Heroes were praised and admired in literature and music. Heroes won the hearts of beautiful women. What aspiring legend could resist taking his rightful place alongside Mt. Rushmore’s magnificent foursome?

It was 1945. The end of WW II brought renewed hope for America and the world, inspiring rejuvenated national pride along with enthusiasm for motherhood and apple pie, family, God, conformity, virginity, and idealism! While experiencing post-war euphoria, Alan Bentley dreamed of becoming a hero. Though only a short-pants-wearing, skinny kid, he felt a calling to become legendary, universally admired for his character, grit, perseverance, wisdom, courage, and unshakable regard for truth, fair play, and humility. He hoped someday to join Borglum’s famous memorialized quartet in South Dakota. After all, this was America! Realizing that the predominant opportunities for heroism were offered by war, he enlisted in the army upon graduating from high school two weeks shy of his eighteenth birthday. He would prepare for the inevitable next conflict. In The Saga of Chief Barking Loincloth, Alan unabashedly recounts his adventures and misadventures, revealing humor and pathos in elusive successes and humiliating miss-steps as he encounters social contradiction and hypocrisy, unanticipated pitfalls, and ill-advised detours. Whether committing a major faux pas in an elementary spelling bee, inflicting injury on a class-mate, facing the wrath of a humorless army criminal Investigation, or warding off sexual assault by Travis, a horny spider monkey, he strives to define and become a hero!

Larry Sargeant, born in 1942, graduated from Mooers Central School in northern New York as class valedictorian in 1960, earned a BS in secondary English education from SUNY Plattsburgh in 1972, and an MA in liberal studies from Excelsior College, Albany in 2011. He has been a soldier, corporate buyer, professional skydiver, furniture salesman, small-time carny, shoe designer, factory manager, and English teacher. In addition to The Saga of Chief Barking Loincloth, his first published novel, he has written special occasion poetry, numerous musical comedies performed as Rotary scholarship fund raisers, and short stories for his English classes. He recently retired as an educator and resides with his wife, Joni, in Little Falls, New York.