MEETING DR. BROWN

[Neenie]

OK, they need to be short! Mrs. Brown worked with Linda in the town office on Island. Worked w/ machine that read sidereal radiation. Linda was a great friend.

[Neenie]

Dr. and Mrs. Brown were renting on Coronado.

[Mark Culpepper]

Neenie, Mark (the teach) here,

I hope that glitch doesn't continue with your computer. I hate that!

I have lost messages too, don't ask me how that all happens, I'll leave that for others to understand. Just know that we all appreciate any messages you get out to us. As I said before it is a wonderful thing being able to talk to someone who actually knew the Browns. I have grown to really understand that they must have been special people. I just finished a post in the section (the Life of Townsend Brown) which turned out to be longer than I had expected. My main question was WHERE did Townsend Brown travel. I know that Paul will eventually tell us what he was doing (to the best of his ability) but I just got curious about all the different places that this couple chose to visit. You mentioned Coronado ... so I should go back and add that to the list. And then Pat , I think, said something about Dr. Brown wanting to go to Hawaii and Josephine saying "No". Was he talking about MOVING there? Can you remember? And Josephine didn't want to leave the island? Who could blame her! Thanks Neenie. Lob those answers out there and maybe you will get past that computer grinch! Mark

[Neenie]

Mark, I remember Linda telling me she went to 48 schools from 1-12. The last 2 years she stayed in the same school. Dr. Brown lived in San Francisco and Hawaii. Also the places Linda went to school. She never listed those. That's living out of a, a suit case! Neenie

[Victoria Steele]

Neenie,

FORTY-EIGHT SCHOOLS!
I know I read that somewhere about Linda Brown but I think I just discounted it somehow because I just couldn't in my mind actually figure how that could even be possible! Did she ever mention any friends from her school days? How could she even make and keep friends? My God!, thats .... ( my math isn't terrific but even I can come up with 4.8 schools a year! ..... five different moves a year, that averages to ....... about a move every two and a half months!) You are not kidding, living out of a suitcase!

And did you ever wonder WHY all of those moves? That would be first on my list of questions. And now my heart goes out to her even more because with that I know she never had a chance really to have a "first crush" or get to know the boy down the street, like I did. And so when Paul writes about her attraction finally to this boy she meets in High school (THIS MORGAN FELLA AS I HAVE COME TO CALL HIM) well ... how upsetting would that have been? to FINALLY find someone and then have to leave again. It makes my heart ache! Victoria

[Mark Culpepper]

This question is for Patrick,

This day has been spent looking over what Paul has written so far and looking over the wonderful posts. Patrick I have more questions for you.

When you were working there at Bird Park, were you Dr. Browns only assistant? I know that Linda was supposed to be his right hand person, was she still working up at the Bird Park with you or did she stay at the office that Neenie mentioned downtown? I am trying to figure where that might have been because I spent some time there during those years and I am kicking myself for not knowing anything about the Browns at the time. I would have loved to have met them.

Neenie just mentioned that Linda had moved so many times during her school years and that she was there on Catalina too. Was she on Catalina before the Browns moved over? Is that perhaps why they moved to the Island? ... just a passing thought ... thanks ! Mark

[Neenie]

Linda said she didn't make friends at school, so books became her friends.
She came over after the Browns were there. She brought her new baby, Jennifer. The baby carriage was the old fashion type. She worked in town.
(Hope this is short enough) Neenie

[Mark Culpepper]

Neenie,

Your message came through loud and clear.

You say that the Browns were there before Linda moved over with her daughter. Well, I can't say that I would blame her. I would move over to that island in a hot moment. And I can understand that the Browns would have been very pleased to have their grandchild there.

You had mentioned the office downtown so I am assuming that Linda continued the work for her Dad at that office . And Patrick mentioned that he was taking care of the Bird Park, which Dr. Brown had "taken over" to become some sort of business with fogless mirrors. Have I got it right so far?

OK ... I am really onto this thing now because I realized that there are MANY unanswered questions. Of course Paul is probably headed here in his biography and I know he is working hard at presenting the facts but I find this fascinating being able to communicate on a one to one with someone who knew the Browns. I still have the question ... WHY DID THEY MOVE TO THE ISLAND? Did they ever mention that?

I appreciate the fact that Linda considered books her friends. I am very much the same way, for much the same reason. I moved alot when I was a kid and didn't have time to make many friends either so I have a feel for what she was going through. Paul has mentioned that "she wrote in her journal. Do you remember that at all. Was she still keeping a journal when you met her? Thanks Neenie, don't mean to sound so insistant but this is really interesting to me. Mark

[Neenie]

Yes, Linda got me into writing in a journal. We also picked flowers to press and make cards and bookmarks. Dr. Brown decided to move to the Island and accomplished it in a long weekend. I don't think Linda even knew why the move to the island, but he seemed to love islands. Neenie

[Mark Culpepper]

Hi Neenie!

You said "Dr. Brown decided to move to the island and accomplished it in a long weekend." Again, I think an indication of many things. Number one, that he was very capable of switching places quickly and number two ..... Josephine obviously went along with all of this moving ... ( and this is added to the moves that Linda kept track of because I think her count was only schools that she had attended.)

Paul, am I cutting into your story telling process here by asking where Dr. Brown was before he moved to Catalina? and it came up on the last Chapter that they had lived in Nassau too ...

Suddenly the thought strikes me ... was this a protective situation? How quickly were these moves accomplished I wonder and again WHY? Not many people would look on Catalina Island for a scientist of his calibre? Would they? Or is Avalon bursting at the seams with people keeping that kind of a low profile.

I just can't get over the fact that he would try to develop for the market electric mirrors for the shower. Sounds doomed to failure, I don't care how safe they might have been. Surely he would have known that, or as I said before, did he not care? Mark

[Paul S.]

Just don't want you all to think I'm ignoring these threads...

Paul, am I cutting into your story telling process here by asking where Dr. Brown was before he moved to Catalina? and it came up on the last Chapter that they had lived in Nassau too ...

Yeah, that bit of info was a tad out of sequence, but I needed that seed for a bit of a sprout that is going to take root later. I almost "cut into" my own story line, but I think the point needed to be made.

Suddenly the thought strikes me ... was this a protective situation? How quickly were these moves accomplished I wonder and again WHY?

That's a possibility, but I suspect there is more to the Catalina move than just that. The Nassau residence was relatively brief, and he stayed for a number of years on Catalina (although he moved back and forth to the island over the last few years of his life, as well).

I don't think Linda was as directly involved in whatever work he was doing (i.e. the electric mirror project) while on Catalina, certainly not as involved as she was earlier. Linda and her husband had a mechanics operation and kept all the machinery on the island running for many years. I think that was enough for them.

Not many people would look on Catalina Island for a scientist of his calibre? Would they? Or is Avalon bursting at the seams with people keeping that kind of a low profile.

Yeah, Islands can be like that... refuges. You never know when the guy falling off the bar stool next to you is a billionaire...

I just can't get over the fact that he would try to develop for the market electric mirrors for the shower. Sounds doomed to failure, I don't care how safe they might have been. Surely he would have known that, or as I said before, did he not care?

Well, thank god he wasn't trying to develop an in-the-tub electric hair dryer.

My guess is that your instinct is basically correct, and that the "electric mirror" project was not really where his interests lay during that period. A lot of things Brown did, a lot of what we "know" about him, was "cover" for the things we don't know and may never learn.

And, Neenie, thanks so much for your input here. It is great to have some comments from somebody like yourself who has such a personal take on TTB and Josephine.

--PS

[Neenie]

Hi Mark & Paul- Patrick said Dr. Brown felt this was his easiest patent he had and he wanted the cash flow it would generate for his other projects. Alas, he didn't accomplish that goal.
Victoria - Linda is a positive soul who had to get use to not trying to "cling"

[Trickfox]

Hi Mark & Paul- Patrick said Dr. Brown felt this was his easiest patent he had and he wanted the cash flow it would generate for his other projects. Alas, he didn't accomplish that goal.
Victoria - Linda is a positive soul who had to get use to not trying to "cling"

Neenie, I guess that means that Dr. Brown was still developing his other projects as late as the 1980s.

Is that correct?

Raymond

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Hi Neenie and Raymond,

I am sort of butting into your communication here because I do have an answer to Raymonds question ... If you get a chance re read Pauls "Prologue:Every Cabbie in Catalina"

Once you have looked at that again you will see that he was still very active with his "other projects". Linda has told Paul that at that time she did not know where he had gone, who he was planning to meet or even why it was so important for him to hand carry those papers away. Paul wrote .........

"With that Linda let her Father go, but she would spend the rest of her life wondering what was in those papers, that was so important .... and so confidential .... that he had to hand deliver them. And she would wonder just who they had to be delivered to. Nearly two decades would pass before she would get so much as a clue."...........

(Making it easier for those who havent yet read that section I think that some of us who are following Morgans footsteps in this story will appreciate this last paragragh). "Later that morning, after the helicopter landed in Long Beach, Dr. Brown was met by the car that would ferry him to the private charter flight that would take him to San Antonio. As the car approached he peered through the windshield, pleased to see the familiar face of Morgan, the protege he had recruited twenty years earlier. who would serve as his escort for the trip to his final destination."......

So Raymond .... whatever Dr. Brown was doing at the time .... he was still active .... right up to just a week or so before his death in 1985.

[Trickfox]

Ok, that's right I do remember reading about this earlier. I had forgotten about it, and I was wondering about it as I noticed everyone's post in this pool.

Thanks Elizabeth.

Raymond