From
Hubert Miller ( K7HUE )
Newport, Oregon, 28 August 2022
Regarding 'U.S.N. Electron' magazine collection:
In the winter of 1994 - 1995 I moved from Seattle to Omaha, Nebraska to keep my job with a large telecom company.
Of course, I kept up with all my electronics publications subscriptions and for-sale lists and such. I was soon surprised
and intrigued to see an advertisement for a military manuals seller with an Omaha address only a couple miles from me.
The seller, John A. Draus (1942-1995) called his business "Keystone Bibliopolist", after his Keystone neighborhood of
Omaha. I made an appointment and went over there one afternoon. Mr. Draus had multiple rooms in the basement of
the family home lined with shelves full of manuals. I had acquired a few stray copies of 'Electron' back in Seattle, so I was
already aware of this publication and it was on my want list. So I was pleased to be able to buy what the gentleman said
was the whole run of this magazine. He told me he acquired these from the man who was the editor of the magazine;
when I asked about that gentleman, Mr. Draus told me that this man was recently deceased, so unfortunately I was too
late to learn more of the Electron story. Now thinking about it, I am guessing the large manuals stock in the basement
may have come from that same source. I did buy maybe a score more manuals, and as always with these short-lived
opportunities, I now wish I had not been quite so conservative and had instead bought more.
In Spring of 1995 I relocated to Salt Lake City. I placed one more order and with the books, I received a note from
Jennifer Draus, his daughter, that Mr. Draus had recently passed away. I do not know what happened with the large stock
of remaining manuals.
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