News photos that have grown whiskers and have become history
This group won a softball trophy in 1965, but I couldn’t read the trophy to see what place it was. I recognize Sally Wright second from left in the front row and Yvonne Askew third from left in the second row. A couple other faces look familiar, but I’m not going to make a guess.
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I could have sworn The Missourian ran school menus, but I poked around for several weeks of old papers and couldn’t find them. I don’t have a lot of memories of the Trinity Lutheran School cafeteria. I managed to convince my parents to let me slip off the school grounds most days to eat at Wayne’s Grill.
The black and white photos were taken February 13, 1967.
I had a weakness for Sloppy Joes, described in Wikipedia as “an American dish of ground beef, onions, sweetened tomato sauce or ketchup and other seasonings, served on a hamburger bun.”
I was so fond of them, in fact, I kind overdid it one day just before going out to the playground. The resulting spewage spoiled the sandwich for me forever. It’s not quite as bad as my Dr. Herbert wooden stick phobia, but it ranks a close second.
This is what the cafeteria area looked like in 2010.
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I ran this photo back in May with some basketball tournament photos, so I hope that either everybody is so hung over they won’t bother to read the page on New Year’s Day or that they have gotten to the age where their short-term memory has gone blank.The Happy New Year sign was on our living room window.
I don’t have a lot of fond memories of New Year’s Eve. I never cared much for parties and particularly didn’t like to be out on “amateur night,” when the streets had drunk drivers roaming around. One night in particular, and I remember it as New Year’s Eve, but I can’t swear to it, I was on my way home when I rolled up on a fresh wreck. Car vs. utility pole with the vehicle on its side and the wires sparking all over the place.
Somehow or another, I managed to convince the people in the car to STAY THERE. As long as the car isn’t on fire or about to explode, you’re a lot safer inside. The metal body works like a Faraday Cage, with the electrical charge riding the surface of the vehicle. If the occupant gets out and gives the power a chance to use his body as a path to ground, things get ugly. If you can’t jump completely clear of the vehicle, then you are better off waiting until the power is cut off.
I don’t know if I had to load my camera in the dark and in the excitement, but I didn’t get the end of the roll of film engaged in the takeup spool and it slipped off when I hit the advance lever. I was clicking away like mad, but there was no film being pulled through to be exposed. After the power had been shut off and the victims transported, I left. I’m not sure how long it was before I checked the camera and discovered my mistake, but by the time I got back, all I was able to shoot was a mugshot of a car with a power pole on top of it.
I never loaded a camera again without reaching for the rewind knob and making sure there was resistance, indicating that the end of the film was firmly on the takeup spool.
Let’s put another myth of rest: your rubber tires won’t keep you safe. I worked a cherrypicker that tangled with a power line. The voltage was high enough that the charge arched from the steel rims of the huge truck tires to ground, melting the rubber. One of the workers had the good sense to stay on the truck. The other panicked and tried to get down. He evidently had one hand on the truck when his feet hit the ground because all that electricity found him a more convenient path than having to arc through the air. THAT was an object lesson you don’t forget.
We had an elderly woman, Helen, living across the street from us who enjoyed Southern Comfort and shrimp cocktail. We invited her over to ring in the New Year with us. I had just poured the first drink and reached for the first shrimp when I got a call from the office: a rare winter tornado had swept though an RV park on an island in Lake Okeechobee near Belle Glade. There were reports of injuries and power lines down. It was late, but could I get somebody out there and back in time to make deadline?
I knew where the park was and I knew I was sober, so I saddled up and drove 50 miles through driving rain, dodged arcing power lines, shot off enough frames to show that SOMETHING had happened and jetted back. I made deadline with some not-so-memorable photos, but sometimes that’s all you can hope for.
So, I am going to be as happy to be sitting here at home on New Year’s Eve, hoping all that ammo our neighbors are shooting up into the sky will come down on them and not rain down on our house.
News outlets always run Top 10 stories at the end of the year because (a) they are usually short-staffed; (b) readers and viewers are busy with family activities and drop off; (c) it’s easy and can be done in advance, and (d) it’s traditional. So, for all of those reasons, except (c), here are the highest-read pages of 2012.
A 2010 post about the old gym uniforms topped the 2012 list because it went viral on another site. It was viewed 3,576 times.
I covered Simon and Garfunkel at Ohio University in 1968. This story was seen by 1,736 readers.
I was hoping to get back to update my Johnson Shut-Ins photos last summer but didn’t make it. Still, 1,674 folks looked at my old pictures.
My tale of getting to cover Queen Elizabeth II in the Bahamas because I was the only guy on the staff with a suit ranked 4th, with 1,462 views.
David Holley, the last man living in Wittenberg and a storyteller supreme died April 11 of lung cancer. I only talked with the man twice, but he’s a character I’ll remember forever. His wife, Joanne, lives in one of only two buildings left in the once-vibrant Mississippi River town
Low river levels has put Tower Rock in the news. A November 2011 story on the abandoned quarry south of The Rock was viewed 1,193 times.
I was hoping the river would drop low enough for me to walk over to Tower Rock like Brother Mark and I did in 2003. It didn’t quite make it, and I didn’t want to take my inaugural kayak ride solo in the Mississippi River when these geocachers made the climb. The page was viewed 1,120 times, and 407 people clicked through to watch the video I produced about the day.
I was interviewing Wife Lila’s Uncle Ray Seyer on a wide-ranging number of topics. Somehow or another, Rush Limbaugh came up. He described the high school Rush as a “horse’s patootie” for the way he monopolized the CB radio channels even when truckers were trying to get directions to local businesses. The page had 1,104 visitors.
A 2010 story pointing out the coincidence of Koran burner Terry Jones and Rush Limbaugh both being members of the Cape Central Class of 1969 is still getting hits. It came in 9th with 1,099 readers.
I was running some errands when a warehouse across the street from our house exploded into flames. Wife Lila dialed 9-1-1, then grabbed her camera and started shooting. The West Palm Beach Fire Marshall and 1,099 other readers were interested in her handiwork.
If you were one of the folks who stopped by 357,930 times during the year, don’t forget to place your Amazon orders by clicking on this big button or on the links at the top left of the page. I get a small percentage to keep the lights on and it doesn’t cost you anything extra.