Stories Told As Lies in the 1950s

That's right, lies, my friends. Lies!!!

Recently, we received a piece of mail at work with the stamp located at right. That is R. Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983), inventor, professor, and science man extrodonaire. He is being honored by the U.S. Postal Service for his contributions to society during his lifetime. This included the geodesic dome which is what his head is superimposed on in the stamp. I'll spare you the details of what exactly a geo-dome is you can google search it if you so desire.

That's what Amy and I did. Unfortunately, we were sucked in to a little tale called A Visit To Black Mountain by Joe Lewis. This is considered a "story about Bucky" which is what R. Buckminster Fuller's friends called him, we learned.

Now when I read "story about Bucky" I assume it will be a true story full of crazy scientist anecdotes. I was shocked to find out that this story was just a woven web of lies regarding a young boy named Jacob who wanders into the black mountains and finds crazy scientist Bucky tinkering away in his geodome.

Bucky welcomes him into Black Mountain College where he becomes a student of new invention things. At one point Bucky and Jacob enter a room with a piano that makes music that sounds like "tinks and plunks." It is discovered that this is no average piano but a prepared piano by John Cage who describes playing it as being "in control of a percussion orchestra."

The stories falsities were tell-tale with lines like:

But in the twinkling of an eye his boredom was gone.

"Just call me Bucky," smiled the inventor, as Jacob ran off to Aunt Nan's and Uncle Ted's.

"I'm pleased to meet you, Mr. Cage. Do you mind if I ask a question?"

At that moment another man sprang into the room wearing tight black pants, a tee shirt, and no shoes.

Anni and Josef had to leave their homeland of Germany when the Nazi Party took control of Germany.

They would take their pie out in front of their small cabin after dinner and talk the night away.

Raleigh seemed so out-of-date now, so plain and unexciting.



In fact, we learn that Anni teaches weaving. Maybe she wove this web of lies.

In the author's defense, she included the small print at the bottom:

I took these historical liberties in order to introduce readers to the wonderful array of individuals who did visit and or teach at that very special college. Also I wanted to enliven the summer of 1948 as seen through the eyes of my fictional character Jacob Moore.

Got some free time? Read this wonderful tale. Have a lot of free time? Act it out with your friends.