Hamilton Stark

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IT DIDN’T OCCUR TO ME to write a novel with A. As the prototype for its hero, Hamilton Stark, until fairly recently, a year ago this spring, when I drove the forty miles from my home in Northwood across New Hampshire to his home outside the town of B. Upon written invitation (via post card, as was his habit), I was on my way to visit him for the afternoon and possibly the evening. The post card read:

4/12/74. If you don’t show up here Sat. with a fifth of CC and a case of Molson I’ll stop up your plumbing with my toe. Number 5 has gone back to Mother and I’ve gone back to my old habits. Bring me a box of 30.06 rifle shells too. We’ll do some shooting. A.

Typically, he had typed his message, and the four-color photograph printed on the reverse side was of a building he had helped construct, in this case a Tampax factory in the southwestern part of the state. A. was a pipefitter with a wide range of practical engineering skills, and on that job he had been the foreman for all the plumbing, heating and air-conditioning systems.

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