The original, 2-page short story version of

THE: "WHITEMAIL" MACHINE

Copyright © 1974 by Roger M. Wilcox. All rights reserved.
(writing on this story began 4-Nov-1974)
The original draft was written on a mechanical typewriter, single-spaced, with arbitrary margins, before I'd learned about those pesky little things called "paragraphs." It was inspired by Felice Holman's 1968 children's novel The Blackmail Machine, which we were reading in 4th grade (yes, fourth grade). At the time, I didn't know what "blackmail" meant. All spellings, punctuation, strings of exclamation points, capitalizations, colors, etc. are as in the original. Many sentences begin with a word in ALL CAPS, because on this early typewriter I was in the habit of using the Shift Lock key to write capital letters — it eliminated the strain of holding down the Shift key while hunting for the letter I wanted to peck — and more often than not I would forget to disengage Shift Lock before typing the rest of the word. Unfortunately, without scanning it in and presenting an image, I can't really convey all the typewriter overstrikes and formatting oddities I had to slog through in the original.

You have been warned.

CHAPTER 1: THE FLYING BARREL......................................

Once I was taking a walk, when, I saw something I never saw before. A helicopter made of a rainbarrel! THEN I said, "come on down" (like on the 'price-is-right'). And so he did. THEN I gave him a little talk. THEN I went on doing my business. THEN I thought "of course! I could make my own flying barrel! I will call it the whitemail machine". THEN I went right to work! AND I built it in 3 hours! THEN I began to test it. And do you know what? IT flied! SO then I went on a small tour of California. THEN I went down to get some lunch. THEN I thought, "insted of touring california, why shoudent I tour the U.S.A.! SO I did. THEN, while I tour the United States, why dont I look at the jets. So I did. I saw a 747, 720, 727, 737, 707, 880, DC-10, L-1011, DC-8, and a DC-9. Then I went back to do something else. But on the way back, I saw the 'First Natinal Bank' being robed! SO I swooped down on him, and, he got so surprized, that, he ran around in circles. Then the police came to get him. And sent him in jail. Meanwhile, the new missle was due for count-down. There were 30 minutes to count-down, so, I flew over to watch the blastoff. -29 m. & 59 s. , 29-58, 29-57, 29-56, 29-54, 29-52, 29-50, 29-48, 29-46, 29-44, 29-42, 29-40 & so on. then it got down to 7 minutes. 6-59, 6-58, 6-54, 6-50, 6-45, 6-40, 6-30, 6-20, 6-10, 6:00, 5-50, 5-40, 5-30, 5-20, 5-10, 5:00, 4-50, 4-40, 4-30, 4-20, 4:00, 3-40, 3-20, 3-10, 3-05, 3:00, 2-55, 2-50, 2-45, 2-40, 2-35, 2-30, 2-25, 2-20, 2-15, 2-10, 2-05, 2:00, 1-55, 1-50, 1-45, 1-40, 1-35, 1-30, 1-25, 1-20, 1-15, 1-10, 1-05, 1:00, 55, 50, -46s., 42, 38, 34, 30, 26, 23, 20, 18, 16, 14, 12, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, egnition, blastoff! And the missle took off! Then I went back to do something else......................;.........

CHAPTER 2: TROUBLE, & GETTING HIGHER.....................................

But, when I went back, all-of a sudden, my generator ran out of fuel. And I landed in the loueseanna teratory! And whithout any gasoline stations! But then I saw an emergency 2 gallon gas tank (my barrel gets 28.3 m.p.g.). So then I put the gas in the tank, &, took off! Then I went back to do something else. THEN I saw a guy with a so-he-called jet. The so-he-called part, was, the jet was a, 717. So I challenged him to a race! Then the race was on! It seemed as if the 717 would win. For at that very moment, the 717 was ahead of me. Then I caught up to him at last. Then I passed him! Then I won the race! Then I went back to do something else. Then I saw a fire! So I 'dashed' over to it to see what I could do. I tried to get some water from the river, but it was'nt enough. THEN I got the fire department, but they couldnt do it either. THEN I thought "ah. The river. I could, make a ditch in it. That would allow the water to flow through on to the fire!" And it worked! THEN I got a medal for it. THEN I went back to do something else.........................................................................

CHAPTER 3: THEY ALWAYS SAY, FIGHT FIRE WITH WATER!...........................

But I was thinking, "I feel guilty of winning that medal. I think the water should get it. but, thats rediculas." So I went on flying.
But then I thought, "what could have started the fire? 'Who' could have started the fire?" Then I went to find that out. THEN I saw that it was someone by the name of: Rick harald dim-o-lan. So I went over to talk with him. He said that he was about to crush out his smoke, when, the wind blew it on to a leaf, and started a fire. So I went back to do something else............

CHAPTER 4: FIRES GONE.......................................................

When I got back, my watch with '25' crystles was stolen! SO I went out to look for the crimenal. Then I saw an empty watch store, with some suspicious-looking finger prints! Then I took them to the police station. They said, "that's 'Slippery-Sam-Smith' ". Then they set a trap for him. Including: 1 bear trap, 100 strings, 1 automatic burgler alarm and 1 bank. Then he came in, and, POW! he was caught! THEN the police took him into prison. SO I went back to do something else........... But there was nothing to do, so the story ends right there.

THE END

A 'WILCOX' PRESENTATION!!!!!!!!!

Author's notes from 2013:

While The Blackmail Machine, the original book I got the idea from, did feature a bunch of kids building their own helicopter, they built it out of their clubhouse. The notion of a barrel as a helicopter came from the Tennessee Tuxedo episode "Helicopter Hi-Jinks."
The 717 was considered a "fake" jet in this story because of a myth my dad told me about Boeing airliners. Boeing, at the time, had airliners named 707, 727, 737, and 747, but 717 was conspicuously absent from this progression. My dad claimed that this was because Boeing feared too many people would confuse "717" with the B-17, the Flying Fortress bomber from World War II. In reality, Boeing had engineered an airliner they intended to sell as the 717, but it never went into civilian production and instead became the basis for the military KC-135. (Boeing re-used that 717 designation in 1997 for the rebranded MD-95, an entirely different airliner.)
The odd phrasing "crush out his smoke" came from various Smokey Bear billboards, telling campers to "crush their smokes" to prevent forest fires. The only kinds of crushable "smokes" I can imagine are cigarettes and cigars — and frankly, I don't think there are many campers who carry cigars with them.
My watch had 25 "crystles" [sic] because, at the time, I'd learned that expensive watches used jewels, or crystals, for the bearings of their tiny gears. Good watches used 17 jewels, but the really good watches used 21 jewels. So, naturally, I made up a wristwatch that was 4 jewels better than this.

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