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| Donated by Becky Saikia-Wilson (2005) |
There were tanks slowly turning red, quonset huts overrun by jungle, stacks of rotting food in which a few pot-bellied natives
and slim dashing parakeets picked, beer cans melting into the mud. The long white strips of airfields grew a fuzz of green
that thickened and then finally swallowed the asphalt and cement completely. The temporary docks rotted and sank into the
ocean. The only orderly thing left in the rich tropical chaos was the trim rows of white crosses, row on row, marvelously
neat and well laid out.
From Eugene Burdick's 1956 classic novel "The Ninth Wave" published by Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston.
"Before the invention of tin cans, beer was a perishable commodity. As a result, during the seige, stranded travelers
consumed beer first, followed later by a supply of hard liquor. Cooley's Hotel in Springfield was a lively location at which
to weather a winter storm." (reference is to a blizzard in 1888 in New England.)
From Massachusetts Disasters: True Stories of Tragedy and Survival. Globe Pequote Press (Insider's Guide), Guilford,
CT, 2006.
(from William Lashner's thriller "Past Due" - Harper Collins, 2004)
"(the funeral) had been an almost touching ceremony at the burned out building that had once been Lonnie's shop,
what with the howl of motorcycles, the roar of boom boxes, the belch of the beer cans in tribute before one of the motorheads
had taken the urn with Lonnie's remains, opened the top, tossed it high into the air so the metal dropped into the burned
out hulk of his shop and his ashes fell upon the mourners and the neighborhood where he had worked and died."
From "Hotel Honolulu" by Paul Theroux (Houghton Mifflin, 2001)...
"His new wife and her uncle and aunt sat stunned and damp after the wedding reception. They had been exuberant at the reception,
but their bewilderment in Buddy's room made them anxious, and attentive in a fearful way. He was not dismayed that no one
laughed. He took papers out of his briefcase, opened a can of San Miguel beer, took a sip, and began..."
From "The Fledgling" by Jane Langton (Harper Collins, 1980)
Turning away, he (the old goose) paddled by himself to a sheltered cove on the other side of the pond, heading for a
place he remembered from years gone by, a place where acorns were scattered thickly on the ground.
And then he saw the present.
It was bobbing in the shallows, floating in the water, bumping the alder stems, nudged by empty beer cans, brushed by
downy pinfeathers that had scudded across the pond (Walden Pond).
This excerpt taken from "Pacific War Diary, 1942-1945",
by James J. Fahey, (HMCo. 1963) who was stationed on the U.S.S. Montpelier during the war in the Pacific in WWII...
" Thursday, February 8, 1945: I received recreation on
the beach today. Everyone was given two cans of beer. Each ship carries its own supply of beer. Some of the men played
football. The fellows from my division, using a tennis ball in place of a football, went through the motions. A group
of Filipinos passed by, a few of them were girls about 20 years old. They had three water buffaloes with them...about
half an hour before leaving for the ship, we lay in the shade under the palm trees and let the breeze blow on us. Away
off in the distance I could see the high green hills and mountains. It felt good to lay and look at this beautiful scenery.
There are still many Japs up in those hills hiding out..."
"Ten minutes later Clete walked through the door with a pizza in
a flat box, a can of Jax in one coat pocket, and a Dr. Pepper in the other. His porkpie hat was tilted down
on his forehead. He sat on the side of my bed and flipped open the top of the box, his intelligent green eyes smiling
at me."
(from 'A Morning For Flamingoes, by
James Lee Burke - Avon Books 1990)
"By dawn, the raft had been found, wedged sideways under a piling
of the I-90 bridge, due west of Lozeau. The oars had been lost, and the raft contained no clues to the identity of the missing
angler. An empty can of Colt 45 and a crumpled Snickers wrapper were the only evidence of a human passenger."
(from
'Striptease' by Carl Hiaasen)
"(Al) Kaline had a presence that proclaimed him too good for our neighborhood,
too athletic, too upright, too rich. Not that we wouldn't have loved for him to live among us. It's just that we knew
he never would. But imperfect Mickey Lolich, with his belly, would have fit right in, changing his car oil in the driveway,
gulping a can of Altes Beer on the porch, dangerously reigniting the charcoal-grill fire by squirting starter fluid
into the fading flames."
from
Tom Stanton's 'The Road to Cooperstown', 2003, St. Martin's Press
(well, this one refers to beer, not in cans, but it's still worthy of inclusion since it has a local Boston angle to
it!)
"Whitey (Bulger) would be the head on (FBI agent) Connolly's glass of beer."
from "Black Mass" by Dick Lehr & Gerard O'Neill (Perseus Books, 2000)
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