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Mr. Cooper -

I wish you'd stick around. Everyone here has a lot to offer, but each of us can learn something, as well. When you take a look around this user-driven site, keep in mind that all of this has been accomplished in less than three years. The best is yet to come!

When it comes to writing, I'm no professional, but understand that while an article should seek to entertain, thus retaining the reader's interest, it should also seek to inform, thus requiring accuracy. Of course, anyone can make a mistake, but even conclusions that were drawn on the best information that was available at the time must be revised as additional information becomes available. In that regard, perhaps a follow-up piece to your original article on those hood ornaments is in order.

As such, I hope you don't take too much offense at any criticism levied, but can use it to improve the greater Packard knowledgebase.

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Well, in defiance of Milt's memo, I will continue to refer to my hood ornament as a Cormorant. It just doesn't look like a Pelican (thank heaven!).

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A wise man once penned:

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet."

I like the ornaments that grace the hood of most Packards, but none of them look like a pelican to me. Personally, I don't find the pelican to be very attractive.

Well, I hope you do stick around Quill.

I hope one bad experience is not enough to run you off. I find your writing very good. I like a columnist in Hemmings Classic Car by the name of Patrick Foster who loves the independents and has his own conclusions on how each failed/suceeded. He writes columns that sometimes provoke raw emotion amongst the readers. You can witness this through the letters he gets. It is split about 50% who think he is right and the other 50% who want his resignation on a monthly basis. All I can say is get used to the criticism. If you write columns and don't have at least a few critics than your doing something wrong. Sometimes the critics are right, sometimes wrong. In the end we all learn and that is the point.

Quill: I have never been one to beat around the bush and I try to get straight to the point. The problem I have with you on this article you wrote, is that to me you took your opinion of how you thought things should have happend at Packard. Then you tried and palm them of to the world as being factual.

Then in your article you say that some commentators who disagree with your views on the Packard hood ornament are not big fans of the Packard Motor Company, because they refer to the hood ornament as a PELICAN. It seems to me that when the true facts are laid out on the table, that many now departed Packard officials such as Hugh Ferry
and others had a different view than you. However what did they know know, they only ran Packard.

What makes this article all the more disappointing to me is that I have read some of your other articles and you can do fine research when you want to.

To answer your last question no I have never had anything pulbished like you have on national level. However what I may or may not have written is not what is in question here. To end this I must say that your not the first national automotive writer that I have had differneces with when they have been wrong.

John F. Shireman

I thought the Pelican name came from the heraldic description of the crest as being "a pelican in her piety" i.e. feeding her young by plucking at her own breast (hence the curved neck), rather than any resemblance to the bird with the pouch. Sorry, can't recall where I ran across this, so perhaps another can add a piece here.

This remains a disputed area in my housa as my son keeps lobbying for me to replace my doughnut chaser with a cormorant.

I gave some thought to a cormorant for my 34 Eight and decided that it's too ostentatious and flamboyant for a black sedan. I like the flying lady but for a change of pace have long considered an Adonis but it's just a year or two too incorrect for 1934. Too bad, I think it' the most stunning of the three.

I like the Boar.

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I prefer birds over boars. This is the hood ornament I plan on using on my Speedster, a Cormorant with an attitude!

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Gerd, you are too kind.

I'm just an amateur writer, and tend to write about only those things I that am confident of or feel strongly about. (That said, scholarly viewers will have to pardon my dangling prepositions.)

Back in my school days, I seemed to do good - er, I mean, well - in English class, but mainly after they taught us how to diagram sentences. Analyzing the structure helped us write better sentences. When it came to greater composition, they taught us proper outlining and note-taking procedures, but I still tend to shoot from the hip.

However, my creative muse is often lacking, and I am a lousy typist. I'm grateful for word processing applications with spell and grammar checking, but they aren't always 100%.

Thankfully, an online forum is a much more informal setting for writing.

Meanwhile, in spite of language barriers, you have done a fine job of communicating here and constantly prove that a picture is worth a thousand words.