In 2011, Craig Teicher wrote a short fiction piece for Tulsa-based This Land Press that revolved around the Blue Whale of Catoosa, Okla.
Later, the essay was adapted into a short film:
Imaginary Oklahoma – The Blue Whale of Catoosa from THIS LAND PRESS on Vimeo.
What a beautiful little story from Craig Teicher about Blue Whale (and Life) and what a lovely film Sterling Harjo and Matt Leach made from it. It’s convinced me I need a copy of Imaginary Oklahoma.
Truth should never get in the way of a good story, though, and certainly Teicher had every right to change facts to construct the story he wanted to tell. This is, after all, fiction and not a documentary, but since Blue is central to the story, I would like to point out the poetic license taken by Teicher when he concluded that Blue was not a gift from the builder (Hugh Davis) for his wife (Zelta), rather that Blue was built merely to be a slide at a roadside water park. For the record: Blue was an anniversary gift from Hugh to Zelta built one wheelbarrow of concrete at a time and that allowing kids other than their own to swim in the pond came after the fact. I suppose the author wanted to inject a bit of cynical realism as he was making his point about how we find the meaning of life that we want to find in the objects around us, a point that I agree with entirely. Symbols are personal. The Teicher story is a terrific piece of writing and my remarks are not literary criticism. I just want readers of Route 66 News who might be unfamiliar with the real story of Blue (they’d have to be brand new readers, wouldn’t they?!) to know the true story.
Unfortunately I am unable to launch many of the the videos attached to the articles. I can get the launch arrow but it just ignores the request. Any other complaints about this, I am using my Droid phone which might be incapatible with some video formats?
Sorry … here’s a link to the photos I found: https://www.avemeander.com/?p=664