Cottage Industries

While the giants of the computer software industry like Microsoft, Lotus Development and Borland International each year crank out millions of word-processing and spreadsheet programs, Marvin Mallon, 64, quietly tinkers away in his Canoga Park house on a computer program for comic-book collectors. His wife, Reva, also 64, sits in an office that once was the family garage and answers calls on a toll-free customer-service line--which is about as close to big business as the Mallons get.

At its most basic level, a 3-D printer is like an automated hot-glue gun programmed to spit out solid objects. The machines extrude layers of plastic into virtually any three-dimensional shape. Print whimsical garden statuary. Reproduce an anatomically correct heart with moving parts for your son's science project (actually, he could do that himself). Create a signature bookend, cookie cutter, necklace - anything. The buzz within the design world is that most homes could have one of these gadgets within 10 years.

Michael Blake is definitely not role-model material for your ordinary Hollywood mogul. He thinks small, human-scale small. Talking with him is like booking a Hollywood tour from the back saddle of a Harley. Words and ideas flash past. Perspectives are ground-level. Blake wrote "Dances With Wolves," originally a hard-to-find paperback book and then the surprise hit movie starring old buddy Kevin Costner and co-produced by old buddy Jim Wilson.

USA Baby Care's website makes no attempt to hide why the company's clients travel to Southern California from China and Taiwan. It's to give birth to an American baby. "Congratulations! Arriving in the U.S. means you've already given your child a surefire ticket for winning the race," the site says in Chinese. "We guarantee that each baby can obtain a U.S. passport and related documents. " That passport is just the beginning of a journey that will lead some of the children back to the United States to take advantage of free public schools and low-interest student loans, as the website notes.

A unique industry began more than 150 years ago when sailors started weaving baskets to pass the time while stationed aboard lightships anchored off treacherous shoals beyond this Atlantic Island 30 miles off Cape Cod. Bright lights tended by sailors warned mariners to stay clear of the dangerous shoals to avoid shipwrecks. After months at sea, lightships sailed to Nantucket Island to refuel and take on supplies. And the sailors would sell their baskets for extra income.

Ten-year-old Zhang Yanhong knew that if she refused to make firecrackers at school she could be forced to pay a fine. Or kneel on the classroom floor. So the girl obeyed her teacher--and lost her life. As Americans grapple once again with the horrors of campus violence this week, Chinese parents are facing a different kind of tragedy in their schools.

Kathy Jo Kadzuiauskas' friend phoned her from Chicago, sobbing. The friend's boyfriend had killed himself with a 12-gauge shotgun, and she needed help. The police and coroner were gone, but the act left a bloody mess in the boyfriend's apartment. "Everyone assumes that the police, the sheriffs and the coroners clean it up," Kadzuiauskas said. "She was shocked to know that wasn't the case." Kadzuiauskas headed for Chicago to do the dirty work.

Cathy Mears thought the best thing she could do after she had children was give up her career and become a stay-at-home mom. But she just couldn't afford it. "My husband and I looked at all kinds of things, trying to swing it," she said. "Finally I said maybe I'll just have to go back to work." However, Mears found some middle ground. Now the co-owner of B&C Family Daycare in Vista, Calif., she works part time from home.

In spring, glove restringer Mark Cole is busier than a baserunner caught in a pickle. To his right, spread over the floor of his Claremont living room, are busted gloves bearing the signatures of Hall of Famers Johnny Bench, Yogi Berra and Mickey Mantle. To his left are dismantled mitts, minus web and finger strings, signed by former big-leaguers Wes Parker and Fred Lynn. In his lap, he's relacing an aging Rawlings glove autographed by ex-Cardinal catcher Ted Simmons.

Myrna Naegle's quaint boutique is filled with women's clothing and accessories from Italy, Egypt and Guatemala, and with antiques she has collected from her travels. Naegle's customers say her shop feels homey. They're right. Naegle's architect husband, Dale, designed the building that houses the shop and the two-story, two-bedroom apartment they live in upstairs.

In calmer times, the true blue Dodgers fan might decide whether to buy a Matt Kemp T-shirt for his wardrobe or a Clayton Kershaw jersey. In these turbulent times, the discerning Dodgers fan can decide whether to buy a shirt that supports a player or maligns the owner. As Frank McCourt has expanded his two-year legal battle to retain ownership of the team from divorce court to bankruptcy court, the opportunities for fans to share their discontent have expanded as well. And, for a few entrepreneurs among those agitated fans, those frustrations have turned into business opportunities.

Nidal Sharif joins the Libyan revolution every day ? in the fabric district. The scraggly young man with a short, patchy black beard often has to scout out more than one shop to get what he needs. These days, everyone seems to be short on red, black or green fabric. He buys at least one roll of each color every morning and takes them to a Sudanese tailor, who makes hundreds of the new (actually the old, pre-Moammar Kadafi) Libyan flag. He then takes them to a printer, who stamps the white star and crescent in the middle.

'We have your daughter." Those chilling words, the worst nightmare of any parent, came over the telephone, spoken by a man planning to demand money for her safe return. One catch: We have no daughter. So the call, for us, was easy enough to ignore. But thousands of Mexicans receive these calls every week. Sometimes they are real; a child or spouse or other relative has been kidnapped, and a ransom is demanded. Often, they're bogus. A cottage industry has exploded alongside the skyrocketing kidnapping rate in Mexico that could be called "extortion on spec": telephoned shakedowns that play on fears, in which the perpetrators scamming for pesos make random calls.

What pushed Priscilla Maddox was the relentless smell of vanilla. Maddox was toying with launching a cookie line after retiring from her 36-year hospital care job, but was overwhelmed by the vanilla smell in her apartment. When she couldn't find a kitchen to rent, she started a rent-a-kitchen that has become a small-business incubator for entrepreneurs including a fudge maker and a twosome baking gourmet dog food.

Hollywood rehab can produce unhappy endings, even when the patient isn't named Lindsay or Britney. That's what Kelly Logan learned when he sought treatment for a methamphetamine addiction at Promises Malibu, detox destination to the stars. Logan's brother, Garfield, says he paid $42,000 up front to admit the former professional surfer for a month at Promises' canyon-top Mediterranean-style home. Five days later, he says, Promises kicked Logan out for belligerent behavior but kept all the money.

Bosses are really mean these days, or employees are really thin-skinned. Lawmakers across the country are considering legislation that would give workers grounds to sue their superiors for being, basically, jerks. Bookstores are stocking bad-boss advice tomes, including "Snakes in Suits" and "Was Your Boss Raised by Wolves?" Today the AFL-CIO will name the worst boss in the country, based on the results of an online contest.

Conmar Publishing Inc. began with a dinner conversation between two sisters-in-law. Obstetrics nurse Connie Marshall had written a book on prenatal care for her husband--an obstetrician then based in Sacramento--to present to his pregnant patients. The spiral-bound compilation of 180 photocopied pages deserved a better format, she decided.

Laura Savage used to make toys for fun and spending money, running an assembly line in her basement in her spare time. But when her husband's construction business collapsed, Savage--pregnant with her sixth child--discovered her home business was key to the family's survival. "We were on the verge of losing everything," Savage said.

Three hours out of the Florida Keys, within wading distance of Cuba's north-central coast, a 28-foot speedboat slowed, its pilot cut the engine, and the sleek hull slid silently to a stop on an ink black sea. Rain squalls had passed, but a trailing band of storm clouds lingered, hiding the moon -- perfect cover for the night's illicit mission: smuggling.

It wasn't an easy way to find a nice spot for a country home, but it worked. During the Nazi assault on Moscow, three Soviet airmen were shot down 25 miles north of the city. After parachuting to safety, they hiked out through a riverside forest of birch, pine and fir and rejoined the fight. At war's end, the men were invited to a victory celebration with Josef Stalin, who asked them, "Guys, what do you want?"