Jerry Miller

In truth, there are no little stars. Some just shone brighter and longer than others. But they all were up there in the endless galaxy of singers and musicians whose grasp for the dream equaled their reach, if only for a passing moment. They were roman candles that lighted up the night skies full of larger, longer-lasting stars, but their music helped show us the way through the ‘50s and ‘60s, too. The afterglow is still there even now if you keep looking long enough. They are only called little stars in this book because one of the earliest of the rock ‘n’ roll classics by a non-black, non-Southern-roots act was “Little Star,” sung by a New York City doo-wop group that never made the Billboard charts a second time. The Elegants and their contemporaries provided the inspiration for countless others to chase the American Rock ‘n’ Roll Dream until they caught it by its tail and, on reflection, inspired the title for Jerry Miller’s book. The stories of a dozen or so of those music dreamers, the ones who were awakened much earlier than they had scheduled their wake-up calls, are at the heart of the book. So, in their way, are the millions who followed their paths across the sky with homemade telescopes. Inside this book’s pages, you won’t need your telescope. It focuses right in on these selected dreamers and where their dreams took them, followed by the often hard realities of where their meteors crash-landed at the end of their sudden descents back to earth. From the Introduction, where you meet the author on his way to the outskirts of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Dream, to the final chapter, where the loyal followers of the dreamers gather to soak up the nostalgia they can only find at post-natal concerts by lingering stars like Gary Lewis or the Four Tops. In between, you get to go backstage, literally and figuratively, into the lives and the visions of the one-time stars who streaked across your lives if you were living them in America thirty or forty years ago. You will be dropping in on them at various points during the past fifteen years or so, at places where their fates are still finding their ways home. At the close of each of your stops, the author updates the individual sagas to the year 2000, for better or worse, in redemption or death or something in between. The first stop on this journey through the aftermath of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Dream is at Doo-Wop Heaven, where you hear first-hand how the dream lives forever in the minds of unbreakable stars like Vito Picone of the Elegants, Nick Santos of the Capris, Jimmy Beaumont of the Skyliners, Charlie Thomas of the Drifters, as well as two long-time managers of our so-called “little stars,” Joe Rock and Arnie Kay, who not only have helped shape the constant comebacks of the dreams but have informed views on how and why the old music has outlived its actuarial probabilities in America. From Doo-Wop Heaven it is on to long, nostalgic stops to visit one-time R ´n´ R luminaries Bobby Helms, The McCoys, Carl Dobkins Jr., Joe Dowell, the Lemon Pipers, Question Mark (of the Mysterians), Jinx Dawson (of Coven), and The Rivieras before heading back to the concerts where the Dream ages but stays alive. Though some of the personal lives turned nightmarish and even deadly, the dream and music continue to play in the background of their stories like secret voices. Put your ear to the book and listen closely. You can hear them still.

Wishing Upon the Rock 'n' Roll Dream

Little Stars

The power of pi is not immedately evident from a glance at this small Greek letter. Yet the existence of pi has confounded mathematicians and engineers for centuries. What does it mean to have a real number that cannot be stated exactly? What is a number that does not appear to have any recurring pattern? And why does it crop up in unexpected places that have no apparent connection with the circumference of a circle? These questions are not answered in this book, but you do get a glimpse of the phenomenon-real numbers to grapple with. A bit of the history of pi. And a program designed to generate as many digits as you'd like.

Pi to 500k Decimal Places

Ann Gordon

Stereotypes are prevalent throughout our society. Using content analytical and experimental data in conjunction with case studies, When Stereotypes Collide explores the influence of gender and ethnic/racial minority stereotypes in the production of campaign messages created during congressional elections. Filling a void in political campaign research, this book draws specific attention to the uses and consequences of political advertisement videostyle strategies on the electoral fortunes of women and minority candidates.

Race/ethnicity, Gender, and Videostyle in Congressional Campaigns

When Stereotypes Collide

At the time of my retirement on March 31, 2006, I challenged myself with a handful of goals. With this publication, all have now been accomplished. Initially, I did not plan to publish. I did plan to write a manuscript or a story . . . or just write something about the universe. I felt compelled to give my fascination with the universe some sort of order, something that would punctuate my life. Upon completion, I wondered if it might have some merit to others and scoped out the thought of publication. I found the manuscript very readable and relatively elementary. It should prove interesting to science students of all levels as well as all people interested in the universe.

A Simple Story of a Not-So-Simple Universe

Describes the story of the universe, from the beginning of space and time to the creation of the Earth and human life.

Jerry Miller

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