people feel a little foolish after we turn them down, but others act put out that we won’t accommodate them. They say things like, `Well, we aren’t going to hurt it’ or `We’ll bring it back afterwards’ – like we’re wrong in not letting this happen.”

Even if the Humane Society did rent cats, Halloween party-givers probably would be a little disappointed at the present selection. Chaboudy said of the 50 or so cats, none of them are completely black.

“We do have a few black-and-white cats, but that’s as close as they come,” he said. “If we did have black cats right now, we might not put them out for adoption until Halloween was over.”

And as for Calvin, whether his injuries are Halloween-related or not, Mrs. Goy said, he’ll spend the rest of his days indoors.

“He’s going to be a house cat from now on.”

 

POLITICAL CAMPAIGNS: Position papers

I’ve worked in a number of political campaigns over the years, from U.S. Senate campaigns down to the local level. Usually, I’ve served as communications advisor — press secretary, writer, positions guy. This is a typical position paper, prepared for a candidate for Pinellas County sheriff. In this case, I prepared a number of position papers on different subjects and we posted them on the campaign web site. I like to think that I’m pretty good at taking a complex political subject and presenting it in easy-to-understand language — that’s really the definition of journalism.

Grow houses versus pill mills

Shrinking budgets demand better decision-making within the Sheriff’s Office, as well as throughout county government and, to be sure, throughout government at all levels.

When it comes to enforcing our drug laws, a lack of good judgment leads to policies that fail to differentiate between big problems and small ones. And, this lack of good judgment illustrates just how the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office has been mismanaged.

Pinellas County has the unpleasant distinction of leading the state in opiate-related deaths. While it should be obvious that pill-related law enforcement tactics should top the priority list, the PCSO has spent huge amounts of money on the surveillance of a hydroponics shop in Largo. (Hydroponics refers to the growing of plants in nutrient-rich water, without soil.)

It is believed that hydroponics shops are favored by people who operate “grow houses” – usually residential homes where large quantities of marijuana are grown.

The PCSO mounted a surveillance camera on a pole outside the Largo shop, then noted the license plate numbers of the cars that were parked there. Deputies would then go to the home addresses of the car owners. Sometimes they would take search warrants with them, and sometimes they would simply ask for permission to search the homes. Some of those search warrants have been found to have been obtained with manufactured evidence.

As a result of these shoddy law enforcement practices, a number of arrests made during these grow house investigations are likely to be thrown out by the courts.

While no one is denying that grow house operators are breaking the law, such operations are not threatening to public safety. The same cannot be said for so-called “pill mills,” which distribute oxycodone and other extremely dangerous prescription drugs.

Applying limited law enforcement resources to grow house investigations while pill mills are operating is a good example of the mismanagement we see at the PCSO on a daily basis.

Blog writing: Real estate

I haven’t posted any examples of real estate writing to this point, but I’ve done quite a lot of it, and here’s why: My wife Beth is a Re/Max real estate agent and she has a blog, pinellasnewsboy.com. I’ve written quite a lot of copy for that blog over the past few years, a lot of it under her name. Most of the blog stories have to do with fun or interesting things to see and do in North Pinellas County, where we live and where she works. As with all aspects of my life, I often find interesting or offbeat things to write about. If you just keep your eyes open, you will find all kinds of interesting stories and photo subjects. The fellow mentioned in this story made a big contribution to the war effort back in the 1930s, but he might have been forgotten were it not for a small brass plaque that I found one day while out for a walk.

 

Donald Roebling didn’t have to work, and he could trace that very good fortune all the way back to the Brooklyn Bridge.

Roebling’s great-grandfather, John Roebling, was the original chief engineer for the Brooklyn Bridge project, the construction of which began in 1870. But John Roebling was injured at the construction site and had to turn his chief engineer duties over to his son, Washington Roebling. John Roebling died of an infection related to his injury before the bridge opened to traffic in 1883.

Which leads us back to Washington Roebling’s grandson, Donald.

In the 1930s, Donald Roebling was living a comfortable life in Clearwater, Fla., where he had build an impressive estate on the shore of the Intercoastal Waterway. Then in his 30s, Donald didn’t need to work, but he did share his grandfather’s and great-grandfather’s interest in mathematics and engineering.

In the late 1920s and early 1930s, three powerful hurricanes struck Florida. Many people were injured and killed, and many others were left stranded for days and weeks because there was simply no way to reach them through the wreckage and the flooded ground. Donald Roebling read about all the hurricane-related carnage and decided to do something about it.

He had a modern, well-equipped machine shop built on the grounds of his estate; he hired a staff of workers; and he set about designing a vehicle that could travel on land was well as through water. Such a vehicle, he thought, could make it through deep water and over blow-downs, and could be used to rescue people should another hurricane come ashore in Florida.

The result was an ungainly-looking two-tracked vehicle with a large open compartment that could hold people or equipment. Roebling called it the “Alligator.”

Roebling thought the Alligator would make a dandy military vehicle, and he tried to sell that idea to the U.S. Government. Try as he might, however, he could not get anyone to listen to his story.

Image

Donald Roebling’s Alligator

Finally, however, he did get a Life Magazine reporter to write about the Alligator, and that got things rolling.  Marine Corps officials saw the article and kicked the Life clipping up the ladder.  Before long, Marine Corps officials were in Clearwater, looking closely at Roebling’s creation.

They liked the Alligator and thought it would be great for transporting troops from ships onto beaches and then back again. The trouble was that the Marine Corps didn’t have any money that could be spent on research and development of equipment. That didn’t really bother the wealthy Roebling, however; he agreed to do the research at his own expense, and turn out a new version of the Alligator that might make a better application for military use.

Within a few months, Roebling’s newer design was approved, and Alligators were being manufactured in Lakeland for the Marine Corps. Not long afterwards, four factories were turning out thousands of the amphibious machines, which saw much action at Guadacanal and throughout the South Pacific during World War II. The machines also were used in Korea and Vietnam, and the modern military amphibious vehicles  in use today trace their lineage directly back to Roebling’s original 1930s design.

Continue reading →

Grave robbing and other deep subjects

UPI was absolutely in love with the strange, the creepy and the absurd. The odder the story, the more they wanted to go after it. The company believed that readers were fascinated by the peculiar, and I have to say that I saw plenty of evidence that they were right. So if I heard about some story that was macabre or unusual, I went after it. This story, about grave robbing, is an example.

By ARTHUR FREDERICK

NORWAY, Maine (UPI) – Oxford County Sheriff Alton Howe said Monday persons who robbed three graves in (the town of) Sweden may have been after skulls to sell to an out-of-state cult.

Howe said three graves were opened at the Black Mountain Cemetery more than a week ago. Other counties have also reported the opening of graves, most of them more than 100 years old.

“We found out that a cult out-of-state is paying more than $100 for skulls,” Howe said. ”Whether or not this is it, or some other stupid thing, I don’t know.”

The three graves, one of a woman and two of men, were dug up more than a week ago. The holes were six feet deep, five feet long, and two feet wide. Howe said the skulls appeared to be missing from each grave, but said the remains were in such condition it was hard to tell what, if anything, had been taken.

“We found a set of false teeth in one and a few small bones and fragments of fabric and hair in the others,” he said.

Most of the bones, Howe said, appeared to be from a foot. Another bone, which appeared to be a thigh bone, also was found.

The grave robberies were not the first in the state in recent months. Another grave was opened at the Black Mountain Cemetery last year, and other grave openings have been reported in Cornish, Waterboro and Fryeburg.

In addition, there was a twist to the previous grave opening at the Black Mountain Cemetery.

“The peculiar part was that one of the new grave openings was alongside the one that had been previously dug up,” According to Sweden Civil Defense Director Donald Laffin. “Whoever did that one filled the grave back in.”

“All we found were some fragments of clothing and pieces of the casket.”

In Waterboro, Leland Swett knew about the grave openings in that town because the robbers had dug up the resting places of some of his relatives.

The diggings there took place in the Swett Cemetery, a private burial plot on Ossipee Mountain.

“One of the graves was my great grandmother,” Swett said. “They were all relatives,. There’s three generations buried there, if not four.”

It wasn’t known if anything was taken from the graves, because the local road commissioner filled the graves back in.

Howe isn’t sure what the diggers were after if it wasn’t the skulls.

“None of them were war veterans, so there were probably no medals,” he said. “And I doubt if it is a matter of finding jewelry, so we are considering the possibility of occult practices.”

“The persons responsible worked hard for whatever they were after.”

Political writing: Presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy comes to Maine

I haven’t posted any examples of political writing to this point, but that’s what I spent a lot of time doing when I was a reporter for UPI in Maine. My office was on the fourth floor of the Maine State House, and most of my days were spent covering government hearings, legislative sessions and gubernatorial news conferences. In this case, a national presidential candidate came to town. I don’t really recall this visit by Eugene McCarthy in 1975, but I’m sure I considered it a break in the usual routine and a chance to get some national coverage for one of my stories.

 

By ARTHUR FREDERICK

AUGUSTA, Maine (UPI) – Independent presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy says both major political parties are in trouble, and the Democrats are in more danger of extinction than the Republicans.

McCarthy, a former senator who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1968, said Thursday an independent stands a good chance in the presidential election next year because of the public’s growing disaffection.

“If you have a party that can nominate Richard Nixon twice, that ought to cause them problems for at least 20 years,” McCarthy said. “And if the other party can’t put up someone to beat him, that ought to say something about them.”

McCarthy said the Democrats have lost sight of their objectives and could be in danger of fading away.

“There’s no reason why a party shouldn’t disappear,” McCarthy said. “It happened to the Whig party between 1856 and 1864.”

McCarthy said the Republic Party is sort of like moss on a rock; “It gets green in the spring and grey in the fall, but it doesn’t change much.” he said. “I think the Republican Party is closer to fulfilling its function.”

The former senator said there is the best chance of the past 30 to 40 years for an independent to be elected president.

McCarthy came to Maine to talk with independent Gov. James B. Longley about a suit the two men are involved in which challenges the federal campaign funding law. The suit goes before the U.S. Supreme Court Nov. 10.

McCarthy said the campaign law discriminates against independent candidates and works to perpetuate the existing parties.

McCarthy said he felt the suit would result at least in changes in the act.

“We’re very optimistic. It is our feeling that even if it is constitutional it is a very bad act, and we’re hopeful we can stop it,” he said.

The act limits contributions to $5,000 to any one candidate and to $25,p000 in any election; requires that contributors’ names be made public; imposes spending limits on candidates; and provides federal funding to the party candidates.

Longley, who attended the news conference with McCarthy at the Blaine House, said the federal act serves to discourage people from running for office.

“I think we need to do more to encourage people to run for office,” he said.

McCarthy said the act has made it difficult for him to run for president.

“It’s made it difficult to finance our campaign,” he said. “It gives a clear advantage to the Democrats and Republicans by giving them funds to start with.