Inspired by the Hank Williams and Leadbelly recordings he heard as a teenager growing up outside of Boston, Jim Rooney began a musical journey that intersected with some of the biggest names in American music including Bob Dylan, James Taylor, Bill Monroe, Muddy Waters, and Alison Krauss. In It for the Long Run: A Musical Odyssey is Rooney's kaleidoscopic first-hand account of more than five decades of success as a performer, concert promoter, songwriter, music publisher, engineer, and record producer. As witness to and participant in over a half century of music history, Rooney provides a sophisticated window into American vernacular music. Following his stint as a "Hayloft Jamboree" hillbilly singer in the mid-1950s, Rooney managed Cambridge's Club 47, a catalyst of the ‘60’s folk music boom. He soon moved to the Newport Folk Festival as talent coordinator and director where he had a front row seat to Dylan "going electric." In the 1970s Rooney's odyssey continued in Nashville where he began engineering and producing records. His work helped alternative country music gain a foothold in Music City and culminated in Grammy nominations for singer-songwriters John Prine, Iris Dement, and Nanci Griffith. Later in his career he was a key link connecting Nashville to Ireland's folk music scene. Writing songs or writing his memoir, Jim Rooney is the consummate storyteller. In It for the Long Run: A Musical Odyssey is his singular chronicle from the heart of Americana.

I am now in the nighttime of my life. It has been a good life – no perfect, of course – but complete with challenges, accomplishments, disappointments, laughter and sadness. No two lives are the same, and my reflections will be from my unique experiences. They are not profound. You won’t find my name in history books or on buildings. I consider myself an average persons. Unless I record my memories, they will soon be forgotten, so I am choosing to record them. Hopefully, you or someone will find them of interest. I will share my experiences, but, also, I will share what small amount of wisdom I have gathered during my lifetime. I have reached my 95th birthday as I share the following pages. I have always had a fascination with live theatre, and, since I discover3d a creative gene in my old age, I have chosen to include a group of short skits I have written. Hopefully, they will produce a smile or two, and, if you have desire to perform some of them, you have my permission to do so. Some have already been performed, and I include a list of those occasions. Before you start reading – you do plan to read, don’t you – let me share with you what I believe to be the three things necessary for a happy life.

In September of 1937, Eagle Scout Tom Larson put a packsack on his back and set out to see the world. After two years at the University of Minnesota, he hitchhiked westward from his hometown of Aitkin, Minnesota. Eight months later as a seaman on a west coast oil tanker, he'd saved $250 dollars. After riding on freight cars and hitchhiking, he arrived in New York City. Luckily he was able to work passage on a Danish freighter to Antwerp, Belgium. Then on his bicycle "Napoleon" he traveled through Belgium and Holland and thence through England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland. Across the North Sea to Norway he cycled through Denmark, Sweden, and Finland, the three Baltic states into Poland and Nazi Germany. In Paris he met his friend, Eagle Scout Edwin Woolverton, of Albert Lea, Minnesota. After wild and hilarious adventures in France and Belgium, they crossed the Mediterranean to Algeria. They took refuge in the youth hostel in Sidi Bou Said, Tunesia. From there their vagabond travels took them to Sardinia, Italy, Switzerland, and back into Germany. Back in Paris they mingled with refugees before making one last journey into West German bordertowns and Holland. War threatened at any day. Luckily in late March of 1939, they worked their way home on a Norwegian freighter through a great North Atlantic storm to New York, just four months before the Nazis invaded Poland and began WWII. On December 7th, 1941, Tom ended up in the Battle of Pearl Harbor. Edwin Woolverton served on numerous merchant ships during the war. They survived on a shoe-string budget, good luck, oatmeal and Scout hospitality.

DescriptionCaught up in the migration boom of the 1960s, the small child moved as a ""Ten Pound Pom"" for this ""better life"" promised by her quarrelling parents. From their first new home... a dry, dusty mineral mining town in North Western Australia, Riannon relocated to a small harbour city... already aware of feeling like a fish out of water. After training in hospitality and nursing, as more of her essential self grew and unfolded, she became an exotic dancer... captivating the minds of powerful businessmen across the Far East. In an underworld, alternative community of gay, lesbian, transgender and everthing in between, Riannon followed the standards of others, finding herself exploring every area of the sex industry... from high class escort to internationally intimidating bondage Mistress. She wandered the many twisted, often dirty paths. Her journey, and all those she met, befriended, lost or buried along the way add to the triumph of self discovery and a woman's true worth. Through the eyes of the mysterious, veiled, Unknown Dancer... she became Rehana Incognito, now taking your hand on the journey to that point we can all reach... which started for herself... ... as a little boy. About the AuthorFrom a coal mining village in the North of England to a mineral mining town in Western Australia, Riannon was dragged by brawling parents as a small child to an unfamiliar, upside down world where her parents had come for a better life in the 1960s. Experiencing incomprensible racism along with an awareness of not fitting in, her world seemed shattered in many directions. Through childhood, teens and into adulthood, she looked at life from many sides... Good or bad, light or dark, power or helpnessness and all it could mean to be male or female. The journey down many of those paths took her through a unique perspective of personal growth and discovery to create her own dance and tune for the person she is today.Always keeping an open mind of observation, understanding and compassion, she tugged herself from one end of these spectrums to the other. Riannon, who became the celebrated bellydance performer Rehana Incognito, unravelled and absorbed the essence of her own powerfully, respectful femininity through the unfolding steps of Middle Eastern Dance. She now lives in Notting Hill, West London. There, with warmth, humour and hope, she encourages others searching for their centre and true self, either through the confident power of dance or the guidance of a caring hand reaching back in friendship.

This is a quirky and engaging caper, the story of a young cycle courier from London who goes on an improbable journey to Norway, to pick up a stuffed owl for a mysterious client. For his oddest job to date, Sam enlists the help of his friend and fellow courier Poyntz. But as they make their haphazard journey to Mr Sorensen's mountain hut, its owner is attracting the attention of the Norwegian police. Have Sam and Poyntz become unlikely accomplices in one of the biggest crimes in the country's history?

Vignettes: Musings and Reminiscences of a Modern Renaissance Man is a remarkable series of recollections from a man whose experiences cover an extraordinary range of places, people, and interests. Eschewing the formulaic conventions of autobiography, Vignettes moves back and forth across time and space to describe in vivid detail events and observations from a fascinating life. Its subject matter reflects the acute perceptions of a man for whom every day is a new adventure and a fresh opportunity to learn