About me
It's something of an honor to have my very own web pages to describe myself and my work. As a former Los Angeles Times desk editor and journalist, then a as a communications exec at Disney, I've alsways admired creators and writers. Special in that cohort is my father, Charles D. Champlin III, himself a former journalist (Time-Life), then a film critic at the LA Times.
As "CDC Jr IV," now I myself am the author of two books:
"Think Like a Molecule" is a meditation on the structures of our world that amazingly evolved from "inert matter" to matter, like us, that can think!
Secondly, "Wand" was an entry in a contest hosted by Ted Turner, the founder of CNN and "Turner Classis Movies." In 1989, Turner offered a prize of $500K for a novel that would promote the survival and success of humanity. I decided to “go for the prize.”
Suffice to say, I did not win the so-called "Turner Tomorrow Award," but now I do have a novel about a slice of life in Los Angeles of the '90s, featuring an ambitious young man trying to make a difference! I have a lot of passion about the core ideas -- that human creativity as exemplified by "magic wands" like pencils and pens can help us survive humanity's worst instincts. Meantime, “Think Like a Molecule” takes off from some of the thinking of futurist/architect Buckminster Fuller, famous inventor of the “geodesic dome.” His creations use natural forces of tension and resistance to make lightweight, efficient dome structures now familiar around the world.
Fuller was a major inspiration to me, as was Carl Sagan, with his books "The Dragons of Eden," the TV series "Cosmos" and his awe at the "billions and billions" of stars. I celebrate Neil deGrasse Tyson, who wears the Sagan mantle today very well.
"Bucky" Fuller is also the coiner of the term “Spaceship Earth,” to reflect the idea that our natural planetary habitat is a living biosphere, floating in space. After some 14 billion years, the universe has created a zone where thinking minds are considering how it all came to be. The universe has “learned to think about itself.” I'm also a proud UC Berkeley alum, with a studies in English and some Architecture. I've worked at the Los Angeles Times and the Disney Company, and a few college campuses.
Today, I'm enjoying "resort living" with my lovely wife in the midst of walnut and fruit orchards in Northern California. We're just a few miles from the magnificent Sutter Buttes, also known as "the smallest mountain range in the world."
More to come from this idyllic oasis on Planet Earth . . . .