Pam Crooks

Railroad China and the Silver Era of Train Travel by Pam Crooks

by

Since my husband was a career railroad man, all things train have always had a soft place in our hearts. My fascination lay with the passenger train and the dining cars that were so much a part of the traveling experience. Indeed, the journey itself was as important as the destination.

The golden age of train travel belongs to the late 1800s and early 1900s when industrialism was booming, and trains were more than just a means of hauling freight all over the country. With both coasts accessible by rail, they symbolized progress and connected people like never before, providing adventure, convenience, and a little luxurious pampering, too.

But for the purpose of this blog, I’ll focus on the silver age of train travel, the period from the late forties into the seventies. By then, automobiles were becoming mainstays in households across the country. Buses and planes, along with an intricate expansion of interstate highways, all contributed to the decline of train travel.

Yet for those who needed to travel by rail, or just plain wanted to, beautiful streamliners like the famous California Zephyr roared onto the scene, and passengers fell in love with their speed, comfort, and sleek stainless steel look.

The railroads spared no expense to give their customers an experience they wouldn’t get at home, providing them fine meals served on cloth-covered tables with china designed as unique as the railroads themselves, in an atmosphere professionally styled by interior designers.

Diners were called to their seating by waiters strolling through the cars and playing chimes. “Nothing could be finer than dinner in the diner” became a beloved and traditional ditty.

 

Once seated at their tables at their allotted time, waiters served meals on china befitting their railroad.

A few examples:

Here’s a sought-after design called “Indian Tree.” Note the word “Pullman” on this sectional plate.

This is Union Pacific’s renowned design of a winged streamliner. The plate is circled in gold.

I thought this one was pretty from the Chicago, Baltimore & Ohio Railroad.

Ice cream dishes from the Atchison, Topeka, & Santa Fe Railroad.

Here’s an exclusive design called the “Milwaukee Peacock” for the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific Railroad.

An egg cup from the New York Central Railroad.

Of course, I could go on and on. There are literally hundreds of railroad china designs for who knows how many different railroad lines. But they’re fun to see and admire, aren’t they?

And because I love vintage dinner menus as much as I love vintage china, here’s an example of the dinner offerings in 1955.

Everything is so cheap! 🙂 Did you notice they even provide baby food, pureed to boot?

Alas, even with all the pampering in the dining cars, passenger rail travel never regained its original popularity of their golden age, and many railroad companies failed.

However, the allure of train travel continues with heritage railways and luxury train experiences. My husband and I traveled on the Rocky Mountaineer through the Canadian Rockies, which was fabulous. And in 2026, 17 vintage Orient Express train cars will be “reimagined” and ready for booking!

I love using china and have three separate sets I use for special occasions–one from my grandmother, a Christmas set, and my own when I was a young bride.

Do you have china of your own or perhaps handed down to you from a family member? Do you enjoy displaying it? Or even better using it for special meals?

To stay up on our latest releases and have some fun, too, join our Facebook Reader Group HERE!

An Angel for an Enemy by Pam Crooks

by

 

The Civil War was raging in 1862, but perhaps no one experienced that more than the Confederate and Union soldiers themselves on September 17, 1862, during the Battle of Antietam. Located in Washington County in Maryland, Antietam held the gruesome distinction of being the bloodiest battle in American history with 23,000 casualties.

Bela L. Burr wasn’t one of them, but he was severely injured in the right shin and left ankle and lay dying in the hot sun that day. Having been enlisted in the Union Army for only a month at the young age of 18, he’d laid there in the blood-soaked cornfield, surrounded by his fellow soldiers already dead and waited for his own death to come.

But even impending death didn’t keep him from crying out for water.

It seemed impossible anyone would hear, let alone help, but angels hovered over those scattered bodies, and one answered his call.

A Confederate soldier by the name of James M. Norton was marching near the cornfield. Moved to compassion, he left the march, well aware that sharpshooters were hidden in the trees with orders to aim at anything that moved. Dropping to his knees, defying the shots ringing out, he carefully shimmied over to Burr and offered him his canteen.

It would be an agonizing 48 hours before Burr was discovered and taken to medical treatment. Doctors determined his injuries were severe enough that he warranted a discharge for disability. Though the bullet couldn’t be removed from his ankle, Burr went on to marry, have a family, and become a successful newspaper editor.

In contrast, James Norton lived and fought through the entire war. Once the war ended, he returned home to marry, divorced his wife, then re-married her. They raised their children while he built himself a career as a builder.

But Bela Burr never forgot James Norton, the angel who helped save his life by the simple act of sharing his canteen. Through the power of his newspaper, he printed numerous want ads in hopes of learning the Confederate soldier’s identity. Amazingly, a former Confederate officer familiar with the story helped Burr and Norton reconnect. The two soldiers began to correspond regularly, and Bela Burr invited James Norton to his home in Connecticut for a reunion, setting the day for the Spring of 1897.

I wish I could tell you the two soldiers had a happy reunion, but sadly, there is no record of it.  Perhaps James Norton became ill and was unable to travel, since he passed away two years later.  Who knows?  But if the reunion did, indeed, happen, as a newspaper man (and a writer myself), I’d like to think Bela Burr would have graciously and eloquently shared his story with newspapers nationwide.

And that bullet in his ankle he carried around for decades? It was finally surgically removed in the early 20th century. Bela Burr died a few years later on April 29, 1908.

But he kept that flattened piece of lead as well as the late 1890’s X-ray which revealed it was still there, and a small local museum housed the artifacts in his memory.

As I prepared for this blog, the author of one of the articles I read mentioned how he felt it was weird for someone to save a bullet like Bela Burr saved his, including the X-ray. He then included a link to a You Tube video of a young man who saved his. . . Well, I’ll let you decide if it was weird and quirky.

World’s Biggest – Toenail Collection

Did you ever have a quirky collection of something? 

Would you have saved your bullet and X-ray like Bela Burr?

What is the quirkiest collection you’ve ever heard or seen?

 

 

 

Don’t forget!  MY KIND OF COWBOY is FREE on your favorite platform for a limited time! 

THE FULL BLACKSTONE RANCH SERIES

 

 

To stay up on our latest releases and have some fun, too, join our Facebook Reader Group HERE!

 

 

So I Watched This Series – by Pam Crooks

by

Yellowstone to Yosemite, narrated by Kevin Costner. 

It’s a beautiful three-part series with breathtaking scenery and a fascinating look into the working relationship Teddy Roosevelt had with naturalist John Muir. Together, they devised a plan to appeal to Congress to preserve the national parks in our country–and much more.

Born in 1838 in Scotland, John Muir moved with his family to Wisconsin at the age of 11. His father was a harsh taskmaster, and John fled home in his 20s, roaming the state, then escaping the Civil War draft in Canada until finally settling in Indianapolis to work in a wagon wheel factory. He had a flair for inventing machinery, and when an industrial accident nearly blinded him, he believed he’d been given a second chance to pursue his dreams. He headed west to wander throughout California. He lived three years in Yosemite Valley and longer in the Sierra Nevadas, supporting himself with his writings about nature.

At the age of 42, he decided to settle down and raise a family. He married, had two daughters, and managed his wife’s family’s orchard in California. As the years rolled by, the wandering urge returned, and he felt compelled to see his parents and siblings in Wisconsin. It’d been 20 years, and he reached his father just in time for his passing.

The trip had been grueling, but he withstood the pain to remain in commune with nature and to become closer to God. Through his essays, he acquired fame and respectability, which eventually inspired President Theodore Roosevelt, a conservationist as well, to arrange a meeting with him in 1903. With Muir as his guide, the president spent three days camping in the California wilderness, avoiding the comforts of hotels to experience the wilderness first hand, including a ferocious blizzard. Their intense discussions revolved around the importance of protecting wild areas like Yosemite and cemented Roosevelt’s growing desire to expand the national park systems.

In the end, due to Roosevelt’s actions, that three-day camping trip resulted in five more national parks being established, along with 18 national monuments, 55 bird sanctuaries and wildlife refuges, as well as 148 million acres into 150 national forests.

Those numbers are even higher today as our leaders secured strong protections on federal lands.

Pretty cool, huh? Of course, the whole evolvement of national parks in the United States was much more fascinating in the series rather than my little summary here, and Kevin Costner does a superior job narrating.

I invite you to settle in and watch the three episodes if you can. I found it immensely informative. We watched the series on Fox Nation, but it’s also available on Roku and YouTube.

Have you seen Yellowstone to Yosemite yet?

Have you been to any national parks or national monuments?

Do you love to spend time in nature, camping or hiking?  Or even just sitting by a lake or a river?

To stay up on our latest releases and have some fun, too, join our Facebook Reader Group HERE!

Like Tomatoes? Or Corn? Or Pigs or Bees? Join the Club! by Pam Crooks

by

Corn Clubs

After the turn of the century, most farmers didn’t trust new technology. Their sons, however, were more receptive, and guided by agricultural teachers and researchers who hoped the latest techniques would be embraced and then adopted on the farm, they formed after-school clubs where the boys learned hands-on lessons to improve corn production.

They were allocated an acre of land, usually given by their fathers. Their leaders taught them how to improve the quality of their seeds, how better to cultivate the corn – and make some nice money besides.

In addition, they were expected to keep precise records of their yields and expenses, as well as to participate in local, regional, and state corn contests, the precursor to today’s county fairs.  Any prize money won was theirs to keep, as well as any profits made from their acre plot.  With these funds, the boys were able to help their families with purchases otherwise deemed unaffordable–clothes, school supplies, and  fun extras. Once their successes were observed, the corn clubs provided their seed to local farmers, boosting economies.

Eventually, the corn clubs expanded to include different crops and even livestock, peanuts, cotton, and potatoes, all through the successful concept of teaching young boys important agricultural skills.

Hey, what about the girls?

Not long after, notable women like Jane McKimmon Simpson, a home economist from North Carolina, and rural schoolteacher, Marie Samuella Cromer, also from the South, recognized the importance of the boys club successes and that they could, indeed, be applied to young girls. They chose to focus on tomatoes, since cultivating them were not as strenuous as raising corn (running a plow down the fields would have required far too much upper body strength).  The women and girls, eager to add to the family’s support at a time when most farms didn’t have running water or electricity, loved the idea of harvesting tomatoes, and soon Tomato Clubs flourished.

Burdensome?  I think I’d resent that!

Tomato Clubs

Tomato Club members were aged about 12 – 18 years and cultivated individual plots of 1/10 acre.  They worked in groups to can and market their produce, and like the boys, kept the profits.

Since most housewives were accustomed to buying tins instead of glass jars, the clubs focused on canning the tomatoes in #3 size tin or steel containers, sealing them with solder.  While the Mason jar had been invented, access to a pressure canner and the jars themselves was scarce.

Like the boys, the girls were required to document their work in multi-page reports, giving them a female touch with uniquely decorated covers, some tied with ribbons, and all precisely written.

One young lady named Lizzie reported harvesting 2,000 pounds of tomatoes and selling 800 #3 size cans, earning a profit of $78 (about $2,470 today). Some serious cash for a young girl in the early 1900s, right?  Good for her!

Another young lady in 1913, Sadie, wrote, “A girl can make money for herself if she desires and still stay right on the farm.”

Another in 1915 writes, “It has been a way by which I could not only have my own spending money and pay my expenses at the Farm Camp, but I also have a bank account of sixty dollars.” (About $1,881 today.)

As you may have guessed, corn clubs and tomato clubs (as well as potato clubs, bee clubs, poultry clubs, and so on!) were the precursor for 4-H Clubs, which over time evolved beyond agriculture to fostering leadership, personal growth, and all kinds of life skills.

 

Have you ever been in a club while growing up?  Did you find it meaningful and educational or more social? Did you have 4-H groups at your school?

 

 

 

To stay up on our latest releases and have some fun, too, join our Facebook Reader Group HERE!

Ready to Exercise? Grab your Corset! by Pam Crooks

by

Like many women my age, I discovered I was losing some bone density. Nothing major or scary, but my doctor urged me to take more calcium and develop a weight-lifting routine.  I’m definitely more of an outside walker (every day) and much less of a weight-lifter (almost never), but dutifully, I looked into what I could do to build more muscle mass.

Fortunately, my insurance will cover a gym membership, which is, of course, much cheaper for the company than paying for hospital stays, surgeries, and physical therapies for their insured customers, and more importantly encourages a healthier lifestyle.  I’m not much into going to the gym every day, but a brand new one opened up close to me, and it is really nice.

So my husband and I enrolled in their SilverSneakers classes, which, if you’re not familiar, are stretching, weight-lifting, zumba, water aerobics classes, etc, designed for seniors.  Ahem, people my age.  The classes are enjoyable and low-stress, and their workouts are excellent.

After that first class, as we were leaving that spiffy, sprawling, modern gym that had more exercise equipment than I would even know how to use, I couldn’t help thinking about women throughout history who would never have dreamed of such a high-tech place to exercise.  Farm and ranch wives didn’t need a work-out routine when they already worked hard inside the home and out, caring for crops and livestock, with a minimum of tools to make their work easier.  I can only imagine how tired they’d be at the end of every day!

But what about the women in cities who were raised not to exert themselves?

Nineteenth-century America required modesty for women. Young boys could compete in sports and games, but daughters were expected to get their exercise from doing normal household chores.  For those females who might be prone to athleticism, any public performance was decried as immodest, selfish, and attention-seeking, especially if she was in her childbearing years.

However, in the 1830s, a fad called “calisthenics” arrived from Europe. Women took to the light choreographed movements that were set to music and resembled dance steps. Society approved the routines as graceful and dignified, emulating upper class beauty and elegance.

As the years passed, females increased their physical activity by walking in zigzags, marching in place, bending the arms and legs, and skipping, their intent mainly on increasing blood flow and preventing bad posture. In time, with the advent of elite women’s schools and country clubs, more aristocratic activities like tennis, croquet, archery, and bathing-beauty swimming in lakes or beaches thrived in popularity.

For others, there were opportunities to exercise at home with these manmade contraptions for those who could afford them. There was no such thing as “work-out clothes” like we have, and so women simply exercised in private and in their regular clothes which included, yep, their corset.

Men even exercised in their suits.

By the 1890s, the bicycle had created a social revolution and eventually became accepted as a means for women to stay active. Two million bicycles were being manufactured every year, and like today, they were designed with a “step-through” frame to enable women to climb on and off. They certainly dressed for the occasion, hats and all. Some added weights to their dress hems to keep them from flying up, and this young lady could most certainly be wearing her corset.

Can you imagine?  Ha!

The Olympics began in ancient Greece, but were abolished because of paganism.  The games were finally revived in 1896, although women were not allowed to compete until 1920.  A special “Women’s Olympics” on a smaller scale than the men’s began in 1922 and continued well into the 1930s.

Fast forward to today, and exercising is roundly applauded and encouraged for its health benefits for all ages. Children as young as two can enroll in tumbling classes. Soccer and t-ball teams are organized for four-year-olds. Sports of all kinds abound for male and female, young and old, in public arenas open to spectators who cheer on the participants. The benefits are enormous, and we’re all living longer lives because of them.

The SilverSneakers program began in 1992, partnering with health care plans like mine to help seniors enjoy convenience access to fitness programs geared just for them.

From their website:

“From national gyms to local community centers, there are more participating fitness locations available in the U.S. to SilverSneakers members than there are Starbucks.”

We’ve come a long way, for sure, and thank goodness for that!

 

Do you like to exercise?  What’s your favorite kind of physical activity? 

Are you familiar with SilverSneakers?  Do you have their program near you? 

 

To stay up on our latest releases and have some fun, too, join our Facebook Reader Group HERE!

 

Cowgirls in the Kitchen – Pam Crooks

by

Fifty years ago, when I was newly married and newly pregnant with my first baby, I joined La Leche League for all their collective wisdom and encouragement with breastfeeding.  Not only was their focus on nursing babies, they stressed nutrition, too, for ourselves and for our families.

Those ladies were some of my best friends for many years, and they were great cooks, too.  One of them shared her Grape-Nuts Bread recipe, which I’ve made more times than I can count.

C.W. Post developed the cereal in 1897. In 1933, Grape-Nuts sponsored Sir Admiral Byrd’s expedition to Antarctica, fed the troops during World War II, energized explorers during their exploring, and soared through the years where it even got a little marketing help from Barney Fife on the Andy Griffith Show.

Yep, Grape-Nuts cereal is still alive and well today.  It’s a bit daunting to love in a bowl with milk (my husband says it tastes like cardboard, and he’s right) but in this bread recipe, it’s so-o good!

Chock-ful of protein and fiber, it’s dense and hearty, requires no yeast, and comes together quickly (once the cereal soaks in milk).  It’s delicious toasted, spread with butter, jelly, or my personal favorite, cinnamon butter.

If you’ve never had this bread, you’ll be taken aback by its subtle sweetness and nuttiness.

As with most recipes, Grape-Nuts bread has lots of variations.  Here’s the original one as shown in this image. It’s easy to make, bakes up nicely, and is very good:

GRAPE-NUTS BREAD – Yield 1 loaf

Oven 350 degrees.

  • 1 1/3 cups milk
  • 2/3 cup Grape-Nuts cereal

Combine and microwave for 1 minute. Stir and cool while mixing the following:

  • 2 cups sifted flour
  • 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 2/3 cup sugar

Stir together, then add in:

  • 1 egg, well-beaten
  • 3 Tb. melted butter

Combine all with cereal and milk.

Bake in greased and floured bread pan 55-60 minutes. Cool before cutting.

Here’s my recipe:

GRAPE-NUTS BREAD – Yield 2 loaves

Oven 350 degrees

  • 1 cup Grape-Nuts cereal
  • 2 cups sour milk

To sour the milk, add 2 Tb. lemon juice or vinegar and enough milk to make 2 cups.  Let stand 1/2 hour or so. Mix the following:

  • 1 cup sugar
  • 2 eggs

Sift together:

  • 1 tsp salt
  • 4 cups flour
  • 1 tsp soda
  • 3 tsp. baking powder

Combine all ingredients with milk and cereal mixture.

Batter will be very stiff.

Bake in 2 greased and floured bread pans 55-60 minutes. Cool before cutting.

Did you grow up having Grape-Nuts cereal for breakfast?  Have you ever baked with Grape-Nuts cereal?   

Flour Sack Towels Through the Years by Pam Crooks

by

 

Among the gifts I received for Christmas this year were flour sack towels. Three of them, to be exact.  Two were sweetly embroidered for my husband and me by our young granddaughters, and the third was screen-printed with a Christmas-themed gingerbread man with a stack of books from my sister.

With this towel came a slip of paper noting the history and benefits of flour sack towels. Of course, I suspect we all have a flour sack towel or two in our kitchen drawers right now, and we all probably have a pretty good idea how the towels came to be, but I especially found interesting the foresightedness of feed companies that led to their practical use and popularity.

I didn’t realize just how widespread that popularity was!

In 1850 or so, flour was shipped and sold in big wooden barrels to the general stores. Cumbersome and not particularly sanitary, right?  About this time, cotton was more easily harvested and became plentiful. Grain mills took to shipping the flour in thick-weaved cotton bags strong enough to hold fifty pounds and later, one hundred pounds.  Soon, sugar, animal feed, fertilizer, seeds, etc., followed in those bags, and it wasn’t long until frugal housewives, loathe to throw anything useful away, found new ways to use them.

Towels, aprons, diapers, bedding, and all sorts of clothing were just the beginning.  But alas, who wanted to wear a shirt or a dress with the flour company’s logo branded across the front?  Housewives determinedly removed the labels with rounds of soaking and washing with bleach and lye soap.  After the chain stitching was pulled out of the side of the bag, the cotton could be cleaned, starched, and pressed.

(These leggings were made by a Lakota woman sometime in the 1920s using leather and dyed porcupine quills on the lower half visible below a dress. On the upper part which would be hidden by the dress, she used flour sacks from Rex Flour.)

Eventually, seeing the growing popularity of up-cycling the feed bags and seeing a potential rise in sales, manufacturers switched to paper labels.  Housewives found removing the glue-backed labels with kerosene much easier but still a chore. The feed companies and flour mills took continued compassion (with an eye toward higher profits, of course) on housewives and began to print their logos using water-soluble vegetable inks.

Popularity for the bags soared in the 1920s when the cotton mills hit upon the idea of producing fabrics in colorful flower prints, designs for pillowcases and curtains, embroidery patterns, and even patterns for children’s clothing, teddy bears, dolls, and so on.

How fun, right?

(Isn’t this a pretty pillowcase?  Sacks were sewn with string and a large needle, and when the sacks were taken apart, small holes were left behind. Can you see the stitching on the edge of this pillowcase?)

Women had to compete for the bags, often bringing their able-bodied sons or husbands with them to the store to maneuver through a pile of heavy sacks to get to the bottom where the choice prints could be found. Rural wives, of course, had an advantage of plenty of bags on hand to feed their livestock. Others had to collect, save, and trade to have enough yardage for their projects.  Others bought larger bags called “empties” from bakers for only pennies a piece.

One 100-pound bag of feed netted a yard of 44 inch fabric. You can see how many bags would be needed for a large project or multiple clothing items.

Even President Calvin Coolidge, known for his frugality, benefited from the women’s enthusiastic creativity by receiving a gift of handmade flour-sack pajamas. It took five flour sacks to make the pajamas and were a show of support for his economic program.

During World War II, due to a shortage of cotton fabric, the government strongly encouraged use of the bags. Women sold their surplus bags for extra cash. After the war ended, rural women developed a sense of fashion from their frugality, and national sewing contests were held so they could show off their skills, netting prizes like expensive sewing machines, automobiles, or even a trip to Hollywood!

It’s easy to see how the cotton bags boosted the cotton industry.  Once the sacks were cleaned and readied for use, there were as comparable in quality and design as any new percale sold in stores, thanks to top textile designers from New York City and Europe who jumped on board to produce designs with colorfast dyes.  One of the earliest collections was by the Percy Kent Bag Company, still in business today in Missouri and have even done bag work for Disney films.

(Staley Milling Company of St. Louis and Kansas City was one of Percy Kent’s biggest customers. Here are packaged animal feeds in Percy Kent dress-print sacking.)

I don’t know that flour sack towels are used much to sew clothing these days, but they are the absolute best for drying dishes and being used in other ways in the kitchen.  They’re fun to use in crafts, too, like stamping, painting with paint pens, screen and digital printing, all things those 19th century grain mills and the cotton industry never dreamed of!

To win a set of these pretty flour sack towels, tell me how and if you use flour sack towels for anything besides drying dishes!

 

 

Have you gotten your copy of JOY TO THE COWBOY yet?  Book #2 of the Christmas Stocking Sweethearts series by the fillies!

She was sunshine. He was clouds.  Until a sprig of mistletoe changed everything.

Griff Marcello must live with the shame of the crime he once committed for his mobster father.  As he grows into a man, he’s found security as a cowboy living in Glory Hill, Nebraska, but the memory of his sin never leaves him.

Joyanna Hollinger is devoted to the community of Glory Hill, and with Christmas approaching, her plans for a special Christmas Eve service consumes her. All her efforts are falling into place–until she loses a key part of the celebration.

When Griff receives an unexpected gift from his former piano teacher, he never thinks her kindness will fill him with the spirit of Christmas, even when Joyanna needs him most.

Could the simplicity of a hand-stitched stocking and the Christmas carol tucked within chase away the clouds in his heart and warm him from the sunshine of Joyanna’s love?

#kindleunlimited

AMAZON

AUDIOBOOK

To stay up on our latest releases and have some fun, too, join our Facebook Reader Group HERE!

Christmas Stocking Sweethearts with Pam Crooks!

by

Book #2!

JOY TO THE COWBOY is the only story in our series with a guy on the cover, and I love the looks of him.  He’s just how I envisioned my cowboy (even though he is a little grumpy at first!)  Trust me, you’ll love him in the end as much as I do!

She was sunshine. He was clouds.  Until a sprig of mistletoe changed everything.

Griff Marcello must live with the shame of the crime he once committed for his mobster father.  As he grows into a man, he’s found security as a cowboy living in Glory Hill, Nebraska, but the memory of his sin never leaves him.

Joyanna Hollinger is devoted to the community of Glory Hill, and with Christmas approaching, her plans for a special Christmas Eve service consumes her. All her efforts are falling into place–until she loses a key part of the celebration.

When Griff receives an unexpected gift from his former piano teacher, he never thinks her kindness will fill him with the spirit of Christmas, even when Joyanna needs him most.

Could the simplicity of a hand-stitched stocking and the Christmas carol tucked within chase away the clouds in his heart and warm him from the sunshine of Joyanna’s love?

AMAZON

Also Available in Audiobook!

Yes, we know. It’s that time of year when we sometimes feel less kind than we should.

Re-write the sentence in red to something less naughty and more nice.  For example:

NAUGHTY:  “Grandma’s eggnog is too thick and chunky.”

NICE: “Isn’t it wonderful Grandma is still with us to make her eggnog?”

THE ELECTRIC BILL HAS GONE UP.

You might win this musical piano ornament, new this year from Hallmark!  

(I love how it looks just like the one on my cover. Even better, it plays “Joy to the World,” the carol I’d already chosen for JOY TO THE COWBOY!)

All entries will be eligible for our oh-so-beautiful Grand Prize, too!

Winners announced Sunday, December 15!

(USA Winners only, please.)

On the Hunt for a Villain by Pam Crooks

by

I’ve always had a fascination with the Mafia.  Be it my Italian heritage or the fact that I grew up in the 50s and 60s when the mob was prevalent in the news, their way of ‘doing business’ was shockingly at odds with their strong sense of family and faith.  Who doesn’t remember the infamous Baptism scene in “The Godfather” while Michael Corleone participates in the revered Catholic ceremony for his nephew, praising God and renouncing Satan, while at the same time his hitmen carry out orders to murder his enemies?

So as I was plotting my story for our Christmas Stocking Sweethearts series, I wanted my hero, Griff Marcello, to be plagued by his past. I wanted him to be as different from my heroine as I could make him. I wanted clouds and sunshine. And since I always have a villain in my books, I thought of having him commit a crime when he was younger, but it still troubles him when he’s older.

Of course, in the West, thieving, pistol-toting gangs abounded, but I was determined to find something different.  Since my book is set 1874, I wondered if the Mafia had infiltrated the United States yet. To my surprise and pleasure, they had, indeed.

The New Orleans Mafia put down their tentacles along the Gulf Coast and busied themselves with criminal activities like racketeering, extortion, gambling, prostitution, narcotics distribution, money laundering, loan sharking, fencing of stolen goods, and murder. The usual stuff, right? And not so different than their more modern-day counterparts.

In the mid-20th century, the Marcello crime family became notorious in New Orleans. Led by Carlos Marcello, who emigrated with his Sicilian parents in 1911 and settled in a decaying plantation outside of New Orleans along with his eight siblings, he eventually assumed the role of boss. The crime family wielded heavy influence until the 1980s when Marcello was sent to prison, and in spite of his downfall, it’s believed remnants of his Mafia remain in New Orleans today.

Remember those eight siblings I mentioned?  One of them was Anthony Marcello, who was far more elusive than his brother, Carlos. Thus, he became the perfect character as the father to my  hero, Griff.  And a shadowy villain, too.

Lest you think JOY TO THE COWBOY is something dark and un-Christmas-like, trust me, it’s not. The New Orleans mobster is only backstory, transplanted from another time, but what a cool villain he could be.  Stay tuned!

And now… drum roll, please!…I’m thrilled to share with you my book in the Christmas Stocking Sweethearts series!  We’ve only just launched the series, and you’re among the first to see!

She was sunshine. He was clouds.  Until a sprig of mistletoe changed everything.

Griff Marcello must live with the shame of the crime he once committed for his mobster father.  As he grows into a man, he’s found security as a cowboy living in Glory Hill, Nebraska, but the memory of his sin never leaves him.

Joyanna Hollinger is devoted to the community of Glory Hill, and with Christmas approaching, her plans for a special Christmas Eve service consumes her. All her efforts are falling into place–until she loses a key part of the celebration.

When Griff receives an unexpected gift from his former piano teacher, he never thinks her kindness will fill him with the spirit of Christmas, even when Joyanna needs him most.

Could the simplicity of a hand-stitched stocking and the Christmas carol tucked within chase away the clouds in his heart and warm him from the sunshine of Joyanna’s love?

Tropes:

Holiday Romance
Grumpy & Sunshine
First Love
Small Town
Sweet Historical Western

PREORDER NOW

All books in the Christmas Stocking Sweethearts series will be released during Cowboys & Mistletoe, starting December 1st. But you can preorder each one now.

See all the books on our SERIES PAGE ON AMAZON

Do you prefer a villain in your books?  Or do you prefer a story less suspenseful?  What’s your favorite kind of villain?  Scary or well-intentioned?  Do you have a favorite villain from a movie or a book?