March 12th, 2014.
I'm reasonably technology literate, I mean, I got to this country in 1982, just as the Commodore 64 was launching. Technology-wise it has been a fabulous trip. So what has this to do with the Journal of Rudd - (hereafter JoR)? Not much and everything.

What made my mouth drop open, and stay open, (for almost 15 seconds - a near record) was that writer's absolute gem of a research tool... Google Earth !

Let me explain. Having reached the point in JoR that Grandpa has reached Cape Town, a new character, my Grandmother, Mini-Clara Harriman, needs to arrive on the scene. A few days ago, what with Grandmother's birth certificate in hand,  I accessed Google Earth, and typed Plumstead, Woolwich, Kent. That, Dearly Beloved (as Kipling used to put it) is when my mouth dropped open - and stayed open. (see above.) I was looking at a rather decent view of where, or at least, the town where, my Grandmother was born.

Now... realizing that Plumstead, in South-East London is only a few miles north of Batesman, where Rudyard Kipling lived, I decided to access that address. And by gosh ! There was Kipling's farm-house skirted by walls covered with green-creeper and paths ... winding little country paths... BUT WAIT! I'm sitting in Tucson, Arizona, USA. That was a shocker. So... THANK YOU ALL at Google Earth! A marvelous research tool. All I'm hoping for now, is, as an author of historical fiction, would it not be great to have a 'Historic View of Earth' so I could go back and see what Cape Town loooked like back in the 1900's. ENOUGH ! Be grateful for what I have. Not so?

-- JSB. 


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