E-mail:millere@siskiyous.edu
E-mail:millere@siskiyous.edu
Phone:(530)
938-5325
Hello, my name is Ernie Miller:
I love writing, and I am very pleased to work at the COS Writing Lab helping others improve their writing skills. It is a very rewarding job because I get to help students spread their wings and fly, at least metaphorically, and also because students help me tune up my own skills by asking questions that force me to study up on small points of grammar and things that I haven't paid attention to since...since...well, for a long time. And for me, it is very important to continually improve my own writing.
When I'm not working at the college, I'm a freelance writer and editor. I write and edit a wide variety of technical work, and while this is not usually considered "creative writing," it really can be (at least the way I do it), and what I really love most is creative writing. I like writing short stories in particular because so much has to be said in so little space that there is an extreme emphasis on economy of words. There can be a lot of technical manuvering involved in getting the best effect from a piece of fiction. I guess you can say that I like to be a creative technical writer and a technical creative writer, and having experience in both styles is an advantage here at the lab where we help with a wide variety of class assignments.
Most of my subject matter revolves around American history and the adventures of the early explorers of the far west. The time period began with French fur traders penetrating the Mississippi River and its western tributaries three hundred or so years ago, and was ended by the great migration of settlers and gold seekers in 1850. Between those dates the American far west was truely wild, and Native Americans and fur traders lived their lives in a state of freedom that may never be known again.
My hobby is re-enacting the mountain man days as accurately as possible on camping and hunting trips. Here is a photo from a primitive hunting trip in 2003. The time frame was set at 1840, so I carried a muzzle loading percussion lock .50 caliber rifle. If the time had been set earlier, say 1830, I would have used my flintlock. I often travel to Rendezvous where hundreds of other re-enactors as eccentric as myself gather to celebrate the best of the good old days. We sleep in tipis or primitive style tents and shelters and cook on fires we start with flint and steel. It's a familly affair with just as many women and children as men. Be careful if you decide to try it--comming back to the 21st century can be very difficult!
Here are three of my favorite web sites. They are great resources for exploring the history of the mountain man era.
http://www.xmission.com/~drudy/amm.html
http://www.geocities.com/barrenriver1833/
Higher educaton:
Rocky Mountain College (1803-1840)
University of Saigon (1968-1970)
St. Petersburg College (1971-1973)
Awards:
Recipient of the William Clark Memorial Spelling Bee Award
Favorite quote:
"You can read a horse Voltaire, but you can't make him think." (okay, it's poor, but it's my own)
Favorite reading material:
Original fur trade Journals such as the following:
From "A Sketch of the Life of the First Pioneer" in The Golden Era, April, 1885
The Autobiography of Stephen Hall Meek
I was born in Washington County Virginia, on the 4th of July, 1805, and am a relative of Pres. Polk. I attended the common schools of the day. When scarcely twenty years of age I became imbued with that restless spirit of adventure that has since been a marked characteristic of my life, and left my home for the then comparatively unknown West. St. Louis was at that time the center of the fur trade of the United States, and when I reached that city I engaged with the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, to work in their warehouses. I was placed in the cellar by the celebrated William Sublette with several other green hands to "rum the beaver," which operation consisted of spreading the skins out upon the cellar floor and sprinkling them with rum for preservation. Sublette left us with the remark "Don't you boys get tight now," at which idea we all laughed. Soon the fumes of the rum began to affect us and it was not long before we were reeling around the room apparently helplessly drunk. Sublette then put in an appearance, and pretended to be angry with us "Can't I leave you here alone for a few minutes, without your getting drunk? Do you think that this is the kind of men I want around me? Here!" said he "drink this?" and he drew a cup from the barrel. This had the effect of making us sober again and Sublette again left us with the remark "The next time you rum the beaver, just rum yourselves first."
[A few years later] "I went to Independence on horseback [from Ft. Cambell on the North Platte River], carrying the annual express. Having ten days to spare, I went to Lexington to see my brother and sister. While there I called on some young ladies, to whom I related many incidents of my mountain life, which so startled their worthy mother that she exclaimed:
"Law sakes! Mr. Meek, didn't you never get killed by none of them Indians and bears?"
Oh, yes, madam," said I gravely, "I was frequently killed."