Collins, Max Allan - Nathan Heller 11
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In addition, I screened numerous Roswell documentaries (about half of which seemed to be hosted by Jonathan Frakes), including Alien Autopsy (Fact or Fiction), directed by Tom McGough and written by Robert Kiviat and Tom Seligson; and viewed the 1994 TV movie Roswell, an entertaining, somewhat fanciful adaptation by Arthur Kopit, Paul Davids and the film’s director, Jeremy Kagain, of the first Randle/Schmitt book; Forrestal is a secondary character in the melodrama, which hints that the former Secretary of Defense was murdered because he planned to tell the public about the aliens who were coming to invade the earth.
With very few exceptions, the characters in this novel appear with their real names, despite receiving varying degrees of fictionalization. A number of minor characters—Deputy Reynolds and Della Brown, for instance—are fictional but have one or more real-life counterparts. A liberty I’ve taken has been to have such witnesses as Glenn Dennis and Frank Kauffman—who did not come forward until many years later—discussing their experiences in 1949.
The romantic relationship between Glenn Dennis and Maria Selff is cited in many references, but—in more recent interviews, anyway—Dennis himself has begun to deny it. Furthermore, “Naomi Maria Selff”—which may be a Dennis-invented pseudonym for a woman whose existence some researchers doubt—is heavily fictionalized in this story. Perhaps the major liberty I’ve taken is depicting the nurse’s presence at Walker Air Force Base in 1949, when Glenn Dennis recalls her being transferred within days of the July 1947 incident. Dennis also claims that Selff was transferred to England and mail to her there was returned to him marked “deceased,” and that he was later told by mutual friends she had died in a plane crash. If Maria Selff actually ever existed—and researchers have for many years tried diligently to find her, or even proof of her existence—there is no evidence to suggest the intelligence work (or lively sex life, much less the violent death) I have invented for her in this novel has any basis in reality.
While Heller’s fictional interviews with Kaufmann, Dennis, and other witnesses such as Walter Haut and Frank Joyce are based upon actual interviews and statements these real people have given researchers over the years, their characterizations in the context of this novel should be viewed as fictionalized, and no negative reflection on any of these individuals is intended. There is, for example, no reason to think that Kaufmann in real life revealed the top-secret and/or classified material the fictionalized Kaufmann shares with Heller in this novel.
Dr. Joseph Bernstein is a fictional character, representing the very real influence and activities of Nazi scientists and doctors within the postwar U.S. government. In this novel Bernstein—in discussing patient Forrestal—occasionally utters sentiments similar to those spoken by Forrestal’s real psychiatrist, Dr. George Raines, who is not an onstage character in this book (though referred to); Bernstein is in no way a reflection of, or for that matter a fictionalized version of, Dr. Raines.
My portrayal of James Forrestal was influenced by two excellent biographies, Driven Patriot: The Life and Times of James Forrestal (1992) by Townsend Hoopes and Douglas Brinkley; and James Forrestal: A Study of Personality, Politics and Policy (1963) by Arnold A. Rogow. Driven Patriot provided much of the background used to develop my unflattering, but I hope sympathetic, portrait of Jo Forrestal. Also helpful were The Death of James Forrestal (1966) by Cornell Simpson, a conservative conspiracist’s take on Forrestal’s “murder” that provided many wonderful details unavailable elsewhere; The Forrestal Diaries (1951), edited by Walter Millis with the collaboration of E. S. Duffield; James Forrestal (1951) by Frank P. Leslie, an affectionate monograph by a Princeton classmate; and Men of the Pentagon: From Forrestal to McNamara (1966) by Carl W. Borklund.
My characterization of the perplexing Drew Pearson was drawn from material in numerous sources, including the first-rate, pro-Pearson Drew Pearson: An Unauthorized Biography (1973) by Oliver Pilat; Drew Pearson: Diaries 1949—1959 (1974), edited by his stepson, Tyler Abell; and an anti-Pearson diatribe, The Drew Pearson Story (1967) by Frank Kluckhohn and Jay Franklin. Perhaps the most enlightening material, however, came from Jack Anderson’s wonderful Confessions of a Muckraker (1979, written with James Boyd), which of course influenced the (somewhat fictionalized) Anderson characterization in this book, as well.
The whimsical portrait of Teddy Kollek—which may have little to do with the real man—is nonetheless drawn from the following sources: For Jerusalem: A Life (1978) by Teddy Kollek with his son, Amos Kollek; Every Spy a Prince (1990) by Dan Raviv and Yossi Melman; Friends in Deed (1994) by Yossi Melman; Return to Zion (1987) by Bodie Thoene; and numerous Internet articles.
My longtime collaborator, research associate George Hagenauer, searched out books and newspaper and magazine articles on topics including the Bethesda naval hospital, CIA mind control, the birth of Israel, the U.S. government’s recruitment of Nazis and much more; he also played advance scout, reading many of the Roswell books and sending me toward only the most worthwhile among them. Articles George uncovered included a 1942 Scientific American article, “The Progress of Science—National Naval Medical Center” by Commander Frederick C. Greaves; “Citadel of Navy Medicine” by Sidney Shalett, New York Times Magazine, April 18, 1943; “Spare Parts of Human Bodies” by Milton MacKaye, The Saturday Evening Post, December 23, 1950; and “Pools of Healing,” Time, August 22, 1955. George, your engraved silver cup is in the mail (stay away from the windows).
Three other good friends helped with research matters: writer Joe Collins (no relation), who dug up material on V-2s and other experimental rocketry, and provided last-minute weapons training; booking detective Lynn Meyers, who located an elusive Forrestal monograph, among other things; and my right-hand man on my film Mommy’s Day, Steven Henke, who shared his research and thoughts relating to his own in-progress documentary on early rocketry (and the German scientists involved therein), not to mention providing a copy of the FBI’s annotated Majestic Twelve documents (every page is boldly marked “BOGUS”). Additional books that aided in the writing of this novel include Blowback (1988), Christopher Simpson; Capitol Hill in Black and White (1986), Robert Parker with Richard Rashke; The Man Who Got Capone (1976), Frank Spiering; New Mexico: Off the Beaten Path (1991), Todd Staats; Operation Mind Control (1978), Walter Bowart; The Search for the “Manchurian Candidate” (1979), John Marks; Smithsonian Guide to Historic America: The Desert States (1990), Michael S. Durham; Stuart Symington (1960), Paul I. Wellman; Trading with the Enemy (1983), Charles Higham; Treasury Agent (1958), Andrew Tully; Truman (1992), David McCullough; The United States Secret Service (1961), Walter S. Bowen and Harry Edward Neal; Virtual Government (1997), Alex Constantine; Washington Goes to War (1988), David Brinkley; Washington Lowdown (1956), Larston D. Farrar; Where I Stand (1966), Hank Greenspun with Alex Pelle; Winchell (1971), Bob Thomas; and World Without Cancer (1974), G. Edward Griffin. As has often been the case in the past, various WPA Guides were extremely beneficial, specifically those for the District of Columbia (both the 1937 and 1942 versions) and New Mexico (1940). And I would especially like to acknowledge the lively Washington Confidential (1951) by Jack Lait and Lee Mortimer.
I would again like to thank editors Joseph Pittman and Michaela Hamilton for giving Nate Heller and his creator the opportunity to enjoy the classic Mickey Spillane Dutton/Signet imprimatur; and of course Dominick Abel, my friend and agent, who went to bat for his author with characteristic tenacity, courage and loyalty.
With the magic of her patience and love, my talented wife helped me through this particularly harrowing race to make deadline in the midst of a chaotically busy year, protecting and advising me as only she can. Nate Heller has many women, and so do I: but mine are all named Barbara Collins.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo Credit: Bamford Studio
Max Allan Collins has earned fifteen Private Eye Writers of America “Shamus” nominations, winning for his Nathan Heller novels, True Detective and Stolen Away, and receiving the PWA life achiev
ement award, the Eye. His graphic novel, Road to Perdition, which is the basis of the Academy Award-winning film starring Tom Hanks, was followed by two novels, Road to Purgatory and Road to Paradise. His suspense series include Quarry, Nolan, Mallory, and Eliot Ness, and his numerous comics credits include the syndicated Dick Tracy and his own Ms. Tree. He has written and directed four feature films and two documentaries. His other produced screenplays include “The Expert,” an HBO World Premiere. His coffee-table book The History of Mystery received nominations for every major mystery award and Men’s Adventure Magazines won the Anthony Award. Collins lives in Muscatine, Iowa, with his wife, writer Barbara Collins. They have collaborated on seven novels and numerous short stories, and are currently writing the “Trash ‘n’ Treasures” mysteries.