Bobby Took Us to the Pour House!

And you thought we had gone to the poor house? Not quite yet, but life is more and more challenging for us as anyone else. I think of the Poor House and am reminded of the old folks home in Ghent, New York. It was where aged without families or resources would go years ago. There probably a lot of those years ago and I felt sad about the one in Ghent on one hand, but felt comforted that those people had somewhere they could call home. But getting back to the subject of this blog, note that we went, not to the poor house - but the POUR house. As in Cambridge City, Indiana. A nice place for a good cup of coffee, a great sandwich, and super fudge.

As a diabetic, I should avoid the word fudge but, hey, fudge is good no matter how you spell it or say it,like, "Ohhhhh,........fudge!"

Bobby is our worthy tour leader at church and she is driver, navigator and whatever else she does to keep her passengers happy. A few weeks I talked about our trip to Delphi, Indiana, and this trip took us east, almost to Richmond along the old National Road, otherewise known as US-40. Cambridge City is known for its antique shops and it has a great history. The picture of a sign above talks about the Overbeck family of artists and sculptors who were famed in the artworld. Near Cambridge City is the Huddleston House, built in 1839 ( now a museum) and in great shape. In Greenfield are great memories of poet James Whitcomb Riley.

And sharp-eyed Joyce saw a Studebaker sign between Greenfield and Indianapolis. One of the great cars though Joyce did not like my 1950 Studebaker Commander because it was black, but the sign piqued my interest to the point that later we drove back and found it was an outlet for parts and memorabilia of this famous auto and truck manufacturer long gone but not forgotten. You may even find a Studebaker sticker on my Dodge Caliber, not that I don't love my Caliber but memories reign supreme in the hearts of some of us old guys.

At any rate, it was a fun trip and I'm grateful for Bobby's efforts to put trips like this together, and for the 'Ancient Mariners' group that fill the bus each trip. Now, we look forward to a Brown County trip later this week and we'll report on that later.

The March of Time

The two pictures are of the same spot. The bottom one is the 'before' picture; the top one is the 'after' view of the same location. They were taken 25 years apart.

Maybe the same think has happened in your neighborhood. Joyce has reflected on the same kind of thing where she grew up. Before World War Two her street was out in the country. After the war the whole area blossomed with homes and today Detroit's suburbs have moved quite some distance west.

It so happens that the pictures I've used are of Elmont, Long Island New York. In the 1930's it was a quiet rural suburb of New York City. Some 120 families live on and worked the farms. I remember going with my father out to Long Island and seeing all the farms. Once in a while we would stop and watch the airplanes flying in and out of Roosevelt Field, from which Lindbergh departed on his historic flight to Europe. To get to Long Island we would ride a ferry from New Rochelle, New York across Long Island Sound to Port Washington.

Twenty five years after the 'before' picture, parkways and Interstates were built as well as some beautiful bridges. The door had been opened to new 'settlers' and Elmont had changed from a farming community to a 24,000 community. In fact, it became wall-to-wall residential communities close to New Yorks major airport, first known as Idlewilde Airport and what is now know as JFK airport.

The world just marches on - growing and populations increase as well. So, if we have any thought that things will never change, they are never true around cities. There are a lot of rural areas - scenic areas - that continue to exist. But as I said, time just marches on and you never know what tomorrow and the tomorrows years from now will look like. But it is fun to look back in history and think of what used to be.

"So Round So Firm So Fully Packed.....

.....That's my Girl" was the name of a country music top seller a lot of years ago.

However, So Round So Firm So Fully packed also describes an object in our refrigerator. Well. half of it anyway. It has to be the biggest cantaloupe I have ever seen. Fact is, when I weighed the remaining half this morning it weighed five and a half pounds so when it was new and fully intact I presume it weighed at least ten pounds, maybe more. About like a bowling ball.

A few weeks ago I mentioned how much I love watermelon. Believe it or not, this critter was as big as a small watermelon - I don't mean one of those puny little watermelons - I mean a small full-size watermelon. I never knew cantaloupes (or whatever is the one in the picture) could be so big - but it is/was good. There was some concern by my beloved that it might not be good because it was so big but it was the sweetest melon this side of Chicago. Well, maybe even this side of Tucson, Arizona. After having been accused of taking the biggest melon on the shelf, I was very much relieved that it was perfect eating.

A long time ago -back in the mid-1950's - we had another experience with melons. It was either in Sacramento, California or Tucson, Arizona (we moved so often in those days that some events tend to congeal) that we saw a fruit stand along the highway. They had cantaloupes as well - priced at ten for a dollar. But they were small and nowhere near as tasty as our Indiana prize. And yes, this came from a roadside fruit stand as well. It cost a bit more (three dollars) but it may well have weighed as much as the gross weight of the ten we got in the '50's. So, all you folks who live in crowded cities, or areas that don't have cantaloupe ranches or farms or whatever, eat your hearts out while we eat some of the best cantaloupe this side of heaven.

Hot as it may have been (or is) in Indiana, I'll accept the heat along with the great fruit and veggies we enjoyed this year.

Upper Room Thought for the Day

One of my Favorite Pictures....

....but it's not one of our children. It was a little girl at company Christmas party for Salvation Army children. And yes, it's me in the background hoping she won't damage the flight control simulator.

I really enjoyed working for McDonnell Aircraft un the days before mergers. Although my clock number was 95702, it didn't seem as if I was working for a large company. The head of the company, J.S. McDonnell, would come over the public address system with pep talks preceded with raps on the microphone and his call, "This is Mac, this is Mac, calling all the teammates." And that was how we felt - part of a team - part of a 'family' of workers, proud of our products and proud of our company. They even had annual company picnics at Blanchette Park in St. Charles, across the Missouri River from the St. Louis airport where the factory was located.

McDonnell Aircraft had all kinds of outreach prograns in the St. Louis area. It was a company that cared for the city it grew up in. The planetarium in Forest Park

was named after J.S. McDonnell. All over the city of St. Louis are things reflecting the generosity of the company. It was a day when there was a personal touch to a Company image - a caring touch that impacted many people.

So it was at Christmas when children were invited to share the Christmas spirit.

Our department hosted a number of children from a less-priviledged life style. The little girl above was one of our guests andit is evident that she is getting a thrill from 'flying' a flight control trainer in the departmental training department. I love the expression on her face. And I was glad to be a part of bringing joy into a young persons life.

I don't think the company atmosphere was ever the same after the merger with Douglas Aircraft. It was more like becoming a corporate number instead of part of a company family. Like so many things, the 'family' atmosphere in industry seems to have disappeared. Maybe it has never been there and it seemed that way just to me. Maybe automation, robots, and labor unrest has replaced old-time industrial pride, but I like to remember a time when a company seemed to care about its community and its employees, and employees were proud of who they worked for. Some of the old time things were not so bad.

Clip Joint - circa 1962

I've had a lot of jobs but the one I've not talked about much was as a barber. I know, the barber's Union may come down hard on me for being a non-union scab, and the Commonweath of Virginia may act retroactively on my non-licensed activities. Or maybe the statute of limitations may have run out since it was a long time ago.

However, the more likely reaction may be a protest from the subject getting the haircut. But maybe he'll appreciate the generous crop of hair being displaced to the ground at the time.

For myself, I'd be pretty well off if I had charged today's going rate for haircuts. But those were days when a penny or three counted and any old way we could save was the way to go. I only had one style of haircut and that was a buzz cut or crew cut. Just whack it off with different cutter heads and say, "well, that's another few dollars saved."

I was in a big department the other day with my good half and mentioned that maybe we might buy a clipper with a variety of heads and she could cut my hair. She gave me one of those looks a wife sometimes gives a husband when he comes up with a far-out idea, and said, "I don't think so." I neglected to say I might pay her to do it - maybe the reaction would have been different.

I think she likes my silver locks the way they are and the way Carolyn does the haircut. Yes, I use a lady barber - a no-no in the old days. After all, the barber shop was a man's stronghold years ago - one of those places a lady never set foot in. Now I may be getting along in years, but I am young enough that I never saw a Police Gazette there and it was too soon for Playboy. But times have changed, and so have some barber shops, and so have the two figures in the picture above. But I won't complain if he won't.

Old Navy

"Old Navy" is a correct description of the vessels above - they go back some 70 years - back, in fact, to World War Two or before. They are models of actual U.S. Navy ships, like the cruiser Portland and destroyers Sampson, Jouett, and Davis.

Before the war started I got the idea of making a scale model of every ship in the active Navy. Using an ancient copy of Janes Fighting Ships (the authoritive book listing all Navy ships of the world) I began to make small models of active ships.
Using small pieces of balsa, at a scale of 100 feet to the inch, I crudely shaped the hulls and super structures. Guns were formed with magnet wire, and the vessels were, for the most part, painted with water soluble poster colors. A scale model of the battleship North Carolina is in the set but it is battered with it's superstructure pretty well gone because it was too high for the box it was in.

I don't know what got me off on this project - I think I saw some models made by a neighbor's son who was a student at Annapolis. Also, I often got caught up in the enthusiam a lot of teen agers had about the Navy in the late thirties and early forties. I even tried to join the Navy during the war but was rejected because I was too young (my father was not happy at all about this ill-fated attempt which involved playing hookie from school).

Anyway, this little box of models has somehow survived all our moves and is a reminder of an early-age passion. So has a copy of the 1942 edition of "Janes all the world Fighting Ships" that provided dimensions and outlines of the ship models.
Not all the ship models survived - among the missing is a very complex model of the first aircraft carrier "Langley". However, I'm happy the small number that HAVE survived are still around - they remain a memory of creative times and of a teen-agers love of the Navy. Now that I think of it, my life has involved the Army, Air Force, Marines, and Navy at one time or another. Not many people can claim that and no one has this many ships that are long gone but not forgotten by the men who sailed aboard them