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Winter
Wolves of Haden County
dedicated to
Eddie Bailey who said fiction was all I ever wrote
Introducing,
The Winter Wolves of Haden County
...the serialized
account of the multi-generational political
families running a quadrant of counties in
Southern Illinois.
There
are
102
counties within the Great State of Illinois, each
typically governed by 29 commissioners .
Within the Great State of Illinois exist two political
realities:
Cook County of the legendary Democratic political machine
and Downstate, a hotbed of Republican conservative farmers.
Noteworthy in Haden County is a uniquely popular Democrat,
William Wolf, president of Haden's Board of Commissioners.
In the opening chapter Commissioner Wolf is under unlikely
consideration for Lieutenant Governor.
"It's
happening!
It's
happening now!" Shelby Wolf texts
Kyle Grosen in the opening chapter.
The step-daughter of William Wolf and
the son of
Haden County's state's attorney had been playmates since
toddlerhood. They'd met in the various styled cloak rooms
and back rooms of their parents' parties and meetings
since before Shelby was a Wolf.
There was no doubt in either of the
teenagers' minds
they would follow in their parents footsteps.
Once
a
Reporter,
Always a
Reporter
Once
I was a straight reporter.
Then my husband became a politician.
That made me a political spouse with bad habits,
some of which are exposed here.
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In the last quarter of the 20th
century St. Mary’s County Maryland still had outhouses, tobacco farms,
fishing villages and plantations. Dozens of skipjacks still visited in
the wintertime.
One
of the last live
radio stations
in America carried the only available daily news. There were a couple
of traffic signals, a couple of dress shops, small community grocery
stores and a Navy base that most military personnel considered a
hardship posting.
Still, just as the first
English settlers
had determined 350 years before, there were always some who saw the
remote and marshy peninsulas for what it is: a
marketable paradise.
St.George
Island 
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Born a third the
way into the 18-year Boom
1952-ers travel just ahead of the crest of the
wave.
We are the froth.
.......and that has made all
the difference.
(with apologies to Mr. Frost)
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