The latest news from Eckhartz Press, and a chance to peek into some of the great previous offerings from our humble little publishing company.
=The books are in! We'll be shipping them out this coming weekend to everyone who pre-ordered. If you pre-ordered, and you're planning on attending this Thursday's launch party, you can pick it up there.
=So what are the details for Randy Merkin's launch party this week?
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=We could feel the excitement building before we even got to Denver for the world premiere of the movie My Father, Dick Allen
=And it ended up even better--surpassing our wildest expectations. What an exciting weekend the Chili Dog MVP gang had last weekend in Denver. Some highlights from the World Premiere of My Father, Dick Allen....
=Another famous member of the 1972 White Sox, featured in the book Chili Dog MVP, is celebrating a birthday this week. Carlos May (May 17) is the only player to have his birthday on his jersey. He was #17. (Photo: Eckhartz publisher Rick Kaempfer with Carlos).
=Special thanks to Elizabeth Hess at Chambana Today for this piece...
=By the way, Bob's book has now officially been available for a year. He's still out there hustling. If only we could clone him.
=A few photos from Friday's appearance at the North Shore Senior Center. If you ever want to hear some rock and roll stories, nobody's got better ones than Carl and Larry Rosenbaum. There was only one microphone so they swapped it back and forth.
=By the way, if you were at the latest Springsteen show and you heard him wax philosophic about his first appearance in Chicago in 1974, Carl and Larry promoted that event. ("Only we could lose money on a Bruce Springsteen concert," Carl said.)
=This week's birthday boy was a favorite of The Flip Side owners. Happy birthday (May 18) to keyboardist Rick Wakeman (Yes). There he is in the middle, flanked by Carl (left) and Larry (right) Rosenbaum.
=We have another big book launch party coming in a few weeks. On Thursday May 28 from 6:30-8pm, Vicki Atkinson is hosting her book launch party for Slivers. Slivers is a supernatural novel set in a grand old house, so naturally the book launch party will be at the Barrington White House (145 W. Main Street, Barrington). A comparison of the two houses...
=The big official launch party of Last Comiskey happened this week in 2024 (May 16). Among the celebrity guests appearing at this one; White Sox greats Ron Kittle, Jack McDowell and Donn Pall, moderator Tom Shaer, author Ken Smoller, filmmaker Matt Flesch, and the aforementioned Organist Nancy Faust.
=Ken was also a contributor to the My Father, Dick Allen movie and was in Denver with us this past weekend. (So was Nancy Faust). Ken ended up spending his time hanging out with Goose Gossage.
=On the other side of town, EveryCubEver is still selling well. Get your copy of the 7th edition.
=This week in 2019, EveryCubEver author Rick Kaempfer met life-long Cubs fan George Will and gave him a first edition copy of EveryCubEver.
=A little birdy told us that John Landecker is going to be featured in the next edition of Illinois Entertainer. Look for it on June 1st.
=Just a few months after the release of his book, John Landecker's former boss Paul Drew died. Drew famously asked Landecker to stop using his real name (the almost perfect radio name John Records Landecker) and go with Scott Walker. The free excerpt about that strange career moment is here.
=This week in 2015, John and his daughter Amy (a successful actress in Hollywood, married to Bradley Whitford) made the media rounds in Chicago.
“The Kiss of Night” ❤️ #newbook #thriller #podcast #chicago #eckhartzpress @rickkaempfer.bsky.social @wynneleon.bsky.social sharingtheheartofthematter.com/2025/05/09/e...
— Dr.Vicki Atkinson (@vickiatkinson.bsky.social) May 9, 2025 at 6:16 AM
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=This week in 2024 Rick Kaempfer appeared with Dave Plier on WGN Radio to talk about The Loop Files. You can listen to that here. The following year Dave (who runs the Museum of Broadcast Communications) asked Rick to curate the exhibit about The Loop at the museum. This is Rick and his family outside the exhibit.
=Thanks to Tom Barnas for this piece in his “Stories from the
78”
= On May 17, 1989, comedian Sam Kinison & his friend (Guns & Roses guitarist) Slash, visited the WLUP (Steve & Garry) studios. The story of that incredible day is told in the pages of The Loop Files.
=Did you know that the Mob Adjacent guys had merch? Does it surprise you that they do? Click here to see a little display.
=This week in 2018 (May 14), the authors of Mob Adjacent, the Gentile Brothers (Jeff & Michael), were interviewed by Tribune columnist and WGN+ podcaster John Kass.
=The current Pope has been in the news a lot lately. You want Pope news? We got Pope news. This week in 1981 (May 13), Pope John Paul II was shot. Roger Badesch was a journalist at the time and covered that story. He tells all about it in his book, The Unplanned Life.
=The original Mayor Daley, Richard J. Daley, was born in Bridgeport this week (May 15) in 1902. Hizzoner always got a kick out of being interviewed by the second most famous Daly in Chicago during the 1970s, newscaster Joel. That story is told in Joel's book The Daly News. Daley meets Daly in the photo below.
=Two big events from this week in history somehow made their way into the pages of the coming-of-age spy thriller Back in the DDR.
=May 14,
1289—The Limburg an der Lahn fire destroys the entire town. But the half-timbre buildings that
replaced the old ones still stand, and become part of a crucial chapter in Back in the DDR.
=May 17,
1632—The Hofbrauhaus saves Munich during the 30 years war by giving Swedes 23,168
liters of beer. In Back in the DDR you learn about a few other Hofbrauhaus contributions to history that are a little less admirable.
=Sportcasting icon Dan Patrick is celebrating a birthday this week (May 15). He is a big supporter of fellow sportscaster Dan McNeil and his book I Bear Witness. Here's what he had to say...
People think what we do is easy. It’s not. Mac’s been one of those guys who makes it seem like it’s easy. I give the guys at the Score a lot of credit and Mac, Jurko & Harry too, I give them credit for staying true to that fraternity house feel, even when it became big. That’s hard to do. Mac made me laugh. Nice run. He did it for a long time.
=How many sportscasters do you know that interviewed Olga Korbut? Chet Coppock is one of them, and he wrote about it in his Eckhartz Press book. Can you tell it was the 1970s? Olga's birthday is this week (May 16)
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=We get a lot of compliments about the cover photo for Gloria Golec's memoir South Side Memories. It's a beautiful photo of a young couple in love. That young couple is Gloria's mom and dad.
=This week is the anniversary of her Dad's death so Gloria posted a photo from 1973. Same couple.
=Author Rosellen Brown (born May 12) is a big fan of Eckhartz Press author Don Evans, and gave this review to his book An Off White Christmas.
Donald Evans has a great ear and a light touch and together they lead An Off-White Christmas in unpredictable directions. Underlying what’s funny in these stories are real families, friends and lovers colliding or coming together in what promises, but doesn’t always turn out to be, the season of good cheer.
=In 2007, future Eckhartz Press publisher Rick Kaempfer released his first novel (with New York publisher ENC Press). The rights to that book have now reverted to Rick and is available via Eckhartz Press.
=In 2017, on the 10th anniversary of Severance, Rick wrote an update about media ownership for Illinois Entertainer. Doing the math here...next year is the book's 20th anniversary? Can't be possible.
=May 17 is also former media critic Robert Feder's birthday. Here's what he had to say about Severance when it came out...
“Told with the keen insight of a veteran insider, it’s a humorous indictment of an industry that has lost all sense of purpose — except for making money, of course.”
=This week in 2012 (May 14), the Daily Herald published an article about the first ever Eckhartz Press book, The Living Wills
=In 2015 when Brent Petersen wrote his foodie novel Truffle Hunt, synthetic truffles didn't exist. He predicted (in the novel) that they would one day, and just two years later May 18, 2017 he was proven correct.
=This week in 2018, Cubsessions co-author Randy Richardson had a book signing at the Billy Goat on lower Michigan Avenue. Among the luminaries who came out that day were former Cubs ballgirl Kathy Wolter, Ronnie WooWoo, and Dave Cihla, the creator of the Shawon-O-Meter. Randy later appeared with Cub Willson Contreras at Club 400. Willson (yes two Ls) is celebrating a birthday this week (May 13).
=This week in 2018 (May 18), Cameo author Beth Jacobelllis appeared on America's Most Haunted to talk about the haunting tale that inspired her novel.
=This week in 2019 (May 18), writer Dave Hoekstra did a heartwarming tribute to the recently deceased Eckhartz Press author Pat Colander. That tribute is still on the WGN Radio website.
Chicago--The Great Retirement Resource
=This week in 2023, Russ Fahrner & Bruce Bohrer released their book about retiring in Chicagoland. We got a chance to have a Q&A with them about their book.
=This week in 2021, the book City U was released. This Q&A with author Bob Boone explains that book pretty well.
=International Chameleon Day was on Saturday May 9. Did you celebrate it? Well, you're in luck if you didn't. Because there's a chameleon story in JJ Novak’s book Meta Stories called “Cathy the Chameleon” and it's always available at Eckhartz Press.
=This week in 2020 (May 15), during the height of the pandemic shutdown, a group of writers and booksellers got together to help raise money and awareness of the plight of Indie bookstores, which were forced to close during the pandemic. One of the writers asked to contribute a video about what it's like to work at home was Eckhartz Press publisher, Rick Kaempfer. This is that video...
