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2. A new page will pop up. Type your comment in the white box for text to the right.
3. To protect against spam, Blogger requires that you copy a strange mix of letters it presents. Simply retype those letters in the space that says "Word Verification."
4. Choose your identity. The easiest way is to hit "Name/URL" and then just type your name, or a pen name you'd like to write under, in the space that says "Name." Ignore the URL box. If you'd rather be anonymous, click the "Anonymous" button instead.
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Comments
Words cannot describe how heart broken I have been all week after learning of your passing. We worked together for a long time at West Point and not once had a bad word between us. You taught me to laugh and take things as they come. I saw how strong you were when your son passed away. My life will never be the same, I will miss you coming in my office and most of all I will miss your booming voice and great presence.Thanks Sue for sharing him with me!
Always a friend-Buttercup!
I may of been crude, rude and a bore. But for me Mr. Guinan's was more than a store.
To John & to Margaret, Kelly, Dean, Todd and more. I'm glad that I've met you and wished our time was much more.
Mr. Guinan I thank you for your words and your songs. To Capt'n Tom and to Ed, Much I can not convey. But Thanks can be hard for me to express.
Soon Summer will be here and the fall bicycle ride. God willing I'll be there support to provide.
But for Easter I trust God will be by your sides.
The final nights at Guinan's was possibly more than anyone thought they ever seen before. To those who I asked not to enter the doors, it was for your safety we feared (and not the age of the floors). The crowd was substatial the exits were few. Please forgive me if then I offended a few.
So those I haven't mention please don't think of me ill, but these limited space and volumes to fill.
Wendy, thaks for the book, the memories and much more.
Quinn
...keep on smiling
Hans P. Bosse
Stamford, CT
Just rereading Little Chapel and decided to blog. My wife, last Jan 27 saw an article in the NY TImes about Guinan's closing. We decided we must visit and came with her determined to get jim to sign her copy of the book. Not only did she get Jim to sign but most everyone else there. We cherish our copy of your book now often rereading the signings, matching them with characters from the book. We only regret not having your signature but than you so much for sharing and bringing this wonderful place to us all.
We hope to be at the reunion on March 11 and will bring the book if you will be there.
Hope you are well and we thank you again for sharing this with us
Don and Eileen Goodrich
Bethel, CT
He will be remembered.
Joe Marcklinger
Nantucket, Ma.
shaun proodfoot
guildford,england
The Guinan's were a fixture in Garrison, and will be greatly missed, I was very sorry to hear about the passing of both Mr Guinan and John....will post after reading the book....Thanks
Alex Hatziemanuel
Great story, quickly from bigcity & tragic to the local everyday, a few beers, few stories, small town. Gives meaning to the commonplace, refuge of time. therapeutic for you to write, for us to read. Well done.
Paul
from the Millbrook book day fair
Thanks for the great read. Growing up in Garrison I visited Guinan's for one-cent tootsie rolls and fireballs, the paper with our family name on it, and then later for the atmosphere in the bar. My most vivid Jim-memory was of him pouring me a Guinness. When I remarked that it was the best beer I'd ever had, he quickly corrected me by saying "It's not a beer, it's a stout!" One of many happy memories of Garrison's Landing. -Wil
I was outside of a bookstore one Sunday browsing a selection of books for sale, when I saw LCotR. It was a used copy which the store owner sold to me for a dollar. It's very ironic that I bought this book in a place that I consider my own little chapel, a place in Los Angeles called Leimert Park. It's a vibrant community full of art and jazz music and smiling neighbors that I hope to make my home some day. I don't really believe in fate or signs, but your book has brought me close to it.
That said, I enjoyed reading Little Chapel very much. The characters were very alive to me and I found myself very much wrapped up in Guinans. I just found out from the other comments that Jim and John have passed, and also that Guinans has been closed since 2008. It's a strange feeling to discover this whole new world filled with interesting people and then find out that you're too late to partake in any of it. I was in high school when 9/11 happened, all the way in California. Yet I could actually picture myself singing at Guinan's on Irish night. It would have been fun. :) But nonetheless I have to thank you for telling this story. And for this message you wrote at the start of the book:
To anyone who has ever known a spot like this, a spot that makes you feel more at home sometimes than home itself, I'd just like to add, go there if you still can. Be there. And don't wait for tomorrow. Go today.
I kept that in mind the whole time I was reading. Thanks again for this wonderful story of how this place changed your life. :)
I'm glad to see this blog is current. As long as this blog is here, I feel like an actual piece of Guinan's still remains.
I'm glad to see this blog is current. As long as this blog is here, I feel like an actual piece of Guinan's still remains.
It's sad that we were unable to save the Guinnan site. I saw the photo of the ivy that is now growing through what was the bar window.It was a shock to see that after remembering all the great
sessuins we had there for so many years.
As a regular visitor to New York, I took a side trip up the 'The Local' in 2007 and had a can of Guinness at the bar with a couple of the real life characters.
I am so glad that I did and I will not forget it.
So, so sorry to hear about it's closure but so pleased to have visited the Local. Thanks to all and thank you to Gwendoyln for a great book.
“ Thy word is . . . a light to my path. ”
Psalm 119:105 (RSV)
On the riverbank in the Hudson River town of Cold Spring, New York, I noticed a small sign:
WARNER SISTERS
VIEW TO CONSTITUTION ISLAND
PRESERVED BY AUTHORS
SUSAN WARNER AND ANNA WARNER
WHO WROTE THE HYMN
"JESUS LOVES ME"
Beyond the forested island I could see the US Military Academy at West Point on its dramatic cliffs across the river. “Jesus loves me, this I know. . . ”Easy words to write, I thought, for a well-to-do woman living in this delightful setting. Then I learned Anna Warner’s story.
She and her sister did grow up in wealth. Their widowed father was a prominent lawyer; home was a luxurious townhouse—servants, grooms, carriage house. But in the stock market panic of 1837, when the girls were in their late teens, all this was lost.
Their father bought a derelict old farmhouse on Constitution Island, fifty miles and a world away from New York City’s high society. The young women learned to cook, clean, wash, sew, keep a vegetable garden. Among many failed attempts to recoup his fortune, their father tried growing rice. I could still see the channels he dug in the marsh between the island and the shore.
To sustain themselves, Susan and Anna turned to writing stories, hymns, novels (some of them best sellers). But because there were no copyright laws, they lived out their lives in poverty. How did they know Jesus loved them? “For the Bible tells me so.” And for forty years they held Bible classes for the cadets at West Point, sharing their love of the book that made their outwardly meager lives rich and joyful.
Speak to me today, Father, through Your written Word.
By Elizabeth Sherrill
I may have to do a copy-cat blog post linking the two "coincidences"
Good lord, what on earth has to happen in order for someone to reopen Guinan's? I'm a USMA grad and currently serving general officer, but I'll retire tomorrow and come up there to man the bar if that's what it takes. This is a special place to so many of us, not sure what the hard part is but let's please fix this quick. My kid's a yearling (sophomore) and I want him to row across the river after taps like my classmate Tom Endres!!
To everyone who had a hand in what Guinan's once was, thank you, and to those who will have a hand in what it will be again, thank you even more!!
It is just too sad that this wonderful place of heaven is closed now.
I too love what is old and cannot be replaced, such as a good conversation, and meeting new people in pubs. Although I'm German, I love Irish pubs, live in New Rochelle, and have only visited one. But was in Forest Hills, and forgot the name of the Irish pub there; but their Irish food, and even the waitress, is authentic.
I am so saddened that all those beautiful little pubs, a hangout for people who like to share a good story, are vanishing; only to replace them with those boring, and cold bigger chains.
Adele Lightner
New Rochelle, NY
'high holy day' is right around the corner and it is celebrated with corned beef, cabbage, and Guinness. Sound familiar?
This damned book made me cry and I just ordered 10 copies to hand out in my pub!
I told my wife about the place when I got home but she didn't seem to really get the big deal. Imagine my surprise when I saw the book in a store a couple of years later. I immediately realized it was that place in Garrison. Although Guinan's was open for a few years after I read it, I'm sad to say I never returned. I'm glad it existed though. Thanks for writing the book so people like me can get a glimpse of what it was like.