# Seems like MarkC spent 500 dollars for a history of OP APOLLO - should I?



## Michael Dorosh (15 Jul 2006)

Got this via email today but some parts of the site don't seem to work for me.



> 2 Volume book set commemorating Canada's military deployment to Afghanistan including over 9000 messages of condolences. This email is being sent to every person that submitted a message of condolence to our site.
> 
> All proceeds to be given to ideaccess.org to promote literacy in the middle east area on behalf of every Canadian Soldier killed in Action while in service to Canada since 17 April, 2002. (Friendly Fire incident)
> 
> ...


 
The main site is slick looking, but there is a long diatribe about how Anne McLellan "stole" one of the serialized books.  He also describes - I think the friendly fire incident but perhaps the entire mission?  as "one of the most sacred" events in Canadian history?  The literature mentions photo galleries and I presume a history of the operations in Afghanistan - but if "9000" messages of condolence are also included, how many pages of these 250 dollar volumes are devoted simply to repeating web-based condolence messages?  Anyone have any inside scoop on this?


----------



## ZipperHead (15 Jul 2006)

GAP said:
			
		

> Deleted By Mod



If you go to the site in Michael's original post (www.hooler.com) you will see that it is written by Joseph Green. My wife was on Op Apollo, and I recall that Mr Green did a tremendous amount of work with his online book of condolensces for the 4 soldiers that were killed. Hence the accolades from 3VP.

The price tag is pretty steep, but I think if anybody were to look into the cost of getting 2 books of similar length printed (in a limited run), it would probably be up there in cost. 

I don't recall there being a gun pointed at anyone's head to buy this, so I'm thinking that if this fella wants to do this (charge $500 for a 2 book set), I have no doubt that there will be a (small) number of people who will buy it. And the proceeds look to be going to a good cause (one recommended by Col Stogran (CO of 3VP during Op Apollo), apparently) so who can complain. Well, we are Canadian, so it is a birthright [to complain].......

Al


----------



## paracowboy (15 Jul 2006)

CO 3 PPCLI wants Mr Hooler's site linked to the 3VP webpage. Proceeds go to a good cause, indeed.


----------



## Michael Dorosh (15 Jul 2006)

Not trying to cast aspersions on the author (I don't know him from Adam), just trying to figure out what will actually be in the book. A decent history of Canadian operations in Afghanistan would be of immense interest to me, personally.  A printout of 9,000 condolence messages is not something I would pay for in leather-bound form.  My impression is that these volumes offer both - just wondering what the ratio of photos and history to recycled web material is. I won't pretend that 500 dollars is in my ballpark but I can certainly recommend the book to the local libraries if anyone has seen the book, participated in its creation, or knows the author and his style.  The answers so far have been helpful, though, so thanks to all so far. Any detailed glimpse of what the actual contents are like would still be of interest.


----------



## hoolerprime (15 Jul 2006)

Hello everyone this is Joseph Green, the one offering the book for sale.
I would first like to express my sincere appreciation for your service to our nation and deepest gratitude. It is people like you that serve that highlight why we have the finest armed forces in the world, or so I believe. I am honoured to have been involved with this project since its inception beginning with lining all of 97th street between 118th ave and 111ave with yellow ribbons when the "Friendly Fire" incident happened, and will continue to respect and honour the intent of the cause. I would like to first like to address the topic of the "Stolen Book" set that was entrusted to Anne McClellan. Today they were found and I was contacted by Colonel Stogran informing me to that point. It was very distressing for me personally due in part for three reasons. First, he was the CO and he deserves a book to commemorate the event where he lost men under his command. He was slated to receive Set # 00002. Set #00001 was given to the Regiment and now as I am told resides in the Museum of the Regiments of which I am fundamentally honoured. Set# 00003-Set#00015 were allocated to the four ladies who lost their loves ones, Marley Leger, Jocelyn Van Sloten, Miranda Boutilier and Jody Carter and eight were given to the eight soldiers that were injured in the bombing and I considered it as a gift from Canada for their sacrifice and loss. It was important to me that they receive a copy. Set#00015 was allocated for Maj Mark Campbell someone I now call a friend . Set #00016 was given to the book editor for her tireless work in editing over 9000 condolence entries. For the record, I do not even have a copy for myself of the final version. I own the black set which is photographed on the site www.hooler.com and in that contains all the original letters submitted by various MP's, ministers and government officials and I hope will someday reside in the National War Museum housed in the same frame as my flag. 

Those books come to represent a sacred piece of Canadian history and when I say that I do not in any way shape or form want to diminish the recent loss of Canadian Forces in Afghanistan. NOT BY ANY MEANS! The sacrifices that have been made and will continue to be made will be honoured and echoed into the collective memory of all of Canada and this book comes to represent a small moment in time that our military was deployed to aid in the hunt for members of Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Last summer when I presented the finished sets to the military, it represented a massive investment of my resources into this project and for that I have no complaints as it was my choice and I would have done it again in a heartbeat. My father suggested that we provide the afore mentioned minister Col Stogran's set so that a member of the government could see a final copy of this book set. While enroute to him, it was "lost". It fundamentally angered me that something like that happened especially after all the work that I put into it. As it has been explained to me, the book has been found and all this could have been chalked up to something as simple as a book sitting in a mail room. I will not care to speculate and I have since changed the site to reflect that. I consider that matter now closed.

I know that many who read this do not know me and are not aware that I am a student at Emily Carr in Vancouver and as such am living the "starving student" lifestyle and my reason for the deadline of August 7th and the time to manufacture these sets as school begins again in September. Even with my status as a student, I do not and will not accept anything in the form of monetary compensation for this book. It is my contribution to creating this "system". 

It was my dream from the outset to create a mechanism that could be employed to create scholarships in the names of all the soldiers killed while in the service to Canada, and have this funded entirely by these book sets with all profits put into trust with scholarships being funded from the interest accumulated so that in 100 years from now, the Cpl Dyer or Capt Goddard scholarship would still be around. I approached the Royal Canadian Legion, initially received support for my proposal at the provincial command level for Proposal 3, and in fact my pitch to them made them cry (never happened before in a presentation), but Dominion Command eventually pulled their support for unknown reasons. You can view the presentation that I made to them at:
www.hooler.com/legion/legion-prop.exe
This is a flash based presentation published to an exe file.

I tried my best to contact publishing companies to no success. It was my intention to place in the hands of any publishing company that wanted to run with this the full rights to this book as I swore and oath renouncing all rights to profit, an oath I still maintain. In fact when I swore that oath, Colonel Wayne Eyre and Jocelyn VanSloten held Set #00000 while I swore out my oath. That is a moment I will never forget and I consider Col Eyre a friend. Anyone that wants to take this book and run with it only needs to contact me and I would be willing to have a discussion with them if they were sincere provided that all profits are dedicated to a noble cause. I was not prepared to sell this book until recently because I was not able to create the Non Profit Organization and Charity for this purpose as I just spent over two and a half full time years designing this and my energies were depleted as I am sure you can appreciate. I was not prepared to publish any more unless I was able to find a worthy recipient that would fall in line to the original mandate and that is when I asked for Colonel Stogran's advice. He recommended www.ideaccess.org, a wonderful organization that promotes literature and women's rights in the middle east. I thought about it and accepted and here we are today.

I realize that none of you know me and in today's world trust is a fleeting thing. I live by the mandate never trust more than you can afford to lose. But I am also a handshake man. I am making this book available to anyone that wishes a copy because it is truly a work of art. I still can't believe I made that to be quite honest. I have made it available because people said that they wanted it and many people have expressed an interest in securing a copy and I will know how many I have to make by August 7th. It is my plan that on Sept 11th at sundown in Vancouver on a beach to present what proceeds I have, along with the final copy of this book, to representatives of Ideaccess.org what I was able to generate in the names of all Canadian soldiers that have died while in service to Canada while serving in Afghanistan. Anyone can do the math. If this project generated sales that equalled the amount of forces that served there, the funds that I could present would be staggering. I will so it at sundown and I will consider this chapter closed forever as I will never offer another First Edition set ever again to the general public. 

I realize the price tag is indeed steep, but that represents my hard cost of publishing these books one at a time. There are over 200 full colour pages, its leather bound with gold leaf and its boxed, in other words its expensive by virtue alone. This book is not a paper back, this book is something you give to your grandchildren and can certainly last hundreds of years and the book binding masters at: www.bookbindery.ca oversee its manufacturing at every step. Printing is expensive and as a student, I hope you all realize that producing the amount of sets that I did came at a high cost to me and it is my little contribution. I am not in the military, but I hope you can at least understand that I honour it and the sacrifices made by so many. I am not complaining, but I am trying to put you people into context of who I am.

Indeed, no one needs to buy it and that is ok by me as the people that matter have the sets. By the way, my name is not Mr. Hooler, its Joseph Green and I run www.hooler.com.  A message to GAP, my track record if investigated shows no unknowns as I have offered full disclosure to anyone. 

I have done everything I can to commemorate this and I know its a number of years late, but I consider my commitment fulfilled.
So far, I have one order and he is Ex 2-Commando and an ex Patricia. 

I would like to close by saying thank you everyone for engaging in meaningful discourse in regards to this subject. I wish you all the very best that Canada has to offer and I hope you realize that there are some Canadians that truly value your service and I am honoured to consider myself one of them.

I wanted to also let you know, the 3 PPCLI flag that was presented to me as thanks, is scheduled to go up on STS-115 this August on Space Shuttle Atlantis. It was supposed to be Endeavour, but I suppose they changed it. It is a profound honour to be involved with having the entire earth fly under the flag of 3 PPCLI. The Canadian Space Agency has stated that they would like to fly the whole crew of the shuttle up to Edmonton to present the flag back to the Regiment at an Oilers game. How cool would that be?

If anyone wants to ask any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me at: hoolerprime"@"hotmail.com. Thank you for taking the time to read this and I hope it provides some degree of clarification.

Thank you and God Bless Canada. 
Joseph Green
www.hooler.com


----------



## Bruce Monkhouse (15 Jul 2006)

Fixed the thread and thank you for the explanation, Mr. Green


----------



## Elisha (15 Jul 2006)

wow...if I had the funds.  But I do know the guy that bought the first book, as quoted on the website.  My husband who was over in 2002 now works for PD and knows Brian very well!


Elisha


----------



## Michael Dorosh (15 Jul 2006)

Mr. Green - no doubt your heart is in the right place, and I can certainly relate to pouring heart and soul into a "magnum opus" as I have certainly been in a similar position, though luckily have been able to do so with a minimum of debt incurred. I have no doubt LCol Stogran and all servicemen (regardless of service, myself included) for that matter appreciate your efforts.

Having said that, despite your lengthy post here - which is also appreciated - I still have no clue what the book actually offers. Can you give some sort of an idea about 

a) chapter subjects/headings?
b) number of photos
c) ratio of historical material to the condolences
d) primary research materials used - did you conduct interviews with veterans of the campaign? Did you have access to military archives? Is the book based on secondary sources (ie newspapers)?

I would be very interested in learning more about this very interesting and heart-warming project, if that is possible.


----------



## paracowboy (16 Jul 2006)

Mr. Green. 
I don't know you. But my Boss trusts you. That's good enough for me. (Hopefully, he isn't going to read this. I spent a lot of time establishing my reputation as an insubordinate bastard.)


----------



## Fishbone Jones (16 Jul 2006)

para,
I understand and want to follow your sentiments. However, I have to side with Michael on this one. Am I going to get one volume on the Op and the second is nothing more than a printout of email condolances? I hve no interest in paying that kind of money for a volume of tomes, available on the internet, of which I have no interest. Trust me, I'm not Infantry, and would not normally buy something that involves another Regiment, let alone another Arm, but I'm intrigued and am seroiusly considering it. I want to get this two volume set, but am not about to buy a pig in a polk


----------



## Roy Harding (16 Jul 2006)

Folks;

I was THERE, and I'm not entirely sure that I want to spend $500.00 remembering it.

On the other hand, I'm not entirely sure that I DON'T want to spend the $500.00.

I know this, however - I WILL NOT be pressured into this decision by the deadline of "7 August 2006", or whatever it was.

If I don't make up my mind by the "deadline", the memories will still be there.


----------



## Fishbone Jones (16 Jul 2006)

Thanks Roy,
My sentiments exactly. I don't have enough information to make a purchase sight unseen. I may be convinced if the author was to post, on his web site, the first para of each chapter in the series, from each book. This is starting to look like " Property in Florida..................My concern is stated in my previous post.


----------



## hoolerprime (16 Jul 2006)

Hello again everyone. Here is what the completed book actually offers.
I have a graphical message from the Colonel In Chief the Countess, the Forward by Col Stogran, a Message from Maj Campbell, myself and the book editor. There are also colour copies of all the messages from ministers, senators, and various MPs including Stephen Harper while he was leader of the Opposition. I also spend an immense amount of time compiling from the DND Combat Camera web site along with securing permissions from them and the Directorate of Intellectual property rights to publish photographs from Op Athena/Apollo in support of Enduring Freedom. If you check the galley section on www.hooler.com you will see a solid cross section of all the work that was integrated. There is also a chronology of Sept 11th, Canada's official step by step process to respond. All information was taken from DND sites and I simply integrated some amazing graphics into it. I am at heart a military enthusiast and a graphics designer and I designed it to satisfy my desire to have a fitting and awesome tribute to the moment. I have the chronology leading up to and including the Friendly Fire event, the trip home, messages from the widow and former fiancé's of the lost men. I have captions of the attempts to rename a Bridge here in Edmonton after Cpl Dyer and my speech I made in support of it to city council. There are also photos of the Bronze Star ceremony held at the Butterdome in Edmonton and the program guide for that. On the front of book one is a photo of the 3 PPCLI HQ, on the back is the group photo of 3 PPCLI.  As you open the book there is a signature colour copy hand written message from Lois Hole and John McCallum. I URGE YOU ALL TO REVIEW THE GALLERY IN AS MUCH DETAIL AS YOU CAN as I shot the majority of the book.

As for the amount of photos....its certainly up there....it is subjective. I have fused in many pages photographs to form new ones. I know I am certainly into the hundreds of colour images. I apologize for being vague in this manner but I simply cannot give you an exact amount because there are so many that I really have lost count and lost a way on how to gauge on how to count. That should give you an idea about how comprehensive it it. All the messages are condolences and they were all collected in real time and it marks as far as I can tell the first time something like this has been done. Some of the stories in there are amazing. Yes, there are many many condolences, but there are also stories people share and it is really amazing. The condolences were taken from 16 online books that complied into this. This is a memorial book after all. The primary research materials were DND published information and as far as interviews and messages came from the Countess, the Colonel and Maj Campbell. The book and all the messages were taken from the hooler.com server that was set up to capture the messages. If you would like to see the old site, please visit www.hooler.com/ppcli
That site has old information about price and should be disregarded. Everything else posted in there is in the book.

I have to make this point clear to everyone. I am not here to pressure anyone at all. But, I will make one thing clear to all, I am putting this behind me because I need to and unless I am getting 10 000 hits a day with 1000 orders a day I will not hold this over and I will close this down at 24:00:00 on 7 August. I need to move on, but I have to make this available to anyone that wants a copy. As for the memories of actually being there, I am truly sorry for everyone that was there to experience such a horrible event, I really am. Yes, the memories will be there for many of those. However, this book will be here long after we who all read this are dead. I designed this book to ensure that it outlives me and will be around for the next 200 years at least. It is my own stamp on this event to document it. It does not matter to me how many people purchase this but it would be nice to present something to the Ideaccess people, but when it comes to this book, I have finished and it really is a magnificent tribute. If it was up to me and if I had the capital, I would love to give a copy of this book to everyone that served there during this event as a gift but that is just not feasible.

I would like to thank all those that have supported me and came to my defence over the course of this project as it is almost finished. As for Brian from Precision, he is one of those people that have inspired me and it is a real honour to be able to say he will get the first book.

Hey, to make things really simple, its there if you want a copy. I hope that you all understand that I am not trying to force this on anyone, just simply making them aware that this is available.

Any other questions?
Joseph


----------



## Michael Dorosh (16 Jul 2006)

Thanks for the detailed reply, Joseph, and good luck with this worthy project.


----------



## hoolerprime (16 Jul 2006)

Thank you very much and good luck to you and everyone on here.

Very sincerely,
Joseph


----------



## Roy Harding (17 Jul 2006)

hoolerprime said:
			
		

> Hello again everyone. Here is what the completed book actually offers.
> ...



Thanks for that reply, Joseph.  

I'll have another look at your site (and my MasterCard balance!!)


----------



## hoolerprime (25 Jul 2006)

My friends,

I have been asked by the military to extend the deadline of the sales of my book so that the Western Sentinel can run an ad for the sales of the book. I have decided to extend the deadline until Aug. 28th which is the same day the Space Shuttle_ Atlantis _ will be taking the 3 PPCLI flag into orbit. The launch window is until Sept 14th and I will consider the store closed when the flag has launched into orbit and escorted our fallen heroes into the heavens.

Thank you.
Joseph


----------

