In the 1920’s up to the 1950’s smoking was not only accepted by had doctors’ approval. Many of the old time radio shows had cigarette commercials about the positive effects of smoking. Of course, it was all a lie. It was accepted everywhere. You could smoke in shops, restaurants, on public transportation, the movies and sports events. It appeared to make people look as if they were special or in the ‘in’ crowd. By the time they figured out it was too late too many people had passed. It affected so many people with a variety of diseases including the obvious one cancer. When I was young I worked in a hospital which is now condos. Back then people were in extreme agony and on huge doses of morphine to control the pain. The sad part was it it barely worked. I hated working the second floor of the hospital because you could hear the people screaming with pain. By the mid 1950’s the medical community had been conducting studies and began to realize the negative effects of smoking. It wasn’t until the 1990’s that the bans began to stop smoking indoors. I always thought smoking had a terrible odor. The worst part was I once bought a house that had wood paneling. The former owner had parties and smoked. It took me weeks to wash all the paneling, walls, cabinets, etc to get rid of the odor. The worst part was that as I washed the walls the nicotine dripped a disgusting shade of yellow. My late husband and I also replaced all the flooring, shades, curtains, drapes and even the front door. People still do imbibe on the cigarette and, of course, in Las Vegas, they are welcome in the casinos. In the Good Gus series cigarettes were not available. I would not have included them in any story so that children wouldn’t be influenced by them. The Good Gus Series is available online at Kindle, Nook and Waterstones. Hard copies, personally autographed, are available through our website www.goodgusbooks.com along with past blogs for your reading enjoyment. Digitizing for all the books are available now! Books one and two are now available on the Tractor Supply website. “Misplaced Trust” will be available this month.