Ripples and resurrection

Today is my grandmother Hazel’s birthday. She would have been 101 years old. Today is also the day my grandfather Hollis died at the age of 40. It probably wasn’t a coincidence, though only one person can know for sure, and he’s the one who died that day. What I know for sure is that when Hollis Hill hit the surface of Lake Hamilton on April 25, 1955, the waves rippled out well beyond the shores. The lives of an entire family were forever set into a certain direction, and we continue to ripple in that direction - away from his body in the lake - to this very day.

I wrote a book about my grandparents. It isn’t just about Hollis and Hazel, though. It’s about an entire city - Hot Springs, Arkansas. It was the city that brought them together, the city where they started their family, and the city that tore them apart. It was the city where I was born and raised. It’s also a city that played an important role in the history of the United States, but a nefarious role, and one that has been obscured and painted over for decades by successive generations who were ashamed or misled by others who were ashamed. In a weird way, the history of my family and the history of Hot Springs have this in common. Shame and regret motivated multiple accountings and histories, and the truth of what really happened all those years ago may never be completely known by anyone.

I spent the better part of five years trying to uncover it. To piece together the puzzle of Hot Springs in the middle of the last century. To understand my own family and the people that made the people that made me. I think I did a fair to middling job of it. In a few months you’ll all get to decide for yourselves.

The Vapors: A Southern Family, the New York Mob, and the Rise and Fall of Hot Springs, America’s Forgotten Capital of Vice, will be published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux on July 7th. (But you can preorder it now!) It’s been a long time coming, as some of you who subscribed to this email list from the beginning already know. There were moments along the way I wasn’t sure if it would ever be finished or actually ever be published and see the light of day. There were moments that I was completely depressed about it all. And now, on the eve of it finally being born, the world is in the grip of a massive pandemic. Still I worry. Perhaps the curse that hangs over my family is real, and the entire world is now collateral damage. Or perhaps I’m just more self pitying than usual because I haven’t left my house in who knows how long. The Vapors being published still feels unreal to me, and I can only compare the feeling to how surreal it all felt before the birth of my first child. I wasn’t sure what to expect, and I was brimming with equal parts joy and terror. Despite my pandemic-induced malaise, I’m excited for you all to read The Vapors, and anxious for that day to arrive.

I haven’t written to this list since last July. For a while, knowing the publication of The Vapors was going to be pushed into the distant future, I was using this list to promote various things I wrote in magazines and whatnot. I’ve written a few things since last I wrote you. But I’ve held off from sending these dispatches because, once I finally submitted the last pass of The Vapors, I kind of didn’t want to think about Hot Springs or the characters and events of the book for a while. My brain had been living in mid-century Arkansas and in the lives of my troubled and tragic ancestors for half a decade. I needed a bit of a break. But as the book nears publication, I find myself getting excited about the world of Hot Springs in the 1950s and 60s all over again, so I expect I’ll return to sharing stories with you in the weeks and months leading up to July.

You’ll notice that I’ve moved the list from TinyLetter to Substack. Rest assured it’s the same list. But if you want to tell your friends about it, you should direct them to http://davidhill.substack.com or just click this button:

I hope that you’re all staying home, washing your hands, wearing your masks, and keeping in touch with the people you love. Most of those things we need to do to save our lives. That last bit we have to do to save our sanity. I’m resurrecting Letter from Hot Springs not only to ring the bell about the book’s coming publication, but also to reconnect with all of you and to stay in touch during this absolutely trying and surreal moment in our lives. Please don’t hesitate to reach out and say hello. I miss all of you, even those of you I don’t even know. Maybe you most of all.

With Love,

David