Background for "Gibbon's Secrets"

When I was writing "Gibbon's Secrets" I knew that background information and research would be absolutely necessary to develop the story.  I called one of my early childhood friends who came back to live in Gibbon, Duncan McGregor, and told him about my Gibbon project.  I asked him if I could come over to drive around Gibbon with him to establish the background of the town and therefore to visit the sites that we knew as kids.  It was a delightful day and it was a pleasure to be able to ride around town with Duncan and to actually take pictures of some places relative to our young groups experience.  I am going to insert some of those pictures for you to get a glimpse of Gibbon Nebraska (remarkably some of the homes we knew back then are still there today).

This is a picture of the house that I was born in on January 31, 1932 in Gibbon Nebraska, right across the street from the park on the west - with Mr. Ross's Big Red Barn across the street north.

 The Park

Mr. Ross's house - the Big Red Barn is sadly gone

Duncan's house

Wally Buchanan's house

We were called the "Five Friends Forever" - consisting of Duncan McGregor, Wally Buchanan, Donny Hawke, Stanley Sylvester, and myself - Bud Phelps.

Donny Hawke's house

Stanley Sylvester's house

My Grandpa Phelps' house

The unattached garage shown in the left background was Grandpa Phelps' Gibbon Shoe Shop

All of these pictures represent actual locations for the events that happened in "Gibbon's Secrets.

Finally this is a picture of the cover of "Gibbon's Secrets" which includes a picture of Bud's 3rd grade class.

I hope that you enjoyed this little trip into "A Boy's Memories of the 40's" found in my book "Gibbon's Secrets".  Again, you can view some of the information for my books on www.budsbooks.com.