Hartford native and author Chas Wienke poses at the West Bend Community Memorial Library with his book, "Our Boomer Years," Wednesday evening in West Bend.

Chas Wienke has come full circle, twice.

A man who's spent most of his adult life in sunny Florida, Wienke never forgot his roots in an area his book jacket dubs "Old-World Wisconsin." He's also a man whose English teacher four decades ago told him to pursue a career in writing, only to take a 41-year diversion into the machining trades.

Now he's come back home on both counts. Wienke is in Wisconsin this week on a promotional tour to discuss and sign copies of his first published work, titled "Our Boomer Years." The 432-page missive recounts, through 140 short stories, Wienke's formative years in the Slinger and Hartford areas while also tracing a growing country on the cusp of phenomenal change.

Along the way, Wienke recounts how the life of he and those around him were shaped by post-WWII fears, developments in technology, transportation and international conflict.

Before publishing his book in March, Wienke said he had to muster the confidence to share his tales with the world. The process took years, he said.

"Frankly, it's hard to know if what you have is viable, if it's a story that will be worth relating or that people will pick up on," Wienke said in an interview before his first appearance in Slinger Tues-day evening. "There's a lot of responsibility, or self consciousness, in affixing your name, your entity, who you are, to a document. Once you do that you're identified to it. That's a big step, and I think that's where a lot of people stop."

Very early inspiration came from Mrs. Louden, his English teacher at Hartford Union High School, where he spent his sophomore and junior years in 1962 and 1963. He spent the previous years and his senior year in Slinger's school district. His family lived on a farm in the rural community of Nenno.

Wienke's teacher told him he was a good writer and to keep up with it.

"Unfortunately I didn't," he recalled.

Instead he spent 41 years as a machinist, toolmaker and industrial machine builder, the past 25 years in Florida.

"But I always thought back on that, thought back on her," Wienke said.

The book traces its roots to when, in 1983, Wienke married a woman in Florida, a widow with three children, the eldest of whom was nearing age 7. He had hoped his notes could relate to his children what had transpired during his lifetime and how the big picture had affected him.

"So I started writing notes then, little stories, things that I thought were memorable, and I compiled those," he said. "But the kids had grown up and were gone, started their own lives, and I had this accumulation of notes."

Around 2000, Wienke's health had declined and reduced his ability to continue excelling in the demanding machining trade. Worsening matters, the industry began to deteriorate in the recession that followed the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

In August of 2005, Wienke's employer laid off virtually everyone after being hit particularly had by increased competition brought on by globalization. He was out of a job after decades.

"I was already at the peak of my career and I couldn't expect to live at that level anymore," Wienke said. "After 14 months, near the end of 2006, I reevaluated my position and I could see that Chas the machinist was not bringing home the bacon anymore. I had to reevaluate what I could do, what I enjoyed doing, and try to see how I could continue to make a living.

He rediscovered those stashed-away notes.

"I thought I had quite a varied childhood, a little bit more so than the average kid. I thought I would put that to use."

He began organizing his notes, polishing them and toward the end of 2007 he began looking into publishers. He wasn't keen on setting himself up for rejection, so he limited his search to ones he thought might react positively to his type of work.

"Rather than send it out to 50 publishers and have 49 no's, I sent it out to six. I vetted those six very thoroughly," he said.

Wienke cherry picked his notes and chose five stories he felt were the very best. He polished them up, printed them out and forwarded his writings to each publisher.

Three of them reacted favorably.

"I was amazed. I said to myself, these are professional critics, and if professional critics agree that my work is viable, that is a real incentive," Wienke said. "That really impressed me inside. It gave me the confidence. Up until that point I was just plugging along. The inspiration from that drove me to see it through."

He chose to go with Tate Publishing & Enterprises, an Oklahoma publisher that bills itself as a Christian-based family-owned company whose mission is to discover unknown authors. Wienke said it is the fastest-growing publisher in the U.S.

In February 2008 he signed a contract and visited the area that spring to "tie up all the loose ends."

He visited with old friends and spoke to others in the area who might have insight to share. He'd hoped to get his book out last December, but it was ultimately released in March.

Wienke singled out lifetime Slinger resident Ken Leeson as his "spot man." He eventually wrote the book's foreword.

"I didn't know Chas that well during high school," Leeson said. "We knew each other a little bit and I ran into him periodically at church. But, sort of out of the blue, he contacted me and I did some research for him."

He helped research some of the major events and goings on in the Slinger area during that period, and looked into the trains that traveled in an out of the period during the era. The timeline of the book is from 1946, when Wienke was born, to 1964.

"We particularly looked at how and when they switched from steam engines to diesel," Leeson said.

He also looked into some of the area's major land formations, who owned the land during periods depicted in the book, and certain dates.

Leeson saw the manuscript in its more formative stages and loved it. During the entire process, the two found out they had a lot in common in their upbringings.

"I just really enjoyed reading it," he said. "It brought back a lot of memories for me."

Wienke said his book's primary purposes are to unearth a distinct era and to educate.

"The world is changing at a fast pace," he said. "The things that happened during the boomer years - 40, 50, 60 years ago - have been kind of overshadowed. They've been overshadowed by the Second World War. They've been overshadowed by the Atomic Bomb.

"History is important. When you define a book, when you get to the bottom of it, it's history. It's what happened yesterday, or last month, or two years ago, or 20 years ago. And yet it's still relevant."