Further adventures of the author on tour

Picture it: A lecture hall, sloping floor and all, probably eighty souls in the room, with your author at the front of it. Invited there (California Maritime Academy) by the course professor, Dr. Tim Lynch, to discourse on “Sailors on Ice.”

It is a big topic. Not just about Tom Crean, though he is the subject of my book. But the idea is much larger than one man and his adventures. It reaches into the more abstract realms of leadership and followership–how we are all interdependent in our entrprises, whether they be on ice or the sea or anywhere you can name in life itself: classroom, family, work, teamwork on the athletic field.

Can the leader–teacher, quarterback, captain of the ship, president of the nation, explorer–depend on those under is direction to fulfill their roles? And equally as important, can the follower trust his leader to make wise decisions, to stand firm when it is necessary and to flex when it is not?

It is in the talking out of Crean’s story that these ideas come to light. And, judging from some of the conversations had with the future ship-captains and mates after it was all done, there was some illumination done.

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