"Jim Wade remembers the Panama Canal Zone well.  It was there in the 1950's that he lost both his innocence and paradise. Forty years later he has the chance of a lifetime—to recapture paradise."

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Here are some details about my Panamanian experience:

I lived in the Panama Canal Zone from 1955 to 1957.  I graduated from Balboa Junior High School in 1956 and attended Balboa High School for part of the ninth grade before my father, a Naval officer, was transferred to the Washington, D.C. area.  I am now 58 and have lived in numerous places, but no locale affected me more than the Zone. I cried when my family left, and I still feel as if some portion of me has been irretrievably lost. Imagine my surprise upon discovering the existence of CZBrats and the Panama Canal Society, where others feel exactly as myself!  I was equally astonished to find that many former Zonians are writing oral histories or life stories that incorporate their Panamanian experience.  I responded to my memories of  Panama in a slightly different manner—I wrote a novel.  After six months of research and nearly two years of writing and rewriting under the tutelage of  three different editors, I had the joy of seeing THE YOUNG BALBOAS published.   It is the fictional account of Jimmy Wade's two years in the Zone, told from an adult point of view.

George C. King
gscloon@aol.com

CZBrats
May 8, 2001