The Liberator

Unhappy with the editorial direction Wagner had taken with the Knoxville Junior Academy of Science newsletter and, perhaps, with the occasional light-hearted jabs at himself, club president Ernie Childs quietly arranged a special election, of which Karl, myself and our friends in the club were not informed, and voted us off the board, thus ending Karl's first publishing efforts. It would be many years before Karl became the editor of his own publishing company, Carcosa. I cannot lay claim to having been the Able Assistant for that venture, but I did execute The Carcosa Colophon,which phrase, Karl once remarked, would make a good title for a thriller.

As a last cry of defiance from the KJAS fifth estate, Karl brought out this special edition of the newsletter, renamed The Liberator, protesting President Childs Night of the Long Knives. Whether we really thought we might arouse a rebellion in the KJAS membership or just intended this as a final thumbing of the nose I don't recall. Karl did, eventually, pursue a scientific discipline and practiced medicine for a year before giving it up to write. Ernie Childs also went into some branch of science; a websearch failed to turn him up, but I recall an article in the local paper about his having discovered a way to smoke carp so that it was palatable. I eschewed science altogether. Until now; having decided the art thing wasn't working out, I'm now back in school studying a medical field. At last all those tedious KJAS lectures Karl mocked in The Cauldron are paying off.

The Liberator

One-Off