WPAA-TV Volunteers Produce a Historical Fiction Book

Storytelling is at the core of what we do at WPAA-TV. Our mission is to provide a brave, safe, and creative space for a diversity of expression from within our community. We hope the podcast and book encourage you to explore our community space. It belongs to you. wpaa.tv/myb

Who, What, When, Why | Wallingford Stories

We help people tell stories. Sometimes we convene people to excavate and produce them. Sometimes our story, as a media, arts, and culture organization in the heart of Wallingford, is part of the story. All of the aforementioned is true about our pursuit of the untold stories of our native son, Moses Yale Beach.

The Check Minus is a narrative portrayal of fictional individuals and events in Wallingford in the 1990s. It is derived from a true Moses Yale Beach student story and a publishing mystery related to Mr. Beach’s date of birth.

The team at WPAA-TV traced the extensively published date error to the American Biographical Sketch Book (Vol. 1) written by Mr. Beach’s peer, William Hunt (1848): ‘Of this couple, Moses Yale Beach, the subject of this memoir was the firstborn, that event occurring January 7th, 1800.” The January 7 date was later published with similar comments in the History of Wallingford by Charles Henry Stanley Davis (1870). Davis’s book was the likely date source for a New York Times obituary written by Emanuel Luetze (1868) and published in Newspapers across the country. To this day, several encyclopedias publish his D.O.B. as Jan 7 versus 15th, 1800. On our behalf, wiki editor, and former WPAA-TV producer, Oral Ofori, corrected the people’s encyclopedia: Wikipedia (May 2023).

What People Do and Do Not Know

Our book features an important media lesson about Primary Sources. While the characters and events in The Check Minus are imaginary, all references to geography, religion, and history are true. All references to Moses Yale Beach are factual. A references section, typical of nonfiction books, is part of this upper elementary-grade book with something for people of any age.

In 2016, Dawn Gottschalk's sketch of Moses Yale Beach identified the few times he was briefly in the consciousness of our community. If you know anything about Mr. Beach, you likely know he had a ‘mansion’ on North Main St. Maybe you know it was designed with 18 bedrooms by renowned Architect Henry Austin. The Italianate Villa, later St. George’s Inn, was a Choate Guest House (1928-58). Just before Mr. Beach died in 1868, his gesture to outfit and arm Wallingford’s volunteer Civil War soldiers was lauded. In 1916, and again in 1950, his name was raised at the prospect of naming a local school. Lyman Hall won the first distinction. The street name, North Main, nearly won the second controversial naming contest.

It remains unclear to our small team of story miners, why naming the school after the benefactor providing the school’s land was even a contest. Or why, the only information about Beach in the Wallingford Historical Society is about his grand home. Is it his lineage, politics, infidelities, or aspirations that stoke adversarial sentiment among the keepers of the town’s history and the near erasure of his contributions to a hustling America?

Tantalizing Story Bites

Dawn peppered her essay with a few tantalizing tidbits. In 1861, Beach's largess captured the imagination writing “…over six hundred Wallingford children marched through a snowstorm to Beach’s residence, where they saluted him with cheers and were accompanied by the Wallingford Brass Band. They then proceeded to Wallace Hall, where “prizes were competed for and distributed,” the main benefactor being Moses Beach to the tune of over five hundred dollars.

She also introduced us to carrier pigeon Sam Patch. Sam appeared in a journal entry by Mr. Beach. Sam stokes the imagination of our protagonist, the fictional new arrival to Wallingford, Youssef Fam. Dawn lays the groundwork for our many rabbit holes of investigation: a promoter of free education, a spy, The Sun, the sons, the Mexican-American War, Jane Storm, rivalries, scandals, hoaxes, family legacies, and street names. Beach St. Saugerties NY, is named in recognition of the twenty-something Mr. Beach. "an extremely important citizen of the early village, who served as village trustee and organized the first fire company…partner in the paper mill and its chief technician…(of) the first Fourdrinier paper-making machines to operate in America." Source: https://michaelsullivansmith.m...

Legacy or Footnote

Mr. Beach’s gravesite is a monument to his hands-on adventures into big ideas. He did indeed leave an indelible mark on history. Maybe a few. An inventor in the “The Era of Hustle”, an expansionist in Antebellum America, a father who saw legacy-making in his many children. A man preoccupied with wealth dismissively ascribed by his peers as ‘Nothing remarkable, merely a determined man’. How does it all add up? What is the narrative through line? Where are the primary and secondary sources that can help us reveal his repeated ‘rags’ to ‘riches’ evolution replicated by a few of his sons?

His embellished sketch of himself was printed in Wealth and Biography of the Wealthy Citizens of the City of New York (1946). Listen here. https://youtu.be/yADm02p0-Qs This multi-volume publication with reprints available on Amazon is described as “culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it” is one of his cultural imprints.

Beach embodied the dissonance of Antebellum America. He embraced novel ideas such as a “Gunpowder Engine" for propelling balloons in pursuit of wealth. His rags-to-riches story includes several ventures, failures, and the loss of fortunes, a tradition passed along to his heirs. His preoccupation with prosperity and speed is directly connected to the birth of the Associated Press (1846). His descendants provided to the AP Archivist primary source evidence of their founding, which was two years earlier than previously assumed. The new date of the Associated Press founding was commemorated in 2015.

Beach also contributed to media acceleration. He invented a rag-cutting machine to make newsprint paper. He deployed pigeons, ponies, paper boys, and steam engines. His ambition democratized news, markets, and the mobility of the working class. His entrepreneurial drive comingled with the dissemination of expansionist and Civil War news. In this hustle, he partnered with journalist, Jane Storm, who coined ‘Manifest Destiny’ which framed this mythological worldview of a westward movement in America.

Invitation: Become a Wallingford Storyteller

There is more to be uncovered about Moses Yale Beach. To join the Initiative Moses Yale Beach_ Revealed tell us you are interested, why, and your particular skill in an email to myb@wpaa.tv We believe Mr. Beach has a place, flaws and all, in the nation's narrative as part of CT250, a celebration of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. We have applied to be an affiliate organization. You can be part of the team.

The book opens with a Podcast. ACB Freeman hosts. ACB Freeman represents anyone who expresses themselves using the tools and stage at WPAA-TV and Community Media Center. #AnyoneCanBeFreeman. That anyone can be you. There are many Wallingford stories to tell. Participation begins with an expression of interest.