Norm Goldman, Editor of the progress site, www.sketchandtravelcom and the tale reviewing and originator interviewing site, wwwbookpleasurescom, interviews travel writer and author, Don Baumgart on Calfornia’s wineries and the Gold Rush.
Expert on Wineries of California and the Gold Rush, Don Baumgart, Interviewed
Today, Norm Goldman, Editor of sketchandtravelcom is appreciative to own as our guest, Don Baumgart Don is a liberate knife writer and author of It Came From Citrus Heights
Good day Don and thanks for agreeing to participate in our interview
Norm:
Don, could you advise our readers object about your personal and professional background.
When did your feeling for writing begin? What keeps you going?
Don:
My finest job out of college was working for the Spokesman-Review in Spokane, a daily newspaper Harry Truman described as the later worst paper in the US I assume it has improved some since then. I moved to Seattle where I went to job for the Associated Press I’ve always liked newspaper undertaking because no day brings the duplicate stories I drifted into civic relations (for the money) and second worked for the Sacramento Bee. Money for repast and contract have me going And, I really like to write
Norm:
I presume you are interested in the California Gold Rush and you have written some articles pertaining to this topic. How did you become interested in the California Gold Rush? And, as a chance up, if one were to motion to California in search of the areas where there were gold rush activities, where would one begin? What is there today by system of museums, etc? Could one tactic a excursion solely based on the California Gold Rush?
Don:
When California commemorated its 150th anniversary I wrote a series of weekly Gold Rush saga columns that I syndicated to newspapers California’s gold idyllic generally runs along Highway 49 from Downieville south to Columbia Many locations obtain preserved buildings in their original province and there’s a stockpile to see In Nevada City, Firehouse #1 has been taken over by the Nevada County Historical Society and made into an worthy trivial historical museum A few miles more south, facade Grass Valley, the Empire Mine is run as a museum by the state, giving visitors a gain look at how hard-rock mining was conducted once the surface nuggets had been harvested This mine produced $5 million in gold during its working life. Also in Grass Valley visitors entrust find the North Star Powerhouse Museum where a 30 foot Pelton Wheel is on express These wheels used water to evolve tenacity to run mine equipment
Norm:
I also credit that you are interested in wineries If you had to choose 8 of the most unique and idealistic wineries you posses visited, which ones would they be and why? Please briefly chronicle them
Don:
Before Prohibition there were over 100 wineries in the Sierra foothills They disappeared when alcohol was outlawed. Now the young of grapes and making of wine is fulfilling the prophecy of one Gold Rush era winemaker who said, “Gold is an celebrated root of livelihood.but it entrust not last The wines cede be additional important”
Nevada City Winery is housed in a tin building dating from Gold Rush days and inert decided “Foundry Garage.” Horses illustration carriages clop down the streets in Nevada City, recent California’s oldest hotel and on through this charming gold mining town preserved in its historic domain At night gas lights adorn the still streets Victorian homes converted to bed and breakfast residence in and around Nevada City make a stopover delightfully restful
Quality wines from other trifling foothill wineries embrace the promise of additional welfare tasting. The Apple Hill innocent appearance Placerville, in El Dorado County, is a picturesque aspect dotted with wineries A comfortable two-hour drive south from Nevada City on Highway 49 takes visitors former Sutter’s Mill, where gold was discovered, and deeper into California’s further wine simple
El Dorado Winery, like most of Placerville’s small wineries, produces estate bottled wine — their varieties are made from grapes grown in their own vineyards Their vintages are only available at the winery or in local restaurants.
At the Madrona Winery the comfortable wood paneled tasting room is decked with ribbons their wines own brought home. Outdoor spree tables invite visitors to take a celebration lunch and complement it with a bottle of wine from the tasting room
Lava Cap Winery’s deck with junket tables overlooks the vineyards, and visitors are encouraged to move lunches A call ahead consign create a waiting chilled bottle of wine to accompany a picnic.
Boeger Winery is nestled into an orchard, its tasting room in an expired stucco-covered seed building with a tin roof, built in 1872. Outside fig trees shade party tables, separated by a stone fortification from a trickling creek, inviting lunch bringers to the grounds
California’s more wine rural is producing wines that are winning gold medals in accomplished judgings, bringing some of the yellow metal back to its homeland, and providing tasting opportunities to travelers who pinpoint its fecund rewards
Norm:
When writing your motion articles, please explain some of your research techniques, and how you find sources for your articles?
Don:
Going there is explanation When I decide on a destination I then query editors on their benefit in feasible articles A trip to New Orleans produced a piece proclaimed by Porthole, a cruise craft magazine, on what to do in the Big Easy before or after a travels from there I subscribe to a weekly e-mail newsletter, WritersWeeklycom, that provides a constant supply of story about publications looking for writers That has been fairly friendly It’s where I found Porthole. I sold a piece on the railroad that runs along the Panama Canal to International Railway Traveler, a publication that had known an earlier something of mine on the Napa Valley Wine Train. When I keep a locomotion announcement idea I run over, in my mind, the magazines in which I obtain previously been published That’s always a wellbeing method to approach an editor: Remember me. Porthole took the New Orleans piece because I had earlier sold them an article on FDR’s expired yacht, the Potomac, which has been converted to a chronicle journey keel operating out of Oakland, California
Norm:
What’s your advice to achieve success as a writer? What do you consider your top “break” as a writer? How do you come up with ideas for what you write? What methods do you use to flesh out your idea to determine if it’s salable?
Don:
I define success as ink on paper, not fiscal (although that’s important, too) I guess my prime pause was being hired by the Review as a reporter when I applied for a non-writing job. I try to collect extraordinary interesting places to visit, looking for the unusual, and trying to splice the dormant information to a specific publication Editors privation short, well written queries they can digest fast I never comprehend if a report conviction is truly salable until I hear back from an editor And, I scarcely write an object until the belief is accepted, because each publication has individual writing requirements
Norm:
What does motility mean to you?
Don:
Besides a ensue to emolument for my vacations, I believe travel has a broader aspect: the opportunity to attain away from one’s everyday life and look back from a extent at what one takes for granted. Some profit insights come from the want look
Norm:
How hold you used the Internet to treat your writing career?
Don:
I used to earn peddle tips from a monthly notebook now I earn them weekly, online And, of course, the approach instance is virtually nil. Push a button and the item is on the editor’s screen Research is another Internet bonus for today’s writer I wrote a romance on restored historic trains, The Ghosts That Roar, by doing a lot of the preliminary research online.
Norm:
Besides writing for magazines, what supplementary writing gigs retain you found profitable or rewarding?
Don:Probably the most fun I obtain writing is the task I do for The Mountain Messenger, California’s oldest weekly newspaper, proclaimed in Downieville. The editor believes there is no such item as chase reporting, as illustrated by his classic data data lead: If a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, the Planning Commission has picked out a couple of socks
Norm:
Is there anything else you fantasy to add that we hold not covered?
Don:
Just a plug for another story I wrote, It Came From Citrus Heights. It’s a science fiction flow book, about aliens who exhibit up at a science fiction convention because, who would notice? More information can be found HERE
Thanks once again and sake luck with all of your future endeavors
