Dispatches, Stories & Journalism: Hank Nuwer
Grab a coffee and enjoy the story clearinghouse of Hank Nuwer with photos of Alaska and its wildlife by Malgorzata (Gosia) Nuwer.
Hank Nuwer’s Indiana University Press books on hazing. Podcast in The Culture
Podcast of “Weed in the Garden of Academe” with Hank Nuwer
Scroll down for archived Realalaskadaily stories.Thank you for reading. Got a compliment or gripe? Drop a line to Hjnuwer@Alaska.edu. Gosia and I want to keep this site ad-free. Trying to raise funds for last-minute research on the new Kurt Vonnegut biography (“Not authorized, but authentic scholarship”). Your donation would be so helpful: Hank Nuwer, PO Box 73446; Fairbanks, AK 99707-3446.
Excerpt from Kurt Vonnegut: Behind the Laughter
Draft only from my in-progress biography of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. Kurt Vonnegut: Behind the Laughter (working title) Chapter One: Oodles of Doodles Kurt Vonnegut Jr. liked to joke that he never asked to be born. Whenever he put his welcomed little scrawl on paper as a...
Indianapolis industrial accident in 1875 claimed the life of the nephew of Kurt Vonnegut’s paternal great-grandfather
Josephine Andre Mueller (her remarried name) lived a life marked by many tragedies. She was the sister-in- law of Indianapolis business giants Herman and Peter Lieber, the latter the maternal great grandfather of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. She was widowed during the Civil...
Death of a Salesman: How Clemens Vonnegut Really Did Die
by Hank Nuwer Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. said in Palm Sunday that his relative was a “cultivated eccentric” as the family historian John Rauch, Sr., had once described the hardware scion. “That’s what I aspire to be,” Kurt wrote. Palm Sunday (Page 28) by Kurt Vonnegut says...
Exclusive: The Indianapolis Partnership of Charles Volmer & Clemens Vonnegut, Jr.
[Author note: Biographer Charles J. Shields (And So It Goes) and Kurt, Jr. in Palm Sunday incorrectly and repeatedly spell Charles Volmer’s last name as “Vollmer,” contrary to the proper spelling published in multiple nineteenth-century Indianapolis city directories...
Exclusive from Hank Nuwer’s forthcoming Kurt Vonnegut bio: Ancestor Johanna Juliana (Julie) Junghans of Dresden
Kurt Vonnegut’s Ancestry: Part One (excerpted from bio by Hank Nuwer) The Vonnegut family’s earliest forbear in America was Johanna Juliana (Julie) Junghans. She had been the offspring of a poor nailsmith. Julie hailed from Dresden, a fact Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. never...
Blue Eggs: Short Fiction by Hank Nuwer
Xavier Lysiak rearranged the papers on his writing table. Today he planned to polish his dissertation, his ticket to a terminal degree and a teaching career. Now his cell phone rang, and he read the caller ID. “I’m handling a tragic mess at Dotty’s place,” his boss...
Ill Met by Moonlight: Charles Wason and the Cornell Fraternity Hazing Death.
By Hank Nuwer: The details and facts in this essay were taken from testimony delivered by members of KAS on October 12 and October 16, 1873, at a two-day coroner’s inquest in Ithaca, New York,. Charles Wason.. Mortimer Marcellus Leggett arrived at Cornell...
A Hazing Death: Human Rights and the Constitutional Right to Remain Silent.
Carl Dingens (team photo), Row Two, Blonde hair, second from right Carl L. Dingens, Cornell 1896: Carl Louis Dingens died in Buffalo on April 30, 1927..He was born in Buffalo March 22, 1873, the son of Joseph A. and Julia G. Dingens. He attended Canisius School...
Casey Dog’s Story
July 18, 2026 I was cleaning out my digital files today and came across an unpublished column (I pretended was) written by my dog Casey. Casey died in 2019. I miss him still. I dated and then married my wife Gosia. Before Casey, she had been afraid of dogs. Before...