Biography for

Howard Popowski

A mere half century. Who would have thunk it?

After graduation from BHS I attended Defiance College. There I met my wife Judy (her name is Mary Judith, but everyone calls her Judy; except me, who calls her She-Who Must Be Obeyed) on Freshman Night. We were married on a date easy for both of us to remember, January 2, 1963. There is no such thing as forgetting 1-2-3. We've been together since. Our son Alan (46), a former Marine, is a purchasing agent for Franklin International in Columbus. His daughter, Chelsea, graduated from Muskingum in 2009 and is now in the University of Cincinnati Nurse Practitioner master's program. Grandson, Zack, a 2009 grad from Westfall HS, is in the Marine Corps. Alan lives about a mile from us.

From 1966 until 1977, I carried mail, was a partner in Defiance Shooter's Supply, a partner in All-American Racing (IHRA & NHRA National Record Holders 1972-74, Winner, Winter Nationals, 1973). Judy graduated in 1965 while I went to work for Johns-Manville. She taught languages for a year, then started a career with the Ohio Job Service as a councilor. Her career brought us to Columbus in 1978, the day after my graduation. After thirteen years with JM I went back to Defiance College and finished the last semester of my senior year, ending up with a degree in Museum Science, and majors in History and English. I began a MS program at Wright State but when my advisor, Dr. Becker, retired without notice, I was assigned the one professor in the department proud to be a card carrying member of the Communist Party. Not wishing to serve hard time for what would be inevitable, I dropped out and haven't regretted it-Joliet is cold in the winter.

I went to Ohio Hysterical Society; Judy to OBES Central Office. I left OHS after the completion of the Ohio Labor History Project and took a position with Harrisburg Steel (HARSCO) ending up as Sectional Door Superintendent. When HARSCO decided to move my plant to Mississippi, I decided to stay in Columbus and took the Managing Editor's assignment with The Camp Chase Gazette Magazine, meanwhile beginning to freelance articles to anywhere that would pay. To keep up my museum skills I did hand bookbinding. Next I became the Editor of Blue and Gray Magazine until my father passed away and was then kept busy settling his estate.

In the early 80s I was one of the founders of The Mudsills, a Civil War Living History group working closely with the National Park Service to present programs to the public. We were the first civilian organization to be allowed to bear arms and demonstrate firing on National Parks and other Federal Lands. We were participants in the Carter Inaugural (1977) and the Second Reagan Inaugural (1985). We mustered almost five-hundred members, including a four-gun, horse drawn artillery battery and a troop of mounted cavalry, not to mention a four-hundred man infantry battalion. I started out in the infantry but made the switch to the field music for the 125th Anniversary Civil War events (1985-1989). At the same time I played field music with the 1st American Regiment (1987-1996) participating in all of the Anthony Wayne Bicentennial events in Western Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky. We furled the colors at Fort Niagara, New York, in 1996. We used the original day-book from 1796 and duplicated the bicentennial of the fort's turn-over from the British to the minute, playing the same music and using the same ceremonies and words.

The living history and field music led naturally to roles in several motion pictures-some even worthy of remembering the titles-NORTH AND SOUTH, BLUE AND GRAY, GEORGE WASHINGTON, LAST OF THE MOHICANS. GLORY, GETTYSBURG, and GODS AND GENERALS. For most of them all I can add is the checks did not bounce.

Meanwhile, In 1985 I switched to commercial/business writing and remained in that field until 1990 when I bought out Heritage Books in Columbus, and began traveling the book and paper show circuit. Part of the buy-out was a garage filled with militaria. So I added military shows to the activities. I averaged 40-45 shows a year from 1990-1999. That, in turn, led to a franchise with GRACO Awards-medals and insignia-which I held until 2007, when I decided enough already and shut down the business and went back to my first love, writing. My first novel, ALL A YOUNG MAN COULD ASK FOR, published in 2007, the second, HAYA SAFARI, in 2008 and the third, THE CHOSEN ONES, should be out before the end of 2010-my editor has the manuscript and is in the process of tearing it to shreds even as I write. There are about ten other books in the pipeline, so all I have to do is last long enough to finish them.

I am still involved with the Camp Chase Fifes and Drums, but the carpal tunnel makes it nearly impossible to play a six-hole fife with three fingers. I still do the treasurer's job and have become the shipping point for our CDs of which there are now four, with a fifth in planning. Judy retired in 1997 and is a home-body par excellence. We sold our house and moved into an apartment in 2002, mostly due to the arthritis in my knees and hips, and the carpal tunnel in my hands. Judy also has some health issues, though I don't know who issued them to her. We have always been cat people, though we are now down to a mere four, having lost our seventeen year old fur-ball last week.

We travel as much as possible, mostly to walk on the turf that I write about. Hope to see all at the 50th.