On October 13 in the Year of Our Lord 1775 the United States Navy was established. That makes all of us old salts 234 years old, at least in theory. We have something in common, a closeness that extends from that time to the present. We have served in ships that have sailed and continue to sail throughout the oceans of the world.
For me the beginning of the Navy was when a young man by the name of John Paul left the British Isles under a cloud, added the name “Jones” and volunteered to serve this bold, new country in a changing world. In action aboard the Bon Homme Richard against the British ship Serapis, things were going badly, and the opposing captain asked if he was ready to strike his colors. His reply has lived throughout the ages: “I have not yet begun to fight”. And he continued to fight until the Serapis colors were lowered, and just in time, for his ship was sinking.
We honor John Paul Jones in another way. Almost every news article about military action uses the term “In harm’s way” to denote danger that is being faced by some of our armed forces. The entire quote has a different connotation. Jones asked the Continental Congress to: “Give me a fast ship, for I intend to sail into harm’s way”. The “Harm’s Way” for Jones signified boldness and daring.
Not many years after our new country’s founding, Congress authorized several, first class ships of the line. Made of native trees, live oak from Florida, pine from Main, with fittings and cannon forged in the burgeoning factories of the New England states, these frigates served us well against our foes, including the Barbary Pirates. And two survive to this day. One has never been out of commission.
The U. S. S. Constitution is moored to a pier in Boston, with a full crew and an open gangplank so that visitors can experience something of the sense of “Old Ironsides”. And I have a close connection with her. Many years ago, when I was three years old, she was sailed down our eastern seaboard into the Gulf of Mexico, making port calls as she went. When she got nearby, my father took me to visit. As I walked the deck I felt the “call of nature” and I wet down the main mast of this great sailing ship. I suppose I felt that this was the thing to do at the time. Regardless, my father later told me that he felt that this was the moment that he knew that I would be a sailor!
Our Navy followed many of the traditions of the British fleet, including a daily ration of rum for crewmembers. Mixed with water, it was called “grog”, and it was considered part of the pay of the fighting sailor. But then General Order Number 99 was signed on June 1, 1914 by Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels, abolishing the rum ration. Coffee and tea had been doled out for some years on a trial basis and the Navy settled on hot coffee as the drink, not of choice but of necessity. Because of this, coffee has become known as a “cup of Joe” in honor of the Secretary.
You may have used the term, not knowing the history, but you haven’t used it in the quantities of us sailors. In March of 1954 the Navy’s Bureau of Supplies and Accounts announced that the Navy consumed 50,688 pounds of coffee per day, more than any other military service on the face of the globe. Recently I read in a health magazine sent to me by my daughter Ashlee, the Nutritionist, that four cups of regular coffee per day will ward off Alzheimer’s. I figure that I am good for at least 50 more years, if averages count for anything.
The U. S. Navy has been known for innovation, but the most innovative move was during the War Between the States. In a time that showed the ushering in of ironclads, rifled cannon, screw propellers and revolving turrets, the Confederate Navy capped it all. The first successful submersible warship, the CSS Hunley, was constructed, and manned with Army personnel. She sortied out into Charleston Harbor and sank the USS Housatonic, but was herself sunk. The Navy continued with research and evaluation, and eventually, in the 1950s, constructed the first nuclear powered ship, the USS Nautilus. I was on a destroyer steaming down the river when she was launched. It was an amazing sight, and long I will remember it. I remember the next three days even better, because I was seasick for the entire time. Never mention the Nautilus to me without being prepared to get barfed on.
David Farragut was a Southerner by birth, but was raised by a Union family, and he signed on with the wrong side. He led the U. S. Navy at the battle of Mobile Bay. He is best remembered for yelling out to his men “Damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead”. He was in the rigging of his flagship at the time, with his foot being held by a seaman who was awarded one of the first Medals of Honor for this. Farragut got his part wrong, though. There were no torpedoes as we know them, only electrically exploded mines, but he damned them properly as any good officer would do, and proceeded to win the battle and the city.
The Confederate Navy was well filled with former Union Navy officers. One of my favorites was Admiral Rafael Semmes of the CSS Alabama. Semmes took the Alabama, fitted it out as a raider and raised havoc with the merchant ships of the North. Finally, though, he was cornered in a port in France and had to go to sea, closely pursued by enemy warships. The Alabama was sunk, but Semmes escaped to Virginia. There General Robert E. Lee put him in charge of a detachment of army artillery in the last days of the war. Admiral Semmes returned to Mobile and refused to take the pledge of allegiance to the United States. The people of Mobile, being still in a rebellious mood, elected him mayor. No one complained and he served out his term.
My favorite Navy family is the McCain clan……grandfather John Sidney McCain, father John Sidney McCain, Jr. and son John Sidney McCain, III. There have been only two father-son full admiral groups, and the McCains are one of them. The first McCain commanded one of Admiral Bill Halsey’s task forces in the Pacific war, and was something of a hell-on-wheels character. His nickname was “Slew”, and no one living knows why that name. My Navy nickname is “Holmes”, as in “What gave you the first clue, Sherlock?”. I prefer that to “Slew”.
The admiral is given great credit for his leadership in bringing the Japanese Navy to bay. If you look at the famous photograph of General Douglas McArthur signing the treaty on the deck of the USS Missouri, and scan the officers watching, Slew is the third from the left. He looks like Popeye, which would have been a better nickname, in my opinion.
The father was John Sidney McCain, Jr., and was my commanding officer in 1953, and I became famous (somewhat) for locating his favorite smokes, Dutch Masters cigars, for him. He had been a submarine skipper during World War II, and later was in command of all armed forces in the Pacific during the Vietnam War, at the time that his son was a prisoner of war in the infamous “Hanoi Hilton”. His nickname among his lesser lights was “Good G—D---“ McCain, because of his profanity, but we never called him that to his face. I would have followed him over the edge of the earth if it were flat, or any where else, for that matter.
John Sidney McCain, III, is known to you all. He is a senator, ran for president, and was a prisoner of war in Vietnam for something over five years. When I first met him I promised to support him if he ever ran for president, and I did. Jackson County gave him 63 percent of its votes. He wrote a book: “Faith of my Fathers”. You should read it, especially the part about his missing washcloth.
So Navy Day has passed by, but you can still celebrate. If you are a man and you see a sailor, shake his hand. If you are a woman, remember: a sailor always appreciates a hug.
Especially “Holmes”!
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Thursday, October 8, 2009
“This is Where I Stood”
“I was 16 years old, the youngest Confederate killed in the fighting. My father was Marianna businessman William Nickels, who was a Unionist. I was burned to death in the St. Luke Episcopal Church”.
“I was a senior deacon and Sunday School leader from Greenwood Baptist Church who rode out with Robinson’s school boys as they came to fight. At the age of 76, I was the oldest man killed in the Battle of Marianna. I was burned beyond recognition in St. Luke’s Episcopal Church”.
In Confederate Park I listened intently while the re-enactors told the heart wrenching stories of ten of the men that fell in battle over a hundred and forty years ago.
The words were familiar to me, but it was as though I was hearing them for the first time. I sensed that many of the listeners were also caught up in the moment.
As battles go, the Battle of Marianna was not much.
It did not have the intensity and the bloodshed of Antietam, the worst single day of that four year struggle, when thousands of Americans died.
It was not a turning point, like Gettysburg, where General Robert Lee, Commander of the seemingly invincible Army of Northern Virginia, was turned back from his invasion of the North.
It was not like Manassas. The inhabitants of Washington had loaded their buggies with picnic food, and had driven out to watch the mighty Union Army vanquish the upstarts. But a strange Confederate general stood his ground and for evermore was known as “Stonewall” Jackson, and the party goers fled back to the safety of the city in panic, and carried with them the sudden understanding that this war was real and terrible.
Marianna was a battle that was a microcosm of this wider conflict, a conflict that was played out over and over throughout our country. There was drama and unspeakable cruelty and great heroism. Men fought for a cause and for their homes, and for each other.
Former Governor Leroy Collins in his book “Forerunners Courageous” told about visiting the site of the Battle of Natural Bridge near Tallahassee as a young boy. There was a feeble old man who would search the ground until he found a particular spot. He would plant his walking stick there and shuffle around it and sing in a monotone “This is where I stood”. Collins said that the boys, himself included, would make fun of the man, but Collins’ father explained that he was one of the last survivors of the battle, and he always looked for the spot where he stood firm against the enemy on that fateful day.
On Marianna Day we watched as men told “where I stood” in a simple way.
I have been privileged to visit many of the War’s battlefields. Theresa and I would try to sense what the commanders were striving to accomplish, and to grasp the soldiers feelings where they stood. One of my ancestors, Samuel Calhoun White, was a member of the 31st Georgia Infantry, and we traced his footsteps through most of the battles in the East and, finally, to his part in the last battle of the great Army of Northern Virginia. We always tried to stand where we imagined Samuel stood at each of the battlefield sites we visited.
Uncle Samuel stood with Jackson’s troops on the unfinished railroad at the battle of Second Manassas. The Southern men ran out of ammunition, so they threw rocks at the Yankees down the hill. The Yankees threw rocks back!
He stood with General John B. Gordon’s brigade below Cemetery Ridge on the second night at Gettysburg. Gordon begged for permission to continue fighting, bnt was refused. The next day Pickett’s Charge sealed the fate of General Lee’s army at that battle.
He stood many more times with the Army, and was wounded three times in combat.
I wanted to record this in a book, as though he were writing home, but I did the last chapter first, and I have never done any others. Perhaps these paragraphs that I did pen will give the reader a sense of the foot soldiers who did not see the battle from the generals’ views, but experienced it on the ground and within a few yards of where they stood.
Here is how I imagined Corporal Samuel Calhoun White, Confederate States Army, wrote of the last day of his war:
The next day we lind up by company four abrest and startd out down the little rode where we had gone to that last fite. Only this tim Genl Gordon led us slow on his horse and he looked real sad like Lee had lookd. And we was draggin along too. We got down the rode a piece and the Yankees was drawd up on one side facin us and some fellow namd Chamberlain sat on his horse lookin at us. We was sad and movd slow and sort of draggd. And then Chamberlain calld out to his men and they come to attention and he told them to “carry arms” which is how fightin men salut. And blame if ever one of them bluecoats didnt do it and then Genl Gordon reard his horse up and did an eyes rite and returnd the salut with his saber and then we all drawd up strait and tall and marchd like we was on parade and returnd the salut.
But then we got down the rode a ways and we stoppd and turnd and stackd our rifels and put our flags acrost them and we all cried, most of us. And then we stood up and walkd down the rode a piece and then just sorta broke ranks and left. And that was the end of the Army of Northern Virginia.
And I thout back to when I left home and went to Savana on the cars and jined Lee’s army. And I rememberd friends I lost and battles we won and lost and what a good army we was and I think it was the best ever. And there was never anythin like us charging like a bunch of horses and yellin til it skeerd the other side and even the animals run from us. And I recollect Jackson and how he died and others and how there was always some good ones to take each place at least for a while.
And I thout about how there shoud have been a better way for us to go than stragglin off, but there wasnt and then I thout to myself dammd if I will ever love another country.
And then Samuel White left, to walk back to Georgia.
“I was a senior deacon and Sunday School leader from Greenwood Baptist Church who rode out with Robinson’s school boys as they came to fight. At the age of 76, I was the oldest man killed in the Battle of Marianna. I was burned beyond recognition in St. Luke’s Episcopal Church”.
In Confederate Park I listened intently while the re-enactors told the heart wrenching stories of ten of the men that fell in battle over a hundred and forty years ago.
The words were familiar to me, but it was as though I was hearing them for the first time. I sensed that many of the listeners were also caught up in the moment.
As battles go, the Battle of Marianna was not much.
It did not have the intensity and the bloodshed of Antietam, the worst single day of that four year struggle, when thousands of Americans died.
It was not a turning point, like Gettysburg, where General Robert Lee, Commander of the seemingly invincible Army of Northern Virginia, was turned back from his invasion of the North.
It was not like Manassas. The inhabitants of Washington had loaded their buggies with picnic food, and had driven out to watch the mighty Union Army vanquish the upstarts. But a strange Confederate general stood his ground and for evermore was known as “Stonewall” Jackson, and the party goers fled back to the safety of the city in panic, and carried with them the sudden understanding that this war was real and terrible.
Marianna was a battle that was a microcosm of this wider conflict, a conflict that was played out over and over throughout our country. There was drama and unspeakable cruelty and great heroism. Men fought for a cause and for their homes, and for each other.
Former Governor Leroy Collins in his book “Forerunners Courageous” told about visiting the site of the Battle of Natural Bridge near Tallahassee as a young boy. There was a feeble old man who would search the ground until he found a particular spot. He would plant his walking stick there and shuffle around it and sing in a monotone “This is where I stood”. Collins said that the boys, himself included, would make fun of the man, but Collins’ father explained that he was one of the last survivors of the battle, and he always looked for the spot where he stood firm against the enemy on that fateful day.
On Marianna Day we watched as men told “where I stood” in a simple way.
I have been privileged to visit many of the War’s battlefields. Theresa and I would try to sense what the commanders were striving to accomplish, and to grasp the soldiers feelings where they stood. One of my ancestors, Samuel Calhoun White, was a member of the 31st Georgia Infantry, and we traced his footsteps through most of the battles in the East and, finally, to his part in the last battle of the great Army of Northern Virginia. We always tried to stand where we imagined Samuel stood at each of the battlefield sites we visited.
Uncle Samuel stood with Jackson’s troops on the unfinished railroad at the battle of Second Manassas. The Southern men ran out of ammunition, so they threw rocks at the Yankees down the hill. The Yankees threw rocks back!
He stood with General John B. Gordon’s brigade below Cemetery Ridge on the second night at Gettysburg. Gordon begged for permission to continue fighting, bnt was refused. The next day Pickett’s Charge sealed the fate of General Lee’s army at that battle.
He stood many more times with the Army, and was wounded three times in combat.
I wanted to record this in a book, as though he were writing home, but I did the last chapter first, and I have never done any others. Perhaps these paragraphs that I did pen will give the reader a sense of the foot soldiers who did not see the battle from the generals’ views, but experienced it on the ground and within a few yards of where they stood.
Here is how I imagined Corporal Samuel Calhoun White, Confederate States Army, wrote of the last day of his war:
The next day we lind up by company four abrest and startd out down the little rode where we had gone to that last fite. Only this tim Genl Gordon led us slow on his horse and he looked real sad like Lee had lookd. And we was draggin along too. We got down the rode a piece and the Yankees was drawd up on one side facin us and some fellow namd Chamberlain sat on his horse lookin at us. We was sad and movd slow and sort of draggd. And then Chamberlain calld out to his men and they come to attention and he told them to “carry arms” which is how fightin men salut. And blame if ever one of them bluecoats didnt do it and then Genl Gordon reard his horse up and did an eyes rite and returnd the salut with his saber and then we all drawd up strait and tall and marchd like we was on parade and returnd the salut.
But then we got down the rode a ways and we stoppd and turnd and stackd our rifels and put our flags acrost them and we all cried, most of us. And then we stood up and walkd down the rode a piece and then just sorta broke ranks and left. And that was the end of the Army of Northern Virginia.
And I thout back to when I left home and went to Savana on the cars and jined Lee’s army. And I rememberd friends I lost and battles we won and lost and what a good army we was and I think it was the best ever. And there was never anythin like us charging like a bunch of horses and yellin til it skeerd the other side and even the animals run from us. And I recollect Jackson and how he died and others and how there was always some good ones to take each place at least for a while.
And I thout about how there shoud have been a better way for us to go than stragglin off, but there wasnt and then I thout to myself dammd if I will ever love another country.
And then Samuel White left, to walk back to Georgia.
Sunday, October 4, 2009
America’s Elite Ruling Class
As I sat recently in the forum held by Congressman Allen Boyd (D-FL), listening to our challenges and his answers, I sensed that the problems we face are well beyond those argued.
Then it came to me: We in America have an elite ruling class.
In the beginning days of our country George Washington set the tone for presidents and for all elected federal officers. His admirers felt that he, the military savior of this brave new country and its first executive officer, should have a title that was befitting a hero. Some wished for him to be addressed as “Your Excellency”, while others proposed similar titles. He put them all down quickly, and let it be known that he would be addressed simply as “Mr. President”.
George Washington understood that this country, with its diverse interests, should not have an elite ruling class. Merchants in the North, planters in the South and a great frontier to the West that was soon to be settled by immigrants, should only be governed by representatives that were answerable to the common man.
But that is what we have today. It is the Congress of the United States.
Those of us that read and understand the Constitution know that the the federal government is made up of three branches, with the intent that one would balance against the other two. But now the Congress has an excess of power, the power of the appropriated dollar, a power that was never imagined when our Constitution was signed.
The blame for overspending our tax dollars is placed on the President, but it should be on the Congress. If the House does not originate a spending bill and the Senate does not agree, then no act goes to the President for signing, and there are no dollars for him to spend.
These “representatives of the people” now have the privileges that our founders feared. They can pass laws that pertain to everyone except themselves and are safe from removal from office except in rare cases.
The members, with a consenting majority, will pass a health care plan that will exclude themselves, yet they can check into any federal hospital, even if that facility by right and by name is reserved for military personnel, and receive free treatment.
The members are vested in the nation’s best retirement plan after serving a few short years. Social Security taxes are not withheld from their pay, so they have no concern for the success or failure of that system.
After only one term an astute congressman can be assured of a job that will last as long as he wishes. He does this by demanding and receiving free publicity from the media, simply by sending out “news” releases.
He votes on legislation that he often does not read or understand. He passes bills that levy more taxes on already overburdened businesses and individuals. He relies on powerful lobbyists for “facts” and for advice.
He inserts earmarks into seemingly innocuous bills, bypassing the tried and true committee system, and then claims that he “did not know”. Bridges to nowhere, weapons systems that the Armed Forces do not want or need, money thrown at problems that were caused by federal money being misspent, all are there by the hundreds.
Wouldn’t it be great if our next congressman, and the one after that, would pledge himself never to vote on a bill that he has not read, and to never insert any earmark?
Wouldn’t it be great if our next congressman, and the one after that, would not be allowed to refer to “Federal funds” but would be required to say “Taxpayers’ money”? The government does not earn money, it spends it. We earn the money.
Wouldn’t it be great if our next congressman, and the one after that, was term limited? It is only conceit of the highest order that makes an elected official feel that he is the only one suited to hold a particular office.
Wouldn’t it be great if our next congressman, and the one after that, would seriously work for the passage of the Fair Tax? Could you imagine not having to fill out another 1040 form ever and that each of us could enjoy April 15 simply because it is a lovely spring day?
And wouldn’t it be great if each citizen’s message to his congressman would be answered with something besides a form letter?
Yes, it would be great!
Then it came to me: We in America have an elite ruling class.
In the beginning days of our country George Washington set the tone for presidents and for all elected federal officers. His admirers felt that he, the military savior of this brave new country and its first executive officer, should have a title that was befitting a hero. Some wished for him to be addressed as “Your Excellency”, while others proposed similar titles. He put them all down quickly, and let it be known that he would be addressed simply as “Mr. President”.
George Washington understood that this country, with its diverse interests, should not have an elite ruling class. Merchants in the North, planters in the South and a great frontier to the West that was soon to be settled by immigrants, should only be governed by representatives that were answerable to the common man.
But that is what we have today. It is the Congress of the United States.
Those of us that read and understand the Constitution know that the the federal government is made up of three branches, with the intent that one would balance against the other two. But now the Congress has an excess of power, the power of the appropriated dollar, a power that was never imagined when our Constitution was signed.
The blame for overspending our tax dollars is placed on the President, but it should be on the Congress. If the House does not originate a spending bill and the Senate does not agree, then no act goes to the President for signing, and there are no dollars for him to spend.
These “representatives of the people” now have the privileges that our founders feared. They can pass laws that pertain to everyone except themselves and are safe from removal from office except in rare cases.
The members, with a consenting majority, will pass a health care plan that will exclude themselves, yet they can check into any federal hospital, even if that facility by right and by name is reserved for military personnel, and receive free treatment.
The members are vested in the nation’s best retirement plan after serving a few short years. Social Security taxes are not withheld from their pay, so they have no concern for the success or failure of that system.
After only one term an astute congressman can be assured of a job that will last as long as he wishes. He does this by demanding and receiving free publicity from the media, simply by sending out “news” releases.
He votes on legislation that he often does not read or understand. He passes bills that levy more taxes on already overburdened businesses and individuals. He relies on powerful lobbyists for “facts” and for advice.
He inserts earmarks into seemingly innocuous bills, bypassing the tried and true committee system, and then claims that he “did not know”. Bridges to nowhere, weapons systems that the Armed Forces do not want or need, money thrown at problems that were caused by federal money being misspent, all are there by the hundreds.
Wouldn’t it be great if our next congressman, and the one after that, would pledge himself never to vote on a bill that he has not read, and to never insert any earmark?
Wouldn’t it be great if our next congressman, and the one after that, would not be allowed to refer to “Federal funds” but would be required to say “Taxpayers’ money”? The government does not earn money, it spends it. We earn the money.
Wouldn’t it be great if our next congressman, and the one after that, was term limited? It is only conceit of the highest order that makes an elected official feel that he is the only one suited to hold a particular office.
Wouldn’t it be great if our next congressman, and the one after that, would seriously work for the passage of the Fair Tax? Could you imagine not having to fill out another 1040 form ever and that each of us could enjoy April 15 simply because it is a lovely spring day?
And wouldn’t it be great if each citizen’s message to his congressman would be answered with something besides a form letter?
Yes, it would be great!
Honors aplenty!
I have just been honored!
I am not very good with computers, but I am learning. I occasionally go on line to see what is happening in this fascinating world of communication.
Last week I had a “pop-up”! I thought that “pop-ups” were something like zits on teenagers, bumps that call for immediate panic and canceling of Saturday night dates. But I was wrong. This “pop-up” indicated that I was about to be honored.
I had five people on something that’s called FaceBook asking me to join them. Imagine that, five folks, only one of whom is kin to me! And something called “FaceBook”! This implies looking into someone’s eyes and accepting their accolades. I found out that I would need to post a personal picture. That in itself presents a problem. Should I send the one of me in my dress white Navy uniform, made when I was twenty three?
How about the one that a professional photographer took for our Methodist Church Directory? That was quite an experience. When I sat down to make the selection, the sales person told me that he could “erase my facial scars”. I am very proud of my facial scars. This would be like asking an old time Prussian Army officer to have plastic surgery to get rid of his saber marks. It just isn’t done. So the Directory will show the Sneads Methodist Lay Leader in all his glory, scars, untrimmed beard and all.
I may settle on the picture that is at the head of my column in the Jackson County Times. A lady told me that it made her think of a famous movie star. I assumed she meant Sean Connery, for that was my aim when I first grew my beard. She said, no, that I really resembled Gabby Hayes. That immediately placed her in the time frame of over sixty years of age, since a younger person would not know Mr. Hayes. Another said that I looked as she would imagine a mischievous Santa Claus would appear between Christmas seasons. That’s acceptable, and so is the photograph.
I have received other honors. Those of you that have followed my columns recall that I told of how Admiral John S. McCain, Jr. (the Senator’s father) honored me by remembering me eight years after I performed a valued service for him. I had procured a case of Dutch Masters cigars when he assumed command of the ship that I served in, so he most certainly kept that important action tucked away in a corner of his mind.
Once I took over the reins of the Tri Rivers Waterway Development Association as the interim executive director. I held that position for three months and, to my credit, moved it forward toward its goals. At the end of that time I was given an aluminum Louisville Slugger baseball bat engraved with the name of the organization, my dates of service and “Home Run Homer” prominently displayed. I have kept this bat concealed, though, since I have two grandsons that play baseball and a daughter who coaches and I do not want to have to tell them that this does not indicate that I have had outstanding playing time in America’s favorite sport.
And if you go on line (JacksonCountyTimes.Com) because you are too cheap to pay fifty cents for up-to-date news, you can look at my column, adorned with my mischievous Santa picture and directly underneath an invitation to become a Homer Hirt “Follower”. I did not know what this really meant until recently. I recalled the famous Lee Iacocca’s admonition when he took over Chrysler to “Lead, follow or get out of the way”. I immediately assumed that most of my readers were getting out of the way. To learn more I went in to see the Times’ REAL EDITOR Stephanie. She sat me down and showed me the workings, which seems to have something to do with a “Blog”, another term that I don’t understand. She could tell that I was unhappy to have no followers, so she logged herself in.
I also decided that my three children should be followers. They have never followed my advice before, but it won’t hurt them to log in, and, as near as I can tell, it doesn’t cost to participate. No, that’s not quite right. It could cost them something not to participate. October is the month when I review my “Last Will and Testament”. I have not made a revision for some years, but this could be the time for change. I may well give each of them notice by registered mail that the opportunity is fleeting and fleeing, and I expect a lot of “Followers” to pop-up, with their own names leading the list (remember, “lead, follow or get out of the way”). My estate could be spent by me in riotous living. I will give them till Halloween.
I have only one other comment, and it has to do with “following”. In the very early days of our entry into World War II, our naval forces in the Pacific were scattered, as were the other Allied warships. A force was gathered up, comprised of American, Australian, Dutch and British ships. The fleet was a conglomeration of old cruisers and destroyers that had little in common except a hatred for their new enemy. The senior officer was Dutch Admiral Karel Von Doormann. Communication between ships was almost non existent, but the good admiral gathered them up and ran up the signal flag for “Follow Me”.
I wish I could tell you that Von Doormann was successful in his venture, but I cannot. Almost all of his ships were sunk in his first and only sea battle, with a frightful loss of life. But I can assure you that if you become a Homer Hirt “Follower” your ship will not sink, and you may well live to become an octogenarian, as I soon will be!
I am not very good with computers, but I am learning. I occasionally go on line to see what is happening in this fascinating world of communication.
Last week I had a “pop-up”! I thought that “pop-ups” were something like zits on teenagers, bumps that call for immediate panic and canceling of Saturday night dates. But I was wrong. This “pop-up” indicated that I was about to be honored.
I had five people on something that’s called FaceBook asking me to join them. Imagine that, five folks, only one of whom is kin to me! And something called “FaceBook”! This implies looking into someone’s eyes and accepting their accolades. I found out that I would need to post a personal picture. That in itself presents a problem. Should I send the one of me in my dress white Navy uniform, made when I was twenty three?
How about the one that a professional photographer took for our Methodist Church Directory? That was quite an experience. When I sat down to make the selection, the sales person told me that he could “erase my facial scars”. I am very proud of my facial scars. This would be like asking an old time Prussian Army officer to have plastic surgery to get rid of his saber marks. It just isn’t done. So the Directory will show the Sneads Methodist Lay Leader in all his glory, scars, untrimmed beard and all.
I may settle on the picture that is at the head of my column in the Jackson County Times. A lady told me that it made her think of a famous movie star. I assumed she meant Sean Connery, for that was my aim when I first grew my beard. She said, no, that I really resembled Gabby Hayes. That immediately placed her in the time frame of over sixty years of age, since a younger person would not know Mr. Hayes. Another said that I looked as she would imagine a mischievous Santa Claus would appear between Christmas seasons. That’s acceptable, and so is the photograph.
I have received other honors. Those of you that have followed my columns recall that I told of how Admiral John S. McCain, Jr. (the Senator’s father) honored me by remembering me eight years after I performed a valued service for him. I had procured a case of Dutch Masters cigars when he assumed command of the ship that I served in, so he most certainly kept that important action tucked away in a corner of his mind.
Once I took over the reins of the Tri Rivers Waterway Development Association as the interim executive director. I held that position for three months and, to my credit, moved it forward toward its goals. At the end of that time I was given an aluminum Louisville Slugger baseball bat engraved with the name of the organization, my dates of service and “Home Run Homer” prominently displayed. I have kept this bat concealed, though, since I have two grandsons that play baseball and a daughter who coaches and I do not want to have to tell them that this does not indicate that I have had outstanding playing time in America’s favorite sport.
And if you go on line (JacksonCountyTimes.Com) because you are too cheap to pay fifty cents for up-to-date news, you can look at my column, adorned with my mischievous Santa picture and directly underneath an invitation to become a Homer Hirt “Follower”. I did not know what this really meant until recently. I recalled the famous Lee Iacocca’s admonition when he took over Chrysler to “Lead, follow or get out of the way”. I immediately assumed that most of my readers were getting out of the way. To learn more I went in to see the Times’ REAL EDITOR Stephanie. She sat me down and showed me the workings, which seems to have something to do with a “Blog”, another term that I don’t understand. She could tell that I was unhappy to have no followers, so she logged herself in.
I also decided that my three children should be followers. They have never followed my advice before, but it won’t hurt them to log in, and, as near as I can tell, it doesn’t cost to participate. No, that’s not quite right. It could cost them something not to participate. October is the month when I review my “Last Will and Testament”. I have not made a revision for some years, but this could be the time for change. I may well give each of them notice by registered mail that the opportunity is fleeting and fleeing, and I expect a lot of “Followers” to pop-up, with their own names leading the list (remember, “lead, follow or get out of the way”). My estate could be spent by me in riotous living. I will give them till Halloween.
I have only one other comment, and it has to do with “following”. In the very early days of our entry into World War II, our naval forces in the Pacific were scattered, as were the other Allied warships. A force was gathered up, comprised of American, Australian, Dutch and British ships. The fleet was a conglomeration of old cruisers and destroyers that had little in common except a hatred for their new enemy. The senior officer was Dutch Admiral Karel Von Doormann. Communication between ships was almost non existent, but the good admiral gathered them up and ran up the signal flag for “Follow Me”.
I wish I could tell you that Von Doormann was successful in his venture, but I cannot. Almost all of his ships were sunk in his first and only sea battle, with a frightful loss of life. But I can assure you that if you become a Homer Hirt “Follower” your ship will not sink, and you may well live to become an octogenarian, as I soon will be!
Cousin Homer and the Cajuns…
One of the benefits of being in the inland barge business is the opportunity to get to know the Cajun people.
My first encounter came at the Jackson County Port in 1975. We had loaded our first two barge loads: three thousand tons of crushed cars, 1500 tons per barge, stacked high and lashed down and moored securely to the pier on the Apalachicola River. We waited for the towboat that would take them out and across the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway to Pinto Island near Mobile. There the cars would be shredded and eventually would wind up as steel.
Around the bend downriver we saw a small push boat, struggling against the current. As we watched she came alongside and we could make out her name. The "Delta Dawn", out of southern Louisiana, had arrived. We assisted in tying her up and Captain Callais came up our ladder. He was Cajun and his language was a mixture of English, Southern and French, with a lot of cuss words thrown in, since he had damaged a rudder on a sandbar downstream. We understood the cuss words best of all.
This began for me an association of over thirty years with the Cajuns, particularly those in the port and barge business along the Gulf coast. "Cajun" is a short version of "Acadian", the French speaking people that were run out of Nova Scotia by the British and ended up in and around what is now Lafayette. Periodically the descendants meet with each other, one year going to Nova Scotia and the next year to Lafayette.
The Cajuns are one of the few cultures in our country that enjoy a good laugh on themselves. When you get to know them well, and are accepted by them, you will hear story after story as they make fun of their own mannerisms, families and customs. When you are called "Cousin" you are being recognized as worthy of sitting at their table, sharing their food and drink and hearing their tall tales, tinged with just enough truth to give credence to them.
Soon you will feel a kinship with Boudreaux and Arseneaux and "Boud’s lovely wife Ma-rie" and you might even feel comfortable enough to eat crawfish by pinching tails and sucking heads, and washing them down with a local beer and then standing up and hollering. You don’t holler because you are hurting, but because it is time. The best is "Hooooo", but any holler will do.
Do you know the reason why many of their last names end with an "x"? When the young men were registering for the draft in the Great War (we call it World War I), many could not sign their names, so young Boudreau made his "X" after his name, and the Army added it to the spelling and he came home as "Boudreaux". They didn’t mind that one bit, and it has stayed with them.
They are proud of their names. I was sitting at a table in a bar in Lafayette with some of my good friends, and one of them I had always heard referred to as "Inner", so I called him that. But soon I found out that he had no first name, but had two initials: "N" and "R", which were combined to be pronounced as "NR" or "Inner". He introduced me to his son Bubba that night. I queried him about this name, which was certainly out of the ordinary down there, and he replied: "Cousin Homer, I din’ wan’ him to have wan of dem crazy Cajun names".
One night a group of us were having dinner in one of New Orleans’ better restaurants, and Cousin Ted selected the wine, and it was a good selection. Then he told the waiter: "put de bottle in a paper bag and put it on de flo’ by me", and the waiter did.
The best of the Cajun stories are visual, and impossible to put into print, but here are some of my favorites.
Arseneaux buys a gas station down in Cut Off, next to the Tippytoe Inn, but his sales were not so good. Boudreaux recommended that he "get a gimmick", giving something away with a fill up. The next day Boud stops and a sign says "Free Sex With Fill Up" and he gets the fill up and announces "I’m ready!". Arseneaux say he got to guess a number between wan and ten ,an’ he guess seven an his frien’ say "you miss it by wan" So de nex’ day de same thing, only Arseneaux say to guess between ten an’ twenty, and ol’ Boud guess fifteen, and he say ‘you miss it by wan’. An he gets mad an’ say: "I bet nobody ever win" an’ Arseneaux he say: "Sho’ dey do. Yo’ wife won……twice!"
The two friends found a job in New Orleans, and would drive up and back every day. An outsider named Brown moved into Cut Off and worked with them and they shared rides. "Wan day dey stop and have three or two beer an’ den three or two mo’ and den Boud ran off de rode and wrek his pickum up truck and Brown gets hisself killed. Arseneaux he say: ‘somebody got to tole Mrs. Brown, but I can’t cause I got no tack’ and den Boud he say ‘I got enough tack I ought to be a diploma’ so he go to Brown’s house an he knock, and de lady come out an he say, ‘are you de Widow Brown?’ An’ she say ‘I’m Mrs. Brown, I’m not the Widow Brown’ and ol’ Boud he say ‘lak hell you ain’t!’".
But I have some bad news. Beaudreaux and Arseneaux got a job up at the Dixie Beer plant, "an wan day Arseneaux come back to Cut Off and go see Boud’s lovely wife Ma-rie, and tole her dat her husban’ done drownd in a vat of beer. After she cry som, she say, ‘well, I hope he din’ suffer much’ and Arseneaux he say ‘I don’ think he did. He got out twice to go to de men’s room’."
(Note: This is dedicated to Bert Benoit, who is from Lafayette, but never gets his name pronounced the same way twice in a row here in Florida)
My first encounter came at the Jackson County Port in 1975. We had loaded our first two barge loads: three thousand tons of crushed cars, 1500 tons per barge, stacked high and lashed down and moored securely to the pier on the Apalachicola River. We waited for the towboat that would take them out and across the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway to Pinto Island near Mobile. There the cars would be shredded and eventually would wind up as steel.
Around the bend downriver we saw a small push boat, struggling against the current. As we watched she came alongside and we could make out her name. The "Delta Dawn", out of southern Louisiana, had arrived. We assisted in tying her up and Captain Callais came up our ladder. He was Cajun and his language was a mixture of English, Southern and French, with a lot of cuss words thrown in, since he had damaged a rudder on a sandbar downstream. We understood the cuss words best of all.
This began for me an association of over thirty years with the Cajuns, particularly those in the port and barge business along the Gulf coast. "Cajun" is a short version of "Acadian", the French speaking people that were run out of Nova Scotia by the British and ended up in and around what is now Lafayette. Periodically the descendants meet with each other, one year going to Nova Scotia and the next year to Lafayette.
The Cajuns are one of the few cultures in our country that enjoy a good laugh on themselves. When you get to know them well, and are accepted by them, you will hear story after story as they make fun of their own mannerisms, families and customs. When you are called "Cousin" you are being recognized as worthy of sitting at their table, sharing their food and drink and hearing their tall tales, tinged with just enough truth to give credence to them.
Soon you will feel a kinship with Boudreaux and Arseneaux and "Boud’s lovely wife Ma-rie" and you might even feel comfortable enough to eat crawfish by pinching tails and sucking heads, and washing them down with a local beer and then standing up and hollering. You don’t holler because you are hurting, but because it is time. The best is "Hooooo", but any holler will do.
Do you know the reason why many of their last names end with an "x"? When the young men were registering for the draft in the Great War (we call it World War I), many could not sign their names, so young Boudreau made his "X" after his name, and the Army added it to the spelling and he came home as "Boudreaux". They didn’t mind that one bit, and it has stayed with them.
They are proud of their names. I was sitting at a table in a bar in Lafayette with some of my good friends, and one of them I had always heard referred to as "Inner", so I called him that. But soon I found out that he had no first name, but had two initials: "N" and "R", which were combined to be pronounced as "NR" or "Inner". He introduced me to his son Bubba that night. I queried him about this name, which was certainly out of the ordinary down there, and he replied: "Cousin Homer, I din’ wan’ him to have wan of dem crazy Cajun names".
One night a group of us were having dinner in one of New Orleans’ better restaurants, and Cousin Ted selected the wine, and it was a good selection. Then he told the waiter: "put de bottle in a paper bag and put it on de flo’ by me", and the waiter did.
The best of the Cajun stories are visual, and impossible to put into print, but here are some of my favorites.
Arseneaux buys a gas station down in Cut Off, next to the Tippytoe Inn, but his sales were not so good. Boudreaux recommended that he "get a gimmick", giving something away with a fill up. The next day Boud stops and a sign says "Free Sex With Fill Up" and he gets the fill up and announces "I’m ready!". Arseneaux say he got to guess a number between wan and ten ,an’ he guess seven an his frien’ say "you miss it by wan" So de nex’ day de same thing, only Arseneaux say to guess between ten an’ twenty, and ol’ Boud guess fifteen, and he say ‘you miss it by wan’. An he gets mad an’ say: "I bet nobody ever win" an’ Arseneaux he say: "Sho’ dey do. Yo’ wife won……twice!"
The two friends found a job in New Orleans, and would drive up and back every day. An outsider named Brown moved into Cut Off and worked with them and they shared rides. "Wan day dey stop and have three or two beer an’ den three or two mo’ and den Boud ran off de rode and wrek his pickum up truck and Brown gets hisself killed. Arseneaux he say: ‘somebody got to tole Mrs. Brown, but I can’t cause I got no tack’ and den Boud he say ‘I got enough tack I ought to be a diploma’ so he go to Brown’s house an he knock, and de lady come out an he say, ‘are you de Widow Brown?’ An’ she say ‘I’m Mrs. Brown, I’m not the Widow Brown’ and ol’ Boud he say ‘lak hell you ain’t!’".
But I have some bad news. Beaudreaux and Arseneaux got a job up at the Dixie Beer plant, "an wan day Arseneaux come back to Cut Off and go see Boud’s lovely wife Ma-rie, and tole her dat her husban’ done drownd in a vat of beer. After she cry som, she say, ‘well, I hope he din’ suffer much’ and Arseneaux he say ‘I don’ think he did. He got out twice to go to de men’s room’."
(Note: This is dedicated to Bert Benoit, who is from Lafayette, but never gets his name pronounced the same way twice in a row here in Florida)
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
Posts
