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by George W. Penington  -  Editor

SEPTEMBER 1, 2003  "HAPPY LABOR DAY"

ISSUE  #41  PAGE 1 of 2

1)  WELCOME TO THE HUNLEY NEWSLETTER >
2)  RAISING BLUE IS COMING TO TOWN-THE UPDATED VERSION>
 "catch Raising Blue fever"
3)   IN CASE YOU MISSED IT -THE UN-CIVIL WAR OVER A CIVIL MATTER >
4) PLANS FOR ANOTHER SECRET SUBMARINE INTERCEPTED BY THE YANKEES  >
5)  FROM THE GUEST BOOK>
6)  E-MAIL >
7)  HELP NEEDED ON BUILDING OF THE "PIONEER" REPLICA  -> 
8)  INFORMATION ABOUT HERITAGE MOTORCYCLE RALLY     April 2004
9)  OUR PURPOSE AND GOALS >

1) WELCOME TO THE NEW HUNLEY NEWSLETTER

A special welcome to all the new subscribers. This newsletter is published every two weeks so no one is bombarded with mail.  This issue contains the long awaited announcement about the play "Raising Blue" coming to Charleston also a Barbeque Fundraiser at The William Aiken House on September 28th.  They need some help and we need to offer.  A recent article verifies that "Spence" is getting a little beat up and roughed up in his 33 year battle. There is some interesting email and information about another Confederate Secret submarine and some plans to build a working HUNLEY.

*Special Notice: We have decided to only send out a text edition of the Newsletter after this month. All subscribers will be also sent the link for the online edition that you can save to your own computer to read or print at your leisure. I feel with the pictures that the letters in HTML format are heavy and burdensome for dial up connections and take too long to download. If you need help downloading, just e-mail me and let me know.

 

Hunley model cutaway 1/32 :Special Price: 110.95 plus  S&H   

( Product # 32-003)Fully cutaway, revealing complete interior. Features 8-position hand crank, helm, ballast tanks, pumps and controls. 21 3/4” long when complete. Scale 1/32. This model is of the old design and will need some modification to look like the Hunley.


Presented by the HUNLEYSTORE.COM

 

   

Photography:

 

The Sister Churches after the fire of 1861 and the bombardment of the civil war, Charleston, S.C. 

 

 St. MICHAELS CHURCH CORNER OF MEETING AND BROAD - THE FOUR CORNERS OF LAW - CITY HALL IS ON THE LEFT - St. MICHAELS STEEPLE IS PAINTED BLACK SO THAT THE NORTHERN BLOCKADERS COULD NOT USE IT for A TARGET AT NIGHT. 

Digital Enhancement by George W. Penington 

 2) "RAISING BLUE" IS COMING TO TOWN - "catch Raising Blue fever"

For the first time ever,

I am asking for contributions for the production of "Raising blue"

I would like to get behind this group as a volunteer and ask that subscribers to this newsletter help out in making this production a major success in Charleston.  Even though McConnell may not get the part of General Beauregard and I probably will not get the part of Dixon there is no excuse for not helping out.  a contribution will be the best way - either monetarily or physically.  let me know if you can help - send me an e-mail (Mistergwp@thehunley.com )  it is my hope that enough money can be raised to sponsor the performance the week of the re-interment (April 17, 2004)  in honor of the final crew.

 

 Raising Blue - A new play about the men of The Hunley
    By G. Riley Mills
The Award-Winning Play about the men of The Hunley submarine during the Civil War makes its Southern Premiere after rewrites for historical accuracy. First time presented outside of Chicago, where it was nominated for the coveted Jeff Award - Chicago's equivalent of the Tony's!
 
 The Footlight Players will be producing the Southern World Premier of RAISING BLUE, the award-winning play about the men of The Hunley.  The play will be presented January 29 through February 22, 2004.  Auditions will be held September 29 and 30th at The Footlight Players Theatre, 20 Queen Street.  RAISING BLUE's southern premier will be produced in association with The Actors Center of Chicago, the company that presented the original production.  It will be directed by Adam Theisen, Chicago director who directed the original production.  The Footlight Players has commissioned the playwright, G. Riley Mills, to do rewrites of the script for historical accuracy for presentation in Charleston.

 

 

A Fundraising Barbeque to benefit our production of RAISING BLUE will be held on September 28th, from 4pm to 8pm at The William Aiken House, 456 King Street.  The public is cordially invited.   Tickets for the Fundraiser will be $50/per person, and includes an afternoon/evening of great barbeque by Momma Brown's, Bluegrass Music, and lots of fun.  Meet the  Director, Adam  Theisen, Playwright, G. Riley Mills, and Actor's  Center of Chicago CEO, Lance Gordon.  Call 722-7521 for information and tickets to this special event. 



 In January of this year, Senator Glenn McConnell met with the playwright, director and actors of the Chicago Production - as well as the artistic team from The Footlight Players - at the Warren Lasch Center and gave us all a wonderful tour and history lesson.  Sen. McConnell has also agreed to attend the fundraiser, as well as serve as a special advisor for our production of RAISING BLUE.   The City of Charleston's Office of Cultural Affairs also supports this special project.

The play opened in Chicago for a 6-week run and received uniformly rave reviews from all Chicago newspapers, including The Chicago Sun-Times and The Chicago Tribune.

The play has 20 roles for male actors and one female role.  Auditions are open to the general public.  The information on auditions and the play follows.  Please call me with any questions about The  Footlight Player's production of RAISING BLUE. 

Thank you!
 
 Sheri Grace Wenger
 Artistic Director
 FOOTLIGHT PLAYERS
 843-557-1163
 
 
 AUDITIONS FOR:
 Raising Blue
 By G. Riley Mills - Directed by Adam Theisen   
 
 
 Produced in Association with The Actor's Center of Chicago Production Company
 
 

AUDITION DATES: September 29 & 30 - 7pm (Monday and Tuesday)
Production Dates: January 29 – February 22
 

The much heralded play about the men of The Hunley submarine during the  Civil War makes its Southern Premiere after rewrites for historical accuracy.  First time presented outside of Chicago, where it was nominated for the coveted Jeff Award - Chicago's equivalent of the Tony's. Award-winning Chicago director, Adam Theisen will direct.
 
 Roles:   20 Men between ages 16 – 50     1 Woman aged 18 - 28
 
Roles include: Col. George Dixon, General P. G. T. Beauregard,
Horace Hunley, William Alexander, James McClintock, and
Queenie Bennett – AND fifteen more speaking roles for men
 
 No monologue preparation necessary. You will be asked to read from the
 script.
 Also needed are set builders, carpenters, painters, costumers, seamstresses, and musicians who play instruments and music from the Civil War era.
 
 The Footlight Players is a 72-year old non-profit, community theatre.  All actors and crew are volunteers.
 
 For more information about The Footlight Players, please check out their
 website:  www.footlightplayers.net
 
 

   

The burial of the final crew of the H. L. Hunley is scheduled for Saturday, April 17th, 2004 starting at 10:00 a.m. at White Point Gardens, followed by a funeral procession and ending at Magnolia Cemetery for the burial.

 
 3) IN CASE YOU MISSED IT -THE UN-CIVIL WAR OVER A CIVIL MATTER >


 

THE UN-CIVIL WAR OVER A CIVIL MATTER
CLIVE CUSSLER E. LEE SPENCE

CHARLESTON, S.C. AUGUST 30, 2003 

Dr. E. Lee Spence, Underwater Archaeologist is in a devastating thirty-three year battle to win what many say is his “deserved recognition” as the discoverer of the Confederate Submarine H.L. Hunley.  Spence never expected to be in this position particularly after having been commended by the State in 1995 for “the important role you have played in the discovery of the Hunley.”

Instead of receiving an award for conveying his interest in the Confederate Submarine, Spence received service of a lawsuit from his nemesis, Clive Cussler from Colorado and the Board Chairman of his own organization called National Underwater and Marine Agency (NUMA), and attorney Richard Tapp.  The suit filed in October, 2001 asks for a jury to decide who first located the sub: Spence in 1970, or Cussler's group in 1995.

Cussler’s suit contends that Spence’s persistent claims of prior discovery of the Hunley has hurt his reputation.

Cussler first arrived in Charleston in 1980 to begin searching for the sub just as Spence’s records showing the precise location of the Hunley were sealed by a Federal District Court to protect its location.   Cussler hired divers equipped with electronic equipment and at least a dozen sites were mapped off Charleston but nothing was ever exposed. Cussler returned to search again in 1981 without success and once more in 1994, when he took part in a joint search with the South Carolina Institute of Anthropology and Archaeology. It also failed to locate the sub.

In May of 1995, Cussler hired local divers - Ralph Wilbanks, Wes Hall and Harry Pecorelli – who went out on their own and uncovered the sub after digging through revised available records and two months after the publication of Spence’s Book, Treasures of the Confederate Coast: The “Real Rhett Butler” & Other Revelations showing the location of the Hunley.

In February, 2002, Senior U.S. District Judge Sol Blatt, Jr.  ordered Cussler's legal team to remove several objectionable parts of the filing that he said appeared to be included solely to embarrass Spence.  Judge Blatt said that Cussler's promise to “give any damages recovered from Spence in the case to charity appeared to be a publicity stunt.”  He also said that “including Spence's description of diving for the Hunley clad in his underwear was meant to bring ridicule.”

 On August 15, 2003 attorneys for Spence filed a motion to delay the trial based on medical justifications. “Spence has been suffering from severe depression and bipolar disorder, among other conditions and as a result, has been hospitalized twice and has been unable to take care of his personal needs, his business concerns or his obligations" in the lawsuit, according to his documentation filed with the court and supported by a statement from his physicians.  The battle for justice has caused “financial difficulties that have made it impossible for him to support this litigation and meet his financial obligations."

Spence’s attorneys have asked that Judge Sol Blatt Jr. delay proceedings until Spence can recover; stating that a temporary delay would not prejudice the trial. 

In a case that has the potential of being a blood bath reminiscent of the American Civil War, where brother turned against brother, there appears to be little compassion.

In response to Spence’s request for a delay, Cussler’s attorney Richard Tapp stated, "It makes little difference as to whether the defendant's motion to stay is actually based on his alleged illness (and resulting stress) or undisputed financial woes, since neither ground provides a valid reason to suspend pending civil litigation."

In a counter motion, Tapp, who is also the attorney for the Hunley Commission, asked Judge Blatt to order Spence be examined by a second doctor noting that Spence did not respond to formal questions submitted to him last December. Before making a ruling on Spence’s request for a continuance, Blatt ordered Spence be evaluated by clinical neuropsychologist Mark Wagner and ordered Wagner to file a report
with the court on Spence's condition by mid-September.

Richard Tapp, an attorney with the Charleston, South Carolina law office of Nexsen Pruet Jacobs Pollard & Robinson, has been working as the chief legal resource and attorney for the “Friends of the Hunley”, the non-profit entity devoted to the raising and preservation of the Confederate Submarine, the H.L. Hunley in Charleston

Senator Glenn McConnell, Chairman of the Hunley Commission is seeking $40 Million Dollars to house the recovered submarine, the first to sink an enemy ship during war.

Continued on Page 2>>>>>

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