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The Men of Steel Project

Extract from "Fantastic Response: Work Stories from the Great Information Age" © 2010, 2020  William P. Moore  Brief Background Big Daddy from Cardinal and now Phoenix CEO and William P (known in this account as "Wimpy") met for beers at Providence Road Sundries. Big Daddy somehow knew that Wimpy had left the Baby Picture Company (PCA) and was jobless again. He offered him a contract gig at Phoenix, his small spin-off company formed after the dissolution of Cardinal Associates, Inc. Wimpy considered the job offer an extension of good will and welfare by Big Daddy to an ex-Cardinal writer. He was between trains and, without thinking it through, accepted. Writing at the Chainsaw Massacre House Phoenix operations were conducted within a gutted 1930s house that was zoned commercial along the frontage of Highway 74. There were three workers inside: 1) Big Daddy, who worked in the dark and dank master bedroom, stacked with filing cabinets; 2) another former Cardinal emplo
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Cardinal Ghosts & Acid Trips

Extract from "Fantastic Response: Work Stories from the Great Information Age" © 2010, 2020  William P. Moore  1  Going to Work for Big Daddy The people and places come and go, asking to be dispelled. The flashbacks are gray and disordered.  One night at Cardinal’s original office on Monroe Road, Big Daddy CEO held a “future stockholders” meeting. He and the head of sales spoke about how rich we were going to be. Big Daddy struck me as having a huge appetite, someone who wanted to eat life before it ate him.  He was powerful when he held the floor, and I remember some of us were jittery with expectation when we got up to introduce ourselves.  At the time I really wanted to believe in all the blue sky predictions. I never expected the Cardinal saga would leave such a trail of woe.   In a dream set in the present I saw Jay the Courier, still alive, using his arthritically twisted hands to load DART audio-visual instructional units into the Cardinal station wagon. He didn’t stac
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