The "Extraordinary Stories Gets A Big Boost! Story

It was an ordinary day.  Had just opened an email from Jack Brubaker, aka "The Scribbler", who writes a weekly column for the Lancaster Newspaper.  Jack was responding to an email I had recently sent to him asking for his help with a few questions about the history of Lancaster, Pennsylvania.  Jack's column "The Scribbler" has been a treasure trove for Lancastrians interested in the history of one of the first inland cities in the United States.  I asked a question about a home with extraordinary ironwork on it as well as the fate of the Moravian Church that supposedly was located on Orange Street in downtown Lancaster.  I went on to tell him I have loved his column for as long as he has been writing it and try to mimic his writing style whenever possible.  He was the inspiration for my blog shortly after I retired from teaching school.  I included a link to my blog just in case he wanted to take a look at it.  Well, within a day or two I got my response giving me information about the house with the ironwork and the Moravian Church, which happened to be on Chestnut and not Orange Street.  He also told me he had read some of my blog stories and found them interesting.  He went on to tell me that he would like to mention my blog in one of his "The Scribbler" stories.  He said he would mention that I had a large following from Russia leading up to the last Presidential election as well as the mid-term election.  He wanted to know how I knew my readers were Russians as opposed to anyone else?  My following letter to him included a screen shot showing him how I can tell my readership from the top 10 countries.  

LDub holding his MacBook Air. (by Dan Marschka) 

Changes all the time, but before the election I was having a few thousand readers a day reading my blog from Russia.  The following summer I had a three day period when I had a few thousand Germans reading my blog.  Why?  I have absolutely do idea.  Well, wasn't long before newspaper photographer Dan Marschka arrived at my rear door with his Nikon camera.  Dan had made numerous visits to speak to my photography class at Mannheim Township High School about journalistic photography when I was teaching.  We spent the next hour or so catching up on family activities and then he took a few photographs of me.  

Dan showing Carol the results of my photo-shoot.

Lighting and composition are some of the reasons for his excellence in taking photos and he spent about 15 minutes making sure he had the proper place in the house with the right amount of light and positioning me for the best composition.  Five days later I opened the morning newspaper and there on page 3 was "The Scribbler" column with my photograph heading a story about blogging, recycling and the Russians!  His usual amount of humor made his story interesting, even for me who was the theme of his story.  Jack had been an inspiration to me for years.  I just love his writing style and try to imitate it wnenever possible.  A big thank you goes out to Jack for giving my blog a boost and to Dan for making me look so good.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.  PS - check out the story at: 

https://lancasteronline.com/features/are-the-russians-watching-how-we-handle-our-recyclables-the/article_0e22d79a-5ad1-11e9-a3d0-87d9b3ac2a0d.html