Fortress Of Good Fortune

Title: Naked Cops II: The New Frontier (1/1)
Author: BradyGirl_12
Pairings/Characters: Adam Flint/Libby Kingston, Frank Arcaro/Adam Flint, John F. Kennedy/Jacqueline Kennedy
Fandom: Naked City
Genres: Angst, Drama, Historical
Rating: G
Warnings: None
Spoilers: None
Summary: A new decade. A new President. Will there be a new beginning for Frank and Adam, too?
Original DW/LJ Date Of Completion: March 8, 2025
Original DW/LJ Date Of Posting: March 14, 2025
Disclaimer; I don't own 'em, Screen Gems does, more's the pity.
Original DW/LJ Word Count: 2985
Feedback welcome and appreciated.
The entire series can be found here.

( The TV was on. The Capitol Building gleamed in the winter sunlight. )

This story can also be read on AO3.

Crossposts: https://bradygirl-12.livejournal.com/1589348.html

Amazing how six decades have passed since JFK's murder. That's well over half a century.

Those who weren't around during the days of JFK as President can't begin to understand the excitement and optimism of the New Frontier years. So brief, 1961-1963, two months short of three years. People believed thay could solve problems, maybe finally defeat poverty, make equality more than a pipe dream.

It didn't mean that life was perfect. People worried about nuclear war, and their fears almost came true in October 1962, but the world survived and JFK, having stared down into the nuclear abyss, started to think about thawing the Cold War. He did have plans to pull us out of Vietnam, bringing the advisors sent to teach the South Vietnamese home. For years people had said, "We don't know what he was thinking about Vietnam" but NSM-263, a National Security memo, clearly stated withdrawal of 1,000 troops by the end of 1963, complete withdrawal by 1965. That order was quietly reversed after his death. Instead American forces were built up to half a million in '65 by LBJ.

Was Oswald the lone gunman? Did he have help? Did he shoot at all from the Texas School Depository? I speculated on this here. Too many weird occurrences.

Another interesting tidbit: two women watching the motorcade from an upper-floor window in the Depository went downstairs immediately after the shooting. They neither saw nor heard Oswald running down from the sixth floor in order to get to the lunchroom where his supervisor and a Dallas motorcycle cop woukd find him seconds later. Oswald would have had to pass the women to get there in time as no elevators were working that day.

Ruth and Michael Paine, who had taken in Marina Oswald and her kids after her separation from Lee, were CIA. Ruth had gotten LHO the job at the Texas School Book Depository. Michael worked at Bell Helicopter, the company that would make millions during the Vietnam War.

The Secret Service detail in Texas went out drinking the night before, consuming white lightning at a Fort Worth club called The Cellar. Needless to say, their reflexes were terrible the next day. Not that they would have risked their lives for JFK at any rate. They hated him because he was a 'n'-lover', according to them (overheard by the first African-American agent, Abraham Bolden, assigned to the White House detail, handpicked by JFK).

On Friday, November 22, 1963, people were looking forward to the weekend, and Thanksgiving the following week. It was a good Friday with lots of promise until the news came from Dallas. And then on Sunday, November 24, 1963, the world got to watch TV's first live murder as Jack Ruby shot Lee Harvey Oswald in the basement of the Dallas Police Department, surrounded by hundreds of Dallas cops. Madness!

Who Benefited From JFK's Death?

So while you're in the midst of Thanksgiving preparations this Wednesday, take a moment to ponder what might have been.

Crossposts: https://bradygirl-12.livejournal.com/1573410.html

Title: Sparkling Stars XIII: Court-Martial (7/7)
Author: BradyGirl_12
Pairings/Characters: Mildred Hanover, El Plummer, John 'Max' Maxwell, Christy/Virgil, Joseph 'Happy' Haines, Lester Gruber, Harrison 'Tinker' Bell, Willy Moss, Molly Turner, Andrew Martin, Douglas Gray, Morton Dedrick, Thomas Jasco, Mike Bartowski, Billy Jurgens, Jack Kennedy, Jamie O'Shea, Quinton McHale, Arlen Spencer, Anne Belson
Fandom: McHale's Navy
Genres: Angst, AU, Drama, Historical, Hurt/Comfort
Rating (this chapter): G
Warnings: None
Spoilers: None
General Summary: The Garcia court-martial begins. Will Virgil and his fellow slaves finally get justice?
Chapter Summary: The verdict is delivered.
Date Of Completion: May 5, 2023
Date Of Posting: May 10, 2023
Disclaimer: I don’t own ‘em, Universal does, more’s the pity.
Word Count: 2370
Feedback welcome and appreciated.
The entire series can be found here.

( It was almost a festive atmosphere as people flowed toward the designated Quonset hut. All that was missing were vendors hawking peanuts and popcorn. )

This chapter can also be read on AO3.

Crossposts: https://bradygirl-12.livejournal.com/1562663.html

Title: Sparkling Stars XIII: Court-Martial (2/7)
Author: BradyGirl_12
Pairings/Characters: Elroy Carpenter, Wally Binghamton, El Plummer, Arlen Spencer, Anne Belson, Christy/Virgil, Quinton McHale, Chuck Parker, Joseph 'Happy' Haines, Harrison 'Tinker' Bell, Thomas Jasco, Morton Dedrick, Douglas Gray, Mike Bartowski, Jack Kennedy, Jamie O'Shea, Harrison Mencken, Molly Turner, John 'Max' Maxwell
Fandom: McHale's Navy
Genres: Angst, AU, Drama, Historical, Hurt/Comfort
Rating (this chapter): G
Warnings: None
Spoilers: None
General Summary: The Garcia court-martial begins. Will Virgil and his fellow slaves finally get justice?
Chapter Summary: The court-martial begins.
Date Of Completion: March 13, 2023
Date Of Posting: March 25, 2023
Disclaimer: I don’t own ‘em, Universal does, more’s the pity.
Word Count: 1753
Feedback welcome and appreciated.
The entire series can be found here.

( The hut was jammed with supporters of both sides. )

This chapter can also be read on AO3
.
Crossposts: https://bradygirl-12.livejournal.com/1558221.html

RIP, JFK

May 29, 1917-November 22, 1963

Anyone watch that dumpster fire last night called the presidential debate? Man, oh, man! Two doddering old fools vying for the White House. Biden was drifting around and the Cheeto-in-Chief showed what a ill-mannered clod he is, but people love that these days in our crude-and-rude culture. I didn't see all of it, popping in and out (after all it wasn't Nixon/Kennedy or even Carter/Reagan), but I saw enough.

Speaking of Nixon/ Kennedy, do yourself a favor and find the first 1960 debate on YouTube. You'll wonder what happened to us as a nation you watch two men respectfully debate each other, men who come across as mature, responsible adults (despite Nixon's make-up meltdown). They both served in World War II and had political experience.

Found it for you!

Highlights:

Watch on YouTube

Full debate:

Watch on YouTube

Cry for us!

Have you ever noticed that whenever someone proposes an alternate theory to the official conclusion as promulgated by the Warren Commission on John F. Kennedy's death (Lee Harvey Oswald did it by himself), the mainstream media goes into action labeling them 'kooks', 'nuts', and 'charlatans'?

When Oliver Stone made the movie JFK, he was viciously attacked even before the movie premiered. Any time CBS or the New York Times or Life Magazine (or any mainstream media) ever did a story on the assassination, they never entertained the possibility of a conspiracy.

Dan Rather, a fledgling reporter from WFAA-TV in Dallas on November 22, 1963, saw the Zapruder film soon after (the American public were denied that right until 1975 as the film was bought from Abraham Zapruder by Time-Life and locked away in their vaults) and declared that the President's head went violently forward (indicating the headshot came from the back) but as anyone watching the film from 1975 on can see, the movement was backward. Rather's career took off soon after, ultimately reaching a $6,000,000 paycheck as CBS Evening News anchorman. When asked why he had described the movement as forward, he said, "I must have blinked."

The famous muckraking reporters of the 19th century and first half of the 20th century are long gone. Clark Kent and Lois Lane would be ashamed. The biggest story of the 29th century was never really investigated by the American press. Why? View Operation Mockingbird (not Marvel's Bobbi Morse), about the CIA infiltration of American journalism:

"Conspiracy FACT #3: Operation Mockingbird" (Watch on YouTube)

I've been pretty excited the past week or so as I'm on the final edit of my professional manuscript. Whoo hoo! I was doing a final edit to catch typos and grammar mistakes and to add more details in, since this novel takes place in the past. I wasn't satisfied with the environment I'd created, so I figured a run-through would be a good thing.

It was! I caught a clue I'd dropped into the story but didn't do anything with, so now I have to decide if it fits into the narrative or just delete it. And my policeman character was mentioned as a detective in an early chapter but a patrolman in later chapters. Which one do I keep? I'm leaning toward patrolman so that he could do something dashing in a future novel to earn his promotion. Oh, did I mention this first novel is the first of a planned series? Maybe I'll never get it published, but I have ideas! :)

My fanfic writing has hit the valley in the peaks-and-valley landscape, so I decided to peruse my notebooks and dig out some old stories that for various reasons hadn't been posted. I will be presenting an oldie-but-goodie like Public Enemies, more stories from Battlestar: Galactica: TOS, and I'm finally polishing a draft I wrote soon after watching The Alienist last year. So there's all that, and a few short pieces that are new.

Mostly in the evenings I've been reading or watching YouTube videos. Periodically I like to delve into the JFK assassination and discover if anything new has been added, or if old info is presented in a new way. I'll probably be making some posts on that. We're living in the aftermath of a blatant coup d'etat that was carried out on November 22, 1963, and it isn't pretty, folks.

Fifty years ago today, the nightmare continued as Bobby Kennedy was shot in the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, five years after his brother Jack was murdered and only two months after Martin Luther King, Jr., was killed. He died 26 hours later on June 6th.

In 1968, the country was having a nervous breakdown breakdown, soaked in violence. The hope of the RFK candidacy for President was blown away by bullets. Another Dallas. Could RFK have gotten us out of Vietnam sooner? Maybe not, but he would have tried. The candidate who appealed to the poor, dispossessed, and those tired of the war was gone and Richard Nixon would win the Presidency.

Later generations can't conceive of the hope and excitement of that campaign in the midst of hate and chaos and a sense that the country was falling apart, or the awful, numbing horror of "Not again!"

What might have been?

I must not hang out in the right places on-line because I completely missed the first four episodes of Timeless. Saw nothing about them starting up again, and the only ads I've seen are for this Sunday's episode about JFK. The premise is that Rufus and Wyatt bring a 17-year-old JFK back to the present after a mission goes awry. Of course that presents the problem of how do they prevent JFK from learning his horrific fate on November 22, 1963? I'm going to tune into NBC this Sunday at 10:00 EDT to find out!

Anyway, I've been catching up on the eps I missed and am enjoying them thoroughly. I'll probably review them in one post once I finish No. 4. I highly recommend this show!

Lately I've been writing short pieces, which is good as I wasn't writing much there for awhile. The problem now is that I don't have the energy to edit! :)

Oh, well, I've got 10 stories in the Queue, so there should be a steady stream of new fic to post.

I watched Scoobynatural, the first and only time I'll watch Supernatural, mainly because modern horror is always filled with gore, and, yep, they had to do bloody things up for the Scooby gang, too. *sighs* But the episode was clever and I enjoyed it.