Fulkerson profiles ‘An American Knight’
By Suzi Bartholomy, Messenger-Inquirer
Norman Fulkerson, who has been voicing his conservative opinions on the Messenger-Inquirer editorial page for 11 years, has written a book about another conservative, Col. John W. Ripley USMC. Over the years, Fulkerson has written more than 75 letters to the editor on many subjects, including family values, abortion, Bill Clinton and homosexuality.
Fulkerson met Ripley in 1993 at a luncheon sponsored by his employer, the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property. Realizing that they were in synch on many issues, the men became friends and remained so until Ripley’s death last October.
There was much to admire about Ripley, Fulkerson said, during a recent phone interview. Ripley’s military career has been documented in other writings, Fulkerson said, but what he was most interested in was telling the other side of the war hero who in 1972 during the Easter Offensive in Dong Ha, Vietnam, blew up a bridge that “virtually halted the largest North Vietnamese offensive of the entire war.”
“An American Knight, the Life of Col. John W. Ripley USMC,” is about Ripley’s “deep Catholic faith, his love for his children and his devotion to his wife Moline,” Fulkerson said.
Fulkerson, of Utica, began writing Ripley’s biography just days after his death and completed it in June. The book will be released Oct. 28, the first anniversary of Ripley’s death.
Fulkerson, an Owensboro Catholic High School graduate, had never written a book before.
“It was like a person who had never run, running a marathon,” Fulkerson said.
When asked how he completed the book in six months, which included lengthy interviews with Ripley’s friends and family, he said he did it with divine intervention.
“I had to squeeze my brain to do this but did not have to squeeze my heart,” Fulkerson said.
Fulkerson, who is a contributing editor for the TFP’s Crusade Magazine with a circulation of 130,000, has received positive reviews of his book from retired military officers who knew Ripley.
Retired Col. Wesley Lee Fox, USMC, a Medal of Honor recipient and author, writes that he knew Ripley “like a brother for 42 years” but learned a lot more about his friend’s life from Fulkerson’s book.
“This is a must read for all desiring to be a leader, especially those desiring to lead Marines,” Fox wrote in his review.
Col. Gerald Turley USMC, Ret., who ordered Ripley to destroy the Dong Ha Bridge, said in his review of ‘An American Knight’ that Ripley truly deserves to be held up as a role model … and Norman Fulkerson’s book will help insure this.”
“An American Knight” should attract men and women to its pages, according to a release from Fulkerson’s publisher. Men will see Ripley as the ultimate warrior who was motivated through “supernatural faith, discipline and pure morals” and women will find Ripley “the kind and gallant husband,” dedicated father of deep faith, refinement and “unfailing leadership” at home and in public.
To order Ripley’s life story by Fulkerson go to www.americanknight.org.
Suzi Bartholomy, 691-7293, sbartholomy@messenger-inquirer.com.
Comments on this entry are closed.