Lunch With an Author

When we were in Windsor earlier this week, we met Ken Milburn for lunch, where he unveiled his latest project: Windsor to the Smithsonian.

It tells the amazing story of his fulfilling his late Aunt Beulah's request that he "do the right thing" with the boxing gloves worn by Joe Louis in his first fight against Max Schmeling at Yankee Stadium in 1936.

This was the fight that Louis lost. He met with Schmeling again in 1938 when Louis was Heavyweight Champion of the world.

Ken's book traces the changes that were taking place in America and the rest of the world in those two years.

He also gives a behind-the-scenes look at how a piece of history can make its way from a plastic bag in someone's apartment to the permanent collection of a museum like the Smithsonian.

I for one will never look at a museum exhibit the same way again. They don't arrive wholesale. They arrive piece by piece, each with its own story and each with the possibility of never having gotten there at all.

And, as Ken so ably demonstrates, each of these little pieces helps to explain the bigger picture.

I'm so pleased that Ken has written this book and hope it's the start of a whole new career for him!