I hope the radio programs I’ve recently appeared on aren’t as unpopular or unknown as this blog appears to be, or I am truly spinning my wheels.  On Aug. 5 I was on the Firebase Network Veterans Hour on the Stardust Radio Network with host Rick Townsend, and Deanna Spignola invited me on to talk to her for two hours Aug. 20 on her daily program, “Spignola Speaks,” on the Republic Broadcasting Network.

Both went as well as could be expected, having last done radio in the mid-1980s.  It was good practice for my Sept. 4 date with Phil Williams of Knoxville’s WOKI 98.7 FM, likely the top afternoon-drive show here, and a real opportunity for a breakthrough.  I never thought he would actually schedule me, but I finally got the official invite on Friday.  Will be on Firebase again tomorrow night for an hour.

Joel Freedman is doing great work on behalf of Truth at Last.  He placed a letter to the editor of The Banner Independent, of Booneville, Mississippi, in the same Prentiss County neighborhood as smaller Baldwyn, where Earskin Nabers lived most of his life, and where he died in 2006 at 82.  Freedman’s letter ran at the top of the Opinion section on August 16.

After stating his belief that Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan “were captured and tortured by the Japanese” and died on Saipan, Freedman wrote that he was “impressed by Campbell’s account of the importance of World War II Marine Corps veteran Erskine Nabers in finding the truth about Earhart. … “Campbell describes Nabers as ‘a soft-spoken, low-key individual, content in his quiet life of work and devotion to family in the obscurity of small-town Mississippi.’

“Campbell explains, ‘As a radio message code clerk in the communications center of the 8th Marine Regiment on Saipan in July 1944, Nabers decoded the top-secret message announcing the discovery of Amelia Earhart’s Electra in a hangar at Aslito Field. . . . “After his death,” Freedman continued, “I can almost imagine Nabers’ spirit was greeted by the spirits of Earhart and Noonan, who thanked him for his courage and honesty, on their behalf.  When I read a good book, I often learn about people I wish I had met during their lifetime.  Earskin Nabers is one of these people.”