Acknowledgements

No undertaking as extensive as the one to follow could ever be completed without the untiring assistance of lots of people, especially when the person ultimately responsible is as inexperienced as I in so great a number of areas vital to telling this story. I am indebted to many for much. Permit me to acknowledge a few to whom I am particularly grateful.

Forty-six people in Yuba City were kind enough to put up with my extensive interviewing. They endured the most, and to those who are not mentioned by name in the work to follow, I still value your contributions just as highly. Mrs. Edith Clairidge of the Sutter County Public Library was a tremendous help in leading me to newspaper articles and other hits of local history. William Detweiler and Allison Macdonald of the Twin Cities Independent-Herald were also helpful in locating important material and relating to me much background information.

Matthew Donovan, a lawyer who may still be writing his own book based on his knowledge of these events, gave generously of his opinions, especially under those potentially competitive circumstances. To another lawyer, Phyllis Baumgarten Dexter, I am grateful for a good deal of information about Selective Service procedures and for supplying me with invaluable literature on the subject. Dr. Creighton Finklestein of the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute, who has written extensively about disturbed personalities, assisted this layman patiently in preparing the psychiatric profile summary appearing here in one of the appendices.

This project required an extensive amount of physical effort. For preparing first-rate diagrams and maps, I appreciate the volunteer help of two Yuba City mechanical drawing students, Artie Chavez and Phillip Cavanaugh. Another student, Kristi Leggett, is responsible for those photographs I did not take myself. Barbara Johnson and the other women of Sutter County Secretarial Service performed miracles in the way of rapid transcribing from frequently unintelligible cassettes. Jack "Bud" Phillips was nice enough to take me on two very useful helicopter rides. I'd also like to thank my former boss, Louise Winslow, of the California State Department of Human Resources, without whose understanding and willingness to give me time off, this book would never have been written.

The American Graphology Laboratory of St. Louis was also helpful in agreeing to charge me only a nominal fee for verifying a piece of important evidence. I am especially grateful to Norman Cardoza, Ph.D., for his interest.

Of course, I should sincerely like to thank the always astute Albert Marcus for his overly generous Foreword. If I have accomplished a fraction of what he credits me with doing, I will feel this task to have been worthwhile. I also thank him for some financial assistance which aided the complettion of this manuscript.

I would also like to acknowledge that many who ought to have helped me let me down completely. To the former friends who turned their backs on me, the teachers I respected who now ridicule me, and to all the others who might have come to the aid of someone they knew well a long time ago, I hope they see I did it anyway.

While many have aided me, for the possible errors and inadvertent omissions, I accept full responsibility. I would appreciate hearing from any readers who might discover minor inaccuracies, so they may be corrected for future editions.