BRAD, A MEMOIR- "This Side of Nowhere"

By Bradley Kuhns

Brad Kuhns is a former Las Vegas performer known for his acclaimed performances and musical talents. In addition to a successful Vegas career, Brad also had an exciting careeer in law enforcement with the  Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), and later opened a private practice in marriage anf family counseling.

BRAD, A MEMOIR, first chronicles Brad's incredible careeer in the enertainment world as he quickly shot to fame. Between peformances, he was rubbing shoulders with and becoming friends with the likes  of America's biggest stars: Elvis, Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack, Nat King Cole and daughter Natalie, Frankie Laine, Lucille Ball, Dinah Shore, Burt Reynolds and many other celebrities. Brad's music group, the "Encores", their electrifying stage presence, and his talents as a studio musician made him a Las Vegas staple.

His second career in law enforcement allowed him to work alongside the elite ranks of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), Scientific Investigation Division. He used his acquired skills of investigation, interrogation, polygraph (lie detection), and forensic hypnisis to assist not only the LAPD but other federal agencies as well to solve some of the most heinous crimes perpertrated in America.. He eventually turned whistlblower to clean up areas of the LAPD.

By Brad's third career change, he earned two professional degrees, one in  clinical psychology and the second as a licensed doctor of Oriental Medicine. He maintained a private marriage and famiy therapy practice while continuing to use his unique skills as a consutant in assisting federal agencies in resolving crimes nationwide.

Fascinating, touching, and bravely honest, BRAD A Memoir, chronicles Brad's remarkable life journey. In this memoir, Brad reflects on his personal life, successes, and pitfalls, and takes you on an incredibly adventurous and fascinating ride like none you've ever read before.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bradley Kuhns
• Release date: Jul 21, 2021
• ISBN: 9781535605519

Bradley Kuhns

Brad graduated through three colorful careers during his life. From the entertainment world, to the law enforcement profession, and eventually working as a professional in the alternative medicine field. Brad has authored numerous books and manuals sharing his knowledge, skills, and expertise with others worldwide.Brad had an incredible career in the entertainment world and quickly shot to fame. Between performances, he was rubbing shoulders and becoming friends with the likes of America's biggest stars: Elvis, Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack,Nat King Cole and daughter Natalie, Frankie Laine, Lucille Ball, Dinah Shore, and many other celebrities. Brad's music group, the "Encores," their electrifying stage presence, and his talents as a studio musician made him a Las Vegas staple.His second career in law enforcement allowed him to work alongside the elite ranks of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), Scientific Investigation Division. He utilized his acquired skills of investigation, interrogation, polygraph (lie detection), and forensic hypnosis, clinical hypnosis to assist not only the LAPD, but other federal agencies as well, to solve some of the most heinous crimes perpetrated in America. He eventually turned whistleblower to clean up areas within the LAPD.By Brad's third career change, he had earned two professional doctorate degrees, one in clinical psychology and the second as a licensed doctor of Oriental Medicine. He maintained a private marriage family therapy practice while continuing to use his unique skills as a consultant in assisting federal agencies in resolving crimes nationwide.Dr. Kuhns is an internationally recognized forensic hypnotherapist, psychotherapist and motivational builder who has used and shared his unique approaches and techniques both in private practice and as an adviser and consultant to many professionals, stars, entertainers and well-known personalities throughout the world.

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The Dawn of Life

Big Joe

Dawn comes at the beginning of each new day. The same can be said for each new life. The dawning of life is birth.

As a youngster, I never really thought about my parents having a life before me. It’s the way of youth. They think life begins with their own births. But, of course, before I was born, my parents had a history every bit as exciting and important as mine. They had stories of their own that should be told. Some of their stories have become family legend. Some seemed silly, but I’m sure they were very important to my parents. Those stories are part of what made my parents who they were.

When I heard about my parents’ childhoods and their lives, it always seemed to me that they lived in a different world. In the same way, my life will seem strange to those from a younger generation who read my memoir.

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I REALLY DON’T know that much about my grandparents or great-grandparents since I can’t remember ever seeing them. I’ve only heard stories from my mom and Aunt Tres. Most stories were about how tough it was for the family growing up during the early 1900s.

I never met my grandparents on either side of my family. My grandfather on my mother’s side was Joseph Basits. He was born in Pecs-Budai-Kalvaros, Hungary. My grandmother, Maria Steinhauer, married Joseph Basits on October 2, 1897. I suspect that the name Basits was Americanized by the immigration service when my grandfather and his family arrived on the shores of the United States. The Basits name could have been spelled and pronounced as Bosich or Basich.

My mother’s older brother, Edmond, was born in Pecs, Hungary, in 1898. My mother, Mary Basits, was born in Hamburg, Germany, in 1899, and my mother’s younger brother, Joseph, was also born in Pecs, Hungary, in 1901. Somewhere between 1898 and 1901, my mother’s parents, Joseph and Maria, lived in Hamburg, Germany. From all accounts related by my mom, her father worked in the coal mines and steel factories in Hamburg, Germany, during that time period.

When the coal-burning ship the Chemnitz left the port of Bremen, Germany, for America in 1902, my mother, Mary, was only three years old. To the best of her recollection, the trip to the United States took about three weeks. Mom had memories of the ship burning coal and making steam.

The family left Germany with their clothing and some bedding, which was tied into bundles in bedsheets. They had no suitcases. They also had a small steamer trunk with some household items. What meager household items the family had were stored on board the ship in some boxes.

There wasn’t much money. The family was poor. All Joseph had in his pocket was six dollars when he landed in America. On arrival in the United States, my mother and her family stayed with relatives in the small Pennsylvania town of Heidelberg, located in Allegheny County, near Pittsburgh. These relatives were the sponsors of Mom’s family.

During the trip to America, my grandfather Joseph contracted yellow jaundice, and the entire family was put in quarantine at the Port of Baltimore until he recovered. Mom’s dad was a big, strong, strapping man. He was six feet two inches tall, had brown hair and grey eyes, and was a lean, trim 188 pounds.

Mom said the immigrant quarantine area looked like a prison. She described it as having cages, and the whole area was surrounded by bars. Although mom herself wasn’t quarantined she and other family members were assigned to another area. She said there were many people being held in quarantine, and she remembers sitting on the big bundles of clothes tied in their bedsheets while her dad was being held.

Mom said she didn’t remember much about the trip across the ocean since she was only three years old, but she did remember how funny her dad looked with jaundice, saying, It looked like he took a bath in iodine. The quarantine was lifted after two weeks, and the sponsoring relatives came to the port to pick up the family. The sponsors home was small. It had two bedrooms, with a small kitchen area and living with the relatives was a cramped situation because they had a large family of their own.

My grandfather had to reimburse the relatives he was living with for the fare from Germany including room and board. He couldn’t speak a word of English when he arrived in America. He stayed with the relatives and took off on his own, staying in boarding houses while working the coal mines around the area. My grandfather would come home on the weekends with his wages, pay the bills he owed, and then give the remaining money to my grandmother Maria.

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MOM’S DAD HAD a hard time as a new arrival to America. Since he couldn’t speak English, he was mocked and made fun of. He was called a hunkie, which was an ethnic insult. He was also called a greenhorn, and a scab. He was often taken advantage of by the foreman on his jobs just because of his lack of English. He was usually given the dirtiest and most distasteful jobs. It didn’t take long for Granddad to see what was going on; he was no fool. He had a temper and he wouldn’t take being pushed around, so he would often throw his tools down and walk off the job. He’d come home and tell his wife, I just quit. This happened quite frequently, but since he was a hard worker, he would find another job quickly.

Between 1906 and 1908, the Basits family lived in the coal town of Twilight for about two years. The coal company had about a hundred houses for the miners. Mom’s family got to live in the house in Twilight for free because their row of houses had ten vacant homes, and Joseph agreed to look after them in exchange for free rent. Mom’s mother and father decided to take in boarders to help supplement the family income. It wasn’t long until the house was filled with miners. All of the boarders worked in the mines with my grandfather.

While living in Twilight, Granddad heard of a farm for sale in a little village named Albany, about four or five miles from the small town of Brownsville on the Monongahela River. Joseph though that if he bought the farm, he would be in a location where he could work in a number of coal mines in the area. The farm sat on 115 acres. Most of the land was fenced. The farm had a large fruit orchard. Mom, who was eight years old at the time, described the house as having nice red brick, three bedrooms, a large kitchen, a large living room, and a fireplace in every room. But the water source was quite a way from the house—a red brick springhouse that sat on the property.

The farmhouse had a large basement with cement floors that ran the complete length of the house. You could enter the cellar from the kitchen or from outside entrances on either side of the house. The cellar had a few large rooms, about eight feet from floor to ceiling, which were finished and made of cement. One of the rooms had a large door that led to the fruit cellar. Mom said this room had a dirt floor and was always cool. Mom’s dad called this room his wine cellar, and her mother called the room her vegetable room.

The farm also had a large barn for cattle, a chicken coop, and pens for the hogs. There was also a second barn on the property to house the farm implements and machinery. The second barn was big enough to hold ten cows for milking and also had room for a team of horses with an attached buggy shed. By this time, Mom’s parents had saved enough money to buy a horse and a buggy. Grandfather went to an auction and bought both the horse and buggy for fifty dollars. He also bought an incubator to raise chicks. The incubator operated on oil lamps. He started with 155 baby chicks. He also bought six ducks, a large number of spring chickens, and four more cows for the farm. He then built a large pond for the ducks to swim in.

My grandfather earned the name Big Joe around the Pennsylvania mining communities because he was a big, strong, muscular, lean, mean machine of a man who had a temper and wouldn’t take guff from anyone. He was afraid of nothing. He ran a very strict household. He expected everyone in the house to do their share of work around the farm. He even stopped sending Mom to school after the third grade, so she wound up having only a third-grade education. Granddad said it was more important for her, a girl, to stay home and learn the duties of cooking, cleaning, and working the household.

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MOM TOLD A story about Granddad and his horse, Nellie. He bought Nellie at auction so he could bring supplies in from town. But Nellie couldn’t be ridden. She had been culled from a wild herd. She ran through the pastures on the farm but refused to be tamed. Every time Granddad tried to get near Nellie, she would rear up on her hind legs and then run way. The only one who could get near Nellie was Mom’s older brother, Edmond. He learned that by feeding Nellie sugar, she would come close to people. When he got Nellie eating sugar out of his hand and oats from a bucket, he could walk her. He eventually put a bridle and saddle on the horse and let it lie there without tightening it up.

A few weeks into the training, Edmond was often riding the horse up and down the country roads. Then one day, my grandfather told the family, It’s time for that horse to earn its keep. He hooked her up to a buggy and walked her up and down the roads for a week or two. He then decided to take Nellie and the buggy into town for supplies.

Everything was going smoothly until Edmond and Granddad came to some railroad tracks. A train came by and Nellie had never seen a train before, and she began to kick and rear up. She continued to kick until the buggy’s shafts were torn into splinters. She then tore free and ran all the way back to the barn. My granddad and Edmond had to walk back to the farm. When they got home, Nellie was standing in the barn with her harness still on, and there was a piece of buggy still trailing behind her. Granddad was so angry he was going to take a bullwhip to the horse, but pleas from his wife, Maria, and Edmond changed his mind. Even so, he told them, Well, she had better get used to trains or I’ll beat her brains out.

After a few weeks, Granddad and Edmond tried the trip to town again with Nellie. But this time they found something new—Nellie wouldn’t let another buggy pass her. If there was a buggy in front of her, she would begin trotting and then run until she passed the other buggy. Granddad told his wife that there was no holding the horse back, and they just had to hold the reins until she passed the other buggy. It was another wild ride into town for Granddad and Edmond.

Granddad was angry, saying, I’ll fix that horse. I’ll take the friskiness out of her. He hooked Nellie up to a cultivator and worked the horse in the fields for a couple of weeks. When he thought he had broken her spirit, he decided to hitch her to the buggy and go back into town. On the way, a farmer driving his Ford automobile frightened Nellie. She again reared up, kicked the buggy, tore the straps and shafts from the buggy, and ran back to the barn.

My grandmother said my mother was looking through the window and saw Granddad and Edmond on foot coming up to the house. She exclaimed, Oh boy! There’s going to be trouble.

Granddad took a large bullwhip and said, I’ll either cure the horse from wrecking the buggy or kill it. He went after Nellie and beat her viciously. It took everything my grandmother and Edmond had to pull Granddad off the horse. He beat the horse within an inch of her life. Mom said that if it hadn’t been for Edmond and Grandmother grabbing and tearing at Granddad, Nellie would have been beaten to death.

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ANOTHER STORY ABOUT Granddad and his temper was about when he dealt with the kids’ dog. Mom and her two brothers were on their way to school and playing along the road when a man in a buggy stopped and asked them if they wanted the puppy he had with him. Mom and her brothers already had two dogs at home, but they couldn’t resist the cute puppy. They took it to school with them and tied it to a tree outside the schoolhouse until school let out.

Mom and her brothers named the dog Chucklehead because he acted so simple. But even though he didn’t seem too bright, he was a dog that wasn’t afraid of anything. If Mom and her brothers told him to go after a squirrel, groundhog, rats, moles, rabbits, or whatever, he would do so without hesitation and with a vengeance.

My grandfather used two of the dogs to help Ed herd and bring in the cattle from the fields each night, but on one occasion, the only dog around was Chucklehead, so he was employed to get the cattle to the barn. There was one ornery cow that kept running away from Ed and wouldn’t stay with the rest of the herd. The cow would kick at Ed every time he approached her. Ed got tired of chasing the cow, so as usual, he pointed and told Chucklehead to get it. When Chucklehead got near the cow, she kicked him. Chucklehead sunk his teeth into the cow’s hind legs.

After Ed and Chucklehead returned to the barn with the cattle and Grandfather saw the injured cow, he became angry. He treated the cow’s leg and, without saying a word, went into the house, came back out with a gun, and shot and killed Chucklehead where he stood.

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INFORMATION REGARDING MY grandparents on my father’s side is vague. I never met or knew them, but I was named after my grandfather on Dad’s side. My grandfather’s name was Bradley B. Kuhns; I was named Bradley W. Kuhns. I do know that Bradley B. Kuhns lived in and around Greensburg, Pennsylvania, most of his life. He at one time had a well-to-do, thriving men’s clothing store in Greensburg. As a young man, he was also a member of the Ku Klux Klan in the southwestern part of the state. Among some photos that were handed down through the years, I saw a picture dated 1928 of Granddad Kuhns in his KKK uniform. He was also a respected member of the volunteer fire department in Greensburg for many years.

Photo-1

Big Joe’s family. My mother is the 3-year-old blond girl sitting on the white rug to the far right.

Photo-2

Big Joe and his wife, Maria.

Chapter Two

My Parents

I couldn’t have asked for a better mother. She worked hard from early childhood and all through her adult life. Mom ran off at age seventeen with a friend, Conrad Gaisbauer, and got married.

In June 1921, Mom’s first child, my half sister, Grace Gaisbauer, was born. By 1925, Mom had left Conrad and relocated to Akron, Ohio, where at twenty-five years old, she bought a restaurant after saving her money and did quite well. She divorced Conrad Gaisbauer and was on her own.

At twenty-six, Mom married my dad, William Bradley Kuhns, in the Akron, Ohio, courthouse. A few weeks into the marriage, Mom said she saw Dad’s true colors. He refused to work, lived off her income, and ran around gambling and drinking.

They used what money Mom had in savings to buy a farm in the small unincorporated area known as Allison, Pennsylvania. It was near the towns of Grindstone and Brownsville. Even on the farm away from the city, Dad continued his bad ways.

As time passed, things went from bad to worse. Dad would work the coal mines, come home, drink booze, and argue with Mom at the drop of a hat. He continued to leave the house at night to indulge in his gambling, drinking, and women. Eventually it got to the point where he physically hit Mom. She said that the first time Dad struck her, she knew in her mind that she had to get away from him.

Over the next few years, Dad used and abused Mom both verbally and physically. He continued to cheat on her with other women, including a fifteen-year-old girl who lived over the hill from our farm. Dad would have the young thing come over, and he would take her behind the barn for sex.

Dad’s jealousy was so bad, he kept Mom isolated on the farm and would limit her trips into town to buy supplies. He didn’t want her to have her own money. When she did have to travel to town, he would give her only enough money for specific items. He would tell her to go to the store, buy the supplies, and return back home. He made it a point that she should not look at or talk to other men, and he didn’t want any other men looking at her.

My sister, Ramona, was born on April 26, 1930, at the farmhouse in Allison. The abuse Dad was inflicting on Mom continued even after Mona was born. It was horrendous. Mom was his punching bag. He not only would slap and punch her with his fist, but there was one occasion he took a scalding poker and burned Mom’s breast. Another time, he started a fire in a closet, locked Mom in, and left the house. It was only by sheer luck that a neighbor came by and pulled Mom from the flames. Still another time, Dad put a gun in Mom’s mouth and told her he was going to kill her.

My mother once told Dad, One day you’re going to rot in prison because of your mean, drunken temper. But that didn’t bother Dad one bit.

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IN JANUARY 1936, I arrived on the scene. It’s January 24, 1936. Mom is thirty-six years old and pregnant with me. She and Dad are sitting at the kitchen table across from each other having a cup of coffee. He looks at Mom and says, Let’s fight. With that, he throws his heavy coffee mug at her but misses. He becomes angry because he missed his mark. He gets up from the table, heats a poker on the coal stove, and goes after Mom with it. He drops the poker to the floor and begins to hit Mom with his fists, striking her in the stomach and back. When she falls to the floor, he kicks her a number of times before leaving the farmhouse.

It took two days for Mom to recover from the beating. On January 27, 1936, which was Dad’s birthday, she went into early labor with me. I was born in my sixth month as a premature baby. It took me three days from the start of Mom’s labor to survive and be born. When I was finally delivered, I weighed in at only fourteen ounces.

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IT WAS IN the dead of winter with freezing, chilling cold, and the snow was five to six feet deep. Dr. Harrington could not get to the farmhouse by car, so he took a trolley that let him off two miles from the house and walked the rest of the way. Dr. Harrington stayed at the farmhouse for the three days it took me to come into this world.

Over those three days in the house, there was a neighbor, Mrs. Richards; Dr. Harrington; my sister, six-year-old Ramona; and Dad. On January 27, when Mom started to bleed, Dr. Harrington asked her if she felt the baby moving. Mom’s reply was, No, I only feel pain. The doctor placed a wooden apple box in bed at her feet and told her when the pain occurred, she was to bear down and push against the box. But nothing was happening.

The next day, January 28, the labor pains came further and further apart, and Dr. Harrington became very worried. Mom was worn out. She could no longer help after being in labor all day and night.

Mom was no longer having pains, and Dr. Harrington told her that if she experienced pain, it would help. He sent Mrs. Richards downstairs to have Dad come into the room. He asked Dad to hold down one of Mom’s arms while he took the other. He then proceeded to pull Mom’s wisdom teeth out without any anesthetic in order to shock her into experiencing pain.

On the third day, January 30, Dr. Harrington felt that the baby was dead. He told Dad that he was going to give Mom some medication in order to throw her into convulsions so that she would react and help with the delivery.

Again, Dad held one arm, the doctor the other. Dr. Harrington gave Mom the medication—but nothing happened. Dr. Harrington thought the only thing left to do was to use forceps to make the delivery.

Mom fought between life and death during those three days it took to deliver me. Her pregnancy had been very difficult. Finally, I came into the world. According to all reports, I was as black as coal. Mom said I looked like one big clot of blood. I was said to have looked like a little black doll.

The doctor could hold me in just one hand, with my head at his fingertips and my feet at the end of his palm. I was so small, they could see the bones in my skull, which apparently weren’t fully closed. My ears were so small, they were described to