Mark R Hunter

Noble County boasts small-town charm and attractions all year long. And ghosts. The county's only movie theater is patrolled by the well-known manager, who died in 1995. Two of the highest hills in the state are haunted, one after a hanging and another because of a murder immortalized by Indiana's poet laureate. The sprawling Kneipp Sanitarium received a visit from the Virgin Mary herself and became a battleground of good versus evil. Former residents of the county poor farm still roam the building. Then there's the "Thing in the Basement." Join authors and historians Mark and Emily Hunter as they tour the dark and spooky corners of Noble County.

"The problem with history isn't that it's not interesting; it's that it's not made interesting. For instance, all too often history classes stress memorizing dates, although I must admit those are the only dates I got in high school."So Mark R Hunter begins his attempt to make history funny, even if it makes history teachers roll over in their graves (hopefully not while they're still alive). With his wife Emily, Hunter goes on an off-the-wall, Indy 500-style race though the past, from Paleo-Indians through the Northwest Territory, the formation of the state, wars, and the ongoing struggle of people against their environment and each other.Hunter tackles everything from A to W ... which in this case means Paleo-armadillos ("look it up-they were huge") to Wayne, as in Mad Anthony ("Mad was his first name. You have to wonder what Mad Anthony Wayne's mother was thinking, back when women in labor didn't get the good drugs").Along the way we encounter killers, heroes, trivia, claims to fame, and of course, Johnny Appleseed. It's all as American as sugar cream pie-Indiana's state pie, thanks to the efforts of a hard-working state General Assembly. So sit back and have some fun ... and if you accidentally learn something along the way, at least it will be painless.

Humor writer Mark R. Hunter often speaks of his life ballooning out of control, and there's no better example than this work, a look at the first century of service for his home town's volunteer fire department. Hunter, who's also a thirty-three year veteran firefighter, turned an idea for a pamphlet for the Albion fire Department's 100th anniversary into a 25 year marathon that produced a book ... just in time for the 125th anniversary.Smoky Days and Sleepless Nights chronicles the hazardous early days of Albion, Indiana, which like many small towns of the time tended to burn down - a lot. The story follows the efforts of townspeople to organize themselves into a firefighting force, and the personalities that stepped in along the way. It moves into modern times along with the volunteers, who face not only danger and death but changing technology and new threats. Using newspaper accounts, official records, oral stories and the fine art of digging for details, Hunter shows how hand drawn apparatus and desperate bucket brigades turned into the trained, organized and well equipped department of today.Smoky Days and Sleepless Nights is well illustrated with historical and firefighting photos. It's also spiced with the humor that Hunter, the author of a novel and short story collection in addition to his column, "Slightly Off The Mark", has become known for.