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Author: Patrick Dobson

Dr. Patrick Dobson is a work in progress until his termination. In the meantime, He is a writer, scholar, postman, and college professor living in Kansas City, MO.

The University of Nebraska Press published his travel memoirs, Canoeing the Great Plains: A Missouri River Summer in 2015 and Seldom Seen: A Journey into the Great Plains in 2009. Canoeing the Great Plains won the 2016 High Plains Book Award in Creative Nonfiction and the Thorpe Menn Literary Excellence Award. His essays and poems have been published in New Letters, daCunha, Kansas City Star, Garo, Wood Coin, and JONAHmagazine, and others.

Dobson earned a doctorate in American History and Literature at the University of Missouri-Kansas City in 2013. He has edited books, taught journalism, and been a union ironworker. He now teaches American History, Modern Latin American History, and Western Civilization at Johnson County Community College in Overland Park, KS.

He looks forward to hearing from you soon.

The perfect job is the one I don’t hate

My dad sat at a workbench in a concrete basement room for thirty-five years. He provided for family—a house, Catholic school for four kids, enough food, a family vacation for two weeks every year. It was saintly work, laboring under that fluorescent lamp, fixing cash registers. It’s work I can’t…

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bioStories publishes “Senior-Citizen Discount”

A great little magazine, bioStories, published my essay “Senior-Citizen Discount,” the story of tawdry behavior, an older woman, and a relationship that changed everything. Take a look. Copy and paste the following link into your browser or click the title above for a live link to the story. http://biostories.com/recent-essays/

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No longer haunted by the groper

Nick and I stepped off the plane in Boise at 12:20 Saturday morning. The airport, stylish and clean, is a model of airport efficiency. We soon found our car rental company and walked out the door into a GMC Acadia, likely the largest car I’ll drive this year. We were…

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The night and the train

Bill stopped the car on the railroad tracks. He turned off the engine. I was in the back seat of the little Mustang convertible with Anthony. His brother Joe sat up front. The brothers were moderate people. They didn’t drink the way Bill and I did. I had a beer…

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