My Portfolio

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   What’s the Address of the Devil’s Tower?   Most young adults these days know enough about GPS technology to find a street address in a strange city by just looking it up on a smartphone, an...

Whether my memory matches reality or is tainted by the slings and arrows of a long, rough-roaded lifetime, I do not have a lot of “good” memories of childhood Christmases.    I recollect a rather peculiar one and I painfully remember an extremely stressful one, both of which are stories already on...

Guns Take Their Toll Posted by Dick Pellek in Tragedy On the road again..! Acer rubrum To Zyzyphus jujuba Essays, Stories, Adventures, Dreams Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Guns Take Their Toll In these times of a national subconscious fear about the next mass shooting, we all...

While driving my jaunty  Explorer Sportrac, which my wife has named “Sassy Red,”  to the dealer some thirty miles away for its scheduled  maintenance, I passed some long-familiar scenes.  My mind began drifting, conjuring an image of life as it was sixty to seventy years ago.  God, how I long for...

Herman Hendrik Thiessens was born January 1, 1919 at 1051 Downington Avenue in Salt Lake City, Utah.  He was the second son born to Herman Thiessens and Henderika Folkers.  He was given an LDS Blessing May 2, 1920 by LeGrande Richards at Sugar House Ward, Granite Stake. Five years later, the...

Leola Rae Dalley Hatch just celebrated her 90th birthday with 93 people.  She was born October 3, 1925 in Minersville, Utah in her grandparent's home.  Her parents, Leland and Zola Dalley, lived in Summit which is north of Cedar City. She is the oldest of five childredn; she had three brothers...

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Adventures In Banking   Among the many small decisions one makes when mapping out their life, some of them are truly inconsequential but others develop into long-lasting, practical choices.  A person may wish to drive a...

On the road…again!!! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek TDY   Getting out of the house once in a while is a desire that resembles an itch. Most people get that itch to travel on occasion, and soldiers confined to a military bases are no different. ...

As a Vietnam vet, I find it easier to share war stories with fellow vets than with non-vets. But there's a lot more to military life than the worst of the worst. And since only a small fraction of veterans ever see actual combat, there are lots of fascinating stories to...

On the road …again!! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek    Stupid Coconut!   When the senior Swiss researcher saw a coconut that had washed ashore at high tide, he was delighted to know that he would soon have a fresh snack.  Despite being in a...

Acer rubrum To Zyzyphus jujuba Essays, Stories, Adventures, Dreams Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek     Change Your Razor Blade—On Demand   Sometimes finding a news story to comment on is not always an obvious topic of interest to everyone. An essay about razor blades is far from...

"Meet you at the roller skating rink."  Arland LeRoy and Ilean Hazel did just that.  They met at the Roller Skating Rink at the Spanish Fork City Park. Arland was born on January 8, 1926 in the family home in Salem, located on the corner of 100 East and Hazel Drive....

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   The Baby and the Bathwater   The continuously improving technologies of digital coding and wireless communications via computer have opened up opportunities for individuals that most of us do not fully appreciate.  As the innovators, techies,...

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   The Golok   Shortly after his arrival on the tiny island of Pulau Peucang in 1975, one of his Indonesian counterparts mentioned that if the Footloose Forester intended to go into the forest, he needed to...

Aylene Christensen was born August 9, 1927 in the family home in Benjamin, Utah.  Her parents were Charles Arlynn Hickman and Delta Larsen Hickman.  She was the baby of the family with two older brothers and two older sisters.  Her mother passed away at age 39 when Aylene was a young...

  On the road… again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Let’s Go Shake The Apple Tree   The Bengal Tiger was already in the branches of the Pennsylvania apple tree in the autumn of 2015 when she connected with the expression she had used...

PREFACE:  This is the second memoir of a multi-year experience that had a definite impact on my later life.  I want to stress that I am sharing these experiences in an effort to give some testimony to the way God has worked in my life and not in any sort of...

In rummaging through my bookshelf recently selecting books I could donate to our church’s garage sale I came across a collection of stories my next oldest brother, Gene, had written as a columnist for the weekly newspaper in the town in which he grew up  He grew up living in and...

We'd like to introduce you to Beverly Faretta.  She was born December 12, 1931.  She was born and raised in the family home at 555 East 200 South, Provo [Utah]. Her parents were Ervin and Minnie Bell Brailsford.  They lived in this this home until she was 12; then they moved...

Marion Robert Morrison aka John Wayne (1907-1979) John Wayne was a larger-than-life movie hero, but his ancestors were the same type and could have fit right into his film roles, according to a Utah genealogical research company. Research International was in the midst of work on a book about Wayne's ancestors...