SELF-PUBLISHER’S MAGICAL BOOK BRINGS HISTORY TO LIFE
Article by Whitney Hallberg, Editor
ForeWord Magazine's "ForeWord This Week"
Reviews of Good Books Independently Published
www.forewordmagazine.com
November 15, 2006
The photographs are familiar: Buzz Aldrin walking across the moon, four Marines raising an American flag on Iwo Jima, and Lou Gehrig standing before a microphone in his Yankees uniform, wiping the tears from his face. They are images engraved in our minds, moments that make up our history, and have taught us lessons about our country and ourselves. But in Anthony and the Magic Picture Frame by Michael Class (Magic Picture Frame Studio, 10 x 10, color and b/w photographs, 224 pages, hardcover, $25.00, ISBN 0-9749269-0-6), there is something different about these pictures. A twelve-year-old boy stands next to Aldrin on the moon’s rocky surface, he watches the men hoisting the flag, and stands beside the emotional baseball player.
The book is the story of Anthony, who has a mysterious picture frame that hangs in his room with the ability to transport him through time and space when he places a photograph in the frame. Anthony’s father, Michael Class, is the author and publisher.
“The book was written because of what I saw after 9/11,” Class told FTW. “I really was dismayed and shocked by the number of people who seemed to struggle with the concepts of good and evil, right and wrong, heroes and villains. It was a time when our children - America’s next generation - really needed to hear some straightforward truth, and some reassurance that there really are such distinctions. I wanted my own kids, Angela and Anthony, to understand that no matter what happens in the world that ‘the purpose of life is to live a life of purpose, and doing the right thing always matters.’”
Anthony and the Magic Picture Frame was written for young adults in grades six to twelve, but Class says he has heard from parents and grandparents who have enjoyed the book with their children and grandchildren. The moon landing, World War II and the Holocaust, Jonas Salk’s development of the Polio vaccine, Lou Gehrig’s career, the invention of the telephone, and the immigration of Anthony’s great-grandfather in 1907 are all covered. Each chapter features cleverly altered photographs, which place Class’s son Anthony in the middle of the action, and well-researched descriptions and details.
“New York Yankees fans chose July 4, 1939 to officially show Lou Gehrig how much they loved him,” reads Anthony’s description of Lou Gehrig’s last game. “It was ‘Lou Gehrig Appreciation Day’ at Yankee Stadium, and I was there. The capacity crowd of sixty-one thousand people stood up in the bleachers and chanted: ‘We want Lou! We want Lou! We want Lou!’”
Class had retired from his engineering career when he got the idea for the book. He had worked for technology companies including Apple Computer and WatchGuard Technologies in Seattle. His idea for the book came from his desire for the heroes of the past to be able to speak to the children of today.
“This appealed to my engineering and scientific nature - a time travel story,” Class said. “It also re-awakened my love of history and the dream I had of sharing the stories behind famous historical photos. Imagine actually being able to meet the heroes of the past - and a book filled with photos that makes it seem like it really happened!”
Class selected the events depicted in the book by first determining the lessons he wanted to portray.
“I wanted to teach about the existence of good and evil, duty and honor, and our responsibility to take care of our brothers,” he said. “My favorite quote along these lines was: ‘The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing,’ by Edmund Burke. So I included the quote at the beginning of Chapter 6 (every chapter begins with a quote that is really the lesson of the chapter). And I chose the story of World War II and the Holocaust to teach the lesson.”
To make the photographs of Anthony seem realistic, Class enrolled in photography classes where he learned digital compositing - putting two or more photos together digitally.
When it came time to publish the book, Class says he never considered an alternative to self-publishing.
“Coming from my business background - and my entrepreneurial nature - I just never considered anything other than setting up my own publishing company, and producing and marketing the book,” he told FTW. “I hired people to help me - like a printer, an editor - but I always thought of the book as a product of a company I would own.”
Each chapter is painstakingly researched. Class even received permission to use quotes from the subjects to make it seem as if they had a conversation with Anthony:
“‘Why are we making this trip? Why are we taking this risk?’” Anthony asks Charles Lindbergh.
“Lindbergh calmly said: ‘It would show people what airplanes can do. It would advance aviation, and it would advertise St. Louis.’”
Each quote is attributed in the book’s extensive footnotes. Also included is a list of books, movies, music, and locations where readers can learn more about each event and historical era.
The book has been embraced by teachers and home-schoolers and has received endorsements from Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin and Dr. Darrell Salk, the son of Jonas Salk.
In a turbulent time, Anthony’s story serves as a reminder of the foundations of our country and what it has achieved through determination and a belief in the power of goodness.
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