The Winding River Project

[canyonjumper]

Welcome back Fred! Sorry to hear about your health and your luggage, I hope you get all that settled. Glad to hear there's a few updates coming up

               Your friend,
                              Jordan

[mightygoose]

nice to see things moving along.

[MattyFo]

glad to have you back Fred!  Glad to here that things are going uphill!

- Matt

[mrbisonm]

Thanks guys.

I will post an update on late sunday night, something to refreshen your memories and get back into the story of the Winding River Project (WRP). I started last night to write a summary of what happened in the last few years of the Valley's existance eversince the story started in 1955, when young Billy was only 7 years old. Today we are in the late sixties already and the the Winding River Valley is under full invasion of civilization with more than 50 Sms we have gotten to know during this period and probably more to come.

I have some interesting stories and surprizes in store for you to enjoy. The region is about to become the center of interest in this Simnation.

See you in a couple of days, (and hey, thanks for having had the patience to stick around.)

Fred

[mrbisonm]

SUMMARY

Update 54 - July 1st, 1965


Let's have something like a "flashback" first before we continue the story. I think it will help us all (including me) to get back into the story and the characters, maybe even interest some newcomers to this journal to stay.

We all know that the story started in the year 1955, when John Gabber and his son Billy (william) went fishing north of the Winding River Region. John has received a demand for submission to build a highway through the Winding River valley to connect the everfast growing city of Bluebay in the south with even bigger both Frampton and Beecherfalls up north. Little Billy liked the area so much because of plentyful forests, rivers and lakes and the untouched wilderness. This was the first contact with the region.
Later the construction of the highway started in Bluebay and got to Sandom (a smaller town north) within a year and this is where we entered the Winding River region. In the beginning only an access road to the highway's location was build, leading through the Grasslake area. The Gabber's liked the area so much that they almost bought half of the lake and the surroundings. Also the right hand of John Gabber, Mike Allheimer spoiled himself with buying some land off Gabber on the lake, where Gabber started building his first cottage. Later many others from all over the place came and bought land from Gabber and built their weekend homes also. Grasslake became the first independant county in the Winding River Region.

A year later only and the access Road joined with the highway. From here on the access road never left the sides of Highway 15 and continues probably until it hits Frampton. The place where Highway and the road met was called "Access Junction" by the loggers and Highway workers. The name stayed and after a few Cantines and Restaurants, it became official. The area became the municipality of Access Junction. I think it was in 1963 that it was renamed "Access Center" by the new Mayor Steven Bartlett, the follower of the first Mayor Paul Hubert, now the owner of a small trucking buissness in town.

The very first arrivals were loggers and highway workers in the Access area. Then came folks like Andy Dubold, who was the foreman of the loggers and who died in 1964, Ray Olsen who built the old Olsen Pub, which is now erased and has become the loaction of the secondt several story office building in Access. Olsen was also implicated in the Lucy's murder case, having ordered the murderer Gerry Mason to get rid of her because Olsen wanted her excellently running restaurant. Mason was executed in 1961 and Olsen got 25 years of prison in Lakestead, the Capitol of Simland. His daughter Judy Olsen continued the Pub for several years until an offer that could not be refused arrived last year, 1964. It was sold and leveled. The terrain was built on with an office bldg, owned by the famous and the richest man in Simland, Mr Rundi Sterling, an aborigin of the area. Mr Sterling is into almost everything, owning several banks and financial institutions, construction Companies and several dozens of the biggest Office Buildings in downtown Capitol City, Lakestead.

In the late fifties, Gabber and Allheimer discovered some weird and strange rockstructures which little Billy was the the first to find. In a form of humanoid skulls these were little homes where the skullpeople were supposed to live almost 4000 years ago, well that is what the country's history says in the legend department of Simland's history. Strange enough, it somehow became reality all of sudden. The find was kept secret and even today they haven't yet talked about. The whole area was immediatly bought by the Gabber family. Father Henry Gabber spent hundreds of thousands of Simoleons to buy as much land as possible surrounding these skull huts as they called them.

The highway continued into the region, slowly invading the whole area. Three years ago it was ordered to built a junction in the Phlox County area and another Company from Lakestead took over for this part and make sure to connect highway 15 with Highway 35 that leads directly through the mountains to the Capitol City of Lakestead. In the same area, highway 15 met its first big obstacle, a bridge over the mighty river. It took almost three years to build it.

Here a new village popped up, it is called Phlox. After Valmore joined Access Center last year, Phlox also is thinking about joining the 11,000 population town of Access now, nothing yet decided, but......hm, who knows.
Today highway 15 reached the second obstacle, the soft grounds of the Wllow lake area. The resposable of the highway bridges is Mr Alex Puto, the chief Engineer of Gabber Ltd. Alex is now confronted with one of his worst nightmares, to build the highway over these swamps which are impossible to drain because of the same waterlevel as the river itself. This is where today, in 1965, the highway construction has stopped. Although the logging and bullzing and freeing the land for the continued highway hasn't stopped on the other side of the swamps, the construction itself came to a halt right here.

Cutting through the dense forest of the Valmore County one day, the loggers made the acquaintance of Robert Sweathers, a second world war fighter pilot who crashed in the area in 1945 and who was reported missing ever since. Sweathers survived on his own having built a blockhome nearby the West River and feeding himself of the land eversince. He was given many acres of land there now and he continues to grow veggies that he sells on the roadside. He is now 61 years old and in topshape.
Meanwhile Access continued to grow fast. Soon, there were several houses and smaller buisnesses and even a market, the Access Tribune (newspaper), a church, gazstation etc arrived. Within a few years after its founding a official municipality was formed which included a Mayor, a council, police, firestation, small school etc. Soon more electricity became a necessity and hydro dam was erected nearby on the Fingerlake, where also new waterpumps were built. Now the town had sufficient power and water. That is where the furious immigration started, almost an invasion. People arrived by the hundreds every month, having heart of the beauty of the area and the work available. Places like the airplane engin industries of Guy Racsan, the food stores of Nethaniel Welligton, Terry Slye's sawmill, the highway construction company and many others, were steadlity looking for hired hands. With this invasion came the town's evolution, church was built, industries arrived, a museum, hotels, restaurants, motels, stores that supplied almost everything, Bussing and taxis of Tom Kohler's transportation Company and so on,  making the town now more independant from bigger cities than ever.
Below is a complete map of the region with some details. The map was made today July 1st, 1965. So it is up to date. This will give you a good idea where we are right now with the civilization of the Winding River Region.

Then in 1964 things started to heat up and scare a lot of people in the area, the army took over half of the West River county and the northern part of Phlox, they started construction buildings and all kinds of stuff in a hidden and heavily surveyed area saying that some groundgas leaks, not dangerous to anyone in these small quantities were discovered and taken car of.....hm, this started a lot of rumours and piled questions of all kind of topics.
A small goup of people formed itself one day, wanting to know the bottom of all this and they illegally penetrated into these army grounds without getting caught. No gasleaks were found, only some towers and a lot of underground diggings. The group members are John Gabber, Alex Puto, Terry Slye, Mike Allheimer and  young Steve Gibson, the bushpilot. Nothing has really been solved, but they had no choice to keep quiet for awhile, while the army is highly alarmed of the intrusion without knowing who, how and where it happened.

I can't tell you all of what happened in the last ten years, you will have to go back and read it if you want to know more. I will though talk about of our charcaters a little, the ones that I haven't mentioned yet above. Creators of the characters are at the end of each description. ( )

Gary Gabber, John's brother and official CEO of the Gabber Industries financial department, while John is the head of the construction department. Gary in the office and John out in the terrain. Henry Gabber, their father, is now totally retired.(mrb)
Joe Bean is the owner and Manager of the Access Tribune, Access's only newspaper.(mrb)
Steven Bartlett, the mayor since 1963.(mrb)
Adrian McCoy, a young fellow not yet much known, but is always present in the monthly meetings of the town's council, mostly complaining about the water situation, pollution and garbage disposals. He is just a simple citizen though.(mrb)
Richard Welder, the outfitter in Phlox, just besides Slye's sawmill.(mrb)
Kyle Roberts, the new Police Chief.(mrb)
George Troy, an old colored man who is also the guardian to the Sterling's lands. He also repairs bikes as a hobby and has a small shop in the village of Phlox.(mrb)
Colonel Neil Myers (not related to Jim Meyers) is the army's base in West River head officer.(mrb)
Robert Yome, not yet known much.(mrb)
Tom Kohler who owns the busses and Taxis in Access.(RustyXL)
Johnny B.Badd....well.....someone who seems to be busy with illegal drug dealing or something like it.(nedalezz)
Riichirou Takahaschi, the architect who is about to change Phlox's landscape, hired by Sterling to plan a new small town.(just_a_guy)
Nethaniel Joseph Wellington, owner of food stores. (danielcote)
Terry Slye, owner of the sawmill in Phlox. (threestooges)
Gregory Badger, a member of the army stationed in West River and growing vegetables and fruits on  a small farm on Sterling Island near the bridge that crosses the mighty river.(frostwolf)
Alex Puto, chief Engineer of Gabber Industrustries fort he highway 15 Project.(driftmaster07)
Barby White who owns the Biergarten Restaurant in downtown Access, where all the meetings of some our characters occur and also the owner of the Valmore Hotel, which she only lately finished, on the banks of the great Valmore lake.(BarbyW)
Charles M. Johnson, for now he works as a reporter for the Access Tribune.(emgmod)
Michael Truex, not much known about yet, but working to bring in a fastfood chain. (Nascar_Guy)
Paul Donovan, the famous young Playboy from Beecherfalls and new to Access with one of his building supply stores. (scott1964)
George and Patrick Westwood, the young fellows that work for the church at the moment.(CabraBruitre)
Steve Gibson, known as the bushpilot. (Cyclone1001)
Diarmuid MacGormain, Billy's (youngest son of John Gabber)  best friend and now in College, also a well known soccerplayer of the Access Logger's Team. (TheTeaCat)
Jordan Meaden, a young fellow not much known of yet, wants to be a cartographer.(canyonjumper)
Harry Wormwood, the first car dealer in Access, just got in.(MattyFo)
Guy Racsan, owner the airplane jet engin manufaturer in Access, also building the access raceway and test strip for his newly planned car industry, son of the millionaire Tony Racsan that owns parts of Kent Engineering and half of the grasslake area.(Nascar_Guy)
Michael Arven,who was the one that designed most lakehomes in Grasslake when he was only a kid and is now in College to become an architect.(mightygoose)
....and many others that are from my part.

This is the latest region view of the Winding River Region. (Warning:Big Picture) click on the link below the thumbnail.....


http://img163.imageshack.us/img163/1927/windingrivervalley.png

And this is the map of all the regions, to find yourself around when we talk about other cities that surround the Winding River valley.



So, I hope that this got you more or less back into the story, after the summertime off. The next update will be next weekend, we'll have a look at the highway in the swampy area of the Willow Lake and also a good look on the developments in Access Center.

Fred

[threestooges]

Nice little recap there Fred. Looking forward to the new developments as you get the time.
-Matt

[MattyFo]

Thanks for the recap! I'm excited to find out what you have in store in the first new update.

- Matt ( I guess there more than one Matt out there )

Nice little recap there Fred. Looking forward to the new developments as you get the time.
-Matt

[KoV Liberty]

I feel refresed. (hehe) Glad to see that familiar red ink (or whatever computers use). You may want to change driftmaster07 to KoV Liberty since I changed my username.

Alex

[MandelSoft]

Impressive region and Mayor Diary! Not only are you building cities, but you also write down a whole back-story. Wow! Keep up the good work 

Best,
Maarten

[frostwolf]

Good to see you back, Fred. Sorry to hear about your trials and tribulations, and believe me, speaking as an American, Canada more than makes up for the faults of it's Foreign Service in other areas, which your southern neighbors haven't a clue on. 

[danielcote]

sounds like the plans are going on track again!

[CabraBuitre]

Thanks for the recap!  My mind was kind of fuzzy with all the details... and now I remember why!

[nedalezz]

Its great to see you back and healthy, Fred. Surgery could not have been easy, and the rehab must be tough. I wish you the best, always.

The update was great, it was nice reading up on the recap, refreshing ourselves with your great story

[Livin in Sim]

Hello, Fred,

I am sorry about your traveling troubles and your illness/surgery, but glad you are making progress toward recovery.  Since I know you, I have trouble imagining you to not do much for a couple months, so be sure and follow that doctor's order, OK?     SC4 is a handy hobby to have when getting back to full strength. I look forward to seeing the results, but only if you play in relaxed manner as well.   

That region shot is just gorgeous.  I spent close to half an hour looking over it, and love the names you have chosen for the features of the landscape.  Another stand out is the farmland beginning to spread over the area.  SC4 farmland makes a region, I think, and yours is naturally placed. 

Well, looking out for more news from WRP, and thanks for the update, both of story and life.
--Liv

[mrbisonm]

You may want to change driftmaster07 to KoV Liberty since I changed my username. ;)Alex

Noted and changed on my papers.

so be sure and follow that doctor's order, OK? 
--Liv

OK!...

Thanks everyone.
I won't be able to finish my update before Wednesday or Thursday. Didn't have time this weekend because of all the people that we received and tomorrow will be *Doctorday* for a Follow-up.

Today I only show you my privatemap "up-to-date" (1965 in the story). This is to remind me wherever things are and what they are called (I forget names easily) when I write the story and show pictures. It is about the same as the map in my last update, except with more details and in a clear sateliteview.

A bigger Image of the region can be downloaded from the link below the picture. This is a very detailed, big and clear png picture file of 4.2 Mb.

Have a nice sunday afternoon and beginning of the week.

Fred



http://www.yourfilelink.com/get.php?fid=574745

[TiFlo]

Impressive map, thanks for sharing!

[mightygoose]

good to seem an update.

[mrbisonm]

UPDATE 55   august 15th, 1965, friday

««" I haven't seen a hot summer like this since 1949," were the first words from Mike Allheimer when he sat down beside John and Alex in his regular chair at Barby's Biergarten on a friday afternoon, "I remember, then it was as humid and tropical like the last few days." He then started to look around and asked, " Where are the others?"
Alex was the one who answered, " They are all busy it seems, TS told me last night that he won't be coming today because of some trouble with his trainstation and I saw the pilot earlier this morning, he also couldn't come, ha, he says he had to go to a theater with a girls or something, and John's father ain't feelin' so good, John just told me."
"Damn," Mike continued, " I wanted to know how it is since our intrusion in West River. Have you guys heard anything about West River, did they ever found out who the intruders were?", and he smiled as he surely knows who they were.
"Nah, and you better just shut up about this, ye hear?" John specified in a solid tone looking around the bar-room suspicously." You know that when they find out that it was us, we all will be in trouble, and big trouble I tell you."
"No problem John, I'll keep it quiet, but the whole story back there is still making me curious and nervous. I don't believe a rubbish what they say. Did you see the dustclouds lately?"»»...and the conversation about the West River Army base kept on for awhile. Then Barby entered the room and all three were surprised to see her here, since ever she finished her hotel on Valmore, her Biergarten is taken care of by her manager and she hardly ever comes here. John and Mike waved her over and invited her for a drink in her own Tavern.

pic.55.1


The construction of her hotel near the Valmore Lake started a year ago and since early spring it is open for buissness. Doing well as Barby confirmed, it was the best time to build it, and give it time to establish itself and get known before others move in with the same idea. Rumours are that already a building permit was demanded to build a hotel on the east side of the lake, but the problem is that the eastside of the lake needs a federal permission too. Most of the land there still belongs to the federal Government and only a few small cottages were allowed to build there since a couple of years.
Barby's Hotel is doing well though, open only for 3 months and already most of the rooms are reserved for the rest of the summer. Valmore lake is becoming a fairly nice tourist attraction, something Mayor Bartlett surely knew when he asked the former municipality of Valmore to join Access Center's administration and jurisdiction.
The hotel has in all 60 rooms, a swimmingpool and access to its own beach with sailinboat rental.

pic.55.2


pic.55.3


The bridges over the marshlands in the Stoke County are about to be finalized and traffic will soon be able to use them. This was quite a challenge for the chief engineer Alex Puto, who had lots and lots of problems with the unstable soil of the region. It took him and his 450 workers almost 14 months to build it and that is without the logging and the clearing. John Gabber went to inspect Puto's works last week and now fully understands why it took so long, but he never confirmed it to Alex, letting him continue to believe that the work was too slow for the boss.
From here on the highway will be easy work, most of the terrain is already cleared and prepared. Until the long bridge over the Ganoga chanel, the construction will be a piece of cake, so to speak, or at least that is what John Gabber says and thinks.
The mosaik on the second picture below shows the whole length of the bridge.
pic.55.4


pic.55.5


Michael Arven, we know him as the young student designer that made the weekend home plans for several people in Grasslake, such as Gabber and Allheimer's cottages, is still studying architecture in the Frampton University, where he also lives most of the times, but sometimes he gets homesick to Access and spends some time with his father, brother and his Nanny called Lizzy. John Gabber has been keeping a close eye on him and his studies and thinks about hiring him once he finished his senior draftsmanship. Spomeone like this can always be useful in the construction departments of Gabber Inc, John thinks. He has been very satisfied and impressed with his designs of these weekend homes he made when he was only 15 and 16 years old. Strongly supporting and encouraging him, John Gabber invites him for lunch or breakfast whenever Michael is in the vicinity and every other early monday morning Gabber flies him to Frampton at the same time as John goes to his office. Arven then continues to visit his university.

pic.55.6


Now let's have a look at Donovan's new construction supplies outlet in Valmore South (now Access Center North). Paul, we also know him as the Playboy and a real good customer of several bars and clubs in Access, has founded a new oulet of his construction supplies. After he bought out a small farm in Valmore, the construction of his store wasn't too long and supplies have already arrived and stored, even if the mainbuilding and office have not yet been buil.t The outlet should be open to the public within the next week or so already, but the the rest of the buildings will only be done by next spring.
Paul Donovan is in his mid thirties now and still flirting around with women and that is why some folks have baptized him as *the Playboy from Beecherfalls*. He is also known to spend his money as fast as he earns it. I wonder how much he spends every week like this...hm?
Most of his construction wood comes from Beecherfalls, the rest from Bluespruce Sawmill in Bluebay. Is this a competition with Slye's sawmill to become?

pic.55.7


The plans to build a small town in Phlox aren't even finished yet and the construction of some roads are already in the progress. The civil engineer Riichirou Takahaschi, who is the designer of this project is surprized that his plans are being realized without even having been told that the Company accepted them yet. The project is lead and financed by the Sterling's Enterprises from the Capitol City. Sterling himself wants this town fully functioning within 5 years and as we know him, he does not like loosing time. Takahaschi takes it as a compliment that his neighborhood plans are so quickly accepted. Only yesterday he received a short message from his boss that he is to take care of the fieldproject also, meaning probably that he will be hired as the project manager. No other explanations were added to the message, leaving Riichirou quite in the fog. Sterling always does that.

pic.55.8


Not much of a story, but at least a beginning after the long summer. Hope you liked it and slowly get back into the story. More coming in a few days, we'll visit the town of Access itself and some wilderness far away and of course the construction of Highway 35.

Fred

[nbvc]

Great update.

[Cyclone1001]

YAY! Its back!