My Book Can Wait! I Want to be a Sportswriter

For some months I have had an urge to write a book. I did the last chapter first, then suffered writer’s block. Now I feel the need to move away from my usual subjects for my columns and I have been casting about for a new direction. I have decided to put my book in limbo for a time, to change the tack of my columns and to write about sports.

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Famous Athletes I Have Almost Known

Famous Athletes I Have Almost Known

While I was in the Jackson County Times office recently I caught Clint The Sports Editor working. I suppose he was working, since he was sitting behind a computer screen. He may have been playing Solitaire. I took this opportunity to tell him that I intended to write a few sports related pieces. He nodded and retorted that he might well come out with some sea stories.

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Pearl Harbor …. And I Was There

I was there on 7 December 1941 when the Jap planes took off from their carriers and flew over our Hawaiian Islands. I was there when they came in low to drop torpedoes that were not supposed to work in Pearl Harbor, but they worked well. I was there when our planes were strafed at the air bases and were unable to take off to defend us. I was there when, at 0800, the color guards at each ship began raising Old Glory and as the bands began playing the Star Spangled Banner.

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The Calendars are Coming! The Calendars are Coming!

The November issue of The National Geographic Magazine features “The Great Migrations”. It traces the meanderings of animals; some flying, some swimming, some running, as their body clocks send them in search of whatever whales and butterflies and birds look for during these events.

We are, ourselves, on the verge of experiencing a migration of a sort.

I am referring to the annual arrival of calendars. Every trip to the mailbox loads you up. Each time you enter the furniture store or your favorite bank, calendars are thrust upon you.

If you have ever contributed to a charity, you will be blessed with a once-a-year “gift”. If you don’t respond promptly, you will be informed that you have forgotten to send your check, and you really should tighten up and get it on the way. This is so they can send you their next solicitation, which will be a ten year supply of address stickers with your name spelled incorrectly.

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Up Nawth or Down East?

Recently I wrote of my “Bucket List” and how I had fulfilled one of my longtime desires. I had never been to Maine, and the older I became, the more I thought about it. It is true that I had been within a few miles of its rugged coastline, but I had never crossed over the southern boundary on land.

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Horses! They are Everywhere!

The day began like a lot of other Fridays.

The event was the First Friday Power Breakfast, and we were to observe Farm-City Day. But once again Art Kimbrough, President of the Chamber, had miscounted, and we were meeting on the second Friday. Some months ago I suggested rather strongly that Art hire someone just to keep track of first Fridays, but no, because I am an octogenarian, he did not follow my advice.

The event went well for the county and even better for horses.

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It’s Semper Fi Time Again!

Each year at this time Marines celebrate the founding of their beloved Corps at Tun’s Tavern in Philadelphia in the year 1775.
Marines were established to provide riflemen who would climb the rigging of sailing ships and fire down upon the enemy decks, and board when the ships were close-hauled, and bring death to luckless sailors who opposed them.

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Homer and His Ship

Once the salt of the sea is in your blood you are forever changed. Homer Hirt is obviously among those who are descriptively “hooked”. He has a large study in his home which is amorously adorned with naval memorabilia. This beautiful painting was created when Homer commissioned a fellow Navy man and renowned maritime artist, Richard C. Moore, to paint the now gone but not forgotten, USS Tweety. Homer now has possession of this watercolor art which will soon find a prominent position in that room. Homer also has reprint rights for the painting, and he can arrange Gisclee prints. This painting was custom framed by Brewer Studios.

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“You Ain’t From Around Here, Are You?

“You ain‘t from around here, are you?” should be engraved on the Great Seal of Jackson County, and installed in stone over our magnificent courthouse. That is, if we had a Great Seal, and if we had a magnificent courthouse.

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My Bucket List’s Got a Hole in It!

“The Bucket List”, a fine movie starring two outstanding actors, should be on everyone’s viewing list. In this story Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman become friends who, because one has only a short time to live, write up and accomplish a “to-do” list.

My “Bucket List” popped up in my column “I AM NOW AN OCTAGENARIAN - but I may still go to the Methodist Church on occasion!”.
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Another Year, Another Birthday

Last year at this time I headed my column

“To John Paul Jones, the McCains and Me……..Happy Birthday!

The occasion was the thirteenth of October, which is the anniversary of the founding of the United States Navy. I had my friend Terry, who hails from Chattahoochee but who sallies forth into Sneads territory almost every Monday to have coffee with some of us, look up the date as the Jewish calendar presents it, and the day is listed as “the fifth day of the eighth month called Hedvan”. At least that is what he said it is.

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Ladies and Gentlemen, in the Center Ring……

Last Sunday afternoon I walked out to my front yard and about a mile away I saw flags and a large striped tent and heard the voice of a man announcing wondrous things……skilled performers and exotic animals and all the thrills that come with a circus. I thought back, as I listened and watched from afar, about my childhood.

Perhaps nothing else brought the joy and wonderment to small towns in the 1930s more than the occasional circus.

In the midst of the Great Depression and in the South that still felt the economic burden of the Reconstruction, life was simple and monotonous, lightened only by the Saturday westerns and radio programs.

And then the circus would come to us!

Chattahoochee did not draw the “Big Top” venues, the Barnum and Bailey and Ringling Brothers shows with elephant after elephant parading through the streets to announce the evening shows. There were no highly decorated wagons laden with lions and tigers and bears (“Oh My!”), driven by men dressed in gaudy uniforms and with beautiful and scantily clad aerialists waving from the tops. Many times our circus would ease into town after dark and set up the tents and feed the animals, and the people would bed down in their trailers to rest up from their journey from the last “wide spot in the road”.

Tallahassee would occasionally be lucky enough to flag down “The Greatest Show on Earth” for a couple of days, and a few of us could make the trip with our parents, where we would feast our eyes and our imaginations on the high flying trapeze artists and the fearless lion tamers and the Human Cannonball and maybe, even get a glimpse of the great explorer Frank Buck, who “brought them back alive” from the jungles of Africa.

Our circuses had worn, patched tents, sometimes sitting askew after they were pitched. We were lucky to see a couple of elephants, but two elephants were just fine, for many of us had never seen even one before a circus deemed Chattahoochee worth a stopover. Lions and tigers? Usually one each, and each one close to his or her dotage. Rousing himself up at feeding time was the action we saw from the king of the jungle, but that was enough for us!

The circus always had dogs aplenty, smart and active ones that did summersaults and flips and jumped through burning hoops and over bars and from one high ladder to the other. As we watched we would make plans to teach our own Fido or Skippy to perform, but we never quite got them past obeying commands to “speak” or to “roll over”.

And the ladies that flipped from the high bar into the hands of the catcher were lovely and costumed with glittering sequins and feathers. At least they were lovely under the lights and from a distance. Up close they looked hard and tired and worn. But when we were seated in the bleachers and they were thirty feet in the air, they appeared as goddesses to us, goddesses that we small boys could fall in love with.

Sometimes when winter set in and the circuses had wended their way back to Sarasota, my father and mother would take me to Marianna, and we would park and observe the Mighty Haag folks in their winter quarters. In the cold light of day, the circus was not wonderful at all. The performers seemed like everyday people as they repaired and rebuilt equipment and practiced routines that seemed simple but would turn into magic when once again the wagons were loaded and taken down the road.

I recall one circus in Chattahoochee in particular, though. One day a man stopped at our dealership to get some service work done. In talking with him my father found that he was the advance man for a circus that was on the way to California to disband. This was their last trip, and at the end of the road the owners would pay off the employees, sell off the equipment and find homes for their animals. Soon my father had made a deal: for $100 the circus would camp down on the ball field owned by the Florida State Hospital, and would do two performances; the one in the afternoon would be for the patients of the Hospital, and the one in the evening would be for everyone that wished to attend.

Both performances were free to the public, and as a bonus we were allowed to show off the new Fords from the center ring. The ladies swung from the high bar and the men walked the tight rope, and the ringmaster directed our attention to the various rings as the dogs jumped and did tricks, and the clowns rolled out with their antics, and the two elephants, a mother and her child, walked around and waved their trunks.

It was truly an unforgettable night for us. The circus got underway the next day and went on down the road, drawing nearer to oblivion with each stop.

And then one day I saw where Walt Disney, the famous animator and film maker, was planning a giant entertainment park, unlike any other on earth, and he was going to have rides, and “live” cartoon characters, and animals.

And there in a picture was the famous man posing with Baby Opal, the elephant that once graced the center ring of a small circus and had played to a captivated crowd in a little Southern town.

The Day…and The War

The Roll Call began:
Henry O. Bassett
James H. Brett
John C. Carter
These were men who came out on that day one hundred forty six years ago:

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Equal Time for the Big-Boned

Jerry is a good friend of mine. He is also overweight, or maybe just “big-boned”.

Jerry was a member of the Florida Highway Patrol and in his youth served his state by covering Florida’s Turnpike. One incident that he tells is great. He was near the northern end and he saw a trucker in trouble, so he stops to see if he could help. The trucker addressed him as “Jerry”, even though he was not close enough to read his name tag. This made him curious, and then the driver said that he had been talking with another patrolman down near Fort Lauderdale and was told that “up the pike” there was a “dumb and ugly” patrolman, and his name was Jerry.

He feeds his grandchildren ice cream cones every afternoon at the Wooden Nickel in Chattahoochee. I drink sugar free Starbucks, look at the Krispy Kreme donuts without a twinge of remorse or desire, as he downs a triple dip of Edy’s Cookies and Cream, probably using the excuse that the kids need training in such things.

Jerry is a regular reader of my column although he has not yet registered as a “Follower”. I believe that his grandchildren could show him how to do this, but they are probably holding out until the old man is no longer good for snacks.

Jerry and I are members of the American Legion Post 241 Honors Detail, and we enjoy the camaraderie while we wait at cemeteries for the casket to show. We have heard each other’s “sea and air” stories so much we have numbered them in order to save time in the telling. We have one hundred twelve on the list, and my favorite that he tells is Number 37, with Number 62 running a close second. Of mine, which have to do with oceans and ships, he claims that Number 12 has edged out Number 1, which, of course, is about Noah’s Ark and a couple of the animals, and a keg. It is truly hilarious. I don’t advise anyone else to call out a number and expect laughs, however. Some folks can tell a joke; some can’t.

Lately, though, as Jerry increases in girth, he has taken to sending me E mails, purporting to be from various experts in exercising and/or dieting. I truly think that he is jealous, but will not own up to it because I am Navy and our pilots can land a screaming jet on a very short carrier, while their Air Force flyers usually require a runway that reaches from one state into another. I have tried to take him under my wing, although it would be difficult to imagine a wing big enough for this purpose, and I have urged him to, at the very least, begin to walk on a regular basis.

Today I received another E mail from him. It caught my eye immediately because it was titled “Getting Older and Walking”, and is bordered with ads for “aerobic flooring” which purports to be the “newest evolution in Group Exercise fitness”.

The title of the article was even more eye-catching:”The Importance of Walking“. I immediately was attracted, because I know what the author went through just to do the title. He had to upsize the print. Then he italicized it, and underlined it and ended up with it in teal blue. Sid Riley, our Managing Editor, would have to have help on something as technically complicated as this.

I was ready for the gospel, which, according to authorities, means “Good News”!

And then I read the first paragraph and I knew that I had not converted Jerry. He will go on eating Cookies and Cream at the Wooden Nickel, and making excuses. Here is what he sent:

Walking can add minutes to your life. This enables you at 85 years old to spend an additional 5 months in a nursing home at $7,000 per month.

Aha! He has a fixation on nursing homes, and he feeds his grandchildren ice cream every day! He knows the truth: grandchildren will select our nursing homes!.

Then he borders on the humorous, at least as close to the border of humorous as Jerry will ever get:

My grandpa started walking five miles a day when he was 60. Now he’s 97 years old and we don’t know where he is.

That is a little funny, until you recall that Jerry is from Altha, and you had better not laugh at anything about Altha if you are not a citizen of that town. “You ain’t from around here, are you?” had its origins there, and if you are asked that, you had better start looking for the door.

Next he reveals his true nature:

I like long walks, especially when they are taken by people who annoy me.

Just last week I announced that my morning walks are up to five miles instead of three miles, and only lightning keeps me from accomplishing this. So I annoy him? Wait until I go into training for my next 5K!

I am rather surprised at the next one:

The only reason I would take up walking is so that I could hear heavy breathing again.

Two thirds of our numbered stories have to do with sex, and to hear him tell it his stamina in this field has not diminished since high school. I believe that he slipped up and told the truth in this quote. I will spring this on him when next we are gathered at a graveside to render honors to one of our fallen heroes. He would not dare to deny anything in such a setting.

Jerry sent a lot more of these “jokes” over to me, but I do not worry about them. He can enjoy his Cookies and Cream, and I will sip my low-fat Starbucks, and we will, by common consent, add eight or ten more “sea and air” tales to our list, properly numbered.

Believe me; we really know how to tell them!

So I was Wrong about Horses!

Horses and I have never been able to get accustomed to each other.

I once rode a horse over a narrow trail through the Sierra Maestra Mountains of eastern Cuba. This was during the time that Fidel Castro was a rebel living in the jungles and threatening the dictator Fulgencio Batista . The Naval Operating Base at Guantanamo, or GITMO, was used for underway training for U. S. ships fresh from overhaul stateside, and we crew members looked for amusement during the scant hours we had between heavy drills at sea. There was a riding stable there, and one day four of us rented horses and set out to explore.

My mount would stand still and then run to catch up with the others, which was rather disconcerting since we were often on narrow trails and
alongside thousand foot drop offs. His gait was uneven and ragged. When he would stop, he would try to bite me, and if I dismounted he would step on me.

There was a reason for this.

My father, while a soldier in France in 1917, on occasion had to dine on horse meat, and I am certain that my mount could sense this. The Bible says that the sins of the fathers shall be inflicted on the sons… So I was being inflicted. Never argue with the Scriptures, except the Book of Nicodemus.

You may have noticed that I own a statue of an elephant. The statue is six feet long and four feet high, and made of resin. He has been featured in parades here in Jackson County, and politicians far and wide know him by name and have posed with him, including one who has since left the Republican Party. Because of this statue I have taken it on myself to learn about these fine animals. I know that they take twenty three months to gestate, and that their tusks are similar to teeth and are valuable. Their trunks are prehensile. When they run they always have one foot on the ground, which is basically the way I run. And elephants are said to have a tremendous memory, and that they never forget.

But they have nothing on equines. Horses that I get near remember that my father had char-grilled flank horsemeat steaks, with Worcestershire Sauce, during his Army days ninety years ago. They step on me, and bite me, and try to throw me down mountainsides. So I have avoided them.

But Saturday that changed.

My grandson Stuart and I went over to the Ag Center on U. S. 90 Saturday to see an antique car show. The autos did not appear, but we noticed activity in the arena, and went up to check it out.

And there were horses, beautiful, well-behaved ones, ridden by beautiful, well-behaved ladies. And they were riding in time to music and parading around in formation. And it was worth our sitting down and watching.

Then at break time we found out that we were in the midst of a rehearsal of the American Dreams Mounted Drill Team and Show Squad. We met Kidnight Color Design, who, when he goes out on Saturday night, is known to her admirers as “Sparrow”. Sparrow immediately attracted me, because she is blond and blue-eyed and reminds me of my true love Doris Day.

Next horse to sashay up to the fence for our inspection was Don’t Look at Me Mr., but we did look, and admire, and we learned to pet a horse on the side of his neck, because that is where the teeth are not.

There were other mounts; all sleek and good looking, and they all seemed to know what to do. The riders were pretty sharp, also. We learned that anyone with a horse and the desire can try out for one of the teams, and learn the formations that are a part of this sport. The Boss Lady, called the Drillmaster, in charge is Tammy Dobek, and she almost sold me on taking up the sport. From Tammy we learned that beginners are welcome as long as they have a horse and a helmet and are willing to learn.

We found out that the American Dreams teams are well known, and that they perform often at horse shows and other events. They are headquartered in Marianna, and you can learn all about them on their Website. I am going to be watching out for one of their shows, for I understand that they sometimes use flags, lances, swords, fireworks and “more”. I may really not want to know what “more’ is. Lances, swords and fireworks will be enough for me.

When I went on their Website I found that the description of the abilities of a Drill Team horse pretty well matches what most men look for in a mate: “A good Drill Team horse has many abilities: looks, style, and must be in overall good health. They must have a good disposition, and at least have a ’forward’ gear.”

And if I am going to be around them, I would add “and a forgiving nature”.

Visit thier website at http://www.americandreamsmounteddrillteam.com/

Flag Day?

This morning I, along with nine other members of American Legion Post 241, rendered honors to a deceased veteran, a long time member of our Post, and one of the few remaining men in this area who served in World War II.

We rendered these honors by reading a short message about his service to his country. Then two of us folded the United States Flag that had been stretched over his casket, and it was presented to his next of kin. We fired a three volley rifle salute, followed by “Taps”, the music that for over a hundred years has signified the end of the day for the soldier and the end of his life here on earth.

As we had waited for the funeral cortege to arrive, I noticed a scattering of small flags on some of the gravesites. Placed there for a special occasion, perhaps for Memorial Day, they were tattered, dirty and torn. I straightened one up so that it would not touch the ground.

I stood there, and thought about our Flag.

Last week the mayor of a nearby town had received a U. S. Flag that had been flown over the United States Capitol. It came from a Congressman’s office. The mayor seemed pleased at the gift. The picture sent me to do research.

The program began in 1937, when a Member of Congress received a request from someone “back home” for a Flag that had flown over the Capitol building. The Architect of the Capitol accommodated him, and the program has grown from that point.

Soon one flagpole did not suffice, so more were installed, and a detail was assigned to fly Flags, however briefly, over the Capitol.

Over a hundred thousand Flags are hoisted annually to the peak of a short staff, lowered and packaged, along with a “Certificate of Authenticity”, and shipped to someone. All requests go through a Congressman’s or Senator’s office. Prices run from $13.25 to $22.55, plus shipping and packing. I could not find how many people are required to furnish this “service”, nor how much it actually costs the taxpayer. I do know that, on occasion, a Member presents one, free of charge, to someone. Perhaps the one to the Mayor came under that classification.

I do not have such a Flag. I have not requested one, and do not plan to do so.

I do have the Flag that draped my father’s coffin that day in March when he was laid to rest. He was a soldier with General John J. Pershing’s American Expeditionary Forces in France in the Great War.

I have a Flag that once flew over the USS SAUFLEY, a destroyer that saw service in World War II in the Pacific war against the Japanese. The Flag was used years later, when I was a young officer in her during the uneasy days of the “Cold War”. It was to be destroyed because it was frayed, so I brought it home and had it repaired.

I have assisted in presenting many Flags as we mourned with survivors of honored dead.

Since that day in September when terrorists crashed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and the field in Pennsylvania, we have seemingly become obsessed with the Flag.

We fly it from houses, and from stores, and along streets and high above businesses and sometimes even from the antennas of new cars on display.

We fly it as decorations. It is not uncommon for a speaker to stride onto a stage that has ten or twelve or twenty U. S. Flags in a row serving as a backdrop or for some well meaning organization to use them as centerpieces at their annual banquet.

In the days of protest during the 1960s we as a people condemned those that made garments from our Flag or otherwise desecrated them.

Today we buy shirts and shawls and hats with the same design emblazoned on them.

Once flags were flown reverently on the Fourth of July and on Memorial Day and on Veterans’ Day.

Today we fly them from our homes and along our streets on President’s Day and Flag Day and on any other day when we feel patriotic.

Today we American Legion members presented a folded United States Flag, with its thirteen beautiful stripes and its field of blue and its fifty white stars, to a weeping widow.

Today a man or woman will receive from his Member of Congress a folded United States Flag, with its thirteen beautiful stripes and its field of blue and its fifty white stars and a Certificate of Authenticity.

Today………which would you say honors our nation?

And then the President said:

Here we are, well into the second week of the campaigns which will culminate in this year’s General Election.

There will be, one way or the other, a new Governor of our great state.

We will have a smattering of new state officials, including a new Commissioner of Agriculture. It is rumored that Doyle Connor, a man who held the office for many years, said that the only qualification for the job was to look good on a horse.

You will notice that I said: “It is rumored…..”, I placed that caveat into my statement because I am going to write this week about quotes, misquotes and quotes that were never said by the supposed author in the first place.

Take this one:

“When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21 I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years”.

This has always been attributed to Mark Twain, but no scholar has ever been able to find it in any of his writings. We know that the statement is true, but Twain did not say it. I am ready to accept it as originating here and now in my column, but only because my father has no opportunity for retribution.

Ol’ Sam’l (Twain’s real first name) did lay this one on us, and it is not used as often as it should be:

“We have not the reverent feeling for the rainbow as the savage has, because we know how it is made. We have lost as much as we have gained by prying into the matter”.

In this one statement we have anthropology, history, religion, science and humor stirred into one pot. Now, that’s the way I expect Mr. Clemmons to write!

You can see from these two quotes that the same saying, filled with the wisdom of the ages, does not draw equal attention when they come from common folk. With Mark Twain’s imprimatur upon it readers will chuckle and get out a highlighter, or E-mail it far and wide. But I put it in my weekly writing, and the reaction is: “After all, he is eighty years old, and you can’t expect anything better”, and there it dies.

Like many folks in Jackson County I attended a church service today. It was a good service, as such things go. The music was excellent, and we had a covered dish dinner afterwards, and even a Methodist can find no fault there. As in most services the preacher read a scripture. Most announce the location in the Bible and give time for the congregation to find the page and follow along with him as he reads it out loud. Not me. I trust preachers to read correctly the selected verses, and will continue to do so, until he commends to us a passage from the Book of Nicodemus, either in the Old or the New Testament. Bible reading is no time for flights of imagination. It is serious business.

Most politicians often borrow quotes from others to fit a particular event. Many of us heard President Reagan on the occasion of the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger quote the first and last lines of the sonnet High Flight. It was a stirring and moving moment. The Great Communicator read:

“Oh, I Have slipped the surly bonds of Earth

And danced the skies on silver-colored wings…

and done a hundred things you have not dreamed of...

And while with silent lifting mind I’ve trod

The high unsurpassed sanctity of Space,

Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.”

The poem was composed by a young pilot with the Royal Canadian Air Force in 1941. He wrote it on the back of a letter and sent it home. He crashed a few days later and the poem has been quoted from time to time throughout the years, but never at a more appropriate time than when President Reagan spoke the words to a grieving nation.

President John F. Kennedy has been known for his speeches, and we admired the way that he gave them. “…..ask not what your country can do for you-ask what you can do for your country.” But we do not often continue the quote, and we should. It reads “My fellow citizens of the World, ask not what America will do for you, but what we together can do for the freedom of man”. What breadth this adds! And, by the way, the first time the beginning sentence came to the attention of the public was from the pen of Kahlil Gilbran, and was written in Arabic.

Since I began this column with a couple of humorous sayings, I would like to end with my favorite.

One of the most controversial issues of all time has been the sale and the consumption of alcoholic beverages. The statement below has been narrowed down to a member of Congress, but no one yet claims it. A member had been queried on his opinion, and he answered, in part:

“If when you say whiskey you mean the Devil’s brew, the poison scourge, the bloody monster that defiles innocence, dethrones reason, destroys the home, creates misery and poverty,…..then I am against it with all of my power.

But if when you say whiskey, you mean the oil of conversation, the philosophic wine, the ale that is consumed when good fellows get together, that puts a song in their hearts and laughter on their lips…the sale of which puts into our treasuries untold millions of dollars that are used to provide tender care for our little crippled children……to build highways and schools and bridges, then certainly I am in favor of it.”

I intend to give all members of Congress a reasonable time, say thirty days from the date of publication of this column, to claim credit for the authorship.

And if no one steps forward, it is mine!

Wal-Mart, We Love You, Really We Do!

Modern Americans are born either to love or to hate Wal-Mart. There are very few folks that are in-betweens, except for me. I would like to have it known, before Mickey Gilmore the Manager comes looking for me with one of his on-sale, no- coupon- needed, case- thrown- in hunting rifles, that I am truly ambivalent.

I do not shop at Wal-Mart.

I do buy there.

I do not shop anywhere. I do not even shop for groceries. I cannot blame that on my daughter, Ashlee the Nutritionist, although she did guide me, and showed me how to read labels and figure calories and sodium content. I read the labels but that doesn’t mean that I pay much attention to them. Ashlee inherited from her mother the ability to tell when I am lying, so I read the packages and tell her the truth, as far as it goes. I do prepare a shopping list for groceries, and I stick very close to it.

But back to Wal-Mart.

Last week I bought a nicely done, made-in-Canada picture of the famous “Sailor Kissing the Nurse in Times Square” photograph on the occasion of the ending of World War II. The act portrayed is not an unusual one. Sailors have been kissing nurses for decades. In fact I kissed nurses myself until the medical profession began letting male nurses in. Even a sailor has to draw the line somewhere.

And of course I went to Wal-Mart for the photograph. Only Wal-Mart had it. It was hanging next to one of Marilyn Monroe. This was the famous picture of her leaning forward, luscious lips parted, eyes with the famous “come-play-with-me” look. But I was there to perform my patriotic duty, so I ended up with the Times Square photo. I delivered it to my friend Grady, who is a World War II veteran, fought in Europe and was waiting to be shipped out to the Pacific when the conflict ended, in Chattahoochee today. I will sleep the sleep of righteousness tonight.

And this set me to thinking about Wal-Mart, and what makes it different. Sam Walton began in Bentonville, Arkansas. Before that he had owned several stores that were franchised as Ben Franklins. These were slightly different from the usual town square five-and-dimes. Walton continued with the lower cost merchandise, but pursued sales by offering low prices and a wide variety of goods. Soon he hit on the formula that began the rise in sales and number of stores. We all know what happened. I understand that ninety percent of Americans are within a fifteen minute drive of either a Wal-Mart or a Sam’s Club. I am one of the ten percent. I live twenty minutes away, unless it is one of the days when I have breakfast at the Gazebo with a Lovely Lady. On that day I am two hours and twenty minutes away from Mickey the Manager’s marked-down items.

Today Sam Walton’s empire sells more goods than Target, Home Depot, Kroger, K-Mart and several other “Big Box” stores, all added together. Many of the stores sell groceries, and Wal-Mart outsells two of the biggest grocery chains each year.

Sam Walton served his country in World War II in the U. S. Army’s Intelligence Service. His father was a farmer who moved frequently. Young Sam became the youngest Eagle Scout in Missouri history. He excelled in sports in high school and milked cows at home. His upbringing and his desire to help folks carried over to his stores, where charity events are commonplace, not the exception.

Walton gave a couple of reasons for his success:



“We’re all working together. That’s the secret”.

“Each store should reflect the values of its customers and support the vision they hold for their community”.

And this brings me to my point.

Many Americans, myself included, have been in retail businesses. We have run clothing emporiums and automobile dealerships and grocery stores. We have begun small and many of us stayed small. We fit the norm of selling to customers in our area but most of us did not think about reaching out. We did not consider that we should open multiple outlets or expand to other areas or stay open longer hours so that our customers could shop easily or add more lines. It did not occur to us that we could do these things.

But Sam Walton decided to do them; he served his customers and got big, and bigger, and finally became the biggest. He became one of the richest men in America, and when he died in 1992 his children were listed among the top twenty richest folks in America. Not a bad record for a farm boy who came out of the depths of the Great Depression, is it?

And now, I have to end this column. I have some buying to do. I wonder if Mickey Gilmore still has a copy of that picture of Marilyn Monroe…………

A Date That is not Remembered

Today is August 15.

On August 15, 1945, imperial Japan, on order of its emperor, capitulated in its war against the allied nations.

The war, intended by Japan to expand its influence throughout the Pacific with the so-called “Greater Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere“, began with the invasion of Manchuria in the 1930s. The aggressor went head-to-head with China, a country divided and subdivided by warlords, generalissimos and just plain bandits. The fighting was sub-human, as evidenced by the Rape of Nanking, where the soldiers of Emperor Hirohito slaughtered thousands of innocent civilians.

And then the attack on Pearl Harbor came on December 7, a date that President Franklin D. Roosevelt said would “live in infamy”.

More lands fell: the Philippines, Malaysia, islands across the vast Pacific Ocean. Australia was threatened. As the Imperial troops came, civilization went out the window. The Bataan Death March, prison camps and unmarked prison ships that were often sunk by our own planes, the construction by thousands of prisoners of war of the infamous railroad made famous later by the movie “Bridge on the River Kwai”, only demonstrated man’s inhumanity to man.

The Japanese themselves were not immune. The pecking order in their armed forces dictated that the lowliest soldier would be kicked and beaten as he was ordered into combat if the officer saw fit. The infamous “Banzai” charges throughout the jungles of the islands in the southern Pacific were not only an offensive tactic but a requirement of the code that required death at the hands of the enemy in preference to surrender.

But Japan gave up, announcing her capitulation on August 15, a date that, to the best of my searching, was not mentioned in newspapers or recognized on radio or television.

But some remembered.

There were fifty two United States Navy submarines that went out and have never returned, and are listed on memorials as on “eternal patrol”. Families of the crew members know only that they are still missing.

Visitors to Honolulu often visit the USS Arizona Memorial. Many do not realize that the structure where they stand straddles a sunken ship that entombs hundreds of sailors. Ashes of Arizona survivors can, by request of the families or the sailor, be taken down by divers and placed with the remains of their shipmates.

Many believe that the formal surrender later in September in Tokyo Harbor should have taken place on the USS Enterprise, a ship that first stood into harm’s way just after Pearl Harbor was attacked, and carried Admiral Bill Halsey’s flag throughout major battles as our Marines island-hopped from Guadalcanal to Iwo Jima and Okinawa. The USS Missouri won the honor because it was Admiral Nimitz’s flagship, or maybe because it was named after President Harry Truman’s home state or because his daughter Margaret christened it.

The grandfather of Senator John S. McCain was one of Admiral Halsey’s senior officers. He was worn down but he was ordered to stay for the surrender. The next day he flew home to California. His wife had a party for him and invited their friends; Admiral McCain excused himself during the festivities and went into another room and died of a heart attack.

I recall a friend that served in the USS Saufley, a destroyer, in sixteen battles. E. J. was from Chattahoochee, and he stayed with the ship through all of the battles, surviving to write a best selling book about this fine ship. The book is “Tin Can Man” and it is still in print.

When I was in business with my father I would attend dealers’ meetings, and on occasion we would gather in a restaurant or lounge at the end of the day. One sallow and emaciated man would, after a couple of drinks, start weeping. I found that he was one of the survivors of the Bataan Death March and of the prisoner of war camps. He lost his dealership in a poker game.

Grady, a gentleman in his nineties, and I occasionally have coffee together in Chattahoochee, and we talk about our childhood in that small town, and about the rivers. Last week he mentioned Eisenstadt’s photograph of a sailor kissing a nurse in Times Square when the announcement of victory came. We laughed about that, and then he said: “I had been in combat in Europe and I was waiting to be shipped to the Pacific for the final invasion of Japan”. The atomic bombs that were dropped on Japan’s homeland probably saved his life, and that of a million or so fellow servicemen, and uncounted Japanese who were set to defend their shores to the death.

I did not find any mention of this date in the newspapers or on television, but I did find a print in Walmart of the sailor kissing the nurse. I looked at it and then walked on. But now I believe I will go back and purchase a copy.

And take it to my friend Grady.

Mish-Mash

At times subjects for my weekly column are difficult to come by. On occasion I end up with too many possibilities.

This week I am closer to the latter, so I have titled it “Mish-mash”. This term comes from a now defunct American Indian tribe-------The Minequans, I believe, or perhaps it was the Lower Kickapoos-------- and it means “don’t stir up the cooking pot, you may not like what you find”.

So here is a “mish-mash” of ideas that I have had for some time. Please don’t tell me that I skipped around too much in this work. I intend to skip around, and confuse all but the most erudite and understanding reader.

Some of these ideas I have discarded as improper or perhaps not worthy of such a first line newspaper as the Jackson County Times. A few ideas will be mentioned briefly, more to tantalize that to fulfill you, and I shall pick them up at a later time and expand and expound on them, and present you with a full column of great interest. If not exciting to you, I know that the twelve members of my blog will read them, and I will be happy.

For the first one, I would like to call to your attention that we are nearing early voting time, which is when we eager citizens will participate in balloting via some amazing machines at Sylvia Steven’s office, or at a couple of other selected sites in our wide county. Our choices between candidates will be fairly straightforward, but the proposed amendments? These will give you problems unless you follow these directions closely. First, read the amendment as it will appear on the ballot. Secondly, study thoroughly all of the editorials in the newspapers that give you points either for or against each one. Then scour your mail on the subject. Spend at least two nights on each one and arrive at a conclusion. Decide to vote it up or down, in or out, yes or no. Then go to the booth and vote the exact opposite and you will be, as Sid Riley our Mangling Editor says in his column, “getting it right”.

I have also had the urge to denigrate one or more, or all, of the candidates for office, and to promote one party over the other, but in Florida that is dangerous. It is best for me to avoid this. I would like to note that a couple of years ago my column was titled: “Political Party? Take Your Pick!”, and I listed out the twenty or so parties that have official standing in our State. I ended up stating that if I ever left the “Grand Old Party”, with it’s elephants and flags, I would probably swing over to the Surfers’ Party of America. You younger readers may believe that this relates to the nerds of computerdom, but you are wrong. If you are a true Surfer then you will be seen deep within the curl of a giant wave off Kanehoe Bay. And you will vote a straight Surfer party line.

My first venture into voting was in the early 1950s. General Dwight D. Eisenhower was waging a campaign against not only the incumbent but against a strong Democrat party. He rode to victory under the banner of “I Like Ike”. About the same time a strange little creature from South Georgia came out of the Okefenokee Swamp and into the hearts and minds of America through a comic strip titled “Pogo”. Wile E. Cat conned him into running for president with “I Go Pogo” as his motto. This little fellow was, of course, Pogo Possum, and he gave sage advice that is often recalled today. “We have met the enemy and he is us” is quoted somewhere daily, usually by treehuggers. I personally like “We don’t know all the answers, ‘cause we ain’t sure of the questions yet”. The latter seems more appropriate to our times. He had other friends: Cherchez La Femme, who was a turtle, and Albert Alligator, who was, as you might expect, an alligator, but one that smoked a cigar and walked on his hind feet. I didn’t vote for Pogo then, but I believe I wrote him in for governor in a later election. He would have made a good one.

I am tempted to tell, in detail, how Margo Lamb, producer of The Fitness Corner show on Chipola Speaks, interviewed me on television and presented me with another 5K medal. Margo has freckles, and that makes her okay with me, and puts her on my list of all time favorites, but not as high up as Doris Day, who also has freckles. As I tried to compact this event into a short form, I realized that I had enough material for a full column, so I will go no further for now.

On the way out of the studio after my interview I was stopped by Royce Reagan, who suggested that I do a monthly show, something in the vein of my writings. I felt flattered that he would ask me to do this, until I recalled that he often goes on the air and says “Don’t call me and tell me of an idea for a show. Come in and do it yourself”. It makes me believe that Royce is desperate for new material, and might already be hanging around the courthouse and accosting accused folks that have posted bond and suggesting that they come down and show the TV audience how to set up a meth lab.

So look for expanded columns from me, drawn from the subjects mentioned here, and possibly for my monthly Chipola Speaks show, as soon as I decide the format.

Unless Royce signs up the meth lab man first.

I Opened a Whole Barrel of Seminoles!

I thought that I had written an interesting and thought-provoking article, one of historical value, a story of the sea and of family life, a tale of higher education and the beginning of an athletic dynasty that has set records during its relatively short time in existence.

The story of “Cousin Ed and the President of Gatorland” was published last week in the Jackson County Times. I was certain that my telling of the first football coach of the Seminoles would bring reactions aplenty from my reading friends.

And I was right!

A resident of Tallahassee, who was one of the early members of the Flying High Circus, a cheerleader and, before you get the wrong idea, a Marine, was at the Seminole Boosters’ Luncheon at The Gazebo Saturday, and I wanted him to see the article. I walked in and I was descended upon, not by happy Seminoles but by ones who gave me the message that “you didn’t go far enough”. George Cone reached me first, but before he could say anything Earl Williams elbowed him to one side and, loud and clear, asked “What about the basketball team in 1946? Ed coached that, too” Of course Earl was on the team, and he probably pitched horseshoes also, and maybe was point man on the curling team, but this was before Florida State University. It was still a girls’ school.

So here is a tenuous connection with that first basketball team, coached by Cousin Ed and made up of celebrities and near celebrities and plain ole’ boys, with at least one of them from Jackson County.

Jim Pavy was also a player. Jim was good with the hoops, and better at coaching. He finished school and began his coaching career. I met him when he was at Chattahoochee High School. He told me one day that “Ed taught me everything I know”, which I somehow doubt, because Jim came from a part of the country that glories in roundball. It is rumored that a birther there, whether a medical doctor or a midwife, catches the newborn, slaps his bottom and hands him a basketball.

I believe that Jim Pavy coached Malone to a state championship and ended up at Chipola. My daughter Meredith the Baseball Coach, who lettered in four sports in high school, received a scholarship for basketball, and Jim may have coached her.

My other daughter, Ashlee the Nutritionist, who had been a cheerleader in high school and a very good one, had to take a physical education course, so she and her friend Michelle, also a cheerleader, decided that golf was their game, probably because the outfits were cute. Their instructor was Jim Pavy. Last week Ashlee visited me and stocked my refrigerator with low fat, saltless, bland foods that may well still be there when she makes her next visit at Christmas. When I asked her about her golf experience, she told me that all she remembered was picking up golf balls by the bucketsful, and that she learned to keep score. She mentioned “eagles” and “birdies” and “mulligans”, but did not recall that the clubs were numbered or had individual shapes. I think that she got a B grade.

Other famous folks? D. L. Middlebrooks played on that first football team, and was later a Federal judge. Chris Kalfas, a Tallahassee native whose father began the Silver Slipper restaurant, where more legislation was passed than in the Capitol, was somewhere in the lineup. Chris and I hunted together on occasion and once I attended a family wedding. Let me tell you that the movie “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” does not do justice to the real thing.

Ken McLean had played for the University of Florida before World War II, and was on the first Seminole team. I understand that he held records at both schools. Ken later coached at several high schools in the Big Bend. I knew him when he was assistant principal at Sneads High. He was still a Seminole “All the Damn Time”, as the famous yell went.

Saturday night I and my grandson Stuart went to Jerry’s Restaurant in Chattahoochee so that he could stoke up on fried shrimp. This seems to be one of his purposes in life, even though I have warned him of the very real possibility of his becoming the reason for making this sea creature an endangered species. Ben Dudley and his family came in, and Ben’s son complimented me on my articles.

Then Ben, who had been at the Seminole Boosters’ meet in Marianna, suggested that I had been incomplete in my describing the glories of the Seminoles. He ended up by reminding me that the first Renegade had been raised by a family from Chattahoochee, but that the patriarch of the family was a Gator by birth and upbringing. He mused that perhaps it was the girls in that clan who actually brought the steed up not to fear unruly crowds, and to stand firm while a steadfast young man, clad in full Indian regalia, rode out onto the field and hurled a lance into the Astroturf or Bermuda grass or Zoyzia or whatever the groundskeepers had placed there.

I said nothing, but nodded thoughtfully, and we took our leave since our waitress said that there was no more shrimp. She may have told us this because we were talking too much football, but probably because it is impossible to reach full capacity of a teenage boy. I certainly hope that she did not mean no more shrimp “in the Gulf”.

So here I sit, trying to please every Seminole fan or graduate or jock, knowing that as soon as the Times is placed in the newsstands I will get more calls, and that I will hear, as I walk the streets or try to sleep or dine or otherwise recreate, “Why don’t you tell about…….”. I intend to ignore each suggestion and go back to writing about rivers, or runners, or medals.

Unless I get confirmation that Army coach Red Blake recommended an assistant for FSU, and that assistant, whose name was Vince Lombardi, was turned down because he did not have head coaching experience.

That could be worthy of another Seminole column.

Words to Live By - Or Maybe Die!

We columnists, or as Sid the Mangling Editor classifies us, “contributing writers”, must use words and we must obtain them from quotes or out of a thesaurus or from graffiti.

So we use borrowed words.

We cannot make up words, because all of the good ones have already been discovered. Misspelling existing words does not count as new ones. Sid misspelled “rudiments” for several months until I called his hand on it. I was right, but it didn’t keep him from putting my work two pages behind the “Partners for Pets” appeal.

I used the word “myriads” incorrectly in a column once, and a man stopped at our table at the Gazebo the next week, introduced himself as being a graduate of my alma mater and later sent me an E-mail that Dr. Zimmerman of that institution would have chided me for my error if he were still alive. I would like to start regular communication with him since we have something in common, but I cannot find my English textbook from the first half of the last century and I know that he will be continuously finding fault with my word usage.

Most educated folks like to quote famous people. Mark Twain is quoted more than anyone else, with the possible exception of Madonna. Twain wrote about steamboats and young boys in caves and Indians (he spelled it “Injuns”, and I am glad that Dr. Zimmerman was not around. Twain would have been in big trouble). He did make a comment about government on occasion, and I really like the one that says “Congress has been proven to be the only truly Native American criminal class”. He deserves being read. Or you can read Madonna, if you wish. Each has left a mark on civilization.

On occasion I receive an E-mail purporting to be quotes from Will Rogers. They are referring to Will Rogers the writer and raconteur, not Will Rogers who sells Fords on Lafayette Street. You can tell how Ford sales are going in Marianna by observing where Will has lunch. Good sales….Madison‘s. Low or no sales……..sardines and saltines at a local convenience store.

Dr. Tom Kinchen is president of the Baptist College of Florida in Graceville. When he was Chair of the Chamber of Commerce I got to know and to admire him. Not that I don’t admire all Baptist preachers. I praise them so I can cover all bases on my way down Life’s path. John Wesley may have gotten it all wrong, and I want to be assured of some mercy at the Pearly Gates.

Dr. Kinchen is fond of quoting Winston Churchill, as am I. Churchill should have the lion’s share of the credit for our victory in World War II. He is praised for rallying his people in the darkest of days. Tom should be careful, though. Once Churchill announced that the people of Britain would have to do without the necessities of life in order to save civilization. Later that evening he hosted some newsmen, and regaled them with stories as he smoked a Cuban cigar (an H. Upmann, my favorite) and enjoyed a snifter of brandy. When questioned about this seeming contradiction between his earlier words and his actions that night, he explained “I said ‘necessities’ not ‘luxuries’ ”. I hope that Tom never quotes this. You know how the Baptists are about brandy.

I am certain that I do not have to remind the twelve regular readers of my column that several weeks ago I won a medal in a 5K run/walk. I am quite proud of it, and I would show it off in public more often, but I pinned it to my pajamas and the ribbon is somewhat ragged now.

Since then I have been receiving quotes via E-mail that are gleaned from the “Runner’s World” magazine. They are meant, I am sure, to be inspirational, and I will leave it to you to determine who forwards them to me. Here is one:

“Winning is not about headlines and hardware (medals). It’s only about attitude. A winner is a person who goes out today and every day and attempts to be the best runner and best person they can be. Winning is about struggle and effort and optimism, and never, ever, ever giving up.”



Anyone who reads that challenge without feeling his heart beat faster is on the way to becoming a vegetable, and I am far from that. The day that I received this I went out and cut a minute off my best three mile time. How could I not?

And then I received this one:

“I usually run the first half of the marathon and run-walk the last half. It gets harder to run 26.2 miles at my age, but I’m inspired by the memory of friends I’ve lost”.

This was written by an 87 year-old grandmother of ten who is a marathon runner.

Wait just a cotton-picking minute (words from Tennessee Ernie Ford)! If there ever was a case for Jethro Gibbs of NCIS, this is it! This woman is eighty seven years of age, and she has lost all of her friends? That is suspicious. Where did she lose them? Are they really lost, or just tucked away in leg irons in an abandoned warehouse? Were they truly her friends, or were they “drafting” on her in these marathons that she has run for the better part of a century, and so she sought revenge?

And ten grandchildren! This indicates more missing persons. Where are the parents? Grandchildren only get here by way of children. I know about this, first hand. Most grandparents wish that there had been a way to skip children and go directly to grandchildren. Someone had better keep a constant check on this marathoner’s grandchildren if they are in their teens and they hang around dear old granny very much, especially on race days when there is a full moon. Forewarned is forearmed (I don’t know who first said this. It might have been Mark Twain, or maybe Madonna)!

I believe that there is enough mystery here for an Alfred Hitchcock show. I am reminded of Pogo, my favorite comic strip character. Upon being told that a black widow spider, immediately after mating, kills and eats her spouse, Pogo’s comment was: “You mess ‘round with black widow spiders, you gotta ‘spec trouble”.

Does the same go for all marathon runners? I have nothing against them, male or female. In fact, I have breakfast with a lady marathoner often, and I really enjoy it, but when she gets to be eighty seven, don’t expect Homer to be hanging around!

Cousin Ed and the President of Gatorland

Almost every family, particularly the families of the South, will have a character that is usually described as “larger than life”. He may be a father figure or a barroom brawler. The character may be rich or poor as dirt in a two rut road; brave, or maybe just afflicted with bravado, but still will be described as “larger than life”.

In the Hirt family our larger than life character was my father’s first cousin, and thus my second cousin or, as some genealogical freaks would determine, my “first cousin, once removed”. Here is his story.

The year was 1947, World War II was over, and floods of young veterans cast about for institutions of higher learning so that they could ready themselves, with the aid of the G. I. Bill, for the future. One of the schools open to them was the Florida State College For Women in Tallahassee. Ed Williamson, my father’s first cousin, applied there for a position as a physical education instructor, and was hired by President Doak Campbell.

And before the year was out he sent a message to the President of the University of Florida to “Go to Hell” when that worthy ordered that there would be no football at FSU. The Gator president did not take his advice, but Cousin Ed went down in the football history books as the first football coach of Florida State University.

Ed and Jerry David (J. D) Williamson were brothers. Their mother was widowed and had been left to raise them. My father was assigned as their guardian in fiscal matters. The Great Depression was in full force when the two graduated from Leon High School, but they went to the University of Florida on football scholarships. At graduation J. D. became a realtor in Jacksonville and Ed went into high school coaching, first in Newberry and later in St. Augustine and finally Lake City. He was there when World War II began.

Cousin Ed applied for a commission in the Navy, but before it came through he was drafted into the Army. I recall going with my parents down to the railroad depot at River Junction to see him. He was physically fit, but the uniform he wore sagged and bagged on him. He chatted with us for a few minutes, and the train pulled out. A few weeks later he came back through, his Navy commission having caught up with him. His blue sleeve bore the single gold stripe of an ensign, U. S. Navy.

The glamour sea duty for young officers was the patrol torpedo boat, the famed “PT” craft that was fast and armed with torpedoes and machine guns. John F. Kennedy, fated to be our President, commanded the PT 109. Ed applied for this duty, but the Navy, in its wisdom, decided he was not physically fit, so he was given command of an Armed Guard, consisting of twenty eight Navy enlisted gunners, and placed on a merchant ship destined to cross and re-cross the Atlantic, first to England and later to Russia on the infamous Murmansk run.

North Sea convoys could only go as fast as the slowest merchant ship, so they plodded across the turbulent seas at a crawling pace, sought after by U Boats and, when close to the continent of Europe, long range German bombers. And always the storms seemed to seek them out, raging against them, tossing frigid ocean waters across their decks. A man falling over the side would be left to float until he died, which often was within minutes of coming in contact with the water.

When the war ended Williamson came home to Tallahassee, and sought employment at the Florida State College for Women, a facility that was answering the call of returning veterans who would go to school under the G. I. Bill. He was there when the leaders of the university decided that a football team was just what was needed to put the newly minted Florida State University on the map.

There was some dissention about this action. One of the committee said that he had never seen a great university that had a football team. Another came back with “I have never seen a great university that did not have a football team”. That committee member, a gentleman named Coyle Moore, won, and a search began for a football coach that had a PH. D.

After some discussion Cousin Ed was called in, offered the job even though he did not have the PH. D. and he accepted, on the condition that he would hold the position for only one year, “win, lose or draw”.

One day President Doak Campbell called Ed in and read a letter from the president of the University of Florida. The missive stated that the male contingent at FSU would be considered a branch of his school, and there would be no football program. Cousin Ed said: “Tell him to go to hell…..you run your program and we’ll run ours”.

The first season was a losing season, but an interesting one. The call for players went out, and one hundred and twenty five men showed up. There was not enough uniforms or equipment. Attrition took care of the high numbers; Ed only cut one man, a veteran that showed up smoking a big cigar. (Some years later Pete McDaniel, a Jackson County Commissioner and a resident of Sneads, owned up to this ‘honor’. Pete told me that Cousin Ed looked at him and his cigar and said “McDaniel, turn in your shoes”. This was all that the players had been issued).

Cousin Ed asked for an assistant coach. He got Jack Haskin. Jack was made backfield coach. He later was the director of the famous “Flying High” FSU Circus. And that was the entire staff; no other coaches, no trainers, no nothing. In the University Club, overlooking Bowden Field at Doak Campbell Stadium, are pictures of each coach and his staff. Cousin Ed is there, looking stern and grim. Jack Haskin is next to him, also looking stern and grim. Perhaps they looked that way because the team had no name, and was facing their initial match-up.

The first game was against Stetson. FSU lost by one touchdown. A contest was held to select a name. “Tarpons” was bandied about, but that was the name of the women’s swim team. “Senators”, “Falcons” and even “Tallywhackers”, but “Seminole” won out.

Cousin Ed finished out the season, 0-5, and, true to his word, stepped down. Bill McGrotha, longtime sports writer and author of “Seminoles! The First Forty Years”, referred to him as “gentlemanly” and “benevolent”. His players called him “Mr. Nice Guy”. He was followed by Veller and Nugent and Mudra and eventually Bowden.

But none of those gentlemen ever told the President of the University of Florida to “Go To HELL”.

Optimism

We have all heard definitions of an optimist.

“A pessimist says that a glass of water is half empty. An optimist says that it is half full”.

The little boy who is always an optimist about everything, so his parents decide to cure him by giving him a room full of manure for Christmas. With a joyful whoop, the little fellow starts digging in the pile. “With all of this manure, there has to be a pony here”.

And my favorite: “a pessimist says that there is a little bad in every woman. An optimist says ‘I certainly hope so’ “.

So with optimism in mind, let us think about our country.

The Fourth of July is celebrated as our country’s birthday. Some brave men got together and hammered out a declaration that changed the world. John Adams, later to become our country’s first vice president and its second president, said that we should celebrate this day with “speeches and feasting and fireworks”. Most of us do just that.

But on this Fourth of July I sat in a church, and I heard the speaker bemoan the condition of our country, charging off its problems to the failure of our people to recognize that the Creator influenced those brave men that signed our Declaration. He castigated our politics and our way of life and called for us to return, in essence, to the “good days” of history when all was well and straight and true.

It was fine to be reminded of these things. But as I listened I thought about our country’s history.

I have been a student of this history for most of my life. I know, for instance, that the decision to break away from England was by no means unanimous. I know that our American Civil War could have been averted if men of good will had listened to each other and had been willing to work out peacefully the problems of slavery and foreign trade and states’ rights. I know that, from day one, the press (or the media, as we call it now) has been one-sided,leaning one way or the other, and trying to influence either the people or those folks in office.

I know that there have always been folks who have extraordinary influence with politicians, and who have used that influence for their own personal well being.



I know that each president, except for those who died in office early, has been castigated by his political opponents, as ours is today, and as President Bush was a few years ago, and as our next one will be. The latest finger pointing was just last week, when President Obama removed the commanding general from Afghanistan. We forget, or some of us may not know, that one of the strengths of our country lies in the civilian control of our military. Truman removed General McArthur in Korea, who had been a hero of World War II. Lincoln removed General McClellan, who wasn’t much of a general, and who also had political ambitions, much like McArthur’s. Franklin Roosevelt fired General Short and Admiral Kimmel after Pearl Harbor had been attacked, even though he was as much at fault as anyone for the Japanese military success.

We blame a president for profligate spending of our people’s dollars, when we should know that the Congress must appropriate the money, and we (speaking collectively) want our representatives to “bring home the bacon” in the form of special projects for our town or county or state.

We blame a president for treaties signed with foreign powers, and we forget that the Senate must approve each treaty.

We blame the Congress for passing improper laws, when we ourselves do not bother to protest or to track and criticize the members except near election times.

In spite of all this, I am an optimist about our country and its future. After all, our country is only two hundred and thirty four years old, a span not quite three times my own age. It is possible that I could have shaken the hand of a man who shook the hand of a Signer of the Declaration of Independence!

In 1953 I was privileged to see the musical “South Pacific” on Broadway. It still had most of its original cast. It was grandly and beautifully staged, and to a Southern boy it was magical.

“South Pacific” was a love story and a war story and a story of intrigue and a protest against racism, all happening on a small island in the midst of a huge ocean. And in one song Mary Martin stepped center stage and sang “I am only a cock-eyed optimist, immature and incurably green, but I am stuck like a dope, with a thing called hope, and I can’t get it out of my head”.

So here I am, an optimist stuck with a thing called hope, believing in my country and feeling that we will recover from whatever ails us and we will get better and better.

As soon as we throw the rascals out!

Travels with Stuart

John Steinbeck, one of America’s most popular authors of the last century, wrote many books, including Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men and Cannery Row. Some were made into movies, and he received several awards for them. My favorite was Travels with Charley. This chronicled his adventures throughout the United States, driving a pickup truck with a special cabin built on the back and accompanied by the family poodle Charley. The time was in the sixties, and the book had been suggested by no less a public figure than Adlai Stevenson.
So, with a tip of the hat to Mr. Steinbeck I have titled this work Travels with Stuart. Stuart is not a poodle, even though at one time his hair hung down to his shoulders. He is now a member of Piper High School’s Junior ROTC program, and he has a “buzz” cut that looks good on him. He is my oldest grandson.

When my wife Theresa and I were making annual pilgrimages to battlefields of the War of Northern Aggression, we would on occasion deviate from this invasion of the Nawth and pick up Stuart. We would visit U. S. Navy ships which are now museums. Our favorites are at Charleston’s Patriot Point, where we would clamber up the ladders of the U. S. S. Yorktown and marvel at the workings of this giant ship. Then Theresa would ensconce herself on a bench while Stuart and I would explore the destroyer and the submarine.

After Theresa’s death I did not plan on any more trips. A call from Stuart changed that: “Okay, Homer, we are going to Gettysburg, and Dad is driving us”. I could not resist such a command, even though it was from a teenager much below me in rank and age.

The Gettysburg trip was good, and I refrained from correcting the battlefield guides when they leaned a bit too far toward the Union side. Southbound took us through the Shenandoah Valley, a spot that is so beautiful that words cannot do it justice. We saw General Lee’s vault, and placed coins on his horse Traveler’s grave, just outside Lee Chapel. The two of us (Dad was on his cell phone) walked through the cemetery and stood before Stonewall Jackson’s grave. I told him why the fresh lemons were scattered there.

New Market had been covered the day before. The “Field of Lost Shoes” was especially poignant, since many of the young students from Virginia Military Institute that died there were Stuart’s age.

On other excursions Stuart and I have covered Shiloh battlefield, where we spoke of the anomaly of the name: “Shiloh” means “peace“, but one of the bloodiest battles of the War was fought there; the marks of combat still are evident on trees.

We traced Nathan Bedford Forrest’s excursions through Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi. Forrest was rated by many historians as the best tactical general of either side. We went to Okalona; his brother died there in his arms. We stood by Tishomingo Creek at Brice’s Crossroads, and marveled at his ability to “call the shots” against an arrogant enemy.

Last year Stuart was with me when I acquired “Ron The Elephant” of local Republican fame. We had gone to Patriot’s Point and then had gotten underway for Wilmington. As we were passing through North Myrtle Beach I spotted a display of statues. We pulled in, and I purchased a six foot by four foot image of an elephant, made of resin, and we brought him back to Sneads in the rear of my Explorer. Stuart fully expected us to be stopped somewhere along the way by a state trooper.

This year “Travels with Stuart” began in Sunrise, his home town, and took us through a part of Florida that is not as well known as the lands that border the interstates and the toll roads. We rode north for a time and then cut over through Indiantown and Okeechobee. I told him of the great cattle drives, much like those that made the West famous in the 1800s. We skirted Lake Okeechobee, where I was once tempted to assist some locals in establishing a barge terminal. We went through Sebring and into Lakeland.

Lakeland is the home of my college. Florida Southern does not have a football team nor a stadium, but it has something that no other institution possesses. It has twelve buildings designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, which makes it the largest concentration of his architecture in the world. I described how I felt when I met Mr. Wright and when I sat in an audience of young students and heard him say to us: “There is probably no one here that is intelligent enough to understand what I am about to tell you”. What a way to attract the attention of a group of college students! Wright once said: “At an early age I was forced to choose between an honest arrogance and a false humility. I chose the former, and I have never regretted it”.

We then cut over to a coastal route and visited Cedar Key. In 1923 my father had the choice of two towns in which to establish his Ford dealership. One was Chattahoochee and the other was Cedar Key. I am glad he chose the former.

As we drove I told him about the towns that we went through. Perry, the “Forest Capital”, had a Ford dealer who was single, as was I, in the 1960’s, and Theresa dated him while she was dating me. This amused Stuart somewhat, because young folks do not think of parents and grandparents as ever having been romantic. I showed him where Ted Turner’s plantation is, and we commiserated with Ted because he was once married to Hanoi Jane.

Arrival in Sneads was uneventful, but the days that have followed have been exciting to him. Stuart really likes Jackson County, with its rivers and lakes and open spaces. We had breakfast with The Runner one morning at The Gazebo. The conversation, as usual, was great, but a three way one this time.

Evenings have often been spent attending fund raisers for candidates. Stuart reveled in listening to folks like Jack Pizza, who described to him how Air Force pilots were trained to deliver the “where did everyone go” bomb. Michelle Kimbrough sold him on trying for helicopter training when he enlists in the Army. He heard from former paratroopers and from Marines (there are no “former” Marines”) and retired Navy men.

He met Marti Coley, and shared with her a political handout that had been autographed by her late husband when he ran for the Legislature. David wrote “be sure to vote when you are old enough”, and I suspect that he will do just that. He was impressed with other candidates but even more so with the attendees that took time to talk with him on an adult level.

Thursday found us at the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola. I collected my salute at the gate, which impressed him, and he impressed me by properly landing an F-14 Tomcat on the deck of a carrier while “flying” a simulator.

We visited Partners for Pets Friday, carrying old towels and a cash donation, and he learned about Phil Rotollo, the founder. Saturday we went to Seacrest Wolf Preserve. He donned a vest and worked as a volunteer on the tour led by Cynthia and Wayne Watkins. Cynthia praised him and awarded him a “totally awesome” wolf tee shirt.

My “Travels with Stuart” are not yet over. I am counting on them continuing for a year or two, and leaving me with a grand legacy of great times with a fine travel companion, and perhaps material for another column or two.

AN IMPERFECT FATHER!

In today’s newspapers we see article after article about fathers, fat ones and thin ones, tall and short ones, business fathers and professional fathers: all kinds of fathers. After all, it is Fathers’ Day.

One thing I noted, though, was that each was perfect, or near perfect. I suspect that during this coming week, in a courtroom somewhere, a man will stand convicted of a heinous crime, and a neighbor will testify as a character witness, and will say: “but he is a good father”.
My father was far from perfect, by today’s standards.
I was attempting to write a Fathers’ Day column.
I began with these three paragraphs, and went on to list why I did not consider my own father to be like the fathers that others looked up to, the fathers that loved them, that hugged them, that stayed at home with them.

I told about his seeming lack of emotion when I had difficult times as a child, as a teenager and as a young adult. I explained that he never took the time out of his busy life to take me fishing or hunting.

I complained about lying in my bed, beset with polio and pain and paralysis, with my mother beside me, but with my father only occasionally standing in the door, stoic and solemn. I described the ceremony when my mother pinned my Eagle Scout badge on me in the Chattahoochee Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and he sat quietly in the audience.

My working days began early in my life, toiling at my father’s Ford dealership, first cleaning floors and tools in the service department, later inventorying parts in the parts department while my friends attended Christmas parties during the holidays. I described how he had driven me to the airport in Tallahassee to go to my first duty station in the Pacific during the Korean War, and how he shook my hand and told me to “be careful”, the exact words he used the first time he let me drive our family car by myself.

Then I tried to ameliorate this description, and to justify his failings, by telling of his early childhood and his growing up without a father; his service to his country when he went to France during the Great War; his hard work in beginning his dealership in Chattahoochee and how it survived through the Depression and World War II.

I remembered when I was at home on my “boot” leave and he asked me if I felt if I were capable of being an officer. When I assured him that I was, he said: “Do it. You owe it to your country”. He did not suggest that an officer’s life might well be easier for me. And when I finished my six years of active duty, and returned home, he welcomed me, not with a hug or with tears, but by handing me the keys to the front door of the dealership and telling me to open the next morning, and that I would be back in the parts department at the same wage that I was paid nine years before.

As I wrote out these scathing remarks, taking out some deep seated frustrations, I recalled a letter that I had received from him in his later years. He must have been seventy five years old. He had typed out, on his old manual typewriter, a letter to me that was titled “On Being Proud”. I found it and re-read it. He listed some things that I had forgotten: my eagerness to learn to read and to find out things from books; my work in the Boy Scouts as a leader; my college career.

He told me how pleased he was that I had not accepted a direct commission in the Air Force but had decided to enlist in the U. S. Navy and later to become an officer. He praised my work with our church. He described how happy he was when Theresa and I adopted our three children. He ended up with praise for my service to my community.

And as I read the letter, I realized that I was, indeed, writing about “An Imperfect Father”.

I was writing about myself.

The Best Movies of All Time!

When a writer, regardless of his capabilities, reaches a certain point in his career and is recognized as a public figure, it is necessary that he become an arbiter. This means that he is a judge, a person capable of rendering a professional opinion on a particular subject. Usually the first field that he is called to judge is “The Best Movies of All Time”.

I have reached that point. My column this week will address great movies, and I will not brook any disputations. Last week I wrote authoritatively about nostrums of the past, most of which have vanished, and our Head of Shipping at the Jackson County Times insisted that our Real Editor, Stephanie, add a footnote that Vick’s Vap-o-Rub has not disappeared from the shelves, but it is in constant usage at her home, and that her husband often puts a smear under his nose, and that it is a turn-on for her. Vick’s may make her passionate, but it takes something by Chanel or Estee Lauder to work for me.

Let this be a warning, all you staffers at the Times. These are my movies! Hands off!

I do not recall the first movie I ever saw. I am positive it was an “oater”, possibly starring Tom Mix, Tim McCoy or Buck Jones. The plots were the same and the characters identical: the bad boys wore black hats, with the exception of the man that played Zorro, and the hero never kissed his girl friend, but sometimes in a close up scene his horse would nuzzle him. Today, in the days of “Brokeback Mountain” that might have a strange connotation, but to us it was the two minute warning before the end of the last reel.

In 1939 “Gone With the Wind” reached the Gibson Theater in Chattahoochee, and school kids could attend if they had the price of admission and their parent’s permission. After all, Clark Gable looked down at Vivien Leigh and said, loud and clear: “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn”. Gasps were heard throughout the movie house. We should have been required to have permission to see a British woman playing a Southern girl. That was the atrocity that we witnessed that day. That, and the burning of Atlanta.

A few years passed and Howard Hughes, that stalwart designer of military aircraft, including the all plywood Spruce Goose, produced “The Outlaw“. This was the story of the infamous Billy the Kid, and had in it the full gamut of characters, including Doc Holliday and Sheriff Pat Garrett and one named Rio McDonald, who was not found in any history books up to that point. This was Billy’s girl, and she was played by Jane Russell. Jane’s assets, at least the ones on the “upper deck”, were not shown at their best in regular clothes, so Hughes designed a special bra. He was a great engineer and many of us boys suddenly became interested in engineering as a career and went to the movie. Some of us were underage, and the poor acting put us to sleep. It was a really bad movie.

Ms. Russell became famous for her ability to look sexy while being interviewed by famous people. Bob Hope introduced her on one of his shows as “the two and only Jane Russell”. Her partner, Jack Buetel, had been signed to a contract by Hughes and did not appear in another movie for seven years. I really think he did not get another part because it took him that long to get his eyeballs back in their sockets after the famous haystack scene with Jane.

At an interview with some of the denizens of the Table of Truth and Justice in Chattahoochee, some mentioned “Field of Dreams”, but that was from jocks that only think of life in terms of home runs and strikeouts. “Sandlot” was better in my opinion. One did mention “On the Waterfront” with Orson Welles, and it truly should be on anyone’s list. Their rankings also included several “Roadrunner” cartoons, but I refused to add them to such an august listing.

You cannot dispute the greatness of “Casablanca”, even if no one actually said to the pianist “Play it again, Sam”. Dooly Wilson was the man at the keyboard, and he played “As Time Goes By”, and no one else should ever be allowed to play that piece. Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman…..what a pair! Yes, “We will always have Paris” stands out, and I hope, someday soon, to be able to add that to my remembrances, but I do not intend to say it to anyone who resembles Bogart or Bergman.

Movies shown aboard Navy ships were sixteen millimeter versions of commercial shows, but were viewed under sometimes perilous circumstances. Underway on small ships both officers and men watched on the fantail (stern) of the ship, with the after gun mount turned sideways to provide the screen. This always gave a haze gray cast to the characters’ complexions. One gunner’s mate objected to a particular showing because “we just painted the mount today and it might damage the finish”. I never said that we had the brightest men in the Navy, just the best.

Ribald comments always were expressed when actresses such as Elizabeth Taylor, Marilyn Monroe or Jayne Mansfield came into view. Some of these suggestions were probably physically impossible, but added much to the sometimes dull plots. On larger ships the officers had separate viewings in the wardroom. The captain or senior officer present made the choice of the movie, and one particular commodore had a fixation on what we called “Grade Z” westerns. Most had the same plots, shown over and over, but with different characters and vistas.

Then “Rose of Cimarron” came our way and the commodore took a liking to it. The plot was different. Rose was a buxom blonde that rode horses, shot revolvers and roped dogies as good as any man. The movie told about her exploits as she branded cattle, winged evildoers with miraculous hits from her Colts, and even lassoed a mountain lion and dragged him back to town, possibly intending to sell him to Busch Gardens. The dialogue was stilted and usually read from an off stage cue card. We watched this through two nights running and then the sound on the projector went out.

We continued watching, and a junior officer had the idea of reciting the words himself. The movie became our favorite, but always with the sound turned off and one of us uttering the various parts. It was a particularly proud evening when I drew the part of Rose, and I said: “Oh, my darling Sam, will you marry me? I am ready to settle down and have your children”. I of course did this in a deep voice and was applauded loudly.

The best movie of all time? For me, that is easy. It is “Rose of Cimarron”. Yes, I have panned it in this article, but after all it is the only Hollywood production in which I had a speaking part!

Taking The Cure

Seventy five years ago, when I was a mere lad, diseases were rampant in small towns throughout the South.  Doctors had skills in setting bones, removing bullets and stitching up cuts, but going past that, treatment of diseases was “iffy” at best.  The local practitioners could align broken legs and bind up fractured ribs with adhesive tape and with no painkillers. Cuts were washed out with alcohol, stitched, again with no relief from the pain of the curved needles, and then the whole works swabbed with tincture of iodine.  The yellow-brown stain from this often lingered well after the wound healed and the stitches had been removed. Injections from a hypodermic syringe came through a needle that had been re-sharpened on a whet rock in the doctor’s office, and felt like a fishhook barb.
But even then doctors were expensive, although they often would accept as payment a slab of bacon or a sack of corn meal or a jug of “white lightning” from Rock Bluff or Booger Bay. Treatments for ailments as mundane as warts and “stumped” toes, rusty nail punctures and childhood diseases were given at home.  The medicine used often had been handed down through generations of grandmothers, woodsmen and in some cases Indian medicine men. Tree roots and bark, sap of plants or the plants themselves, well pulverized and forced down ailing throats or applied properly actually cured or gave the appearance of curing “what ailed you”.
I noticed the other night on TV that a fast-talking huckster was promoting a product that would cleanse your intestinal tract (his words), thereby getting rid of all accumulated fatty deposits and, I assume, foreign objects that you had tried to digest, and put you on the road to good health and attendant weight loss.  I was struck by this, not enough to send off my $9.95 plus $4.00 for shipping and handling (again, his words, not mine), but because I recalled the annual springtime “through” of medicines that our mothers gave us when we were young.  For those of you that did not experience this, I will explain.  A bitter liquid called calomel, which was a mercury compound, was forced into our mouths, and a few hours later followed by a large dose of castor oil.  I will leave it to you to decide why this was called a “through”.  I would imagine the total cost was about twenty cents, including shipping and handling.  As Carley Simon sings so eloquently “What Goes Around, Comes Around” or does she do “it‘s Coming Around Again”?.  The “through” has returned, but at a much higher cost.
Other products were there for the unsuspecting child that had a real or feigned illness.  Castor oil was the ultimate cure-all.  A good friend of mine, now departed, explained its magic like this:  you would arise on a school day, dreading what lay ahead, which could be a test or a bully that had threatened you on the playground.  You would say “Momma, I don’t feel so good”, and she would pour a dose of castor oil, a vile tasting mess, down your throat.  After some time she would ask how you felt and you would be afraid to claim illness since she would then insist on another dose.  My friend said it never cured anything but cowardice.
Patent medicines were sold in drug stores, grocery stores and from the automobiles of traveling hawkers.  Surprisingly, many are around today.  Claims of magical cures are no longer made and some of the names are changed slightly, but the intimations are still there. Carter’s Little Liver Pills have metamorphosed into “Carter’s Stimulant Laxative”, and can be found in your pharmacy.  It will be next to Ex-Lax, the chocolate-flavored elixir that pranksters often passed off as candy to unsuspecting playmates who were hungry for anything sweet.  By the way, Ex-Lax was a cure for coughing.  If you took enough, you were afraid to cough, or sneeze, or make any sudden moves that might relax certain muscles.
The Mayo Brothers’ Barber Shop in Chattahoochee was that town’s answer to the Forum of ancient Greece.  It was where the sages gathered to watch a few haircuts and to discuss the world’s events.  In 1939 Hitler’s Panzer forces invaded Poland, and continued rolling on through Europe.  One Saturday I was awaiting my turn in the chair.  The discussion centered on the almost assured “end of civilization and/or the world”.  Here was the reasoning: Hitler claimed that his Third Reich would last “a thousand years”.  In the Book of Revelation the author mentioned a thousand year reign of evil that would precede the Second Coming, and the Beast that would supervise this happening had as his mark “666”. 666? The hairs on the back of my neck rose!  I had seen “the Mark of the Beast!”  In fact I had seen several, painted on pieces of tin and nailed on trees and fence posts! I left without my haircut and went to the nearest “Mark”.  It was outside of town but within walking distance.  I neared it with fear and trembling, only to find that it advertised “666 Tonic”, which I assume was good for what ailed you. It must have worked.  It kept Hitler away from our shores. 
Dr. Ludd M. Spivey was an ordained Methodist minister that was assigned in the 1920s as president of a small college in Lakeland, Florida.  Florida Southern College had two buildings, about two hundred students and a lot of debt.  The trustees voted to close the doors, but Dr. Spivey vetoed this, and set out to raise money and to make the school unusual.  He convinced the noted architect Frank Lloyd Wright that he should design its buildings.  Spivey then went out to raise funds.  The first Wright building was to be a chapel, and the story of how the money was acquired connects to patent medicine.
Dr. Spivey was in Chicago and the day was typical for that city:  cold and windy.  He was walking down the street and he saw a lady who was dressed shabbily and looked cold, so he invited her to dine with him.  In conversation she learned about his dream for his college and about the proposed chapel and the estimated cost.  They parted, but within a few weeks, Dr. Spivey received a check for the amount he had cited.  The check was from a patent medicine company and the chapel, still standing, is a monument to Dr. Spivey, Mr. Wright and a “bag lady“.
There were other patent medicines out there. Some are no longer in existence.  As a child with asthma, I had to inhale the smoke from Asmador, which was made from eucalyptus leaves.  Today we wheezers have immediate relief from a variety of potions, oops, I meant medicines, that are more effective.  I was given cod liver oil, usually by my mother, who wielded the spoon while my father forced my jaws open.  Today we purchase fish oil pills.  I take them, but I learned that for an hour or two after taking one my breath smells as though I am holding a sardine under my tongue. Now I wait till I get home and pop the pill and go to bed.  And then my cats join me and seem to enjoy the air that I breathe out.
Iodine has been “decolorized”, and it’s about time, too. Vick’s Vap-o-Rub is gone, and that is good.  (The non-existance of Vick’s Vap-o-Rub has been disputed, however, it does not change my opinion of this “kudzu killing” salve.)  My grandmother used it and mustard plasters to treat my colds, and that is why I went through life with only six hairs on my chest. Nothing could grow where Vick’s had been.  It could kill kudzu.  She also believed that turpentine was good for ground itch and, with a small amount of whiskey added, bronchial problems.  Enough whiskey would cure almost anything in those days.
Yes, I know that I have not mentioned Epsom Salts, Ben Gay, Cloverine Salve, camphorated oil nor a hundred other nostrums.  But I have to save some for a future column.  Stay tuned!

Trophies, Accomplishments and a Birthday Gift

I’m in trouble……big trouble.
Not as bad as Royce Reagan is.  Today at the Memorial Day observance several folks complimented me on winning my first 5k event.  Royce, ever eager to draw attention  away from his knobby knees, came out loud and clear proclaiming that I’m three years older than I had stated and, what’s more (and this is his big trouble) “The Runner” is also three years older than I had indicated.  I can accept being eighty three, but he should know that you never add to a lady’s age.  If he gets his wheel chair tires slit, don’t blame me. As the Book of Nicodemus says:  “Hell has no fury like a Runner lied about”.
My trouble does not stem from my age, but my references to trophies and my two daughters’ recognitions throughout their lives.  If you recall, in a recent column I stated: “I live in a house filled with trophies”.  I went on to tell of Meredith the Baseball Coach and her athletic attainments, and how Ashlee the Nutritionist garnered one basketball letter and many cheerleading awards, and looked pretty while doing it.
All this sounded harmless until someone who signed himself “anonymous” suggested that my son also had a few trophies and many accomplishments, and why did I not write about them.  I am certain that Mark himself did not do this, since he is modest and retiring and never calls attention to himself, but it could be from one, or maybe both, of his friends.  And “anonymous” is correct.  I just don’t like having topics suggested, except during two hour breakfasts at the Gazebo.
Before I proceed, though, you should know something about my family.
Theresa and I found that we could not have children, so we decided to adopt.  Our first contact with the Children’s Home Society in Tallahassee led to a beautiful little red headed girl coming into our home.  This was “Meredith the Baseball Coach”, although she was not a coach at the time.  A couple of years later we went to Tallahassee and picked up “Ashlee the Nutritionist”.  These worked out so well that we felt it would be appropriate for us to seek a hard-to-place child, a boy this time.
My wife had been a Presbyterian until we got married and I lied to her about how long my family had been Methodists.  She changed denominations but always held to predestination as an abiding belief.  On June 13 we talked and decided to approach our caseworker about our feelings.  A few weeks later the lady came over to our home with four files, and one was of a little boy who had been born on June 13!  Predestination came through; Methodism fell behind!
On Labor Day Theresa and I went to Fort Myers and picked up our son.  Mark had been born with one hand, a problem that we figured we could cope with.  After an operation we put him in with the other two children and sat back to watch.  Mark was eager to please; his two sisters looked on him as a butt for their pranks.  Somewhere there is a picture of him dressed in Ashlee’s dance class tutu. This was all right with him, since he figured he had a long life to even up.
We named each child appropriately.  Meredith’s first name is Glenda, for Theresa’s sister.  The Meredith came from “Dandy Don” Meredith, an athlete and sportscaster.  Ashlee’s middle name is Ione, for another of Theresa’s sisters.  The “Lee” part is for Robert E. Lee, who else?  Mark came with the name “Mark” firmly attached, so we inserted “Stuart” into the middle, since we were able to afford a middle name for him, and Stuart was General Lee’s cavalry commander, one of the best ever.
Theresa felt that we should make each child proud to be adopted, so she would tell each one an “adoption” story.  Meredith heard about our trip to Miami and it being the coldest day in twenty five years in that tropical paradise.  Ashlee learned that she was bald, and somewhat ugly (at least in my opinion) and had a propensity for soiling her diapers, which meant she had to be changed often, just as we should change elected officials often, and for the same reason.

And Mark, in his eagerness, would plead: “Tell me my adoption story”.  Theresa would use some license and tell him that we got him from Monkey Jungle and that when we went into a café for coffee, the waitress asked: “And can I bring you a banana for your monkey?”  His comment was usually “OH, Mother!”  This stood as a joke until two years ago, when Mark and his son and I actually went through Monkey Jungle, and on the way out we saw a sign that said “Adopt a Primate”.  He looked at me and I just smiled.
Mark’s “handicap” did not hold him back. His teachers were instructed to let him try everything, and if he failed, then so be it.  He played football, and the trumpet, and rode a bicycle and at age twelve would sneak my car out at midnight.  His two sisters took piano from Mrs. Charolett Bailey in Chattahoochee, and once while I was talking with her after the girl’s lessons I heard someone swinging out with “When the Saints Go Marching In” on the organ. When I inquired who it was, she shrugged and said “Oh, that’s just your son”.
Accomplishments?  He had many.  He managed to get through Sneads High School without reading a book until his senior year.  Mrs. Pam Rentz demanded that he read a book from the senior list and write a review.  He conned her into letting him select one from my library, and his report was on “Young Stonewall Jackson”.  He got an F for his effort.  I felt that he should have gotten an F+.
One summer while Theresa was visiting her sister in Maryland, Mark talked me into building a deck as a surprise for her.  We did not use a kit.  My cuts were ragged; his were square.  I bent nails right and left; he drove his straight and true.  We even constructed a fire pit from concrete blocks.
I did go down to the school office once on his behalf.  In the ninth grade he wanted to take a computer class, but was told he could not since he had not had typing and he could not take typing because he had only one hand.  The principal relented, and before the year was out he had found his calling, and today he is a contractor with an outfit called National High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, and gets big awards from them, including something that looked suspiciously like a trophy to me.
Mark took ten years, working off and on, to acquire his bachelor’s degree.  He progressed better after I cut him off and his Ford Probe wore out.  During this process he got married and divorced, but ended up with a fine son who is now sixteen and falls for my jokes and likes Civil War battlefields and aircraft carriers and destroyers and can program my I-Pod with our kind of music.
Mark and I seldom agreed on anything.  We are different, but very much alike.  We are both stubborn.  We are both left handed.  He plays tennis and softball and scuba dives.  I play none of these sports, but I did win a ribbon in a 5k.  So what if it took me eighty years!
 Some years ago I hit on giving a dollar for every year of age to my children and grandchildren for their birthday.  I will be sending Mark a check soon, and also this column about his accomplishments.
The U. S. Navy’s highest accolade is just two words.  I send them to my son:  Well Done, Mark Stuart Hirt!