Publications

The following are examples of publications created for clients by Garcia Publishing Company.

Search for Lost Time

By: Peter Garcia

Peter Garcia writes a remembrance of growing up in Covington, Louisiana.  He takes the reader on a memory walk through the neighborhood of his childhood and the rooms of his home.  His transcendent prose carries the reader beyond the ordinary descriptions of a house and a town to the particular places of his youth.  He successfully captures the Covington of the 1960s and the rambling wooden home that sheltered his family.  His neighborhood comes alive again as he depicts its peculiar characters, colorful eccentrics, and the scads of children of large families who spent days outside—playing and yelling and running.  This quote suggests the spirit of Peter’s writing:

The hot and sticky Louisiana nights were filled with the chirping of crickets and frogs and the sound of kick the can games under the corner streetlight.  If you sat on the side porch off the kitchen on the old white Naugahyde sofa from Broadway, you could hear neighborhood dogs barking at the night sounds and watch the fireflies flicker in and out of the azaleas.  The kitchen stove was right next to the screen door, so if you were lucky, the smell of that night’s casserole would be mixed with the outside night smells amid the rattlings of dinner preparation and Mama’s muffled conversation from the kitchen.  Daddy would be waiting impatiently at the dining room table, drink at hand, waiting for Mama to come pick up her gin hand and finish their game before dinner.
 

Meet the Simonton Family

By: Mary Susan Templeton and Margaret Simonton Templeton

Mary Susan Templeton and Margaret Simonton Templeton trace the history of the Simonton family. From Scotland to Ireland to Colonial America came two Symontown brothers in 1717, establishing a name change to Simonton, and becoming successful landowners. They grew in numbers, contributing to the communities in which they lived. They were farmers, colonial magistrates appointed by the British King, and surveyors assisting in the establishment of new counties in North Carolina and in creating the boundary line between the Carolinas. Several were patriots who served in the French and Indian War and in the American Revolution, fighting to preserve their newly found freedoms. From the 18th to the 21st centuries, the Simonton families that migrated into the southern and western territories of the United States of America expanded to eleven generations. Education, hard work, and a strong sense of civic duty are their characteristics that will carry the family into the future. 

Meet the Templeton Family: Four Centuries of Southern Heritage and Traditions

By: Mary Susan Templeton

Mary Susan Templeton’s family history includes information on her Scotch-Irish ancestors who immigrated to Pennsylvania and headed south along the Great Wagon Road to settle in Anson and Iredell Counties in North Carolina in the 1700s. She writes about family members who lived in the Catawba River valley until 1845, when her direct ancestors moved to Tennessee. Since that time, seven generations of Templetons have lived in Tennessee. Later generations settled on the Templeton farm which has been in the family since the 19th Century. Recently, some members of the Templeton family have moved to North Carolina and Virginia. Her book, Meet the Templeton Family: Four Centuries of Southern Heritage and Traditions, also includes genealogical charts of related families: Gracey, Dewese, Stevenson, Bell, and Simonton.

Zero to Eighty Over Unpaved Roads: A Memoir

By: Evelyn McNeill

Evelyn McNeill was a retired professor of neuroanatomy at East Carolina University’s Brody School of Medicine when she decided to write a memoir of her life. She traced her life story in Zero to Eighty Over Unpaved Roads. She used a unique method for expressing her thoughts, placing “letters to Dad” throughout the book to express many of her thoughts directly to her long-deceased father, allowing sometimes difficult subject matter to more easily flow into written words. She included numerous photographs that illustrate her times and those of her parents: early 20th century rural life in North Carolina; the joys and hard work of a Depression-era family farm; education at Elon College, the University of North Carolina, and Duke University; military service in the U.S. Army as a physical therapist; doctoral studies at the Medical College of Virginia; service as a pioneering first female faculty member of the East Carolina University School of Medicine; active retirement as a devoted daughter and sister and loyal friend. Evelyn died in the summer of 2016.

Conversations with Rene: A Memoir

By: Rene J. Thionville, Jr.

A memoir by Rene J. Thionville, Jr., illustrated with personal photographs. Over a period of 45 years, as a hobby, Rene Thionville assembled genealogy documents concerning the Thionville family of Guadeloupe and Louisiana. He wrote of his family and its journey through generation from France to the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe to Louisiana, as well as his own interesting story. From the introduction: “My nieces and nephews often express an interest in knowing more about the family and my wife, Charmaine, encouraged me to write about it, even though I had never intended to write a book. So, here is Conversations with Rene, a book I have written so that you will feel as if we are sitting together and I am telling you the stories of my life and my family.”

Now and Always: A Louisiana Love Story

Edited by Christian Garcia

Now and Always: A Louisiana Love Story is a book of letters written by Joseph Bradford Lancaster and Amanda Doerr Lancaster between 1901 and 1916. Their letters record their love for each other and their children and reveal a picture of life in Louisiana at the turn of the 20th century. Joseph Lancaster was a parish superintendent of education, legislator, and judge who kept in close contact with his wife Amanda Lancaster through their correspondence while he traveled throughout Louisiana. Christian Garcia edited the book by completing photo research to illustrate the people and places that Joe and Amanda described in their letters. He also wrote an introduction to put the letters' early 20th-century south Louisiana setting in context for 21st-century readers.

The second edition includes many new photographs and two new sections. One section in the introduction shows what small-town life was like in the early 20th century as recorded by a member of one of the oldest families in Covington. One section in the appendix gives background information about all of the people and places mentioned by Joe and Amanda in their letters.

Tip and Blue

By: Bob Fuselier, DVM

Dr. Bob Fuselier’s books find their roots in his experiences as a husband, father, grandfather, and veterinarian. He credits his grandchildren with waking up his poetic abilities and offering him the experiences that eventually became a series of children’s books. The series begins with Tip and Blue, a story about a young boy reflecting upon his life with his two dogs as one nears the end of its life. 

Tip and Blue blends Dr. Bob’s childhood experiences with his dogs in rural south Louisiana with his experiences with young children dealing with the loss of their beloved pets in his veterinary practice. The result is a book that tugs at the nostalgic heartstrings of adults while it prepares young children for the loss of loved ones. 

The president of Garcia Publishing Company, Chris Garcia, is a lifelong friend of Dr. Bob’s.