These
are the first words I wrote on what I thought would be a short tour
through the life of Palos Verdes founder Frank Vanderlip. Little did I
know what a long and eventful journey I had just begun.
Nine
months later, I published a book that weighs in at almost 400 pages.
Could have had a baby in that time - instead, I had Frank. I learned a
lot about a lot of rather obscure (to me, at least) subjects. The
Chicago Exposition, President Garfield's funeral, the Spanish-American
War, the Haymarket Riots, several Bank Panics, segregation in 1900s
Washington D.C., peafowl, Teapot Dome, the Great Kanto Earthquake. And,
of course, the Federal Reserve.
On each subject, I had to
absorb enough knowledge to be able to explain several points to a reader
such as myself - why each fact was important not only in Frank's life,
but why it was important to the reader. It wasn't just Frank's story; it
was the story of 70 years of our country's history as seen from his
perspective.
Now that "Frank A. Vanderlip - The Banker Who
Changed America" is finished, Frank has, so to speak, a new lease on
life. As I travel and lecture all over the country in places that he
developed and where he lived and worked, a new generation is learning
about his important role in forming America as we know it today. At the
same time, I am learning even more about the man by visiting sites he
knew well and walking, almost literally, in his footsteps. It is
surprising to see how many of the places he knew and loved are so
unchanged from his time, even going back to his birth 150 years ago.
This series will walk in my footsteps as I follow in his. The entries
will not be chronologically posted according to Frank's life, as I never
know where and when I will give my next talk in a place Frank formerly
experienced. We (the readers and I) will see places that Frank saw, and
meet a wonderful cast of present day inhabitants, including archivists,
historians, and the full range of people who now live with or in the
environments Frank created. We will investigate stories found after the
book's publication, as well as some that were not included in it.
