Wanderon

About the Book

Our true story begins in Hungary with the Hungarian hussars, a group of mercenaries, and ends with the third generation, an American icon, Minnesota Fats, the hustler and entertainer known around the world. The lives of the three Wanderons have touched history’s most memorable events from the past one hundred years of revolutions and wars around the world to audiences with world leaders, movie stars, corporate tycoons, mobsters and gangsters, famous entertainers, dignitaries, and celebrities. History has been made clearer from the lives of the Wanderons as they travelled through decades of time spawning an incredible spirit of challenge and adventure. It is not only their adventure throughout the past 150 years and the uniqueness of the Wanderons, but also their secret of success and their ability to earn this success that mystifies the “tablets of love and memory.” It is not only the search for the keys to this successful formula, but also the keys to happiness that fuels this book. Behind the scenes of many accepted historical accounts and explanations, there often exists hidden and undiscovered information yet to be brought to the surface. The desire to know the complete truth and the curious need to know the why of historical accounts is often void of the complete story as we know history today. But Wanderon will add spice and flavor and give a new perspective to the past while revealing a unique formula to the Wanderon success.

About the Author

Fred Walther is a billiard enthusiast who has been in the automobile business since selling his first used car (a 1938 Chevy coupe) in 1959. A dean’s list graduate of Southern Illinois University, he and Margie, his wife of 43 years, were privileged to befriend and hear a multitude of fascinating stories told by pool great Minnesota Fats (Rudolf Walter Wanderon). They visited their friend often in the lobby of Nashville’s palatial old Hermitage Hotel, where Fats lived. A friendship and business relationship developed from 1985 until Fats’ death in 1996. These intriguing stories prompted him to write his first book — Minnesota Fats, Never Behind The Eight Ball published in 1998. Unsettled and pushed by an insatiable desire to further research and investigate Wanderon’s family roots and those incredible stories which contained many mysterious clues dropped by Minnesota Fats, he has spent the last 12 years (including several trips to Germany and Switzerland) searching for closure as to why Minnesota Fats became an American icon and what the keys to Fats’ success were. He and Margie have 3 children, Katie, Becky, and Erich and 5 grandchildren Nicole, Luke, Esther, Abby, and Jack, all of whom live in the Murfreesboro, Tennessee area.