Additional Writing Work
“The Staff of 08/29/2005” is a permanent display at WDSU-TV New Orleans
In the predawn hours of June 6, 1944, over five thousand ships bore down on the northern coast of France for the Allied invasion to liberate Europe.
Among them were the “Higgins boats,” the ingenious landing craft named for their designer, New Orleans entrepreneur Andrew Higgins.
He was a loving father and a demanding boss. A visionary industrialist who never held his tongue, Higgins fought the Navy’s Bureau of Ships to equip the fighting men of World War II with the finest landing craft possible, his own.
Together with a diverse New Orleans workforce he mass-produced boats that were, like Higgins himself, powerful, ambitious, and able to accomplish the impossible.
In this special half-hour presentation of WWL-TV Entertainment, you will hear one of the great American success stories from those who knew him best. Then you will know why Eisenhower called Andrew Higgins “the man who won the war for us.”
Program description for show packaging of “Andrew Higgins: The American Noah,” a Suncoast Emmy-winning historical documentary that I wrote and produced.
A crescent bend in one of the world’s great rivers is home to one of America’s oldest and most European cities.
At a time when the main thoroughfares were water, New Orleans was a bustling, international seaport on the Mississippi, uniquely situated for waterborne commerce. Traveling through this gateway to North America, a melting pot of influences including French, Spanish, Caribbean, and African cultures blended together and left magnificent imprints on the landscape of southeast Louisiana.
For visitors, New Orleans holds the promise of a lost age. Ancient homes harbor fascinating stories, secrets, and occasionally… spirits. Historic gardens, filtered by fragrant canopies await discovery behind cast-iron fences.
Civil War-era plantations rise out of grassy fields to overlook the mighty Mississippi—ancient sentinels from a past world. They share a ribbon of concrete between New Orleans and Baton Rouge known as the Great River Road. Built along the Mississippi to facilitate easy shipping, most plantations produced sugar, the “white gold” that provided their owners with the enormous wealth to construct these palatial estates.
Here, time travel is possible. 19th century homes, lush gardens, beautiful swamps, and stately plantations beckon our visitors who return time and again to enjoy their mystery and charm. They are all part of a distinctive collection—the birthmarks of an old and wondrous city whose citizens are proud to share its beauty and allure with the rest of the world.
