Saturday, January 24, 2026
Thursday, January 22, 2026
Free Excerpt--Back in the DDR
January 27, 1756, 170 years ago, Mozart was born. Mozart is featured in the Eckhartz Press book, Back in the DDR. Sounds like it's time for a free excerpt from the novel.
This short excerpt is taken from Chapter 2 of Back in the DDR. It's the day our main character Rudi visits Mozart's birth house in Salzburg.
It was only about a twenty-minute
drive to Salzburg. Onkel Franz and Tante Margot in the front seat of their
Mercedes, me in the back.
We
attended mass at the Salzburg Cathedral. I thought Holy Name Cathedral in
Chicago was big, but this was gigantic, and beautiful. Three green domes
towered over the structure. Inside, every word echoed, and the music from the
organs went right through you. Bright white walls—probably marble—and red and
white tiles in geometric patterns on the floor, were striking. The murals on
the ceiling were obviously religiously themed, but the ceilings were so high it
was hard to even see them from my view. Surrounded by this size and beauty,
sitting in these small, wooden, uncomfortable pews made me feel like a tiny
speck in the universe. I didn’t listen to a word of the Mass. I was mesmerized
by the sights.
Before we
left the church, Onkel Franz showed me a few other things, including four giant
statues: Saint Peter and Saint Paul, and the two patron saints of Salzburg,
Rupert and Virgil. He also pointed out a baptismal font from the 1300s that was
used to baptize Mozart himself.
That was
only the beginning of the Mozart references. We walked through Mozartplatz on
our way over to Mozart’s birth-house. Mozart-related items were on sale
everywhere you looked. The Mozart-Kugeln that I gave to Tante Margot for
Christmas were literally sold in every store. By the time we finally arrived at
the Mozart birth-house (not hard to spot, it’s written in giant white script on
the front of the five-story yellow building), I was getting a little cold and
tired.
“Rudi,” Onkel Franz said to me, beaming with excitement, “try to soak it all in. Absorb the wisdom and magic of these walls. This is where the greatest composer of all-time was born and lived. He might be waiting to sprinkle some of that majesty on a fellow musical boy.”
There were portraits of him in every room,
at all different ages, and there was no escaping one thing; Mozart had a giant
nose. What a honker. It was hard to see anything else. He wasn’t what you’d
call a good-looking man, or an elegant man. In fact, he was downright ugly. I
looked right into his eyes in every portrait and noticed something else
interesting. Sometimes he had blue eyes, sometimes green, sometimes brown (not
sure why they couldn’t nail that down), but in every portrait he looked
miserable and unhappy. He wasn’t smiling in any of them.
The apartment was set up to look like it did
in the 1700s. There was a kitchen with a very large wood-burning stove, a
dining room with pewter plates, glasses, candlesticks and utensils, and, of
course, lots of musical artifacts. Mozart’s first violin and harpsichord (which
is sort of like a piano) were on display, along with letters to/from friends
and relatives. The tour guide told us about Mozart’s love of opera. She told us
that he had six siblings, five of which died in childhood. She told us about
his very strict upbringing, and about the musical background of Mozart’s father
Leopold. I didn’t know any of that before today, so I did find it interesting.
Mozart was significant to the story-line in another way, but you'll have to pick up a copy of Back in the DDR to find out what that was. It's still available at Eckhartz Press.
EveryCubEver--Hall of Famer birthdays
Yes, it's true, I'm not doing an update of EveryCubEver this season. On the other hand, I do plan on featuring every Hall of Fame Cub this year right here on this blog. And those entries will be from EveryCub Ever.
Ernie Banks 1931-2015 (Cubs 1953-1971)
Monday, January 19, 2026
Publishing Portal--January 19, 2026
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 Book of the Year Awards
=Another Eckhartz Press book is taking home some well-deserved hardware this coming Friday. (January 23). Daily Herald Opinion Editor Jim Slusher won in the Non-Fiction Book of the Year category. Come on out to the Book Cellar in Lincoln Square (Chicago) on Friday to see him, listen to him do a short reading, and buy his book. He will happily autograph it for you.
=The award ceremony last year was at the Tip Top Tap in the Allerton Hotel. Mark Taylor won in the same Non-Fiction Book of the Year category. Mark's book Hospital Heal Thyself came out this week in 2024. An international publisher bought the book later in the year, but not before Mark's Eckhartz Press version won the award. Congrats to him!
=Last Comiskey author Ken Smoller (a finalist himself last year) was there too. That's him in the photo with Eckhartz Press publisher Rick Kaempfer.
The City News Bureau of Chicago was the starting point for several of America’s most celebrated journalists: Mike Royko, Seymour Hersh, and Pam Zekman among others. The local wire service closed in 2005 after operating around the clock for 115 years. Stories about CNB have taken on characteristics of epic fishing tales, a mixture of fact and fiction: The bureau broke stories on the St. Valentine’s Day massacre (true), the Tylenol murders (also true), and on Pearl Harbor (not verifiable); one of its reporters committed armed robberies in order to write stories about them (unlikely); and its reporters would get yelled at by gruff editors until they cried (exaggerated).
To set the record straight and to tell the real history of CNB, two former staffers have produced Sirens in the Loop: A History of the City News Bureau of Chicago, publishing February 1. The book was a passion project of Paul Zimbrakos, the legendary managing editor who worked at CNB from 1958 until its closing. Zimbrakos passed away in 2022 before finishing the book, but his friend and former employee James Elsener picked up and finished the project.
=This Saturday (Jan 24), Jim will be on WGN Radio with Steve & Johnnie. Tune in at 10pm.
Additional upcoming Eckhartz Press
author events. Mark your calenders...
=Rick Kaempfer and David Stern will be moderating a virtual discussion about Tony Fitzpatrick's book (The Sun at the End of the Road) on February 6th. It's free, but you need to register here.
=David Stern will be appearing at KinoWerks (5645 N. Ravenswood in Chicago) on February 14th. He'll have a table selling an assortment of Eckhartz Press books at their Arts Event that day.
=Mark Wukas (The Kiss of Night) will be appearing at
Welcome to the Show at the Getaway (4530 N. Lincoln Avenue) on February 16.
=Vicki Atkinson (Surviving Sue) will be appearing at
Wauconda Library (11am-12:30pm) on February 20. Vicki's debut novel is coming
out later this year on Eckhartz Press.
=Robert Conlon (Celtic Knot) will be appearing at the Gman (on Clark in Chicago) on March 15.
=Lauren LoGiudice (Inside Melania) brings her Misfit Variety show to the Annoyance March 13. Show's
at 9.
=Eckhartz Press author Chuck Swirsky was in the news this week. He was the recipient of a pretty blistering critque from ESPN-Radio announcers Marc Silverman and Tom Waddle (who have both been to an Eckhartz Press book signing). The duo was upset that Chuck was upset about Ben Johnson's profanity laced anti-Packers rant. Of course we are standing by our author, Chuck. But we are not upset, because if we get upset about Waddle and Silvy getting upset about Chuck getting upset, we're pretty sure some sort of space-time upset-continuum will be disturbed.
=By the way, Chuck Swirsky has some great photos in his book, including these two with this week's birthday boys Vince Carter and Pat Tomasulo.
=The Eckhartz Press signing that Waddle and Silvy attended was the book launch for Randy Merkin's first book. Here's the photographic evidence.
=This week last year (January 19), we lost one of the main characters from the book. Former White Sox manager Jeff Torborg, passed away. He was 83 years old. Jeff was the skipper of the team during their last season at old Comiskey.
=Pat Colander passed away this week in 2019. Publisher Rick Kaempfer wrote this tribute to her when he heard the news.
=This week in 2024 Rick Kaempfer appeared at the Chicagoland Record Show (1/21). Here are a few photos from that signing. (Top photo includes fellow Loopers Neil Sant, Artie Kennedy, and Bill Holub, second photo includes David Stern and Record show founder John Govi.)
Records Truly Is My Middle Name
=Here's a free excerpt from John Landecker's book about Wolfman Jack (born 1/21/38), and two photos from the book from additional famous birthdays this week, John Belushi & Ernie Harwell (1/25/18).
=Rock journalist Bill Paige got the opportunity to interview some of the biggest rock stars during rock and roll's heyday. Among them, Steve Perry, who turns 76 this week (1/22). He rates his own chapter in Bill's great 2017 Eckhartz Press book.
=Tom Weinberg was a WTTW producer for years, and wrote a book about his greatest adventure, looking for a lost city in the jungles of Honduras. The photos alone, like the one below, are worth the price of admission. This week in 2018 he had a book signing at The Book Stall in Winnetka.
=He may be the White Sox radio announcer now, but back in 2016, Len Kasper was the TV play-by-play man for the Cubs. In the book Cubsessions this week's birthday boy tells the story of that magical night in Cleveland.
=This week in 2018 there was a colliding of two Eckhartz Press authors. The author of Brandwidth, Kipper McGee, interviewed the author of Doin the Cruise, Mitch Michaels. You can listen to the podcast here.
=This week in 2020, Eckhartz Press author Andrew C. Langert released his biography of Lewis University's Brother James Gafney. This photo is Andy holding the very first copy of the book.
=This week in 2019, Eckhartz Press author Chet Coppock made his final public appearance for a charity. He grabbed the mic and entertained the Bowling for Veterans event. That's a photo of him at the event below, along with a shot of Chet with his lifelong friend Jack Brickhouse. Jack was born this week (January 24), 110 years ago.
=Randy Richardson is not just the president of the Chicago Writer's Association, he's also a three-times published Eckhartz Press author. His first book for us was the coming of age novel Cheeseland. This week in 2013, Randy recapped the many stops on his media tour.
=Eckhartz Press Author Brent Petersen might be a famous globe-trotting foodie, but he's not getting any younger.* Want proof? His Destination Eat Drink podcast was recommended by the AARP.
*We're allowed to say that. We're even older.
=This week in 2012, The Living Wills was featured on Rick Kogan's show on WGN. Both authors (Rick Kaempfer & Brendan Sullivan) gave Kogan credit for encouraging them to write this book.
=This week in 2021 comedian (and Eckhartz Press author) Dobie Maxwell appeared on the Comedians Over 50 podcast.
=For years Joel Daly delivered a nightly commentary on the Channel 7 News in Chicago. This week in 1978 he delivered his last one. Would you like to read it? It's featured in his Eckhartz Press book The Daly News.
=This week in 2015 Rick Kaempfer was wrapping up his Father Knows Nothing Publicity Tour.