The News from Herman Junction

SEVEN YEARS AT LEVY: POST #76: JAN. 10, 2011

2011-01-10T08:59:00.000-08:00

How in the world would a person be able to describe seven years of his life on just one blog? It isn't possible, so I don't know when I will quit writing about Levy.

How we loved that church! We were just kids and I didn't have sense enough to know that I had no business being their preacher. I remember one day riding down the road to a funeral at Beebe, Ark. for Lindy Beaver's Father. I had a car full of people. One of the fellows in the back seat asked, "Ted, how old are you?" "Twenty-Six", I said. Brother Mel Landers was in the front seat with me and he said in sort of a startled way, "You told us that you were Thirty!" I replied, "No, I didn't. You guys asked me if I was thirty and I said NO." Barbara was Twenty-Three and we had two babies and here we were with a congregation of 400 people to work with. They were so patient and loving to us, especially the elders...Harry McCorkle, L.T. Blevins, Mel Landers, Guy Stewart, and Ted Sorrells.

One day about two weeks after moving to Levy my office phone rang and the voice at the other end said, "This is Al Jolly", who was the preacher at Sylvan Hills. We had a good visit and a few days later Al called and asked me to go visit the Green's with him and I agreed to go. I thought that we were going to visit a family named Green and when he picked me up and drove to the Golf course I learned for the first time about greens. I had never been on a golf course, used a golf club, and never dreamed that I would be crazy enough to go out there and hit a ball and then walk to it and hit it again, over and over again. I am a left handed swinger and they rented me a set of clubs and off we went to the greens. I like it pretty well and Al and I played often for several years. I remember one day that he had hit a ball out of the fairway and was over there trying to hit it and was not having much success. Suddenly I heard him say to himself, "Well, Arnold Palmer can't preach either!" One time Al and I were asked to help with a funeral service for a man that neither or us knew. The only special request that the family had was for us to sing, "The Great Speckled Bird." I told Al that I could Roy Acuff's part if he could get Brother Oswald's." But, we didn't do it of course. Al became a great influence in my life and I learned so many things from him and still love him even if he did move to Texas many years ago.

Our work at Levy prospered. We had a lot of good things that happened there through the years. We had some of the greatest gospel meetings that I have ever been associated with. In 1967 there was a State wide television program called, "Journey To Eternity" presented by churches of Christ all over the State. The campaign on TV was followed by a one night meeting in Barton Coliseum and thousands attended the service to hear brother Mid McKnight preach. We had scheduled a city wide campaign for the same dates so we moved our campaign to one week following the television presentation. Brother Harvey Starling was our speaker. A couple of nights before our campaign started we had 153 of our own members who assembled and went from door to door inviting people to come to our building for the campaign. We had workers every day out in the field studying the bible with people. At the end of the campaign we had baptized 22 folk and 73 others came to be restored to their first love or asking for prayers of the church. The attendance averaged 496 per service which probably still stands as the highest average attendance for a gospel campaign in Pulaski County.

We had other great campaigns with men like E.R. Harper, Jack Gray, Glen McDoniel, Cleon Lyles, V.E. Howard, Alan Bryan, Charles Lemons, Ira North, and others. No one was there to tell us that gospel meetings do not work. I wish that we could have so many more of those meetings today and we could if brethren would work as hard as our brethren did then to help them succeed.

The need for additional men in the leadership of the church was very great. In October 1966 we added several men to serve as Deacons in the Levy church. Then, in 1969 J.J. Pace, Jack McGee, and Roy Brown were added to the eldership.

Brother Mel Landers had a serious heart attack shortly after retiring. One Sunday the other elders and I went to visit him in a hospital in Pine Bluff, Ark. It was during that time that I mentioned to the elders that I would like to someday go into full time evangelism and mission work and them get someone else to fill the pulpit. We talked about it several times. But, in the beginning of 1973 I decided to resign my work with Levy and did so the first Sunday in February. I had no idea where my family and I would go but we knew that God would take care of us. We had no idea how it would be done or when it would begin, but here is what happened.

Following the service when my resignation was read, L.T. and Dorothea Blevins took us out to eat at Bowen's restaurant in Conway. During our lunch Brother Henry Jones, an elder in the Robinson & Center Street congregation in Conway came over to our table to visit. I must have told him that I was making a change in our work. About two hours later I got a phone call from Brother Arless Murray, one of the elders of the Hillcrest church of Christ in Oklahoma City, Ok. He told me that he had just had a call from someone recommending me as a preacher for the Hillcrest church. My resignation had not been made known more than four hours earlier. I told Brother Murray that we would come and discuss the work with them, then I turned to Barbara and told her about the call and laughed and said, "I will go and talk with them, but there is no way that I am moving to Oklahoma City!" My ignorance and arrogance all came out at the same time. I'll tell you where the Herman Junction boy moved in the next post.

TED'S RULES FOR FLYING: POST #75 APRIL 1, 2010

2010-04-01T16:55:00.000-07:00

1. Old people cannot fly. They can't find their row and seat assignments nor put their luggage up in the overhead bins, and they have to go to the toilet every three minutes. Kids, take them wherever they need to go or keep them at home
2. Anyone with a neck brace on or an arm in a cast cannot fly unless it is on an Air France plane everywhere they go.
3. All parents with crying babies must be put on the back row behind some kind of sound barrier unless it is one of my Great-Grandchildren, then they can sit with me and Great-Grandma.
4. If I am in an aisle seat and someone just parks right in the aisle with his back to me and his rear end right in my face, they will be thrown out the window.
5. If there is not an exit row or bulk head seat available, I will be automatically upgraded to business class.
6. Those bing-bong sounds that keep going off, especially when I am trying to take a nap, will be disengaged forever!
7. Anyone who even resembles a terrorist will not be on a plane that I am on and I will be the judge of who looks like a terrorist.
8. Old women, ugly girls, and gay guys cannot be flight attendants except on Air France.
9. All meals will be made from recipes from Herman Junction chefs. Cheeseburgers and fries (not FRENCH fries) for lunch; Corn bread and fried potatoes for supper, and Mexico Chiquito cheese dip and chips for a snack.
10. All pilots will be trained by that 'Sully' pilot that landed that plane safely in the Hudson River.
11. Anyone who asks me if the Clinton's are from Arkansas one more time will ride the entire flight on the toilet seat.
12. No alcoholic beverages will be served, especially to Texas Rednecks who keep yelling, "Don't mess with Texas."
13. If I have to sit on a plane more than thirty minutes my money will be refunded.
14, The next gate agent from Paris, France who lies to me will have to move to Red Onion, Arkansas and pick cotton for the rest of their life.
15. Delta Airlines must sever all relations with Air France. Come to think of it, Air France should not be allowed to fly anywhere but in France
16. I will not be served my Sprite anymore in a little cup that is empty after one gulp. Mayonaise jars will replace them immediately!
17. Every plane will have a 'Razorback' emblem on it somewhere and everyone will call the hogs while those attendants make all those safety announcements that you cannot hear and understand anyway.
18. When I am flying home to Arkansas, I am not to be flown OVER Arkansas and then brought back four hours later.
19. Great, Great, big fat people who are eating Cheetos and Reese's peanut butter cups cannot fly at all unless it is on Air France and with their food they will surely lose some weight.
20. Trips to the toilet will be limited to one trip per flight and after that you can use that mayonaise jar that you had left over from drinking your Sprite.
21. Waking me up to crawl over me and get out will result in your being super-glued to your seat the rest of the flight.
22. Any complaints about these rules will be dealt with according to age and size of the complainer.

HERMAN JUNCTION BOY GOES FLYING: POST #74, APRIL 1, 2010

2010-04-01T16:37:00.000-07:00

I never flew much out of Herman Junction as I was growing up there, at least by airplane. Now, when Harvel got behind the wheel of a car you could almost feel it lifting off the ground at times. We had a pretty good air strip with Old, Old, Highway 63 running right through Herman Junction.

But, since I left Herman Junction I have done my share of flying and I still don't like it one bit. A friend told me once, "The Lord said, "LOW I'll be with you always." I think that is right too. However, I have accepted the fact that if I am going to go some of the places that I want to go, I must fly.

I recently made a trip to Romania for about the 50th time. I had some experiences that I must tell you about. Of course, it was on an Air France plane and that is about as bad as it gets for me. I had rather fly on one of the crop dusters in the Herman Junction area as to ride one of their planes. Here is one reason why....

The main meal of the day on that 5,000 plus mile, one way trip was a choice between these two things:

Mixed vegetable salad and poached egg; Lamb meatballs and Semolina, OR, Neapolitan style Cheese tortellini. Then, they added a tiny piece of Camembert Cheese, a Pineapple stick, a tiny piece of what they called Raspberry cake but it wasn't, and rolls hard enough to knock the depot over if you threw one at it.

Most of you know what I thought about that poached egg salad deal. I did eat the pineapple stick, the raspberry supposed to be cake, and one bite of the strange cheese. It was awful. To my surprise I did try the Lamb meatballs. I just closed my eyes, plopped one in my mouth and it really wasn't all that bad so I ate another one or two. But, all that I could think while I was eating it was: "Mary had a little Lamb, it's fleece was white as snow. Now it's all chewed up in a boy from Herman Junction, and it's off to Arkansas he go."

I asked what "Semolina" was and when that French flight attendant answered it sounded to me like she said something about "Goose" and that closed that deal. I would have liked to ask for a baloney sandwich but I knew that would have been talking in tongues to her as much as she was to me.

All of these flying experiences have moved to to do something about it. So, I have submitted my set of rules for flying to the FAA, certain that they will be approved. If you don't like them you can just take the bus or train. They will be in the next blog post.

HERMAN JUNCTION ECONOMICS LESSON:POST #73 FEB. 25, 2010

2010-02-25T16:13:00.000-08:00

I never knew a rich family or person monetarily that lived at Herman Junction. Sometimes when we would be working in the fields the land owner might come driving down the road real slow just looking over the crops and I would look at that bright, shiny, new car and the driver with a big cigar in his mouth and think about how lucky he was and how rich he must have been. But, I didn't know any rich people. We were richer than we realized, just not in money.

But, my Dad and a lot of other people in Herman Junction knew a lot more about handling finances than a lot of rich and powerful people do today, especially those in Washington who are supposed to know about such things. I never heard of anyone going bankrupt. I didn't even know what that meant until years later. I believe that I learned something from the Herman Junction folks about the economy that I wish our 'guvment' leaders today would learn. And, the American people would be much better off if they would learn this lesson to. Want to know what it is? Here it comes....

"IF YOU DON'T HAVE MONEY TO SPEND, DON'T SPEND!"

If my Dad didn't have the money for something that we wanted or thought that we needed, he didn't hesitate to say, "We don't have the money." We made other arrangements without an argument because we knew that was the end of that conversation. If Mom wanted new curtains, a washing machine, running water in the house and a bathroom, that was fine but it didn't come until there was money to pay for it. If we kids wanted skates, a bicycle, new basketball, or whatever, we didn't get it until there was money to pay for it. I needed some Converse athletic shoes for basketball one time but Dad didn't have the money so older brother Harvel bought me some. He just didn't spend money when he didn't have money to spend. A few months before Dad died he told me, "I want to leave this earth not owing anyone a dime" and he did it. That is quite an accomplishment for a guy with a fourth grade education who was just yanked up by the hair of the head, and the seat of his britches but worked really, really, hard and didn't spend money that he didn't have.

Is there anything in there that you cannot understand? Isn't it simple? Today our leaders continue to spend, spend, spend, and the hole just gets deeper, deeper, and deeper because they don't have the money to spend but they keep on spending. Some families are doing the same thing. Why are there so many mortgage foreclosures, cars repossessed, and savings depleted? People are spending what they don't have to spend! Government is spending what it doesn't have to spend! Yes, I know that some people have unexpectedly lost their jobs or medical expenses or some other catastrophe has wiped them out, but in MOST cases spending what we didn't have to spend has led us down a path to heartache.

If I could give some families some economic advice today it would be simply this: "If you don't have the money to go out and eat, EAT AT HOME! If you don't have the money to go to the movies, STAY HOME and play with the kids or read a book! If you don't have the money to trade cars, DRIVE THE OLD ONE! If you don't have the money for a new suit or dress, PATCH up your old ones for awhile! If you don't have the money to pay for that dumb cell phone with all the text message system, GPS system, TV, Camera, Music, go to Wal-Mart and buy a 'Go Phone' for $19.95 and just settle for a CELL PHONE! If you can't pay for a new TV, listen to the radio until you can buy a new one and pay for it. Throw out the credit cards, burn up the ATM cards and debit cards, and don't even think about charging something! If you don't have money to spend, DON'T SPEND!

After all, look at the expert who is writing this!! Well, I know that I don't have enough money to pay attention, but I have a 1973 Monte Carlo and a 1996 Grand Marquis, both paid for and I ain't spending money that I don't have to keep up with people that I don't even like. So, hear it one more time....

"IF YOU DON'T HAVE MONEY TO SPEND, DON'T SPEND!!

THE HOLY GUM SLOUGH DITCH: POST #72: FEB. 22, 2010

2010-02-22T17:53:00.000-08:00

Every year there was at least one evangelistic gospel meeting ( some call them revivals) held at the church of Christ in Bay, Arkansas where we attended church services. These gospel meetings sometimes lasted two weeks and if the weather got too hot they would move the pews outside and string up some lights and conduct services under the stars. Herbert and Dessie Knight never missed one service of these meetings unless there was some very serious conflict like sickness or something. We walked to the meeting many nights after Dad had worked on the railroad all day and the others worked in the fields. However, the meeting usually was scheduled after the crops were 'laid by', so it was a little easier. After services we would walk back home until Dad got a car and then of course we would ride and that was much better. I remember the gospel meetings so well and remember many of the preachers who came to preach.

When gospel meetings were conducted it was not unusual to have several people respond to the invitation to be baptized. There was no baptistery in the early days. So, many times it would be several days before the baptisms were done. Then, everyone would meet at the Gum Slough Ditch and all be baptized at the same time. I remember when 46 people were baptized there in one meeting in which the preachers name was V.E. Howard. Until the church had a baptistery installed, the Gum Slough Ditch was the official baptizing place for the church of Christ.

I got to thinking about that one day. I thought that the Gum Slough must have been either the most righteous ditch in the country or the dirtiest ditch one could find. If all those sins were washed off right there in the ditch it would surely muddy it up bad. But, I don't think that was the case. I think that those sins were washed away in the blood of Jesus and that Gum Slough ditch must have been the most holy body of water in the entire county. I guess that is why the old swimming hole on down the ditch a little ways was so suitable for a swim. The swimming hole was called, "The Forks".

We got a baptistery later and then baptisms took place in the building. I think that I mentioned this earlier but when it was put in someone must have misplaced the drain stopper and it was replaced by a Dr. Pepper. Sometimes some ugly-minded guy would get in there and grab the Dr. Pepper and the next service the baptistery was dry. All of that is fixed now and I'm glad.

But, I still wonder about the condition of the old Gum Slough Ditch? A Herman Junction Boy Can figure for some time on a deal like that.

SPORTSMANSHIP AT HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #71, FEB. 21, 2010

2010-02-21T11:23:00.000-08:00

Growing up at Herman Junction was exciting and we never found ourselves with nothing to do. I don't remember anyone talking about being bored or complaining because there wasn't anything to do. We made things to do. We had more games than you can imagine that youngsters today would think were stupid, but they weren't stupid to us.

Most of the things that we did involved competition. We wanted to see who could win. Every one that I knew would expend every effort to win whatever we were competing in. Second place finishers were losers. When one would climb up on the concrete storm cellar and proclaim himself 'King Of The Hill' he gave everything that he had to keep from being knocked off there by the others. When roller skating on the old highway, every person was determined to be the fastest, most stable, and creative skater there was. If you lost in any event it broke your heart and drove you to do better the next time.

When I observe some of the things today in sports I am surprised at how people feel about winning and losing and their attitudes toward their opponents. At high school basketball games when the players are introduced they run to the other end and shake hands with the opposing coach. After the game they all line up and shake hands or give hugs to each other and extend congratulations to one another. Can you imagine me running up to one of those Herman Junction boys and wishing him luck in opposing me in some contest? Or, can you imagine one of them coming to me after the contest is over and congratulating me for beating him? It ain't never gonna happen!

No, Sir that would not have happened at Herman Junction among the Knight boys or any of the others who came to our house. If an opposing player came over to shake hands before the game and say, "Good Luck", he would have been considered to be out of his mind. If I were a Coach today and some opposing kids came running down to shake my hand I think that I would tell him to get back to the other end because my team was about to whip his team from end to end. And, when that game was over and I had lost, don't come running down there to tell me how good a game we played and offer congratulations! We just got beat! Get out of here before I melt and pour all over you! I see these Tennis players work for several matches and then when the game is over they meet at the net and hug each other, etc. Not me! If I met him at the net I would hit him in the head with my racket! He just beat me and that is not acceptable to me. Old Peyton Manning walked off the field after losing the 2010 Super Bowl and people got all over him for not being a good sport. Phooey! He just lost the biggest game of the year. Let him go off and work it out in his own mind and then maybe later he can tell the victors how good they played.

Sportsmanship. Well, it is good but only to a degree. Give me time because the Herman Junction in me isn't all gone yet so leave me alone before the game because I am going to try to beat you as much as I can. And, when that game is over, stay away from me. I ain't going to congratulate nobody for whupping me!!

LEVY CALLS: POST #70 FEB. 7, 2010

2010-02-07T14:01:00.000-08:00

We were so happy at Swifton and Barbara thought that we would stay there until we retired or died. The new house that we had just moved into was such a beautiful house, especially for that time. It was so big that we could not even afford to furnish it completely and had conveniences that we had never had before. The church was strong and they loved us and showed that love in so many, many, ways. No preacher had things better than I did. I had landed in a tub of butter for sure.

One night Barbara was ironing and I was sitting watching her iron and we were just making conversation. The phone rang. I said, "I will get this in the bedroom, it's some big church calling for me to come preach for them." I picked up the receiver and said, "Hello", and on the other end I heard these words: "Brother Knight, this is Ted Sorrells from the Levy church of Christ in North Little Rock, Arkansas." We exchanged our greetings and then he continued, "Our preacher is moving and we are looking for a preacher. We wondered if you might be interested in talking with us about this."

I was almost completely speechless! I had never heard of the Levy church of Christ and had only been to Little Rock two or three times in my life. I was stunned. I simply asked if I could have a little time and talk to My Lady and if he could call later that would be good for me. He said that he would. You cannot imagine how big a lie My Lady thought that I was making up when I went back in the other room and told her about that call. It took some time before she really believed what I was telling her. We were both just completely overwhelmed at this moment in our life together.

On May 15, 1966 three of the elders at Levy came to visit our Sunday evening services and we met at our house after services. The news was out at Swifton because one of the elders at Levy had a nephew who worshipped at Swifton and that nephew knew immediately why they were there. We agreed to come to Levy and 'try out' which I hated, so we went there on June 4th and spent the night at the Holiday Inn. Marty wanted a Holiday Inn in his back yard at Swifton because he really thought that we were walking in high cotton. On June 5, 1966 I preached my first sermon at Levy and fell in love with that church. We ate lunch with Ted & Edith Sorrells and had a great time. The next day we ate with L.T. & Dorothea Blevins, one of the elders and he told me that in the elders meeting later that evening they were going to invite us to move there and work with the church. Again, I was completely floored.

I went back home and told the elders at Swifton that we were going to move in three months. They were shocked too and began to encourage us to change our mind. In fact, they were so persuasive that I told them that I would stay at Swifton. On July 20th I went back to Levy to tell the elders that we would not be moving there. It was Wednesday night and they asked me to give the devotional and extend the invitation. When I got up there I knew that I could not back out, so we went back to Swifton and backed out on them.

On August 29th they packed our meager belongings and moved us to 112 Farmere Circle, North Little Rock, Arkansas. I preached my first sermon as the regular preacher with the Levy church of Christ on September 4, 1966. What an exciting life we were beginning and I was in such a whirlwind that I didn't even notice it.

I knew one thing for sure though...I was a long way from Herman Junction and I just had a hard time understanding all this.

SWIFTON, ARK.# TWO: POST #69: JAN. 15, 2010

2010-01-15T14:28:00.000-08:00

We arrived in Swifton on June 10, 1963, tired, hot, hungry, and about as ragged as three people can be. When we got there the folks from church had unloaded our meager amount of household belongings and put them in the place that they thought we might want them. Loyd Hulett and Henry Webb had brought a big truck to Manila to get our things. We had a small 5,000 BTU air conditioner and they had put it in our bedroom and that was just great. We could make it alright in the rest of the house but at night we really needed that AC in our room so we could sleep better. Every time someone would come to visit when it was really hot, we took off to the bedroom and just piled up to visit because that was the only cool place. Later, we were able to buy an 18,000 BTU unit and installed it in the living room and we thought that we had really moved up town.

The wonderful people of the whole town of Swifton could not have been better to us. I am going to mention some names and I will miss someone for sure, but I certainly do not mean to slight anyone. From the very beginning, the elders of the church were so supportive and encouraging. Ira Hulen, Henry Webb. W.O. Hulett, Sr., Homer Smith, and C.G. Holt were the elders and we loved them and their wives so very much. I just cannot adequately describe how they shepherded us and were so patient and kind. I could write a book about each one of those couples.

There were a lot of people that I admired who did not attend the services of the church of Christ in Swifton. I am not just 'name dropping' when I say that we loved and admired George and Charlene Kell. George was a great professional baseball player who had just retired and began his career as broadcaster for the Detroit Tigers. We watched him play one time in an Old-Timers game at Yankee stadium in New York on a Saturday and on Monday morning he woke us up to sell us a new car. When My Lady was expecting our baby girl, Charlene Kell hosted a baby shower for her and every person in Swifton was invited. What a shower that was! We bought two new cars from George and just paid him each month whatever amount we could afford. He was a STAR in many, many, other areas than baseball and only the people from Swifton knew it.

I hung out a lot at Buck Hulen's grocery store and Ray McNutt's Gulf service station. I made more contacts with the people of Swifton at those two places than probably anywhere else. I met characters like Burrhead Russell, Claude Mitts, Junior Templeton, Alfred Moon, and many others and listened as they told stories of the past in the Swifton area. I don't know if half of them were true or not, but they sounded good.

Stan and Oneida Chapman became two of our dearest friends and they owned the theater in Swifton. That was quite a popular place in those days. We could go to the show any time we wanted to by just walking in and taking our seats. We didn't go much but a few times we enjoyed seeing a good movie. It was a real treat to eat at Lola Thompson's Cafe over on Highway 67. Lola fed us so well when we would go in, especially on Sundays after Bible study and worship.

I often went to O'Bannion's grocery store and just sit and visit with Walter and Beulah O'Bannion who owned the store and attended services at the church there. It was there that I met a candy salesman named J.B. Milligan. J.B. sold candy and also was a gospel preacher. We would sit and visit and eat Baby Ruth candy bars so long that sometimes he didn't have time to finish his route and he would just go home and finish it later. Baby Ruth candy bars then were what they call 'Family size' now but J.B. and I could eat one each without any problem at all. It was from those visits that J.B. decided to devote his life to preaching the gospel full time and at the age of 88 he is still preaching near Batesville, Ark.

Places and events like these reminded me so much of being at Herman Junction and Bay, Ark. They were the same kind of people and maybe that is why we loved them so much. Ah, Herman Junction and Swifton, how we loved you.

SWIFTON, HERE WE COME: POST#68, JAN.15, 2010

2010-01-15T09:10:00.000-08:00

When we decided to leave Manila, Arkansas after two years, I first decided that I would quit preaching. I just thought that there must be a better way of life. I went to Jonesboro to talk to my brother, Ray and he would not help me find another job. He wanted me to preach. I went to my old friend, Floyd Winningham and talked to him about a job in his business or about him helping me find a job. Floyd said, "I would never help a preacher quit preaching!" He gave me some really good advice and we decided to continue our life in preaching the gospel. So, I began looking around and setting up times to "TRY-OUT" (I sure didn't like that term and still don't.")

Someone told me about the church at Swifton, Arkansas looking for a preacher. I didn't know one thing about the church there, but I made an appointment to go there to preach on a Wednesday night in May 1963. We rolled into town with a flat tire and three of the poorest looking characters in the country. I went to Lewis Hudgeons Texaco station to get the tire fixed and then we went on to church services. I don't remember much about that night except the sermon that I preached and it was probably about as flat as the tire was. However, they greeted us like we were really something and the next day they called and invited us to move there. I accepted the offer and began making plans to move in about 30 days.

Then, a preacher that lived close by told me that the Swifton church just fought all the time. That was one thing that we didn't need. I drove over to Swifton and met with the elders and told them what I had heard. Ira (Buck) Hulen said, "We don't have enough energy to fight" and they assured me that they had no desire to have anything but peace and unity. The first Sunday that I preached there I told the entire church about what I had heard, and that if they wanted to fight they would have to give us time to get into fighting shape because we had been through some hard times the previous two years. I will say right now that the 3 1/2 years that we lived at Swifton were some of the greatest years of our life, even until right now.

We had been in the house for about two days and a man knocked on the door. When I answered, he pushed me aside and walked through every room of that house and came back through and walked out and never said one word! I was in shock. What had I moved My Lady and Son into? I thought that the elders had lied and had sent a guy to whip us before I had even preached my first sermon as the local preacher. But, in a few minutes to same man came back, carrying a cold watermelon, introduced himself and we sat down and ate watermelon and had a great visit. The man's name was Bill Wheeler, Sr. He and Vesta his wife and thier family became very, very, dear to us. He was one of the most outstanding Christian men that I have ever known and taught me lesson after lesson about living for the Lord. I could write a book about Bill Wheeler. How we loved them! I could not possibly write in one blog post all the people at Swifton and what they meant to our lives.

It was at Swifton that our KATHY DEANN KNIGHT was born on February 16, 1966. When she was born at 2:30 in the morning I was so excited that I ran down the hall and woke up Oneida Chapman who was a patient there and told her about our baby girl. Then, I went to Tuckerman and stopped and called Ewell and Eloise Webb and told them that our Kathy had just arrived. Ewell could have shot me for waking him up that early but he was gracious. Our Kathy was named after their daughter, Kathy. So now we had a Son and a Daughter and Barbara thought that we were the only couple in the world with a child of each sex.

Life sure was good and we were still only about 40 miles from Herman Junction and could go there often and visit.

BACK AGAIN: POST #67

2010-01-08T18:08:00.001-08:00

It has been some months since I wrote and I have been quite neglectful. I could also say that I have been very busy and that would be true. However, I have found that we can make time to do what we really want to do.

I stopped the journey from Herman Junction with POST #65 and inserted one concerning a trip that My Lady and I made in July 2009 to Hot Springs. I was just so 'inspired' when I got home from there that I could not restrain myself from writing about that trip. Now, I will go back to the time when were on our journey in the early days of our married life.

On February 1, 1960 we left the church at Michigan City, Indiana and moved a few miles away to work with the church of Christ at Laporte, Indiana. The church there had elders to oversee the work and I really needed the guidance and leadership of a good Eldership. There were three elders in the beginning....Leo Bailey, Ernie Bush, and Collie Owens. Brother Owens resigned shortly after our arrival there and began worshipping in Michigan City where he and his family lived. I worked the entire time that we lived there under the oversight of Brothers Bush and Bailey and I will always be thankful for the great work that they did and the wonderful influence that they had on our lives.

The entire congregation at Laporte was was wonderful to us. When we moved into a small house at 707 Division Street, there was one house between us and Bryan and June Butts. They were from Arkansas and they were as happy to meet us as we were to meet them. We developed a friendship that lasted as long as they lived and we loved them dearly. I spoke at both of their funeral services. We also became dear friends to their children and grandchildren. It is sad for us that today all of their children have also passed away but we cherish the memories of the great life that we had with them. We still go back to Laporte from time to time to visit those who are still living from years ago and to enjoy a wonderful relationship with the church.

In July 1961 we moved from Laporte to Holland, Missouri. We had such a hard time there that I do not even like to think about it. Yes, there were some good people that we learned to love but it was while we lived at Holland that Johnny (Pete) Earls, the youngest brother of My Lady got sick and passed away. It was such a sad and difficult time for us.

Do you know how that sometimes we jump out of the frying pan into the fire? We did that when we moved from Holland, Mo. to Manila, Ark. We wanted so much to leave Missouri and when we were offered the opportunity to move to Manila we accepted it and moved there. But, it was a sad mistake. The best thing that happened while we lived there was the birth of our son, Martin Andrew Knight on My Lady's 21st birthday, September 17, 1962. What a great joy and one that made a lot of bad things kind of disappear.

Marty got his name from my mother's maiden name and a dear friend, Andrew Simpson of Buchanan, Michigan. We had met and fallen in love with Andrew and Mary Simpson while we lived in Indiana. It was about one week before Marty was born that Andrew died and I was afraid to leave My Lady and go to the funeral at Dover, Arkansas. Marty has blessed our lives more than he will ever know.

In June, 1963 we moved on again and life began to be better than the last two years had been. I will tell you about that next.

HERMAN JUNCTION BOY IN HOT SPRINGS: POST #66

2009-07-31T09:43:00.000-07:00

You can take the Herman Junction boy out of Herman Junction, but don't leave him forever in Hot Springs. Really, I love Hot Springs and have had many enjoyable and pleasant times there. We try to go for a short stay at least one time each year but sometimes don't make it. One of my favorite places in the world is the famous Arlington Hotel in downtown Hot Springs. I like to think of the history of that 134 year old structure and all of the things that have gone on there.

It is said that there were a lot of big time crooks who stayed there many years ago and I suppose that is true. Speaking of crooks some of our nations Presidents have spent some time there too and I suppose that you can guess who at least one of them was. But, there have also been a lot of other famous and not-so-famous people who have walked the halls of the Arlington Hotel.

One time Barbara and I were there between Christmas and New Years. In the past we have gone there at that time of year many times. We were sitting in the lobby one day and an elderly lady was sitting across from us and she seemed so alone. Barbara went over and invited her to sit with us and visit if she desired to do so and she came over immediately. She lived at the Arlington and had done so for many years. She had never married and owned a farm in Illinois consisting of almost 2,000 acres. Her nephew farmed it for her while she enjoyed living at the Arlington. She told us that she was 93 years old and that she needed to get a will made soon to take care of that farm and other assets. I didn't tell her, but I thought that she needed to hurry!

We just returned from a short trip to Hot Springs and I learned a lot. I strongly believe that "NURDS" should not be allowed to reproduce. Now, I have my own definition of a 'Nurd' but I am not telling you what it is, you will have to make up your own. We were sitting on the veranda of the hotel and here came a NURD with a bunch of little NURDS right behind him. He had no idea where he was going and the baby Nurds kept telling him that Momma said that she would meet them in the lobby. Finally, Papa Nurd listened to them and they strung into the lobby and sure enough Momma was there and she was a NURD too! How they got into that hotel I will never know and it must have been real interesting to see them get around the city.

Has your companion ever talked you into doing something that you really didn't intend to do? I have had that experience many, many times. This time she talked me into having a thermal bath and a massage. Can you imagine Booie Woods from Herman Junction doing that? I can't imagine me doing it either. But, here I was and at least I thought that I had no choice.

I went in for the bath and here was a great big guy handing me a key to a locker and telling me to get COMPLETELY undressed! I hid in a closet and did it and wrapped up in a towel. Then, he took the towel away and made me get in a tub of scalding mineral water and that almost took the hide off me. He took a mit and put it on his hands, rubbed off my arms and then told me to lift up my leg! When I did he could see where I didn't want him to see but he was much bigger than me and was in charge. He got me bathed off and that was my first time to have a bath by someone other than my Momma or me and I don't want to make that a habit. He gave me a cup of that HOT water and told me to drink it. SHOO! He left me in there for 20 minutes and came to get me and put me in a 'HOT BOX" he called it and it sure was a "HOT BOX". Much hotter than the "SWEAT ROOM" at Bay High School.

When he took me out of that hot box he put me on a table with a hot towel under my neck and left me again and then he put me in a COLD SHOWER! He didn't know it but I kind of hunkered over in a corner where just a little bit of it hit me because it was really COLD. That ended my bath....I mean it really ended my thermal baths at Hot Springs. Never again!!

Now it was time for the massage. Everyone had told me how wonderful a massage is and how they felt so wonderful after it was over. So, here I go and a guy named "Bob" came out to administer the massage. He rubbed me down on both sides for about 15 minutes. It seemed to me that he got his hands all wadded up in the flab and after getting untangled he told me that he was through and I could go. He held out his hand and said, "Bob" again and I thought that anyone could remember a man's name for 15 minutes. I really did not feel any different than I do when I get out of Barbara's whirlpool tub at home. Barbara said that I should have given him a good tip before he started and he would have done a better job. But, where is a man going to find a tip when they have taken all his clothes away and locked them up? Besides, I think that they should have paid me for all that.

From now on I am going to just stay at home or maybe go visit Herman Junction where they all do their own baths and if someone gets a massage I never have heard of it.

PREACHER MAN: POST #65: July 9, 2009

2009-07-09T06:33:00.000-07:00

I worked at Independent Steel Co. for some time and really enjoyed my time there. One day as Ray Brown and I were sitting side by side working, he asked, "What do you plan to do with the rest of your life?" I said, "I hope to someday work as a full time preacher of the gospel." I had already been preaching for a few months every Sunday morning and the other men of the church rotated the preaching duties on Sunday evening. We talked about that for some time that day and I had absolutely no idea what was about to happen.

One day Ray came to me and asked if I would be interested in preaching full time for the church at Michigan City and I told him that I would like that. A few days later the men of the church had a business meeting and to my utter surprise asked me to begin working with the church on a full time basis. I began on February 1, 1959. I had four books...my Bible and four volumes of Hardeman's Tabernacle Sermons which had been delivered by Brother N. B. Hardeman and published shortly after that. My two older brothers who were preachers sent me some helps and I bought other helpful books and materials as I could afford it.

I would write out my sermons and go over to the church building and preach to the empty seats all week. When we moved into the preachers house in September 1959 Barbara said that she could hear me all the way over inside our house as I would 'lay back the hide and pour in the salt' on those empty seats. One day I was able to buy a small tape recorder at Sears and then I would go to the building and record my sermons and listen to them over and over again as I prepared for the next Sunday. Of course, I did all the other things that a 'minister' does such as visiting the sick, hospitals, etc.

One of the more interesting things that we did was working with inmates at the State prison in Michigan City. The first time that I went there I was absolutely scared out of my wits. I had never been behind so many locked doors in my life and I wondered if I would get out or become another inmate. We baptized some men and when they were released we were able to get jobs for them and they worshipped with us. But, I must admit that every one of them that we worked with returned to prison and that was disappointing to me. I saw enough that I surely knew that I never wanted to reside in one of those places.

The preachers house was a wonderful place. It was a huge, two story house with a full basement and here were two kids from Herman Junction moving in. Dad and Mom had come to Michigan City and he co-signed the papers for us to buy a cook stove, refrigerator, bedroom furniture, living room and dining room furniture, at Montgomery-Ward's and we moved in. It was so big that we could just get lost in there but we loved it so very much. That house still stands and looks almost exactly the same and we often wish that we could spend just one more night there.

What a wonderful place Michigan City was and is. There is one special thing to me....the first check that I ever received as a full time preacher was signed by brother James Alred on Feb. 1, 1959. Today in 2009 the church there helps to support us in our present ministry and the check they send each month is signed by brother James Alred. We are still blessed to go there almost every year and preach in a gospel meeting and it is one of the highlights of our year.

We had left Herman Junction less than one year before, planning to go back home but it has been fifty-one years and we have never lived at Herman Junction again.

MOVING ON: POST #64

2009-05-19T18:32:00.000-07:00

It was a very hot day on August 22, 1958. I will never forget that day as long as I have my right mind. Late in the evening when it got a little cooler, My Lady and I along with my sister Linda and her husband got in their old 1949 Ford car and left Herman Junction. We drove to St. Louis where we spent a little time with Linda's brother-in-law and his wife before resuming our journey to Rochelle, Illinois to work in the Del Monte Company canning plant. We got lost on the way and spent some time on roads that we had never heard of and it was during a terrible thunderstorm. We began to wonder if we would ever make it to our destination.

Our plans were very simple. We would work at Del Monte for a few weeks and go back to Herman Junction, build a Jim Walter home on Dad's place, get a job at the Singer sewing machine plant in Truman, and live happily there until we went to heaven. I hadn't really thought about people going to heaven except the folks at Herman Junction and a few from Bay and Truman. Our plans and dreams were simple and we had no doubt that everything would work out perfectly for us. We even took very few clothes because we fully intended to be back to Herman Junction very shortly.

But, it was not to be. The Del Monte plant was slowly closing down because the harvest was almost over and they were not hiring additional workers. I don't know when nor why we decided to go over to Michigan City, Indiana where our oldest brother, C.W. and his wife lived, but that is what we did. Sister-In-law, Emmie worked at the M & M diner on the main street of Michigan City and we walked in unannounced to her surprise. Barbara ordered a Dr. Pepper and the whole place responded in laughter at that little ole Southern girl coming in there and ordering a Dr. Pepper. That didn't set too well with her either. We went on to 202 California Ave. where C. W. and Emmie lived right on the edge of Lake Michigan. I mean when you stepped out their door there was sand on the driveway and it was just a few steps to the beach.
What a wonderful place. We slept on pallets on the floor and wherever we could find a place to lay down.

I got my old job back at Weil-McClain, a company that manufactured boilers for heating systems in huge buildings and maybe even some smaller ones for homes. I loved working there until the snow came and it got extremely cold. I think that I have mentioned before how hard it was to go to work at 6:00 in the morning to shovel the snow off the sidewalks so the people who worked in the offices would not have to wade through it. It was a hard job but one that afforded My Lady and I the opportunity to soon move into our own apartment on Franklin St., the main street of the city. The building is standing there today and we love to drive by and see it. We asked one time if we could go up to the third floor and see it but they would not allow us to do so.

Soon, I was offered a job with a company, Independant Steel where I would work inside where it was warm and it even paid a little more than my job at Weil-McClain. Ray Brown was a good friend and he called and told us that the job was mine if I wanted it. I considered it for about two minutes and took off for home to go with him to work at 1:00 in the afternoon. I really liked that job. I went in at noon Indiana time and was back at home at 8:00 PM and I loved that. When I got home My Lady would have a great meal and I ate like a full grown hog and went to bed and before long I weighed 250 pounds and was still gaining.

I love Michigan City, Indiana to this day and go there every time we have the opportunity to do so. But, we missed Herman Junction so very much, especially My Lady. A truck driver came through one day and he had a stalk of cotton and she just looked at it and cried like a baby. Seeing it almost made me cry too but not for the same reason. It was March of 1959 before we got to go home for a visit and it was a delight for us both.

We have never lived at Herman Junction again but we have visited there hundreds of times and we still do as often as possible. Why don't we just go there right now?

SMART BOY FROM HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #63: May 19, 2009

2009-05-19T04:27:00.000-07:00

We had some pretty intelligent people at Herman Junction when I was growing up. Dad said that Booie Woods had more 'common sense' than anyone that he knew even though Booie could not read nor write. My brother Rayburn won the Math award when he was graduating from high school so I guess he was a pretty smart old boy. My Dad seemed to be able to do anything that he wanted to like farming, carpentering, painting, rail-roading, gardening, and all kinds of things. As I got to thinking about this, shoot, we weren't a bunch of Dumb Bunnies down there.

But, I learned this week that I am lacking somewhat in Computer knowledge. My computer began doing a few things that I didn't tell it to do and would not allow me to do some things that I wanted to do. Marty was too busy so I called "The Computer Doctor" that I found listed in the telephone book. What a nice guy! He took my computer off on Wednesday and said that he would get it back to me on Thursday. He didn't! Barbara called him on Saturday and he told her to send me to his office and he would go over some of my problems and I would see why he needed to keep it a little longer. So, I went over there.

He began telling me all this stuff and clicking on things and telling me things but I didn't have a clue what he was talking about. He said that I didn't have enough Mega Bytes and I told him that my Doctor said that I had been having too many Mega Bites and that was why I had to take the medicine that he prescribed. He said that wasn't the kind of bites that he was talking about. He said that I really needed a GIG! I hadn't heard of a GIG in years and had never used one because I never hunted for frogs in my life and had no idea where to get a GIG! He said that wasn't what he was talking about either and that he would take care of it. He must have clicked on 500 buttons and things would pop up and he would click them off or sometimes he would say, "Uh, Huh" and go on to something else. He sat there and talked to that computer just like it was a real live person and it never answered him one time that I heard. He would tell it to do this or do that and sometimes it would and sometimes it wouldn't and he would ask it, "What in the world is wrong with you?" Since he could tell that I thought that The Computer Doctor needed a Doctor, he told me that I could go on so I did, thinking that if Booie was here he could probably fix that thing!

He brought it back to me and it is working faster and some better than when he took it, but the problem that prompted me to call him in the first place is just like it was when he got it. He said that I would have to call my ISP for that problem and I did and after about an hour they told me that I needed to call Microsoft. I have a call in now for Bill Gates and he will probably call back in a few minutes.

At Herman Junction we didn't have this problem. When something went wrong with a tractor or plow or something, Booie and Dad just fixed and went on with their work. Where did those simple days at Herman Junction go? I think that I'll just go back there today and get some of the fog in my head cleared up!

CHURCHES AT BAY: POST #62

2009-04-25T14:02:00.000-07:00

There never was a church of any kind at Herman Junction that I ever heard of. But, in Bay there were four churches and today as far as I know those same four churches are there, plus as Assembly of God church. The First Baptist church met in a rock building on the Northeast side of town, the Broadway Baptist met on Broadway St., and the church of Christ and Methodist church both met on church Street. When the First Baptist church built a new building the Assembly of God bought their old one and today all of those churches still meet in the same locations.

I was raised in the church of Christ, baptized at the age of 12 and made my first 'talk' in church at the age of 12. Aubrey Vanwinkle asked me one Sunday morning after services if I would like to speak to the auditorium class that night. Aubrey liked good, long, advance notices you see! Well, with my Mom helping me work it all up I made my first public appearance that night and it wasn't long until I was doing that quite often. I also began leading singing at about that same age and Jimmy Chester and I did a lot of the song leading until we both grew up and moved away. I loved to sing and still do. I have some wonderful memories of church as I was growing up. We were always the first ones to arrive. We always parked in the same place. I remember going to 'gospel meetings' in the summer time and the house being completely filled and people standing outside and looking in and listening from the windows which were wide open because it was so hot. I recall many, many, baptisms, dinners on the ground, afternoon singings, vacations bible schools that lasted two weeks, gospel meetings that lasted 10 days to two weeks, and the church growing and was strong. The gospel was preached in love and I don't remember any big fusses or the church splitting because of personal differences.

I went with my buddy Jim Isbell to visit the Baptist church one night and I hoped that nobody would see me and tell Mom that I had gone to the Baptist church. But, you can't get away with much in Bay! I had hunkered down as low as I could so Max Taylor couldn't see me but it didn't work. When Max asked all the visitors to stand and I didn't, he said, "Well, I see Hook Knight back there to but he didn't stand up." Now, everyone in four counties knew that I had been to the Baptist church! Well, as you can see, I survived it!

I don't remember any big fights among the churches although there were severe disagreements doctrinally. I think that we all knew that those disagreements existed but we all agreed that there was a way to address those disagreements with a good spirit. That's the kind of people that we had at Bay and they even let us Herman Junctionites come into town and worship with them and I enjoyed it immensely.

E. D. SMITH'S GROCERY: POST #61

2009-04-25T12:07:00.000-07:00

I don't know what our family would have done had it not been for E. D. and Aunt Mollie Smith and their grocery store. This is where all of our groceries were bought for many, many, years. We would go into Bay on Saturday night and Mom would take her grocery list and hand it to E.D. and he would go about the store gathering all of the items and piling them on the counter. Then, he would take a pencil, spit on the end of it, and record every item and price of it on his little book and charge it. It took quite some time to do that too because there was always a long list and especially when Grandma Halfacre would send some money and order bologna, cheese, bread, and other stuff for us all to eat when we got back home. Can you imagine the food that it took to feed all of us? In the winter there was a roaring fire built in the stove in the back of the store and people gathered round that thing while the head of the clan would take care of buying the groceries. It was as crowded as Wal-Mart it seemed to me.!

I guess most of the other shoppers paid for their groceries at the time they bought them, but the Knight's charged theirs. I guess we must have paid once a month or something when Dad would get paid on the railroad and then later when we were farming and he was a carpenter. I don't know how all that worked out but we sure spent a lot of money at the Smith's grocery store. Later, E. D. retired and in 1956 he passed away. Dad bought the 1949 Chevy truck from Aunt Mollie and I loved that truck. He drove it until it was demolished by a train one day on the railroad crossing right in the middle of town. Aunt Mollie ran the store for a little time and then she closed it and sold it to Ben and Hazel Swanner and they ran it for a few years. They tore the old building down and built their home there and the house is still standing. I sure did hate to see that old store building go down. Dad built Aunt Mollie a house right next door and he and Mom lived there until they both passed away.

We did our shopping for clothes from Sears-Roebuck and Speigel's catalogs. What a great day it was when one of those big orders would come in and everyone would sit around and Mom hand out to each one what was meant for them. It all smelled so good and fresh. New jeans, shirts, underwear, socks, and shoes were distributed to everyone in the family. We sure looked spiffed up for some time before they would all begin to fade into looking just like the ones that we had before. We had Sunday clothes and everyday clothes and you didn't dare get those Sunday clothes all torn and messed up. They all had to last at least a year before we would make another order.

Sometimes I long for those days and those times. No credit cards, hot checks, thieves, etc. It was quite nice really and as we made our way back to Herman Junction we were glad that Bay was close by.

SHOPPING AT BAY, ARK: POST#60

2009-04-25T11:26:00.000-07:00

Bay, Arkansas was a suburb of our town of Herman Junction. That is where most of our shopping was done as well as visiting the Doctor, going to church, school, and most other things that we could not take care of at Herman Junction. By the time that we arrived at Herman Junction the school, hotel, sawmill, and the post office were closed. There was the one little grocery store left and that was about all. So, when we wanted to 'go to town' that meant going to Bay or to Truman and we chose to go to Bay most of the time. Truman just seemed a little unclean to Mom because it was in a 'wet' county so we stayed in the one that was dry even though the old highway that ran in front of our house was lined with empty beer cans and whiskey bottles that were thrown out of the car window as the consumer made his way back to the 'dry' county.

Bay was a bustling little metropolis as I was growing up. There were several grocery stores. E.D. Smith and his wife Aunt Mollie had one on what is now called 'Church Street'. Sitting beside the store was a Grist Mill where corn was taken and made into meal. West of the Grist Mill was Dick Davis's barber shop and across the alley was the Herman Hill/Carl Taylor grocery store and then on the corner was a Drug Store. The drug store burned and just left a huge, gaping hole in the place where it had been and there has never been a building built there again on the same spot.

Lining Main Street were several businesses. There was Raymond Collins Barbara Shop, another grocery store that I don't remember who owned it, a Cafe that various ones ran, Sam O'Daniel's grocery store, another building that housed a variety of businesses, the Post Office, and then there was another big grocery store. At one time Willis Holmes owned it and then a man named Roach owned it for several years. Following that the 'Chinaman' owned it and I never did know his name, it was just the Chinaman. Across a small parking lost there stood Fred Friends Gulf service station.

One the other end of Main Street there was the theatre, Howard Hundley's grocery store, later owned by Carl Taylor, W.A. Hall's variety store, the Yellow Jacket Cafe, and a pool hall. Behind Howard Hundley's grocery store was a little shack that Doss Miller lived in. Mr. Miller drank an awful lot and I remember that they would limit his purchase of shaving lotion and other items like that because he would drink them. On past his little house there was another store and on the corner there was Mr. Burris's shoe shop. A big house called the "Hindman House' stood between the pool hall and Vernus Kitterman's grocery store. Barbara and I spent our first night of married life in that house. Out in the alley behind the Post Office was the huge Mule Barn and the jail house. Various families lived in part of the old mule barn building including the Knight family before I made my appearance on the scene. Various changes were made through the years but that is the basic layout of the downtown part of Bay.

When I was in my teens I worked with the Mexican field laborers driving them out to the fields, picking cotton with them, and then driving them home for the night. On weekends we always took them to town and since I had learned to speak Spanish pretty well I would work in Mr. Hall's Variety store translating for them and I really enjoyed that. He sold about everything that one could imagine except groceries. How I wish now that I could remember all the Spanish that I learned and could even expand on it but when you don't use something you usually lose it and I did.

Across the railroad tracks were two gins and several other houses in my day. The gins are still there and still operate during the fall and you can hear and smell them all over town. They sure aren't good for allergy prone people like me. As I mentioned earlier, Bay was a bustling place on Saturday evening and night. It was the place to be. I can go back there in my mind right now and really have a good time, but for right now I will move on back home to Herman Junction.

SHORTEST POST IN BLOG HISTORY: #59

2009-03-04T19:07:00.000-08:00

Have you ever cleaned out an outdoor outhouse? That's all I'm saying 'bout that!

OLD SPORT AND OLD BESSIE: POST #58

2009-03-04T03:50:00.000-08:00

We lived in a perfect spot at Herman Junction for people to drop off their unwanted animals and invariably they would come to our house for provisions since it was the only house right on the highway. I couldn't begin to count the animals that came to our house and there was no way for us to keep them so I would chunk rocks at them and run them off. I guess that I wasn't any better off than the people that dropped them off in the first place. But, with ten people to feed there wasn't much left for the dogs and cats from all over the country.

But, one dog came and I fell in love with him. I named him Sport. I really loved that dog and I am proud of a picture that I still have of Sport and me. He would wrestle with me just like another youngster would and I taught him a lot of things. The thing that I liked the most about him was that he would go a long way across the field and bring the cow, Old Bessie in for milking. I would just take him out to the edge of the field and tell him to "Go get Old Bessie", and he would take off and in a few minutes they would be back to the house. It sure saved me a lot of walking and I liked that.

I don't remember what happened to Old Sport. I know that he died of course, but I don't remember when. But, I do know one thing---"If dogs have a heaven, there's one thing I know; Old Sport has a wonderful home." Does that remind you of a song that Gene Autry used to sing and even Elvis recorded? It was about "Old Shep" and I have cried a river of tears listening to that song. Don't deny it now, you have too!

Then, there was Old Bessie. She sure supplied milk and butter to a lot of hungry Knight's. I have churned a lot of butter and didn't mind it at all because you could sit and do that. I also loved that milk after it was cold. One hasn't lived until he has a big chunk of corn bread crumbled up in a glass full of good milk.

Have you ever noticed that nearly every old cow in those days had a name and most of the time the name was "Old Bessie"? I have even seen one or two in TV shows that were given that name. I wonder why? I have known several nice ladies named Bessie or Bess. I wonder if they know that there is a big herd of cows scattered all over the place named after them? Or, forgive the thought, but could it be that they were named after the cows? I'll try to see that this doesn't get into the hands of a woman named Bessie.

DREAMS AT HERMAN JUNCTION:POST #57

2009-02-08T19:15:00.000-08:00

What in the world does a boy from Herman Junction dream about? I mean, does he just intend to spend the rest of his life at Herman Junction picking cotton? I suppose that when I was very young that was about all that I had in mind for myself. Oh, I would stand in the cotton patch and watch the trains and cars go by and wonder where they were going and wish that I could catch one of them some day and find out the answers to those questions. But, until I got in my teens I never thought much about doing anything except living at Herman Junction. I remember My Lady and I were in Bay one time and wanted to just go out and walk around the streets in town. We met Howell Morrison coming down the street and we stopped and visited with him. Howell said, "You know, Hook, everyone always wanted to hurry and get away from Bay. But, I always wanted to just stay here." And, he did and not long after that he died right there where he had always lived and I suppose he was as happy as could be.

When I was out of school in the summer between my Junior and Senior years in high school I went with brother Rayburn and some guys from Harding to work for the Del Monte Canning Company out in the fields harvesting English Peas. We lived in a bunk house and worked long, long, hours every day. We made $1.00 per hour and that was the most money that I had ever made in my life. Sometimes when I would just give completely out, Ray would do my work for me and let me rest awhile. I remember one night that he and some of the other guys went in to Deklab, Illinois to the White Castle Drive-Inn to get hamburgers. I ordered one but when they got back I was sound asleep and I never knew what happened to my burger.

But, it was during this time that I began to dream a little. I dreamed about cars, dating My Lady in my own car, going to Harding in the fall, and a lot of other things. I had begun to learn that there was life outside of Herman Junction.

Then between my graduation from high school and beginning at Harding in the fall, I went to Michigan City, Indiana and C. W. got me a job with him at the Weil-McClain Company for the summer. I liked that job and I really began to dream about the future.

Dreams are good and they help to motivate us to go on to better things. I think that I have gone on to better things but the memories of Herman Junction still live in my heart and they always will.

TRAINS AND STORM HOUSES: POST #56

2009-02-08T18:49:00.000-08:00

My Dad loved trains and I did too. Dad worked on the railroad for Sixteen Years and even though he loved it, he often said that if he had continued working on the railroad he would not have lived as long as he did. It was really hard work. I liked trains too but you know, I have never ridden but one little train and it was not a very long trip. Someday, I want to take a good long ride on a train. Barbara's mother heard that they were not going to continue with passenger trains through Bay so she put My Lady and her little brother and sister on a train to Jonesboro and drove along the highway in the car waving at them just to let them ride a train. She was a great Mom.

Dad would be in the cotton field later or out on a job as a carpenter and he would hear a train coming through. He would always look at his watch to see if 'old 96' or whatever the train was, was on time. Our Son Marty still has a smashed nickel that Dad gave him and took him down to the tracks and put it on the rail and let the train mash it flat. He loved trains to the day that he died.

Another thing that Dad got into was building concrete storm houses. I told you earlier about him building one at our house but part of it was already built. But, I suppose that it was after one of the real bad storms came that Dad built a set of forms and began building concrete storm houses. There are many of them still across the country in Craighead County Arkansas and some of the storm houses are still standing even though the house itself is gone.

Building a concrete storm house is WORK! I helped him build some of them and just thinking about it now makes me tired. All of those forms had to be bolted together and tied with wires in some places so that they would be able to hold all that concrete. Then on the top and down the sides there were steel rods put in there so that storm house would be there when the Lord comes again. But, he wanted them to especially last through any kind of storm.

When the forms were all set he would start the concrete mixer and mix the gravel, sand, and water until it was just right. Then, the fun part would start. He had already built a runway about thirty feet out from the storm house up to the top. He would pour the wheel barrow (wheel Barr) full of that concrete and it was my job to push it to the top and empty it down the sides until we had it all filled up and the top poured. The sides and top were EIGHT inches thick. I tell you right now that was some job! But, I did it all day long and into the night several times, up and down that runway with that load of concrete. I got to be a mighty strong man during those times. Today I couldn't go up that runway with a snuff can full of concrete but I did then. I weighed about 250 pounds when I was doing this and I cannot imagine now what I ate when I got home from one of those days. After the concrete would set a few days we had to go and remove the forms and he would be ready to build another one.

"Hard work never hurt anybody" they say. I have heard that all of my life. Well, if you believe that, just go out and build yourself a concrete storm house and see if it hurts. It won't be long until you call one of these companies that makes these new-fangled storm cellars and have them come put one in for you.

I like to go down to Herman Junction and every time that I do, I look out at that first storm house that Herb built and thank the good Lord that I don't have to do that anymore. That one at our house helped to make Herman Junction alright.

FARMERS: POST #55, JAUNARY 31, 2009

2009-01-31T10:49:00.000-08:00

I am thankful that I grew up on a farm at Herman Junction. No, I didn't like the work in those days but now I look back with fondness and even to some extent long for a return to some of those days. I have known a lot of great people who chose farming for a vocation. Our country around Herman Junction was full of fine men who farmed for a living. They never got rich but they worked hard against bad weather, boll weevils, weeds and grass, and a lot of other things and provided for their families well.

I've talked about Booie Woods. What a farmer he was. He had a 'B' Farmall tractor that had the seat over on one side and the front wheels spread far apart. He kept two things on that tractor at all times. (1) A box of snuff. (2) A box of Arm and Hammer baking soda. The snuff gave him heart burn and the baking soda relieved it. I can see him today as he drove that tractor through the field or pulled a wagon load of cotton off to the gin and would flip me a dime or quarter to open the gate for him. His philosophy differed sharply from the other farmers. As I mentioned earlier, he would turn out the cows, pigs, geese, and everything to eat the grass out of the cotton. I didn't know anyone else who did that. But, he made a very good crop every year and was more well off than we there with his chrome dinette set and new TV. He also had a new Ford truck that I admired a lot.

Jim Norwood, Clarence Rodgers, Opp Rodgers, the Faulkenberry men, and the Furnish's all farmed near our home. Now, the houses are all gone. I remember also the Spencer boys and their farming. Some of them still farm at Bay and it seemed that every year one of the Spencer boys would bring in the first bale of cotton and they probably still do. Cecil Ashlock was a prominent farmer that we worked for some. Later his son, Ernie (Buck) took over the operation and farmed until he died far too young.

Today one of my favorite people is Carrol Wayne Morris and he has farmed big-time for many years in Mississippi. His wife Myra taught school until she retired. It has amazed me to hear Carroll talk about how many bales of cotton that they pick nowadays in just one day. Our whole family worked really hard to pick one bale a day and sometimes we failed. Farming sure has changed. Carroll took me out to a farm one day and showed me a cotton picker that costs $450,000! I thought, "Man if I had $450,000 I wouldn't buy a cotton picker with it" but that just show how little I know about farming.

I wish that I could literally go back to Herman Junction for just one day and see all those farmers in the field making their crops. BUT, I DON'T WANT TO CHOP NOR PICK ANY OF IT!

SCHOOL TEACHERS: POST #54

2009-01-31T10:18:00.001-08:00

I haven't written much the last couple of weeks. There are a couple of reasons why. I got my Flu shot some time ago and thought that I would not have any problems this winter with the flu, a cold, or any such thing. I was WRONG! I have had a terrible sinus infection and felt rotten. Also, I tend to forget things more and more these days. Some days I can't seem to remember my name. And, then some days I can't seem to remember my name. But, maybe I can get back on track for at least a few days.

When I lived at Herman Junction we went to school at Bay. As I reflect upon my school days I am made to remember some really good times and good people. I especially remember some fine teachers. I never had any idea how much they would mean to my life later on and if I could have had my way I would have just stayed at home and passed school up. I have mentioned before Miss Una Pounds who taught everyone from the days of Noah on down in the first class of their schooling. What a kind and gentle soul she was. I moved on up in grades through the years and I remember Miss Helen Reed who later married Claude Montgomery who chewed the calf's ear nearly off. I recall Mrs. Holmes, Mrs. Montgomery in the Fourth Grade and J. P. Taylor who was my teacher in the Sixth grade. J. P. had a little nephew or somebody who called him P. Joe and so I will never forget him. He later married Miss Jennie Sue Cooper, another one of the teachers. As I moved into Junior High and then Senior High I had a lot of teachers but one stands out in my mind. I listed her as my favorite teacher when I was a Senior. She was Mrs. Gatewood and she taught bookkeeping and I loved it. One of the highlights of my schooling as far as grades were concerned was when she gave me an A+ and wrote on my report card, "Outstanding" and I really liked that. I liked working with numbers and still do. Maybe that is why when someone counts the attendance at church I always come up with about 40 more than they counted because I was good with numbers you see. I also like Miss Carol Burns who taught English. I wish that I had studied more diligently in English class but I think that I studied the teacher more than the English. She was pretty and very much a lady. In my senior year she really encouraged My Lady to marry me one day and told her that she would make a great preachers wife. How did she know that I might be a preacher? Boy, nobody else seemed to think that.

Probably the most influential man in the school to me was Arthur Cooper, the Principal of the High School. Maybe that was because we spent so much of our time together in the sweat room. Although I incurred his wrath a lot of times, I respected him so very much. Many years later when I went back to Bay to preach, Mr. Cooper was there and was very gracious and kind in his comments about the sermon. He was another one who seemed to know that My Lady and I would get married and surprisingly he encouraged her in that union as well.

Good teachers have such great power in molding the lives of young people. Today they have a lot of duties that takes time from their teaching and that is sad. I know several teachers today who are just waiting for the day when they can retire because teaching school 'ain't what it used to be.'

My hat is off to you, teacher friend, and may you have no students like I was!

HIGH TEMPER: POST #53

2009-01-10T11:39:00.000-08:00

There are some things that a fellow who is about 7-8 years old just finds hard to understand. I had never heard the term, "High Temper" until I was about that age and I had no idea what it meant until it was used to describe something that I had just seen. At Herman Junction we lived next to a man who farmed quite a bit of land and we share-cropped with him. Dad worked on the railroad but he and the older boys worked making a crop and working with our neighbor, Mr. Claude Montgomery. Mr. Montgomery was a fine man but he had some peculiar ways that I didn't understand at all.

One day Mr. Montgomery's cows got out of the fenced in lot where he kept them. I guess that Mom or one of the boys saw him out chasing cows all over the place and so they ran to help. Cows were going in every direction, in the railroad ditch, up on top of the railroad, and right down the middle of old highway 63. Finally Mr. Montgomery caught one of the cows that was not yet fully grown but was not just a baby calf either. He tackled that calf, threw him down on the ground, and nearly chewed his ear off! I was shocked. I could think of ways to punish that cow maybe, but not by chewing his ear almost completely off. I just stood there like a stump! I suppose that I wondered what he would do to me if I displeased him in some way. After getting all out of that ear that he wanted, he let the cow up and it went straight to the lot where it was supposed to be. Little wonder! I suppose that I would have straightened up too. Well, when we discussed that later Mom said, "He has a "High Temper". So, now I knew something new.

I saw another example of Mr. Montgomery's "High Temper" later. One day his tractor would not start. He worked on it for some time and tried to start it and it wouldn't start and then he would do that again and again. After several failed attempts at getting the tractor running, he stood back from the tractor a little, took a big monkey wrench and beat the tar out of that tractor motor. He broke things all to pieces. It still didn't start! You know I have wanted to do that with my car or some other thing that wouldn't run when I wanted it to, but I have never followed through with it. I don't know what he did nor how much it cost him but I do remember the tractor running later.

A high temper never accomplishes good. I remember having a "High Temper" myself as a younger fellow. One time I kicked a hole in the wall of our living room. I don't remember why I did it. But, I will tell you that I was dreading when Dad got home and saw that busted wall. You know, he didn't do anything to me about it but he said, "If I had been here I would have made another hole with his head."

I have since noted that there was something funny about my 'High Temper" and I suppose that the same thing is true of most people. It was easy for me to lose my temper with my little sisters and brother and maybe with others who were younger and smaller than me. But it seemed that I could always control my temper in other situations. It seemed to me like a six foot, three inch, 153 pound guy didn't have any business losing his temper with a 200 pound six foot, three inch guy. For the life of me I cannot remember ever losing my temper with Waylon Russell, Winston Holmes, Bob Inboden, or a lot of other guys that I knew. It seemed so much easier to control my temper under those circumstances. Maybe it was because I loved my teeth too much. So, I have tried through the years to bring my high temper under control and I have made some good progress. And, when I do lose it, I don't try to find some cow so that I can chew his ear off. If I am around Herman Junction I send for Jack to take care of the problem for me.

FROM HERMAN JUNCTION TO iPOD:POST #52

2009-01-07T05:04:00.000-08:00

My niece had a little thing in her hand while we were sitting at the funeral home with some friends and family. She kept punching around on it and finally I asked her what in the world she had in her hand. She said, "It's an iPod!" I asked her "What does the thing do?" She said that it has a lot of information on it and that she had 15,000 songs recorded on it. I couldn't believe it. I know all the songs in the song books that we have used at church nearly all my life and I thought that I was doing good, but 15,000 songs on that little hand held thing was just hard for me to believe.

You see, it was not long ago at Herman Junction that I was listening to the Grand Ole Opry on a radio sitting up in the window of the house on Saturday night. I moved from that into having a little tiny record player that would play one record at a time and then to a stereo where I could play albums with six songs on one side. Then I got eight track and cassette tapes and moved on to the CD's but that is as far as I ever intended to go in the electronic world.

Why does someone need 15,000 songs on a little hand-held gizmo? How many songs can one listen to at a time? Are all of those songs desirable songs? How long would it take me to listen to 15,000 songs and by the time that I listened to all of them some new ones would have been recorded and I would need to add them to the list. This electronic gadget age is driving me nuts. I like simple things. I mean, I know every song in the song book, "Songs of the church" and I thought that was pretty good but it is far short of 15,000 songs. My Pod was doing alright I thought and then comes this iPOD thing and confuses the daylights out of me. I used to get after the teenagers for passing notes during my sermons because I could see them doing it. Now, they text message and they can do it while looking me straight in the eye and causing me to think that they are listening. I just can't stand it.

I have no idea what else there is in the gadget world that I don't know even exists. I know that we bought our two Great-Granddaughters a little plastic computer each and they like them. They call them thier 'pooters' and don't want anyone touching them. Well, they and the rest of the world may be learning a lot of new things but back at Herman Junction we learned a lot of things in much more simple fashion. We listened to one song at a time, added up our figures in our head, wrote letters and sent them in the U.S. mail, and some folk even had a party line telephone. It was a pretty good system and I liked it. I say, "If it was good enough for Herman Junction it is good enough for me."

It seems to me that the more electronic stuff we find the more complicated life gets. Some folks know all about it and some don't know diddly about it and that makes it hard to deal with. At Herman Junction everybody could turn on the radio and listen to a song or Young Dr. Malone, write a letter, etc. It was simple! Now, I've go to learn how to compute on a 'pooter', work an iPOD, work up a sermon on Power Point so I can show pictures in the church house, and all of that stuff and it's hard for a Herman Junction guy to do that. And, while I am pointing at stuff on the Power Point the kids are having a field day text messaging. I wonder what is coming next? None of this stuff is going on at Herman Junction today and that makes everything well at Herman Junction.

'57 YELLOWJACKETS: POST #51

2009-01-06T07:10:00.001-08:00

One of the great blessings of my life in being raised at Herman Junction was getting to go school at Bay, Arkansas. At one time there was a school at Herman Junction housed in one building across the railroad tracks from our house. When we moved there the school had already closed and we rode the bus as little folk to the school in the big city of Bay. To me it was a HUGE school and I may as well have been in New York City even though at that time I didn't know that there was a New York City.

Miss Una Pounds was my first teacher and it was called the 'Primer' class. I guess it was similar to a kindergarten class today. Miss Una taught that class from the beginning of time I guess. I know that she taught Noah's grandchildren after they got off the Ark. She was known and loved by everybody in the country. I moved from that class to the Second grade after the first year, skipping the First grade. I don't know why that was but it was OK to me. That is why I graduated from High School at barely Seventeen years old and several of my classmates did too.

Most of my early classmates and I went all the way through High School together. Our society was not as mobile as it is today and moving around was only from one to another share-cropping place but we stayed in the same school. Not too many moved away and not too many moved in it seemed to me. It was such a blessing to go to school with children and young people who would be dear friends to this very day.

Every year now there is a reunion at Bay of the '57 Yellow Jackets. There are only about three or four of our classmates that we cannot find and about Seven who have passed away. There were 46 graduates in 1957 and we usually have about 32-36 at our reunion and we really enjoy it. You know, when you get our age you need to have your reunions often because you don't know when you might be called for a funeral instead of a reunion!

Our class was made up of some really good people. Oh, we had our differences but that was OK. Gladys Jean Hines asked me in October 2008 if I was still spreading that church of Christ stuff around. She wasn't being mean, just showing her hard-shelled Baptist feelings. We talked about church quite often and argued about dancing, etc. but we loved each other in spite of our differences. Shirley and Peggy Ashlock were neighbors and both of them in my class. I told the church where Shirley attends that when we were youngsters we fought nearly every day and she started every one of them! We don't fight any more though. One classmate told me recently that the two of us had a fight once because I was trying to keep him from fighting with Jimmy Isbell. I don't remember that but he shouldn't have been picking on Jimmy anyway. I remember one time we were at a basketball game at Marked Tree and we were outside the gym during the girls game. Some guys wanted to fight us and one of the Marked Tree guys said, "I have a brother in High School." Dalton Weaver said, "I have a brother in the PEN!" That was the end of the fight and I sure was glad. I don't remember when Walton got out of the pen but he has been preaching now for about 50 years. (Now, he wasn't really in the pen...Dalton was just joshing.) I could tell a thousand stories but some of them would accuse me of not telling the truth on them so I will just hush before I get in more trouble than I am already in.

Yes, I am really proud to be a part of the '57 Yellow Jackets and look forward to seeing them time and again. In fact, I hope that I am the last one to leave this earth because I would not want to think what some of them might say if I go before them. May God bless you dear friends and may we have many more good times together.

DUST, MUD, GUMBO: POST #50

2008-12-31T10:11:00.000-08:00

Every road in the Herman Junction area was dirt except old highway 63 that ran right in front of our house. No, I did NOT say GRAVEL road, I said DIRT road. The roads in every direction from our house were just dirt roads and that made life interesting at times.

Herman Junction was the only place that I knew of where one could stand in mud up to his butt and have sand blowing in his eyes! Things could change that quickly it seemed. I hated DUST! It was awful to be walking down the road and a car or truck meet you or pass you and the dust would be so thick that you could not see and you could just feel it filling your lungs in spite of any effort that you made to keep it out. Dust was everywhere and covered everything. It could even get in the house around the windows and you could write your name on the end tables and other pieces of furniture. One would anxiously await a little rain and then it would come. When it came, we had......

MUD! I mentioned earlier that when I was very young I enjoyed riding in the wagon with the family and leaning over the side boards and watch the mud squshing up on the wheels and leaving a trail behind us. Even as I got older I enjoyed riding the tractor or a bicycle through the mud. It was kind of fun to make mud balls and fight with them unless you got hit square in the face with one and I have had that experience many times. Mud doesn't taste too good. A lot of time could be used taking a stick and making all kinds of designs in the mud only to have your little sister come along and mess it all up. But, I didn't really like the mud all that much and I was happy to see it dry up some. But then that dad gummed dust would come back and mess everything up again.

GUMBO! Do you think that I am talking about Louisiana Gumbo that one eats? Well, I am not! I am talking about the dirt out of Ben and Pete Harpers farms. It would be dry and dusty, then the rain would come and there would be mud and gumbo. We often wore shoes that were called, "Gumbo Boots or Shoes." I can hardly describe the feeling of trying to walk in a pair of boots or shoes through gumbo. I mean that stuff was like some kind of plaster or cement. You would get stuck and the only way out was to pull your feet out of the boots and then try to pull the boots out of the gumbo and carry them to dryer ground. When you pulled those boots out of the gumbo it made a sound kind of like we make when we put a big sucker in our mouth and remove it quickly. We would go to chop cotton and that gumbo would stick to your hoe and about every third strike you would have to stop and clean the gumbo off your hoe. When you were picking cotton because the cotton was dry but the gumbo was still a bit wet, when you got to the end of the row you would have about sixty pounds of cotton in the sack and twenty pounds of gumbo on your sack and feet. Barbara and I slid off a road one time and there was no way to control the car in the gumbo. We were going very slow and just gently slid off in a ditch. We had to walk a few hundred yards in the gumbo and you never saw such a mess in your life. We had it all over us by the time we got to a nearby house. It is cold black and as sticky as glue.

There are still come dirt roads at Herman Junction just exactly like those in days gone by. And, they are still dusty and muddy and that gumbo remains on those farms where we once chopped and picked cotton. Ain't it good to have nice paved roads?

FUNERALS: POST #49

2008-12-22T04:34:00.001-08:00

There were some sad times at Herman Junction just like there are sad times everywhere else. I remember them vividly. We came home from school one day and there were several people at the house on the other side of the track from us between Herman Junction and Davis Spur. The wife and mother of the family that lived there had died some time before. On this day when we got home and saw all the people there we learned that the father/husband of the family had just died. I believe that there were four children in the family and now they were without father or mother and I remember how painful the thought of that was to me. I don't know what happened to the children but I hope that they have each had a very good life as adults.

I hated funerals. I only went to two funerals and left both times before I began preaching and had to preach one. I went to the funeral of My Lady's brother, Pete and I had to leave because I could not stand the pain that completely filled that building. Pete was 18 years old and died of kidney disease. My Grandmother died and I went to her funeral but again I had to leave because I simply thought that I would burst with pain when I saw my Dad and so many, many, others who hearts were broken. I am an extremely emotional person and to this day I cry every time they open a new Wal-Mart store or something like that. Funerals are especially tough for me. I have come a long way though and was able to speak at both Dad's and Mom's funeral although later I crashed.

There were some things about Herman Junction funerals that I didn't understand and I thought were quite odd. Most of the time the body of the deceased was taken home for a day or so before the funeral and people in the community would come to the house and 'sit up' with the family. I remember a lady who lived there and when someone died she would just move in with the family for a couple of days. Sometimes she didn't even know the family but she would always go and just sit there and eat. You know, there was always a ton of food for the family when someone died and this lady would go there and just graze for a couple of days and I remember Mom and some others talking about that. I thought that I could surely find a better place to eat myself. When the funeral occurred this same lady would just wail and carry on like she had lost her best friend but after the funeral she was just fine and ready to eat again.

One of my Aunts had always heard that the body of the deceased was put in a casket with clothes that had a front in them but no back and she had always wondered about that. One time she decided that she would sit with the corpse and when everyone else was gone she would take a peek and see if that was true. But, there was one other lady who sat there too and didn't budge to leave. They sat there together all night long although they really didn't know each other very well. Later, my Aunt learned that the other lady was there for the same reason that she was but neither of them knew what the other was thinking.

One of my preacher friends preached an entire funeral calling the deceased by the wrong name. She had a twin sister and the living sister sat there and heard her own funeral preached! Her corrected it at the cemetery.

The people in the community in those days honored the deceased and the family in every way that they could. Work almost stopped. Traffic on the highway stopped as the procession made it's way to the church building and cemetery. If there was a crop in the field that needed to be tended, neighbors banded together and took care of those needs. If help was needed financially there was always someone to lead the way to gather funds and help. There was a bond in the community that is seen very seldom these days and everyone was willing to do whatever he or she could do to relieve the needs of their neighbors.

In Romania a funeral is so different and I was shocked one day when I saw one taking place. I was sitting in a big bus that was stopped and I was just looking out the window. My Lady and some other Americans were with me. Suddenly there was a three quarter ton truck passing by and up on the bed of that truck was a casket with a body in it and the top of the casket was turned across the front of the bed and the body was lying there all clothed but exposed to the elements. There was a rail across the rear of the truck and family members were holding on to the rail and behind them were other family members and friends. The truck was moving very slowly so the people could keep up with it and they were very, very, respectful as they made their journey to the cemetery. There was a lot of loud wailing and crying as they walked down the street. But, I was amazed at the body just lying there and I told My Lady and the others that if I die in Romania to please put the lid down on my casket because it is unusually cold over there.

I didn't like the funerals at Herman Junction but there were some funny things that happened sometimes and I guess that was alright because it helped to lighten the load a bit. I hope there isn't a funeral at Herman Junction today because it would have to be James or Ann Ritchie or my sister, Mayor Linda and I wouldn't like that.

CHRISTMAS AT HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #48

2008-12-19T06:12:00.000-08:00

My memories of Christmas at Herman Junction will live with me forever I hope. I honestly do not remember having a bad Christmas or one that failed my expectations except once when I was disappointed that I did not get a bicycle and instead got a scooter. Do you know what a scooter is? It was certainly not a motorized vehicle. It was a little deal where you put one foot on it and used the other foot to push yourself and you had a handle bar sticking up to guide yourself. We don't see them much anymore.

Preparing for Christmas was a joy. We went to the woods and found a cedar tree that looked just right, cut it down and pulled it to the house. Our tree was always decorated beautifully. We had popcorn that we had strung, red berries that we found in the woods and strung them, painted gum balls that were all over the place and we painted them different colors, a few icicles, and other home made decorations. We may have had a few other things and an angel on top but I really do not remember electric lights and many other decorations that we have today. It was always a joy to behold. Dad always provided for us more than I can now believe that he could have done. We had nuts, apples, oranges, candy, etc. all over the place. The one time that I remember being so sick that I could hardly move was when I ate about five pounds of that old hard Christmas candy. They had to hold a dish pan under me when I threw up because a normal bowl would not hold it. I can't stand that stuff to this day and haven't had it in our house for years.

Christmas morning was the time for opening presents. We would not have considered giving out gifts before that at all. Well, maybe I would have thought it but I knew better than to ask. It sure was fun anticipating the coming of Christmas morning, gathered around that tree and a good fire going in the old king heater, and Mom preparing a feast for breakfast. As soon as we finished we had acres and acres of places to go outside and play with the things that we got. I couldn't imagine how many times we got roller skates and we eagerly waited for them each time.

Later there was the Christmas dinner. I don't know how Mom did it. She had already fixed that huge breakfast and then must have just washed the dishes and started over for preparing dinner. There was always that chicken and dressing, her specialty and everything that went with it. She had pecan pies and several others, and a Jam cake. Mom made Jam cakes for other people too. They would pay her enough for the stuff to make it and then a little extra and they were really good. There wasn't anyone in the country that had a better Christmas than we had at Herman Junction.

I loved to sing Christmas carols and I still do today. I remember walking all over Bay with the other young people at church and singing Christmas carols. One time we went to Nettleton and met with other young people from around the area and we walked all over town singing Christmas carols and then came back to the building where the ladies had hot chocolate and cookies for us. I would love to do that today!

I do not believe that Jesus was born on December 25. I do not celebrate this day as a religious holiday. However, it is a great time at our house even now and part of the reason is because of the Christmases that we enjoyed at Herman Junction.

YELLOWJACKET#27: POST #47

2008-12-19T03:47:00.000-08:00

I don't remember when I did not like basketball. My older brothers liked basketball and we played it a lot at Herman Junction. Before we had a real basketball we had a home made goal with a rim from a barrel or keg nailed up on the end of the little barn and later made a goal out of an old Texaco sign. Our basketball was a toe sack or two rolled up in a ball and held together with twine and we would bounce it on our hand instead of dribbling. You know, a toe sack ball won't dribble too good. If you ever stopped bouncing that thing in your hand you had to shoot or you would walk and you would lose the ball.

I played on the Junior High team in the 9th grade and would have played before that but there was no way to get me into Bay for games. I was not very good I guess in the 9th grade because I have never forgotten that I was the only player on the team that never took my warm up off the entire year. I never played one second in a game and I think that I certainly would have remembered it if I had. I think that if I had been the coach every player would have played at least a few minutes in a full year but I didn't. I never missed a game though and practiced as diligently as every other player.

In the 10th and 11th grades I got to play some and just loved it. There were certainly too many good players on the team for me to get in very often but I did get to play some. In the closing part of the 11th grade year I got to play a bit more and then in my Senior year I played a lot. I did not start many games but I normally was at the scorers table when the game started ready to come in at the first opportunity or the coach would call time and put me in. Winston (Truck) Holmes started every game because he was taller than the rest of us and he jumped center at the beginning of nearly every game. I loved playing basketball and stayed after school and practiced and then walked home. While the baseball team was playing a few of us who didn't play baseball were in the gym playing basketball in the spring. In the summer time I spent as much time as I could playing basketball.

The best one half of a game that I ever played was against Jonesboro in the NEA Tournament at Arkansas State in my Senior year. I was wide open a lot and made 18 points the first half. Coach Bob Pierce told the other guys to get me the ball and screen for me and let me shoot the second half too. But, that didn't happen! The Jonesboro coach put Ralph Buhrmiester on me and told him to see that I didn't score any more and he did it except for TWO points! The whole half Ralph was in my face and do you know what else he did? He would play right up close to me so the Referee could not see him, and grab my jersey and hold me. He never got caught and I never scored but two points. I tried that same thing with Jimmy Mote from Monette one night. Jimmy was a lot faster than me, as nearly everyone was, and one time he was getting away from me and I grabbed his jersey and we stretched it nearly from one end of the court to the other and of course I got caught.

The day before the game with Jonesboro I sprained my ankle pretty bad in practice. The day of the game Coach Pierce took me to Jonesboro to put me in a whirlpool to try to help that ankle. I had never heard of a whirlpool because we never had many of them in a Number 3 wash tub at Herman Junction. I sat with my leg over the edge of that whirlpool for I don't know how long and then they taped my ankle real tight before the game and I played the entire game. It was one of the few times that I started the game and it was real nice to hear my name called and get to run out there with the other starters. Barbara heard the game on the radio at home and got to hear my name called quite a bit for the first half of the game and then she must have thought that I died because she didn't hear it the last half thanks to Ralph.

One game that I especially remember was a game against Green County Tech. I was a Junior and the coach put me in after we were so far behind that we couldn't have won anyway. I was over between the basket and the left corner and someone threw me the ball. Here I was with the ball and the biggest man in the nation guarding me! I think that his name was Pigg and he was a BIG PIGG! I didn't see any of my teammates open and I couldn't dribble. I simply turned to my left and let go a hook shot with my left hand and it hit nothing but net! It wasn't because I meant for it to go in but it was just a lucky throw. But, everyone gave me a big hand just like I meant to make that basket.

I love basketball. I played with some great guys and we remain close friends to this day. Every year our high school class has a reunion and every time we talk about those games in high school I get better and better! When I preached in North Little Rock, Arkansas for seven years, I was invited to go to Barton Coliseum and give the invocation three times every day at the State Tournament when the entire thing was conducted in Little Rock. I watched a lot of basketball. I really enjoyed it when Bay came to the tournament. I watched the McMaster boys, Butch Isbell, Eddie Morrison, and others play Rector in the tournament and it really brought back memories. The tournament lasted for three weeks and I watched a lot of it and really did enjoy it.

We've come a long way from a balled up toe sack at Herman Junction but I loved it even then. I may go back there and challenge Mayor Linda to a game but she will have to play barefooted and promise not to hit me in the head with her shoe if I beat her. Oh, yes everything is good at Herman Junction today.

ICE STORM: POST #46

2008-12-16T06:45:00.000-08:00

I am sitting at this computer right now looking outside at ice everywhere! The streets are covered and we are being advised to not get out at all because it would be too dangerous. Offices and businesses are closed. We were just about ready to leave for a doctor's appointment in Little Rock but the office called and said that they would not be open.

This reminds me of the first BIG ice storm that I remember. It was in the very early part of 1957 and I had never seen anything like it at Herman Junction. Ice covered the trees and the limbs looked like pure crystal. The roads were completely covered and we could get outside for short periods of time and skate on that ice as long as we could stand the cold. While we kids enjoyed the time off from school our parents had problems to deal with. Public worked almost stopped. It was wonderful that we used wood to heat our house because we had plenty of wood stored up for the winter.

I suppose the biggest problem that people had was trying to keep the food in the deep freezers from being ruined. The electricity was off for several weeks after the ice had melted because the REA couldn't get all the power lines back up and power restored as quickly as they can do it now. Barbara's family had a freezer full of food and cooked on a gas stove. They had a water pump that could be thawed out and a good water supply. They invited people who could get out on a tractor or just walk to their house to come and eat with them because the food in the freezer was going to ruin anyway. The electricity at their house was off for exactly two weeks and in some areas it was off longer than that.

My Mom cooked on a stove heated with Kerosene all the time that I was at home. So, we had plenty of food, water, and other necessities. We did not have indoor facilities and maybe you have heard the old saying, "Colder than a well diggers hind end". Well, you didn't have to be a well digger to have a cold hind end during that time. We just made sure that there was plenty of kindling and wood carried in the house and we made it fine. We had lamps to read by or to play rook or some other game. We would play games like, "I Spy" and "I see something that you don't see" and we kept busy. After dark I would often get to pop the corn and I hated it when someone would come and start grabbing a handful before the dish pan was full. While I popped they grabbed and I wanted an equal opportunity at that dish pan.

I was fortunate that someone would pick me up and get me to town because we were playing in the Northeast Arkansas Invitational Basketball Tournament in Jonesoboro at Arkansas State College. They managed somehow to get us to town and the bus managed to get us to the game. My Lady had an old battery radio and she listened to the game at home.

We were happy when things cleared up at Herman Junction and we could get back to school to see our friends and basketball games could resume. Even at Herman Junction a feller could get cabin fever after so much time. As I said, ice is everywhere today as I look out my window so I think that I'll just pop up some corn after while and if you are not too busy, come on over and we'll pretend that we are at Herman Junction again where everything is alright.

THE MINK'S CAR/TRUCK: POST #45

2008-12-16T06:19:00.000-08:00

When I was about 15 I had some good times with James and Melvin Mink in an old car that had been converted into a truck by their Dad. Some of the time the doors were taken off of it and we would fly up and down those old dirty gravel roads around Herman Junction and Bay and it was a wonder that all of us didn't get killed. But, on a very hot day with cotton chopping over and it wasn't time to pick yet, we could take off in that old buggy and be as cool as a fellow could be in a vehicle without air-conditioning. The 'thing' had some side boards on the back part of it and we had a message on each side. On one side it said, "Lady, don't laugh your daughter may be in here." On the other side was a more classy little saying, "Constipated, can't pass a thing."

I don't know how many people could get in it to ride around. I don't remember any girls getting in it but maybe they did when I wasn't around. But, I remember it being full of guys laughing, gouging each other in the ribs vying for a little more room, and having a good time. We had an old radio antenna that we used a few times to hit mail boxes and weeds as we flew down the road. A dollars worth of regular gas would last nearly all weekend.

When we got a bit older and starting courting some we moved up to their Dad's car and that was much better when we expected the girls to come along. It is funny how things work out. I have ridden in the back seat of the car with another girl and James had My Lady sitting next to him in the front seat. It wasn't very long until that changed and I have been tagging along after My Lady ever since. A young man told me one time, "When I get married, my wife is not going to know where I am all the time!" When he said that I thought, "I have been married for many years and most of the time if you wanted to know where I was, just find My Lady and there I would be." I wouldn't have it any other way.

James and Melvin's father, Bead Mink died not too long ago. Melvin has told me that that old 'thing' with the sayings on the side boards was still sitting in his back yard. Nowadays guys have to have a spruced up sports car or something to drive, but I love the memories of that 'thing' we had so many years ago at Herman Junction. Do you see why I say, "Everything is Ok at Herman Junction?"

CHORE TIME: POST #44

2008-12-12T04:49:00.000-08:00

When our son was younger and about all that we asked of him was to carry out the garbage two or three times a week, he hated it so much that he told his mother that when I was real old and had to come live with him, he was making me carry out the garbage every day! That is how spoiled most of the kids are these days. They are asked to do very little except maybe kind of straightening up their own room occasionally. Most of the either don't do that or resent it.

Down at Herman Junction we had chores and if we didn't get them done we had to pay in some way like getting up on a cold morning and having no kindling or wood to build a fire. So, most of the time the chores were done. Let me list some of them for your consideration.

There was the cow to milk. I never did learn to milk a cow so when it was my turn to do that I had to do some trading with somebody. I had all kinds of lessons from nearly everybody but I just couldn't do it. I would squeeze those teats in every conceivable way but no milk would come out. Dad or one of the older boys would come squeeze and squirt that milk forty feet but I could not get more than a drop or two. I sure am glad that my living did not depend upon me milking.
There were hogs to feed. We had to mix up the shorts and get all the scraps together and fill the hog trough to fatten up the hogs. We would be rewarded greatly for that feat later in the winter.
There were eggs to gather. I hated eggs and still do. They could have just rotted as far as I was concerned but my older brothers were sloppy pigs when it came to eating eggs. Harvel, Jack, and Ray could eat half a dozen each or more right now! When they would pour gravy over about three fried eggs and then mash and stir them up and run a cat head biscuit through there it was the most sickly looking site that I could think of. So, I gathered up the eggs like I was supposed to.
Feeding the chickens wasn't too much of a deal. We always had some corn and it was kind of fun to throw out the corn or chicken feed and watch them scramble for it. All that I could see when I was doing that was a nice, big, pully-bone running around in there that would one day be mine all fried up crispy brown and hot. That kind of kept my mind off it being a chore.
We had to pump up some water in the winter time because the pump would freeze that night and we wouldn't have any unless we got out in the cold, cold, weather and thawed out the pump. So, buckets and dish pans were filled with water every night when the weather was going to be so cold.
Of course there was that splitting wood and making kindling and I hated that. I was not good with an axe and it is a wonder that I didn't cut my leg plum off. I have skinned them up a few times when I would miss the chunk of wood or that axe would bounce off the wood and get me. Then we had to carry it in the house and put it behind the stove for the fire that night and the building of a fire the next morning.
Someone had to bring in the clothes off the line that Mom had washed and hung out to dry. It looked like that clothes line was two miles long and I thought that I would never get them all carried into the house. Can you imagine the clothes that Mom washed, rinsed, and then hung on the line? And she did that all by herself most of the time.

Yes, there were chores that had to be done every day. That was after a hard day of chopping or picking cotton in some cases too. But, it never hurt us and it didn't hurt Marty to carry out the garbage either. I wish that he had lived a few days back then, he would have said, "Man, Dad I appreciate getting to carry out this garbage a couple of times a week!"

Just getting to live in Herman Junction was worth all the chores that one had to do when we lived there and that is why everything is alright in Herman Junction today.

HAIR CUTS: POST #43

2008-12-11T17:13:00.000-08:00

My Dad was a barber too. He didn't go to Little Rock and pass a hair cutting test and get his license so he couldn't charge for haircuts, but the guys in Herman Junction would come over and get thier haircut and just give Dad an offering. Even if he didn't make any money cutting other fellows hair, he saved a wad just cutting his boys hair. I didn't like hair cutting time either.

There are a couple of reasons why I didn't like to get my hair cut. One, Dad made me stand up in a chair and he would yell at me to be still. I have never been able to stand still for very long or I will just fall over. Sometimes even today when we stand to pray in church I have to back up to the bench behind me and put my legs up against it to kind of steady msyelf. I'm usually on the front row so there isn't one in front of me to hold on to. But, I would be standing up in that chair trying my best to be still and then I would feel myself sort of swaying back and forth and Dad would say, "Be still, Boy or I am going to mess your hair up." Mom would take my side and say, "Herbert you know that he can't stand still, he'll faint or get sick and throw up." It sure was hard to stand there but I never did faint and I don't remember ever throwing up during a hair cut.

There are a couple of things that I remember well about hair cuts. When I was about 15 some of my friends dared me to get a Mohawk hair cut and they even made up the money to pay for it if I would get one. Dick Davis, the barber in Bay agreed to do it and he did it. He said that it was a little hard to get the streak down the middle exactly where it should be because my head was whop sided. I remember going home and dreading it awful, but Dad just looked at me like he thought that I was crazy as a loon, and didn't say anything about it. I never had another one of those.

There was a time when Dad let the older boys and a neighbor or two swap haircuts. The boys cut each others hair and you should have seen that mess. Sometimes we see the young guys nowadays and thier hairdoos and we wonder about thier sanity. Well, you should have seen the boys from Herman Junction. When one would get his hair cut and look at it in the mirror and see what had been done to him, he would get to cut the next guys hair and you know what he would do, don't you? Yes, that is what he did! After it was all over Dad tried to straighten it up so that it would not be so ugly and miserable for them but he couldn't do a real good job on them. Funny, I only remember that happening one time.

Dad spent about twenty or thirty years going to what we then called the, County Home, giving all the men thier haircuts. If he got paid at all it was about $1.00 per head and I don't think that he got paid all the time. He was faithful to go and cut the hair of these men who were unable to go to a barber shop. Someone said one time, "When Herb dies, I wonder if there will be anyone to cut his hair?" Well, there was someone who did it and I am glad that it wasn't a Mohawk. It was a fine flat top like he wore most of his life as he got older.

Hair cutting time at Herman Junction was probably a good time out under those mulberry trees or on the front porch for most people, but for me standing up in that chair it was not good at all. Maybe Mayor Linda will get a barber shop there someday and then everything will be just fine at Herman Junction.

COLD MORNINGS/BUILD FIRE:POST #42

2008-12-11T16:49:00.000-08:00

I loved sleeping in a big, deep, feather bed. If we didn't have that we had a pile of wonderful quilts piled on us and we slept as warm as if we had central heat. Especially if there were three of us in the bed!

I mentioned in an earlier post how awful it was to be sound asleep and a storm would come up and Mom would start yelling and we all made our way to the storm house. How miserable! But, there was another time that was maybe even more miserable than that. We would all be sound asleep and the house was cold and suddenly there came this booming voice, "Teddy, get up an build a fire." You talk about miserable! I would crawl out of that bed in my drawers, trample through Mom and Dad's bedrom and into the living room where the king heater was. I'd then grab a few sticks of kindling or if there was no kindling get some pages out of the Sears-Roebuck catalog that wasn't in use at the outhouse yet, add a few sticks of wood and set them on fire. If they caught I could then go back to bed. The miserable of all miserables was that the fire would go out and you would hear that booming voice again, "Boy, your fire went out" and I had to do it all over again. I just hated having to start the fire in the moring. After while the whole bunch would get out of thier warm beds and come in to a toasty warm fire to get dressed for the day and turn around and warm thier rear ends good before eating breakfast.

This is why it was important in the late afternoon when doing the chores to get some kindling in and a few sticks of firewood. If you forgot to do that and you were chosen the next morning to build the fire, it was out to the wood pile to fumble around in the dark trying to find something for kindling and a slab or two of wood, and that was plain inhumane treatment! Where was the ACLU then?

I have spent considerable time helping to cut wood so we would have a warm house in the winter time. Sometimes we would walk up and down the railraod tracks and find a few chunks of coal that had fallen off the train and that coal would make a super fire. Since Dad worked on the railroad we often got the old railroad ties and hauled them home and sawed them up and they too made a super fire. They were all soaked with creosote and caught pretty quick and that king heater would just turn red with heat and sometimes Mom would get a bit scared that the fire was so hot. Later Dad started going up to Bradshaw's sawmill and buying slabs of lumber and that would catch quickly because it was dry and it made a good fire too.

Old Booie would come down to the house sometimes at night and we would just sit around the stove and talk. Booie dipped snuff and he would spit in the stove until he put the fire out and then he would go home and we would go to bed. I have listened to some mighty interesting and educational conversations around that king heater in the evenings at the big house.

But, here is the sad part. After a few hours of good sleep we had to go through all that ordeal again: "Rayburn, get up and build a fire." Boy, was I ever glad to hear him say any name other than Teddy. You know, the odd thing is this: Until the day that he died my Dad argued that he never made one of us get up and build a fire because he did it every morning! If he did, which I know he didn't, then I sure had some miserable dreams. I think that I am going to take a little kindling and a couple of slabs of wood with me and when I meet him in the great by and by, I am going to say, "Get up, Herb and build the fire!"

GOOD TIMES AT HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #41

2008-12-09T14:24:00.001-08:00

What can a guy do for fun in Herman Junction? There are no video games, rodeos, TV's, and things like that. I have mentioned before that there was a basketball goal that we made out of a pole and a discarded Texaco sign. There were skates, a stick with a Prince Albert tobacco can on the end of it and bent close together so we could get a hoop off a keg and push it down the road. We could even pick up a couple of beer cans that had been thrown out of a car, stomp our feet down hard on them and walk down to the big bay ditch and it sounded like a horse coming down the road. Then we could throw rocks at the snakes in the ditch or the bottles that someone had thrown in there. We might even get a can and make a hole in top of it and drop marbles from our waist and see who could hit that hole the most times. Shoot, I could take that can to school the next day and if some of my buddies wanted to try it, they could drop marbles with me. That meant if they missed the hole I got the marble but if they hit it, I had to give them two or more depending upon the size of the hole. If there happened to be an old discarded tire around you could push it to Bay and leave it in the ditch on the outskirts of town and then push it back home that evening. There were still a lot of miles on a tire after it was taken off the car, don't you see. My, My, there were all kinds of things to do.

You see, we had to make our things to do because most of the things that some other kids did, we didn't get to. We didn't get to go to the movies unless we snuck in because Mom said that the Catholics got all the money from the movies. We couldn't play the pinball machine because that was gambling. One time I was playing the pinball machine in the Yellow Jacket Cafe and Dad came walking up. That pinball machine was right in the window. I nearly busted the thing trying to get away from it and pretend that I wasn't playing it although that ball was rolling around and bumping into things and making all kinds of racket. I got by with it though because he didn't come in before I could get out to where he was. We could play Rook all we wanted to at home but we couldn't play with the cards that had Kings, Queens, and Jack's on them because they were gambling cards. Mercy, don't you get caught in that pool hall either because that was a gambling den for sure!

Well, you may think that I am complaining and thinking that I was cheated out of having a good time but that sure isn't so. I cannot think of many boring times at Herman Junction. Nowadays kids have all kinds of electronic gadgets and games and they still complain that they are bored. All they need is for someone to take them out and show them how to make a sling shot or a rubber gun and the boredom will be relieved. Or, have them try to walk on a pair of tom-walkers. You don't know what tom-walkers are do you? Figure it out for yourself. I'll tell you this, one of the funniest sights you will ever see in your mind is Harvel walking on a pair of tom-walkers and Dad whipping him and he couldn't walk fast enough to get away. Better than a rodeo!

I have knocked a ton of rocks off the Frisco railroad with a stick about like a baseball bat. I was better than any professional baseball player. And, I have thrown a few of them at Rayburn and others who got close enough to me. Wading water in the ditch catching crawdads was something that every boy should experience unless there was a snake in there too. Aw, the list is endless of good things to do if a feller just put his mind to work inventing good things. There was never a dull moment at Herman Junction for six boys and two girls plus all the neighbor kinds. If you think that it might be boring there today, just get the Mayor, Linda all excited and things start flying again and that's what makes everything well at Herman Junction.

FRAIDY CAT: BLOG #40

2008-12-09T12:08:00.000-08:00

Have you ever been so scared that you could hardly walk? I mean, 'trembling in your britches' scared? When a young fellow from Herman Junction finds himself in Bay on a Saturday night when the old town is bustling with people, that can happen. And it did happen to me. Not just one time but several times.

I was in Bay with the family one Saturday night and Mom and the little ones were at E.D. Smith's grocery store visiting with E.D. and Aunt Mollie. I had walked around to the front with Dad and then he got to talking and I just wondered up and down the street by myself. After while I heard some men talking about a man that had been murdered at Truman earlier in the evening. His throat was cut from ear to ear! Can you imagine the images that formed in my head when I heard that? They also said that the murderer was last seen headed toward Bay! Holy Cow! Here I was by myself just walking around watching the people, etc. I remember very well looking for any stranger and if I saw one I hastened to the other side of the street or turned and walked the other way quickly. I just knew that if the throat cutter was in town I would be his next victim and a knife cutting me from ear to ear was about the most gruesome thing that I had ever heard of. I was absolutely scared to death and went hurriedly around the corner to E.D. and Aunt Mollie's store where I knew I would be safe. I never did know whether the killer was caught or not and don't know anything else about the case but I do remember it happening very well.

We went to church services one Sunday night, Dec. 13, 1948, as we always did. When we got out of services we heard that there was some kind of commotion going on down on Main Street but Dad took us down another street and took us on home. He immediately went back to Bay and came home some time later. I heard him tell Mom that a black man that we had always known had come into town that night waving a shotgun around and yelling and hollering for someone. The man was known to have a mental defect. Dad knew this man and had thought that he could go back to town and calm the guy down and everything would be alright. However, when Dad arrived the man, Early Hughes had already been shot and killed by the city marshal. When they went to check Early's body they found that the gun was not loaded but of course the marshal did not know that. The man was out on Main street near the depot and the marshal stationed himself behind the theater and shot him from there. Again, when I heard that story I never wanted to go to Bay again! Herman Junction seemed to me to be a lot safer place.

It was Saturday night again. The town had a small brick building out in an alley behind the post office and some business places, that was the jail. That night a couple of guys were put in the jail, probably because of drunkenness, but I don't know for sure. The next morning when we went to church we learned that the jail had burned in the wee hours of the morning and the two guys inside had died. I do not know who the fellows were or anything about them but I know how I squirmed when I was told that two men had burned to death in that jail house. I never wanted to walk through that alley again.

Many years later My Lady and I with our children went to Bay for a family reunion. We started home in the evening and just pulled up at the corner of Main Street and Church St. Then, I heard gunshots and a man with his arm out the window of a car shooting at some other men across the street by Wayne Hill's grocery store and we were right square in between. I yelled, "Get down" and took off. Am I in Dodge City? What is going on here? I went and told the police and while they were pecking out the information on a typewriter a couple of other guys had run down the shooter and brought him in while we were still there.

Yes, Sir, I have been 'trembling in your britches' scared at Bay and that made Herman Junction seem so much a better place to be.

NEAR TRAGEDY AT HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #39

2008-12-06T10:20:00.001-08:00

My heart almost stopped one day a few minutes after the phone had rung. My Lady answered and all that I heard her say was, "Oh, Marty!" She listened for a little while and then hung up and turned to me and said, "Marty just heard on the radio that Harvel has been killed in the deer woods." I could not believe my ears as she went on to explain that Harvel was in the deer woods near Mountain View, Arkansas hunting and was killed. I knew that he had a cabin there and that he was in the deer woods hunting. I immediately called the radio station and they told me that I needed to call the Sheriffs' office in Stone County. I called the Sheriffs' office and told them what I needed and the dispatcher asked if I was part of the family. I told her that I was Harvels' brother and she said, "You need to talk to the Sheriff." Almost instantly the Sheriff got on the phone and I told him that I had been told that my brother had died in the deer woods near Mountain View and he said, "No, he and his son Roger were up here hunting with another man and the other man died with a heart attack." When he told me who had died it stirred mixed feelings in me because I had known Mac McCool for many years too and he was the man who had died. I called Harvel's house and his wife Bobbie answered the phone. I asked her what she was doing and she said, "I am just sitting here by the phone answering it and telling people that Harvel is not dead." What a deal! I learned then that the news media needs to confirm things before reporting on the air.

Another time our phone rang and I answered it and a good friend on the other end said, "I sure am glad to hear your voice." I asked, "Why?" She told me that Ted Knight had been killed in an automobile accident up near Herman Junction and she just knew it was me. Well, it wasn't. But, I don't know who it was and what he may have been doing near Herman Junction.

I was in Andulusia, Alabama once with car trouble and when we got to the dealer where our car was towed, I walked up to the window to give them the information that they wanted and when the guys asked me my name I said, "Ted Knight." He just froze and stared at me. I figured that he was thinking of the Mary Tyler Moore character who was named Ted Knight. After he came unglued a bit he said, "Our general manager here is named Ted Knight." I was glad because that Ted put this Ted in a borrowed car and sent us on our way to preach and then delivered our car to us a few days later.

It seemed that we never lacked having something to excite us at Herman Junction but it all worked out to make Herman Junction OK today.

THE TRUCK WRECK: POST #38

2008-12-05T17:46:00.001-08:00

The old highway that ran right through Herman Junction was a pretty popular course. One could take the old highway to the county line to the nearest liqiour store and was a lot less likely to run into a policeman than if he took the new highway. So, most people who wanted to buy liqiour came right through Herman Junction, sometimes both going and coming. Because of that there were a lot of wrecks on the old highway. I remember one night when a car wrecked smack dab in front of our house. There were two bridges in front of our house about 100 feet apart. One led up to Booie Woods house and the other was the bridge into our yard.

We were already in bed when we heard a terrible noise and people yelling and hollering right in front of the house. When we got out in the yard there was a fight going on and a car turned upside down in the ditch perfectly between those two bridges. Another car was sitting up on the highway and both cars were full of young men. One had been chasing the other when the first car lost control and into the ditch he went. No one was hurt and they were already out of the car and yelling and screaming at one another. I don't know if they ever exchanged blows or not because I was watching from behind the storm house and couldn't see everything clearly.

One wreck that I remember best did not involve drinking or chasing or anything like that. It just involved three boys being ignorant and having fun at the same time. My transportation was limited in those days and I either had to walk or catch a ride with somebody most of the time. Walton and Dalton Weaver didn't live far from us and they drove their Dad's truck to ball practice and to the games most of the time and would come by and pick me up. One time we had a batch of bad weather and school was not in session but Coach Pierce called us to ball practice anyway. The Weaver boys picked me up and then after practice they were going to drop me off at my house. There was snow and some ice on the road, especially on the edges. We met a car and had to get over on the shoulder to pass and as Walton started to pull back into the middle of the road the truck kind of slid sideways and that was fun! So, every time we came to a patch of snow and ice over on the side he would pull over there, give a little extra gas to pull back in the road and we would slide back and forth a little. You are ahead of me now and you know what happened don't you? One time he gave it a little extra power and that thing started sliding all over the place, slid just past a huge tree, down in the ditch, and turned over. We didn't like that much and in our efforts to climb out of there one of us stepped on the window of the side under us and broke that window out. We finally got out and as we walked on down the road to Herman Junction we kind of got tickled, especially as we developed our story about what had happened. We got my Dad's car and I took them home and thier Dad came and got the truck out. I don't know if either of our Dad's ever knew for sure what happened. When we all get to heaven we will tell them what the deal was.

But, things like this made Herman Junction pretty exciting at times. Ah, Yes, everything is OK at Herman Junction.

MUSCLE MAN: POST #37

2008-12-05T17:21:00.001-08:00

When I graduated from Bay High School I was 6' 3 1/2" and weighed 153 pounds. When I was in the 7th grade I was 6' 3 1/2 and weighed about 77 pounds. I mean I was skinny. I wore one of Mom's garter belts for a belt and still had plenty of room to spare. I ate all that I could hold but it seemed like I could not gain an ounce and no girl was going to look at me because if she looked in my direction she would look right by me as if I was not there. I was gawky and gangly and I was tired of it but didn't know what to do.

One day I was reading a comic book of some kind and in the back there was an advertisement from Charles Atlas. It talked about this guy that so skinny and weak that the other guys would kick sand in his face and the girls all laughed at him. Then, it showed this guy after he had been trained by Charles Atlas and he was a HUNK! So, I wrote to Charles Atlas and told him that I would like his program but I didn't have any money so was there any way that he could send it to me anyway? He didn't.

I stayed that way all through high school. We would go to ball practice and I was tall but that was all. I couldn't jump very high either. I was the one who guarded Walton Weaver in practice and we were about the same height. He would shoot a jump shot but he would fall backwards and I would jump and miss blocking the ball by a mile. Coach Bob Pierce put me in the game one time to stop Leotis Shedd from Manila. I was in the game about three minutes and fouled out because all I could do was hit him and not block his shot. Finally, in my senior year I played a lot and had a good year but because I couldn't jump, Winston Holmes started every game to jump center and then I would go in.

When we ordered our basketball jackets that last year the Coach told the man to order me a size 46! It would wrap around me twice nearly, but he told the man that if I didn't put on a bunch of weight as soon as I got out of school he would be surprised because all my older brothers had done that. So, I had a coat big enough for me and Barbara to both wear at the same time.

But, you know what? By July 24, 1958 I weighed 210 pounds. By 1965 I weighed 290 pounds. And, Charles Atlas had absolutely nothing to do with it. Yep, I had followed the same course as my older brothers and put on the weight. Then came December 21, 1971 and I had a little heart attack and my Doctor said, "You can do what I tell you and you will probably live to be an old man, but if you don't YOU WILL DIE!" He was a good friend and a great Doctor and he explained it right. I lost almost 100 pounds and have battled every day since then to keep it off. It is a constant struggle. I have been hungry since December 21, 1971!

I will say this though, no one has ever kicked sand in my face! So, in spite of a lack of training from Charles Atlas I have managed to make it just fine. Barbara shot a glance my way one day and didn't see past me. She saw old Charles Atlas standing there! And, all has been well at Herman Junction since that day.

BIG MOUTH: POST #36

2008-12-02T08:55:00.000-08:00

There always has to be a big mouth it seems and in Herman Junction I guess I was it. But, I am not talking about gossiping, carrying tales, etc. although I could have been guilty of that too I suppose. I am talking about a literal BIG MOUTH.

One time I had been to basketball practice and I was hot and tired so I stopped in at the Yellowjacket Cafe to have a Pepsi. That Pepsi tasted like heaven to me. There were two of three guys standing around and I said, "Man, I could drink 10 of these things!" One of those men told Harold Freeman, the owner of the Yellowjacket to bring us 10 Pepsi's. I suppose they were either six or eight ounce drinks. Regardless, 10 of them makes a lot of Pepsi! Ten six ouncers would make almost a two liter bottle full. They set them up there and said, "We want to see you drink TEN Pepsi's. It took me a few minutes to do it, but I did it. Then, I had to walk three miles to Herman Junction. I tell you, I was as sick as I had ever been in my life. I would walk a little bit and stop and throw up, walk some more and throw up again. When I walked I just sloshed around like a tub full of water. I'm sure that if people had been close enough to me as I made that awful journey they would have wondered what in the world was going on.

But, that wasn't enough for an ignoramus from Herman Junction. Sometime later I was in the Yellowjacket again and some other guys were standing around talking about who could put the most chewing gum in their mouth. Guess who spoke up and said, "I can put TEN packages in my mouth? You got it right, it was BIG MOUTH again. Junior Denton was home on furlough from service and he went in and bought ten packages of Wrigley's Spearment gum and brought them out and said, "Let's see you do it." Junior was a very handsome, tough, guy and I didn't want to cross him and I didn't have any money to pay him back for the gum. So I started chewing and they watched and laughed like a bunch of idiots. I put 51 cakes of that gum in my mouth and then quit. I chewed around on it for a few minutes then took it out of my mouth and threw it across the street and hit the railroad depot. It looked like that thing just rocked back and forth for a little while before settling down. I have often wondered what the person that found that huge wad of gum thought when they found it lying there. They may have thought that BIG FOOT had been there but it had only been BIG MOUTH.

I was working with a farmer one time and had never planted a row of cotton in my life driving a tractor. But, I had always wanted to! He asked me, "Can you plant a straight row of cotton?" I said, "Yes, Sir, I can do it!" I thought that he was going to drive his own tractor but he said, "Get on there and let's see what you can do." Why in the world don't I shut my mouth??

I got on that tractor and planted the straightest row of cotton that you have ever seen and planted several acres before I stopped. I know now that the Lord must have had charge of that steering wheel seeing to it that BIG MOUTH didn't get embarrassed again.

I have tried to do better in my adult years and have tried to be 'slow to speak.' But, I don't chew gum at all and haven't drunk a Pepsi in years. I have not been on another tractor either. Oh well, that's not to bad for a boy from Herman Junction where all is well today.

THE CRAZY DOCTOR: POST #35

2008-12-02T05:39:00.000-08:00

When one has a bunch of kids there is a greater need for a Doctor not only to bring them into the world but to keep them as healthy as possible. Dr. Burge delivered me and I am sure that I had to see him some after that, but I do not remember him. The Dr. that I remember most as a child was Dr. Tullos from Truman. While we didn't go to the Dr. as much as folks do nowadays, I do remember going to him from time to time. I remember not wanting to go to school one time and I really put on a show professing to have a terrible belly ache. They kept me home and took me to see Dr. Tullos and for some unknown reason Mom did not go into his office with me. So, he couldn't find any appendicitis or anything like that and told me to go on home. I went straight to the car and told Mom that he told me to go home and eat soup and drink cokes to help settle my stomach down. We went and got that and took off home and I had a fine day drinking cokes and enjoying my holiday from school. I was not more than 9-10 years old when that happened and it's OK for a feller that young to tell one once in awhile and I was pretty good at it Ray tells me.

But, the story that I enjoyed more than about any concerning Doctors was about something that happened before I was born. Mom told me this story not too many years ago. It seemed that Dad needed to go to Truman for something and Mom had the four oldest boys and they decided to go to Truman too. While Dad was inside some place attending to his business Mom and the boys just sat in the truck. Shortly, Dr. Tullos came out of his office and started walking down the street. Mom had the windows down in the truck and as he walked by she said, "Do you remember these boys?" He stuck his head through the window and looked them over and said, "Sure, I'd know those little old Morgans anytime!" Mom replied, "Those aren't Morgans, they're Knights." The good Dr. thought that she was Bill Morgans wife and those were the little Morgan boys. I guess that it might have been easy to get mixed up when delivering babies in big families like that in those days. Mom set him straight on that real quick.

Mom had to spend about four weeks in a rehabilitation unit before she passed away. I had some really good times with her while she was in there. One day we were sitting talking and a Doctor walked by and she said, "Well, there goes old Pusservin." I asked her what she said and she told me and I found out that she had just given him a new name for some reason. My Lady and I went to Indiana for me to preach in a gospel meeting and before we left I sent Mom a card to the Rehab unit. On the return address I wrote, "Burt Reynolds, Hollywood, Calif." When we came back from Indiana we stopped at the rehab place to see her and I said, "Mom, I've been to Indiana to preach." "Why, you have not," she said, "You've been to California, Burt." She loved aggravating the doctors but she was dead serious when Doctor Tullos thought that my four older brothers were Morgans.

What memories and how they bless my life and help me to know that all was well at Herman Junction.

JACKIE LYNN KNIGHT: POST #34

2008-12-01T08:00:00.000-08:00

Well, we had to stop at the Ashlocks' again on January 30, 1951 and when we got home sure enough there was another baby! When is this going to stop? I knew that people would come down to the Big Bay Ditch and leave their dogs and cats and they would make their way to our house, but where in the world are these babies coming from?

When we got home there was Jackie Lynn Knight. Do you know what? My Lady's mother, Edna Earls had come down there and brought him into the world! Did Edna bring that baby and leave it? If so, that would make me and Barbara brother and sister I guess! No, the Dr. didn't make it in time and Edna and Margie Woods helped Mom with the birth.

When Jack was about 6 years old I went away for two months to work in the harvest in Illinois for the Del Monte food company. When I came home I will never forget sitting in the house and Jack came walking in from another room. He had on a pair of short pants and no shirt and it looked like he had grown six inches in those two months. I was really surprised. I was really glad to see him and will always remember that hug from such a tall boy.

I was not around home much as Jack was growing up either. I missed a lot things with him. I have some vivid memories of him though that I cherish. When he was about 10 years old he came to visit us in LaPorte, Indiana. He must have stayed two or three weeks and he made some friends there and had a good time. He asked me one day to keep a quarter for him and I did. The rest of the time that he was there, every time he would want something I would buy it for him and then he would say, "Now, that wasn't my quarter we spent!" I guess that he must still have that quarter.

Years later I kept up some with his baseball playing exploits and have been told by several that if he had been given some guidance and discipline he could have probably played Major League Baseball as a pitcher. But, he had rather play with some independent team there around home than to go off somewhere.

My next experience with Jack came in 1974. Both of us had gone away from Herman Junction and I was living in Oklahoma City, Okla. When he turned 21 I wrote him a letter and told him that it was time for him to straighten out his life and quit doing some of the things that he was doing and just grow up and live right. A few weeks later we had been to church services on Sunday night and then gone home with some people for fellowship and to eat and just have a good time. About half way through the visit someone from the church building called and said that some of our kinfolks had come there looking for us and asking where we lived. So, we jumped in the car and took off for home and me growling the entire way about Barbara's brother coming to visit and never calls and gives a notice that he's coming or anything. Here I had to miss my supper and the good time that I was having because her brother had decided to drop in on us. I mean I was really pouring it on her.

When we drove up to our house there was the biggest motorcycle that I had ever seen sitting cross-wise of our driveway so that I couldn't get in. Lying out in the middle of our beautiful lawn was a mountain of a man with a little vest on and he was as brown as any indian that I had ever seen. He had hair down to his rear end, a long beard, and a mustache and big old black boots on his size 14 feet. That was MY baby brother, Jack! And, he had not dropped in for a day or two, he had come to live with us! After all I had told him to straighten up and live a better life so he had come to live it with ME!

Jack got a job and lived in Oklahoma City for ten years. Then he moved on to Katy, Texas to live near our brother Ray and his family. Ray had befriended him too and we learned that he was like feeding a cat, if you fed him he would keep coming back.

Several years ago Jack moved back near Herman Junction to Bay. Not long after he moved back there he called and told me that there was some property for sale at a real good price. It was the old Cochran home place just outside of Bay. I went up there and we went to the bank to see about buying it and all the time I just knew that the bank at Truman was not going to loan me some money when I lived in Conway, Ark. A couple of days later I came home and found a message on the answering machine. Jack said, "Hey, Bobby, this is J.R. and the bank approved our loan to buy the ranch!" I could have fallen over. So, we bought the property and not long after we sold it to Ronnie Davis and since Jack and Gina wanted to buy a house I gave him my part of the money for a down payment on the house where they live today. Jack and I are very close. But, I am afraid to say a lot of good things that I might otherwise say because the dude might just jump up and come to live with me again! He and Gina help Linda to make sure that all is well at Herman Junction.

LAURA ANN KNIGHT: POST #33

2008-12-01T05:33:00.000-08:00

It was February 14, 1949 and other than being Valentine's Day it was a perfectly normal day. I went to school that morning expecting it to be just like every other day that I had known. But, when school was out and we boarded the bus to Herman Junction, when we got to the Ashlocks' we were told to get off the bus and stay there for a little while. Later Dad picked us up and took us home. When we arrived we had a brand new baby sister and we were told that she was named Laura Ann Knight. Two years later we would repeat this process and when we got home we found a little brother. I had begun to think that we had better quit stopping at the Ashlocks' because every time we did we had another baby when we got home and the 'big'house' was getting fuller than it already was. What in the world did the Ashlocks' have to do with this anyhow I wondered?

Laura was the second girl in this family of five boys and Mom was elated to have another girl. It had been seven years since a new baby arrived at the Knight's house. In fact, this was the first one to be born at Herman Junction. Laura was adored by those older siblings. Two years after Laura was born Jack was born and he was a sickly little guy for a time. Mom had kids of all ages and had so many things to do that any help was appreciated. So, Edna Earls whose youngest baby was five years old, just kind of adopted Laura. One time Edna took her to a basketball game and Laura wanted to know when they were going to stand up and sing. Edna told Mom that she was going to have to take Laura somewhere besides church because that was all that she knew.

Laura can play a piano and never took a lesson her life. She can play by ear. That makes me mad because I have always wanted to play something but all that I can do is blow a sonata. (You may have to put your imagination to work to figure out what instrument that is). She loves to sing and play and we have had some great times singing together. I have been blessed to preach in several meetings in Ocean Springs through the years and have stayed at Laura's during that time. She and Jewel took us to one of the finest restaurants to eat that I have even been in. It is called, "Anthony's Under The Oaks" and is in Ocean Springs.

Laura married a military man and they moved about over the U.S. and even overseas. She had two children, Kirk and Kendra. Kendra was killed by a drunk driver several years ago leaving a baby of her own. Laura and Jewel adopted that baby, Lindsey who is now soon to graduate from high school and is a beautiful and wonderful young lady.

Laura is stark raving crazy! Now, you might wonder why an older brother would speak so of his baby sister. She lives in Ocean Springs, Mississippi and has stayed there through the worst hurricanes the U.S. has had. She stayed there through hurricane Katrina and I just thought that after everything was over we would have to go and gather up her family and take care of them but they survived wonderfully well and were able to help so many other people. When hurricane Ike was coming I thought, "She will leave this time!" Nope! She stayed right there again and everything was well. She needs to at least learn how to swim!

So, February 14, 1949 was a special day at Herman Junction and with this new baby all was well.

HERMAN JUNCTION FINE DINING: POST #32

2008-12-01T03:59:00.000-08:00

I mentioned in an earlier post about Dad that when he was young he would often have to go to bed hungry and he resolved that when he had a family that would not be the case. He said that we might not have a lot of different things to eat but that we would have plenty of what we had. He kept that promise through the years too. I remember once that Louis Woods came to the house to buy a gallon of coal oil. Dad kept two fifty gallon barrels of coal oil all the time because Mom cooked with it and of course we built fires with it in the winter time. I was a little kid wandering around outside while they were talking and I heard them talking about how hard the times were. Louis said, "Herb, I have eat so much poke salat that every time I go to the toilet it looks like a brush pile!" Can you imagine the picture that flashed through my mind? Probably the same one that you just had. We never had it that bad that I remember.

Mom was an excellent cook and we grew up eating about the same foods that others in our area ate. I have mentioned earlier how many huge biscuits (I called them cat-head biscuits and so many didn't know what that was) she made every morning. I was an odd one I guess but I didn't like eggs and gravy and still don't. But, when Mom would open one of those half gallon green jars that was packed with canned sausage balls and fix them for breakfast I could eat that, Pride of Dixie syrup with butter stirred up in it, and buttered biscuits and felt that I was fed like a king. We ate about three different kinds of beans, potatoes, every kind of vegetable that one could think of almost, pickled beets and other kinds of pickles, etc. and we fared sumptuously every day like the rich man in Luke 16. We ate about the same thing every day and it was just wonderful!

Then, the Herman Junction boy went off to Searcy, Arkansas to Harding College. I was introduced to some things that I had never seen before and I am not good at all at trying new foods. Boiled Okra! Mom had always fried hers and I loved it. I took one bite of that boiled okra and that was it. I never did like anything in my mouth that I couldn't spit out if I wanted to and I couldn't do that with slimy boiled okra. I knew then what E.D. Smith meant when they told me that he took a bite of boiled Okra and then leaned over and looked under his chair to see if it went straight on through. I went in the dining hall one night and there on my plate was a pile of white, stringy, stuff with a little wad of red sauce looking stuff right in the middle of it. They told me that it was spaghetti but I had never seen any like that and I wasn't about to eat it. So, I walked down to Bill Bob's dairy queen and got me a chili dog. A few days later I went in the dining hall for lunch (Dinner at Herman Junction) and there were some tables at the side with sacks of stuff piled high on them. I learned that our dinner (they had done replaced supper too) was in those sacks. There was a sandwich, apple, and potato chips. It was off the Billy Bob's again that evening. I don't know how in the world that I gained about 40 pounds down there because I thought that I was starving to death and would have if it had not been for Billy Bob's.

My Lady and I married and moved away to Michigan City, Indiana. It was there that I first met something called, "PIZZA." Some folks had us over to eat one night and they had Pizza. I could not stand the smell of that stuff. I didn't know what to do because this wasn't a regular staple at Herman Junction and just the way it was spelled looked silly to me and the fact that they called it a pie was outright ridiculous because I had eaten pie all my life and none of them were like this. Do you know what I learned to do? I put peanut butter on it and I liked it fine! But, My Lady made me stop doing that and I learned to eat it as long as I could choose what they put on it.

We moved back to Arkansas and a Dr. and his wife at Manila, Ark. took us to supper one Saturday night at Paragould. They ordered 'Filets' for us and I had never heard of that either. Here I am in another dilemma and I hated it. But, when they brought that filet it was wonderful and I ate every bite of it.

Then, My Lady, two children and I moved to North Little Rock, Arkansas. The second week that we were there some folk took us to Mexico Chiquito to eat. I had never seen nor eaten Mexican food. It was dark in there! I couldn't see what they were bringing. They brought a Guacomole salad with all that lettuce and stuff and a wad of Avocado stuff sitting on top of it. I looked at that and thought that it looked like where a goose had been eating Johnson grass all day and put his droppings on top of that lettuce. No way am I going to eat that! I would not touch that main course either and I apologized profusely but I just could not eat that stuff. Two weeks later the same folks took us out again to another place and they and My Lady ordered Mexican food again and I ordered fried chicken. It was light in there. When they brought that big plate of food, it looked like chili! I loved chili! I took a bite of My Lady's stuff and I have eaten five tons of Mexican food since then! It makes a difference when I can see what I am eating. A few weeks later I took My Lady and kids to the Holiday Inn for supper one Friday night. There on the menu was that word again, "Filet". I was glad to see that ordered one and my mouth watered the whole time that we had to wait. But, when they brought my food it was FISH! AWFUL FISH! No one had told me that they made filets out of fish just like they did beef and I had no idea on earth what HADDOCK was so that was a disappointing ordeal.

In recent years I have worked a lot in Romania but I learned very quickly that I could not eat their food. So, every time I go it is back to 'under the cotton wagon' food for me...Beanie-Weenies, Peanut Butter and Crackers, baloney sandwich etc. and I'll tell you what, it is mighty good over there.

After my travels in the world I have really learned to appreciate the fine dining that I grew up on at Herman Junction and My Lady still fixes regularly. That is what makes everything just fine at Herman Junction.

THE WEDDING: POST #31

2008-11-27T05:44:00.000-08:00

It was July 24, 1958 when the wedding took place in the 'big house' at Herman Junction. I had asked Barbara Jean Earls to marry me in April of that year and she said, "Yes" and so we had been planning it during that span of time. In those days a couple desiring to marry had to get a blood test and wait for three days before the license would be issued. I hate needles! I might have joined the Army had it not been for having to take all those shots that I heard about. But, I had the blood tests as required and the license was granted. Floyd Earls, Barbara's Dad was working so he just told Dad, "Herb, you just sign for both of them" and he did. The County Clerk was Ted Spurlock, the guy that I was named after so he had no problem just letting us have the license under those terms.

We went to Jonesboro to look for a ring shortly after I had come home from working in the fields in Dekalb, Illinois. My Lady went to Jonesboro by herself and shopped for her wedding dress as the wedding day approached. July 24 was getting close and we were excited. Barbara's Father Floyd, brother Pete, and sister Lin, my Mom, Dad, sister Laura and brother Jack, best man Jim Isbell, and maid of honor Myra Kendrick, and of course the bride and groom, were all there waiting for the wedding to take place. But, there was a hitch!

My older brother, Harvel had been invited to officiate at the wedding. The time was set at 6:00 in the evening. Harvel didn't show up at 6:00! Or, 7:00! There was no phone to call him nor email to send him a message. A few minutes before 8:00 I started to Bay to see if Melvin Elliott, the preacher could come down and perform our wedding ceremony. On the way to town we met Harvel so we turned around and followed him to the house where the wedding finally took place more than two hours late.

Do you have any idea where he had been? EATING SUPPER! Barbara Jean Knight will never, ever, forgive him. There were a few pictures made but they were destroyed because the anger on her face was so clearly seen. So, there is no pictorial evidence that we got married. I'll bet that if she ever gets married again she won't have Harvel to do it.

Barbara's older sister, Shirley and her husband Benny were living in the old Hyneman house in Bay right beside the pool hall and the yellow jacket cafe. They let us have their house for the night of our wedding. It rained and stormed like crazy all night but for some reason we didn't pay much attention and we sure didn't go to the storm house!

The next day was one that I will not forget either. I got up early as I always have and went to Carl Taylor's grocery store and bought a pound of sausage and a can of biscuits. I don't know why I bought those biscuits because My Lady is a fabulous biscuit maker and was even then. We had a wonderful breakfast and then went to her house to take her Dad's truck to him. A little later she needed something from town and her brother Pete and I took the truck and off to town we went. Of course, we had to stop by the station and see what was going on at school. We learned that the baseball team was playing a game at Childress, just outside of Monette and we decided to go over and watch the game. Some other guys jumped in the truck with us and off we went. We didn't get home until much later than My Lady expected us. When we walked in the house there sat Floyd as quiet as a mouse. Floyd wouldn't have gotten excited if someone had thrown dynamite under the house so I knew that everything was OK with him as far as I could tell. But, when I walked in that kitchen I saw the same look that I had seen the night before when Harvel was late for the wedding. She was as mad as a feist dog in high oats and made me feel like somebody's red-headed step child. I was as confused as a three legged chicken because I didn't think that I had done all that much wrong. Here I had been married less than 24 hours and was up to my ears in trouble with the new bride. Well, as I looked back on it I could see that I should have done better and we made up and all was well. I don't have a clue who won that ball game.

You might think that a wedding like that would not help a marriage to last very long. In fact, we got a letter from one of the older residents of Bay just a few years ago and she told us that she would not have given a nickel for that marriage. But, it has lasted now for more than Fifty years and if she will behave I think that I will keep her. In spite of the way that it started that night, that marriage helps me to know that all is well at Herman Junction.

THANKSGIVING AT HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #30

2008-11-26T16:55:00.000-08:00

I was born on Thanksgiving Day. Not at Herman Junction though. I was born at Bay, Arkansas and moved to Herman Junction later. Some of my most memorable Thanksgiving Days though were spent at Herman Junction. It was not just a holiday for us, it truly was a day of Thanksgiving. We always had a big dinner and I loved that. Dad raised turkeys and one of them old gobblers was as mean as could be. Barbara remembers him and she remembers what happened to him. He was turned into Thanksgiving dinner. He flogged Barbara one time and as I look back on it I don't remember if Barbara or the gobbler won the battle. I suppose she rejoiced and thought that she had won for sure when she saw his eventual end.

My Mama could really make cornbread dressing. That was her specialty as long as she cooked for holidays or family gatherings. She always made Pumpkin pie although I didn't like that kind of pie much. We had all the normal Thanksgiving Day food and it was a real treat, right in the middle of the week too!

One of my most memorable Thanksgiving Days though was one when we didn't have all the traditional Thanksgiving food. We had been to Uncle Louis's to pull bolls that morning and it was cold as a beaver's belly. Uncle Everett and some of his kids were working with us. I remember how cold it was and I knew that it was Thanksgiving Day and we had a special dinner coming up later. My mouth watered all morning as I anticipated sitting down in a nice, warm, kitchen and eating all I could hold of that meal. But, when we got home I was surprised and thrilled to death when I saw what we were going to eat. Mama had fixed CHEESEBURGERS! Man alive, with the exception of corn bread I suppose that cheeseburgers and chili dogs were my favorite food. I have often wondered how many she prepared because there was a bunch of us to eat, but I can just see those bread pans full of cheeseburgers right now and it makes me hungry as I think about it. We didn't have to go back to the cotton patch that afternoon either and that made me especially happy. We spent the rest of the day just enjoying the day.

I mentioned chili dogs. I always loved chili and I loved hot dogs and when I learned from the Dairy Queen that you could put chili on hot dogs, that just seemed to be about the finest thing that I could think of. Of course Corn Bread has always been my favorite food. I have often said that if the Lord were to decide that there would be only ONE kind of food for the entire world and that I could choose it, the rest of you had better like Corn Bread because that would be it. But, chili dogs came pretty close to corn bread. I think that it is just awful that when I was a kid I didn't have the money to buy chili dogs. Now, I have the money and my heart doctor tells me that if I eat them they will kill me!

Thanksgiving for many years was the day for the Herman Junction Knight's to have their annual reunion. We started them at the 'big house' at Herman Junction and boy was that house ever full! We moved it from one place to another for several years and then as Dad and Mom got older we began having the reunion at Bay every year. Now that our family has grown so much and there are Grandchildren and Great-Grandchildren, we have our reunion at another time so that Thanksgiving Day can be shared with others. It sure would be nice though to go one more time to Herman Junction and have Thanksgiving again and I know that would make everything well at Herman Junction.

A STORM'S A COMIN'! : POST #29

2008-11-26T15:26:00.000-08:00

I hate storms! We had some experiences at home at Herman Junction that I did not like at all. In the middle of the night you would hear a big clap of thunder and then you would hear Mama's feet hit the floor. "Get Up, a storms coming up", she would say, "and we've got to get to the storm house." Man, that bed was warm and it was cold outside and I had been sound asleep and now the whole world is upside down.

One night the storm came up and we all took off to the old storm house. It had been built with some poles and stuff and covered up in dirt. We went flying out there and whoever opened the door and shined the light in there put it right on a BIG SNAKE lying across the back wall of the storm house. Now, we are in a pickle! We can stay out in the dangerous storm or go on in with that more dangerous snake. We elected to take off to Booie's storm house and the rain was pouring down. Scattering across the yard like a bunch of geese suddenly there was a cry like a panther but it was Smiley. He has stepped on the cycle that was used to cut weeds and tall grass and had almost cut his big toe off. We had to forget the storm and get in the house so the folks could take care of that toe. I'll bet he wasn't smiling then!

When Dad bought the place where the 'big house' was there was a little thing that had evidently been used in the past to hold water or something. There were four walls about three feet high and with a door in the right hand corner as you entered. After that fiasco with the snake and the toe cutting, Dad built some forms and built a concrete storm house. It was about 10x12 feet and he put a little pipe in the top of it for ventilation. He put a bed in that thing and said that when we had a storm we just go out there and sleep. SLEEP! That place was filled with such a musty smell that there was no way that I could sleep in there. Besides that it was half full of canned food and there was so many of us we had to almost sit on top of each other. I have spent many a miserable time in there. The thing that I never understood though was, Dad would put us in there and then he would stay outside and watch the storm. How in the world could you watch a storm when it was slap dark out there? I guess he could but I couldn't and still can't.

One of the things that really stands out in my mind about that storm house was when the worst storm we ever had came through the country up until that time, Dad and Clarence Rodgers got caught standing on the back porch watching it and when it really hit they couldn't get to the storm house. Mama and Grandma was screaming and hollering and Dad and Clarence couldn't do a thing but just watch it. That was when the tornado came through Bald Knob and Judsonia and all over the country. I think that it was 1953. There was only that one time that a really serious storm came and the other times we just came out and went back to bed and all was well. It reminded me of a story that Mama told us about an old lady that ran to the storm house just like we did and every time she came out all was well. One time she came out of the storm house and her house was gone! She said, "Now, that's more like it!"

I don't want to get blown away but I don't like storm houses, musty smells, and especially snakes in one of them. But, if that is what it takes to make everything well at Herman Junction, I guess it's worth it.

UNCLE CHARLIE: POST #28

2008-11-26T13:05:00.000-08:00

One of the people that I loved and respected at Herman Junction was my Dad's older brother, Charlie Knight. He and Aunt Agnes were great people and I loved it when we visited them or they visited us. They had four children: Vera, Billie Jean, Leonard, and Helen. Helen passed away many years ago.

There was a time when Uncle Charlie and Aunt Agnes lived out close to the Gum Slough ditch near the old swimming hole that we called, "The Forks". I have spent many hours in that place and cannot imagine now how I brought myself to do it. I am so afraid of snakes that nowadays I don't want to walk through a puddle of water in the street for fear of a snake being in it. That swimming hole was full of kids a lot of the time in those days. It was also used as a bapistry quite a bit and maybe that's why the Lord kept the snakes away.

I went with Uncle Charlie one time to Jonesboro to trade trucks. I asked him what kind of truck he wanted. I will never forget his answer: "I will not have a Dodge and I don't want a red truck!" You know what happened before I tell you. We came home in a Dodge truck that was red with a black top and to my knowledge he never drove another truck except a Dodge. He was always full of fun, like calling me 'Teddy Martin, goin' down the road and kickin' and a.....laughing'. Yeah, laughing. He worked in the stock yards in St. Louis for many years and finally came back and settled in Bay. I have a billy club that he used to nudge the cattle around and I don't have a clue why he gave it to me. I carry it in van but have never had the ocassion to whop anyone on the head with it.

Dad had three brothers and one sister and I loved them all. One time Linda and Larry, my sister and brother-in-law took Dad and Mom to Hot Springs to visit Uncle Everett and Aunt Clara. When it got dinner time they decided to go to the world famous "McLard's Bar-B-Que" place and get food to take home. When Linda and Larry got in the place they looked around and Dad and Uncle Everett were not behind them. They waited a few minutes and out of the KITCHEN came those two brothers, dressed up in overalls, and acting they were one of the McClard's! They each had a $100 bill, probably the only one that either one of them ever had, and were fussing about who was going to buy the dinner. The whole restaurant full of people stopped eating and watched the show until they got what they wanted and left. Dad's sister Evelyn Church was one of the finest human beings to ever live and had TEN kids! Uncle Louis and Aunt Ruby live at Elm Grove and they had Kathryn, Wanda, Tom, Pat, Shelby, Zelna Rose, and Sharon. I don't remember all the names of Uncle Everett and Aunt Clara's kids and regret that I never got to know them very well. They all lived at Hot Springs I think, except Jim.

It was people like them that made Herman Junction such a swell place to live.

WATERMELON PATCHES: POST #27

2008-11-24T14:13:00.000-08:00

When I lived at Herman Junction I had two experiences with watermelon patches that I will never forget. A lot of people grew watermelons and the farmer would take them out on a roadside stand or to a market somewhere and sell watermelons, canteloupes, and whatever else he might have. Of course a watermelon patch was a notorious temptation to a young feller who felt like a real, genuine outlaw and wanted to test his courage.

Booie planted a watermelon patch right beside our house and smack on the edge of the highway. I know now why he did it. Of course, he liked watermelons and his family and our family could eat a lot of them. But, it wasn't the eating that Booie liked the most. It was the fun that he and dad had chasing the watermelon thieves out of the patch. I have known that they laid out in that watermelon patch half the night just waiting for the gangsters to come to steal some and then they would rise up and start yelling and watch the mighty men flee for their lives. Booie was also known to cut a hole in a few of those watermelons and put some stuff in them to make a feller do the green apple two-step after he had eaten a bait of watermelon. I didn't have to steal mine because they were just outside the door in the field and I could eat all that I wanted.

Oh, but there was a time when the old devil got the best of me in the watermelon stealing business. Several of us were in a pickup truck and we went to Marvin Scrivners watermelon patch down on the county line road. It was after ball practice and we weren't ready to turn in for the night. We all spread out over that watermelon patch and suddenly I noticed that all of the guys but me were in that truck and they began hollerin' at me to come on too. They had spotted Ole Marvin and took off. I hadn't seen him and I was still huntin' for a good, big, ripe one. Then, I saw him and I took off running faster than Jesse Owens ever thought of running and just jumped over the side of that truck into the bed. As soon as I was in it, Marvin started shooting! I am confident that he shot straight up in the air but there was no convincing us that he wasn't shooting at us, and whoever was driving floor-boarded that truck and we flew out of there. When we got to my house they didn't even stop, they just slowed down and I jumped out. I ran in the house and dad said, "Where have you been?" I said, "Ball practice!"

Well, I had been to ball practice! With a little side trip afterwards but I saw no reason on earth to tell him about that side trip. Now, when I want a watermelon I just go buy one and usually it is too green or over ripe. So, I just eat watermelon candy or something. Yes, Sir, things are alright at Herman Junction!

DRINKIN'. SMOKIN' & CUSSIN': POST #26

2008-11-24T13:30:00.001-08:00

Boy, doesn't this sound exciting? Well, to some of you it may sound exciting and some of you may be thinking that I am full of baloney, but these are the things that this post is about.

I ran with a pretty good bunch of guys when I lived at Herman Junction. I mean to some it may seem that we were a pretty boring flock and maybe we were, but it didn't seem that way to me. I guess I had lived in a sheltered family in a sense. I have been told that anyway. My Dad once said that he loved the taste of whiskey more than anything that he had ever tasted, but I never heard of him taking a drink of any alcoholic drink in my life. I never heard him say a curse word in my life. So, I guess maybe I was pretty weird to some folks.

One time I was with some other guys and one of them was older than the rest of us and he was known to drink sometimes. He bought a six pack of beer and offered all of us one. I took one of those cans, popped it open, and never took a taste of it! I pretended to and then threw it out the window but so help me I didn't take a swallow of it. My first taste of an alcoholic beverage came at church in observance of the Lord's Supper in Pitesti, Romania in July 1995. They passed that tray around and I took the cup and thought, "Somebody sure left that grape juice out too long or something!" That was the worst tasting stuff that I had ever had in my mouth. I told someone about it and they all laughed at Barbara and me and told us that we had just tasted some very, very, good wine. If there is any wine on this earth that tastes worse than that, I sure wouldn't want it in my mouth. I mean, I have walked in stuff when I fed the hogs and milked the cow that probably would have tasted worse than that but I have never eaten or drunk anything that awful.

I never got the habit of smoking. I suppose that if all the cigarettes that I smoked were put together I might have two packages or so. I tried to chew once or twice but the experience was about as bad as my drinking spree in the communion service. I even tried to dip some of Aunt Mollies Rooster snuff and I tell you now I'd be ashamed to admit that I put that in my mouth.

But, I did try cussin'. It wasn't cursing that I had heard about, it was cussin'. I don't know if there is a difference but either one is not a smart thing to do. I remember going out in the field a good ways from the house and trying to learn how to say, 'Damn' or 'hell' and it was hard to do. I had never heard that language at home in Herman Junction and I was mighty careful to practice it a long ways from the house. I never did feel comfortable talking like that and my engaging in the practice didn't last too long.

There was a girl in my class whom I respected a great deal and we were very good friends. We went to school and church together and participated in a lot of youth activities at church. One day I was talking to somebody and in the conversation I used the word, 'damn'. I turned around, probably out of guilt, and standing right behind me with the most disappointed look on her face was Kathleen Chester. I knew that she was hurt and that hurt me a lot. Here I was leading singing at church and now I'm out here cussin'. What a mess! Well, it didn't take me long to unlearn all the cussin' that I had learned, which wasn't much and I never did that again.

The language that we hear on TV and at other times and places is far worse than the cussin' that I remember. It is shameful and there needs to be a lot of mouth washing done today. I'm glad that this Herman Junction boy never did cuss much and today if I could keep Barbara from cussin' so much, everything would be just fine in Herman Junction today!

NICKNAMES: POST #25

2008-11-24T08:14:00.000-08:00

At Herman Junction nearly every person had a nickname, especially the guys. Really that is true about all of the South. We have more "Bubba's" than you can shake a stick at. That has always amazed me. Our parents give us names when we are born and then call us something else all of our life. I mentioned in an earlier post about Booie Woods calling his son Jerry, Joe Bob. By the way, wonder where the name "Booie" came from? His name was Henry but I never heard anyone call him anything but Booie.

My oldest brother C.W. was called 'Gravy'. When he was in Korea he heard someone yell out the name 'Gravy' and it was a friend from home who was stationed in Korea too. I was told that when he was a little fellow a group of men were at our house helping Dad kill hogs. Some of the men told C.W. that they were going to take the meat home with them. He told them, "You can take all the meat but you can't have the gravy." From then on that was his name. Harvel's nickname was "Star". He was the catcher on the baseball team and when he was batting they would yell at him, "Come on, Star Baby", but later it was just Star. Rayburn's nickname was "Smiley". I don't have a clue where that came from. But, through the years I have met a lot of people who attended Harding College at the same time that he did and I will often ask, "Did you know my brother, Rayburn?" They will tell me that they don't remember him. Then I tell them that everyone called him "Smiley" and nine times out of ten they will say, "Yeah, we know Smiley!" In Herman Junction there was Thomas "Buster" Norwood and I don't have a clue to this day what "Oop" Rogers real name was. I had a cousin named Leonard Knight but we all called him "Boke" and another cousin named Tom Knight but we called him "Tuck". And then there is Roosevelt Spencer that everyone still calls "Roosy".

My nickname was and still is "Hook". That name is on my diploma and about everyone around home still calls me "Hook". There have been all kinds of stories told about how I came to get that name and I never correct anyone about it even when I know they are wrong. I know why I got that name but I ain't telling so you just think whatever you want to about it. I kind of like the name "Hook" and if you were named "Teddy Martin" you would like "Hook" too! My Uncle Charlie used to say, "Teddy Martin, going down the road a kickin' and a .......laughin!" I knew that he didn't mean 'laughing' though.

Barbara's family never called a soul by the name they were given at Birth. Oldest brother Floyd was called "Gabby" all his life. Shirley was next but the family called her "Hawey". Have you ever heard of such a name? The next sister was Melba Louise but everyone to this day calls her "Jane". My Lady Barbara has always been called "Bob" but she sure didn't look like a "Bob" to me, and little brother Johnny was called "Pete". Linda Faye came close to being called by her real name because everyone called her "Lin".

At school at Bay there was a ton of Nicknames and I am sure that I do not remember them all. I suppose that the one most well known guy out of Bay many years ago was Wally Moon. He was the rookie of the year with the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team in 1954. But, everyone at Bay knew him as "Booger". Just a few years ago C.W. saw Wally and they addressed each other as "Gravy" and "Booger."

This post is going to go on forever if I don't stop. But, I will tell you some more nicknames that I remember and some of them I am not going to put the real name in because I don't want to have to whip someone that will jump on me about these names being revealed, especially the girls. I remember, Rip, Big Dog, Truck, Snuff, Duck, Cotton, Bird Dog, Hoss, Fat, Leech, Skinny, Ott, Gooley, and on and on the list goes. I suppose that I will miss someones nickname in this post but you get my point in all of this anyway. In spite of our identities being lost in all these nicknames, all is well at Herman Junction.

LINDA MARY KNIGHT JANUARY 8, 1942 POST #24

2008-11-21T04:45:00.000-08:00

Suppose that you have given birth to FIVE boys (if you are a woman, of course) and they range in age from Eleven years to Twenty-Six months. Then you learn that you are pregnant again. There are no ultrasounds or other methods of technology so you won't know what the new one is until the Dr. tells you when it is delivered. Would you wish for another boy? Or, would you just nearly burst with anticipation of a little girl coming this time? I was the 26 months old fellow so Mom didn't talk to me about it too much so I don't know first hand what her heart was yearning for, but I was told later that she really wanted a girl.

Well, this time the girl came and she named her Linda Mary Knight. I can imagine the joy that she brought to Mom and Dad and those older brothers. When Kathleen Chester and I were born our mothers joked about trading me for Kathleen because Mom didn't have a girl. So, Linda filled Mom's desire for a little girl.

Have you ever been hit in the head with a SHOE? You see that is why Sisters are born! And, that is why my head is a bit whop-sided! Brothers that are just 26 months older evidently represent good targets for sisters acts of violence. You know that I would never think of doing anything that would deserve a blast with a shoe in the head! But, I got one. In fact, I may not have gotten more than one shoe in the head but there are other weapons that can be used you know. Besides that she was left-handed and left hands hurt more than right hands. You understand then some of the perilous times that I faced.

I suppose that I would have grown up and become a hermit if it had not been for Linda. I was so bashful that I would not think of talking to a girl about anything much less boy/girl things. So, when I was smitten with one Barbara Jean Earls and couldn't talk to her, Linda would relay bits and pieces of information between us and carry our notes back and forth until my tongue loosened up a bit. 'Bob' would come spend the night or come home with Linda on Sunday after church and eventually I could communicate with My Lady myself. Therefore, I have Linda to thank to a great extent for the 50+ years of happiness that I have enjoyed with My Lady.

There is no person that more personifies servant-hood to thier parents than Linda was to ours'. She lived near our parents as the years went by and was there to relieve thier every need. There is no way to count the number of trips that she made taking them to the doctor or the grocery store and everywhere else they needed to go. We lost Dad in 1994 and Linda checked on Mom every day until finally she just moved her clothes and things to Mom's house and lived with her while she continued to work. Upon Lin's retirement because of disability she moved into the house with Mom and provided her complete care day and night. Some of the others contributed to Mom's care, Ray and Rachel, Harvel and Bobbie and C.W., but Lin was there constantly. She continues to dwell at Herman Junction right next door to the 'big house' where we lived for all those years. Every year in the election she votes herself in as Mayor and she rules with an iron fisted left-hand. She is making sure that all is well at Herman Junction today.

MR. MISCHIEVOUS! POST #23

2008-11-19T08:25:00.000-08:00

I don't know why anyone would be into something all the time! I was never a mean guy even though when I was preaching in a meeting a few years ago and ate dinner with Sue (Barber) Nash who had been a school mate at Bay asked, "Teddy, why were you so mean?" I didn't think that I was mean but upon reflection to my Herman Junction days I guess that I did get into my share of goofy things. I may have even gotten into someone elses' shares too. I remember a few even though I try to forget.

Can you imagine anyone being so dumb as I was to do some of these things. One time several of us guys where standing at the door of a classroom and the door was shut. Up above the door was a small window and it was open. There was a larger window in the door too and one could see shadows on the other side. We decided that someone should take an eraser and just drop it through that top window on the head of Mrs. Melba Aston who was standing on the other side. I reached up there and dropped it and when she opened that door I was standing there ALONE! I don't know what happened to those other guys who vanished in a second. It was off to the principals office! I opened the windows when it was snowing so it would snow in on the girls sitting next to the windows. Why did I do such a thing? It was off to the principals office! I helped make an electric chair out of an old crank telephone and a metal chair. When someone would sit down in it we would crank the old phone and they got a shock. We all went to the principals office! Barbara was crying one day in study hall. I went over and leaned down to ask what I had done...I'm pretty sure that I was responsible somehow...and Mr. Cooper came over and sent us to his office. He came in behind us and scolded us pretty good for 'mugging' in the study hall. I didn't know what mugging was but we had to quit it! Another guy put a match under my leg one day while I was sitting at my desk and lit it without me knowing it, right in the middle of class. Of course, I yelled when it burned me, and it was off to visit Mr. Cooper. It got so that I thought that every time I did something I should have just gone to the office and waited on him because I knew what was coming.

But, that all stopped one day. I hadn't done a thing but I was sent to the principals office anyway. When I got there my Dad was standing in there! I wondered what he had done to get sent to the principals office? They talked a bit about my frequent visits with Mr. Cooper, with me standing there in front of them. Finally, my Dad said, "Why don't you whip him?" Mr. Cooper replied, "He is too big!" I'll never forget it...Dad said, "He may be too big for you but he's not to big for me." That was the last visit that I ever made to the principals office. By the way, I was not too big for Mr. Cooper to whip either because he was one tough guy and I respected him greatly.

I like to think of it as just having fun. After Barbara and I were married I did something one day that got her all stirred up and she was really after me. I ran into the bedroom and locked the door. She stood there banging on that door and yelling at me. I crawled out the window and came around and rang the door bell. We had been expecting company any minute and there she was yelling 'til you could hear her all over town and our company ringing the door bell. But, it was me at the door and I thought that she would think that was funny but that just made a bad thing worse! When the company came and I went to get dressed to go to Memphis, I had to crawl back through that window to get in the bedroom to change clothes. I wonder if they wondered about thier preacher and his wife?

I've about quit those things now. I'm too old to run and not smart enough to convince someone that I didn't do it, so I think that I'll just retire and pass on the Mr. Mischievous award to Derick Harless. In spite of all these things, all is well at Herman Junction.

HERB GOT ME! POST #22

2008-11-18T15:43:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I did things that were just plain dumb for a boy from Herman Junction. You know a fellow from there should have been smart enough to know better than to cross Herb Knight but I guess it takes a lot of learning for me.

The boys were playing baseball and I knew it. I wanted to be there so bad that I could have spit straight up. It was a beautiful day and I could just see them playing baseball and here I was having to plant corn. It would take me long enough that the baseball playing would be over by the time I finished. So, being the brilliant guy that I was I devised a plan. I simply dug a hole and put all the corn in it! A man cannot plant corn if he has no corn, right? When you run out of corn you can run into town and play baseball because all the corn is gone, anybody can see that. So, that is what I did.

Why are Daddies that are so dumb, so smart sometimes? He came home and I was gone and he knew that I could have been super-corn-planter himself and could not have been done by that time. It didn't take him long to see where I had planted that corn and he scratched around and sure enough found it in that hole. What was a Dad to do under those circumstances? I'll tell you what mine did.

He came to the school yard and there I was with all my buddies playing baseball and having a great time. When I saw him drive up I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me like it did that corn. I didn't wait for him to come get me though right there in front of my friends. I took off to the truck and hopped in with guilt bearing down heavy upon me. The lecture wasn't too bad, in fact if this is all I get this is going to be OK. It was not to be that easy. We got out of the truck and he headed for a mulberry tree and I didn't make it to the house. I had already learned that when Herb was going to do the whaling, I needed to start yelling before he even started, hoping that the yelling might make it shorter. It didn't! He used that mulberry limb to it's fullest and then I had to go dig up the corn and plant it in rows like it was supposed to be planted. I wore those whelps a day or two and if the ACLU or someone like that had been in business I might could have gotten him in a heap of trouble. But, I have often wondered how some of the meddlers of today in some of these kinds of things might have done if they had tried to meddle in Herb Knight's discipline of his boys?

"Be sure your sins will find you out!" That is what the Bible says but I would know that even if it wasn't in the Bible because mine found me out too many times!

THE COTTON BUSINESS: POST #21

2008-11-17T16:16:00.001-08:00

My Dad worked on the railroad in my early years and then we went into the cotton business. Chopping and Picking that is. At Herman Junction we share cropped with Booie Woods and at other times we worked for a lot of other people. Linda and I picked cotton for Barbara's daddy up on the Easton place north of Bay. That is where I first began to pick at Barbara (Bob as we all called her and some folks at home still do). I threw 2000 cotton bolls at her through the years. Isn't it funny that a guy would try to get a girls attention by trying to hit her in the head with a green cotton boll? I made contact a few times and it wasn't funny what she said.

We worked some with Mr. Montgomery too. I remember so well the boys pulling bolls all day while dad was working on the railroad and just before he got off to come by the cotton patch they would get up in the wagon and take a hoe and chop it all up real good and it just looked like they were picking it rough. Dad would come in and say, "You boys are picking this cotton to rough!" They weren't picking it at all, they were pulling it and that did make a difference. When you pulled bolls you didn't have as much chance of nicking your fingers on that boll and causing yourself some misery. It sure did have an effect when you took the cotton to the gin if you had picked it rough. I didn't mind it as bad when the cotton was a little wet because it weighed heavier, but sometimes they knocked off some in weight for the water so it didn't help too much to pick wet cotton. I remember putting rocks, clods, old coke bottles and everything that I could find in my sack to make it weigh heavier but I got caught nearly every time. Crime doesn't even pay in the cotton patch.

One time Harvel threw a chunk of chewing tobacco away while the boys were chopping cotton. Later in the fall he found that chewing tobacco and made Jamie and Ray chew it. It had laid there thruogh all the rain and everything from the summer to the fall. They threw up their socks and were sick as they could be.

Some people could pick a lot of cotton and some worked just as hard as they could and couldn't pick nearly as much. Many years ago they had the National Cotton Picking Contest at Blytheville, Arkansas and if I remember correctly one guy picked 900 pounds in one day and won the championship. It would have taken me five days to do that!

Two of my favorite stories do not involve the Knight family. At Swifton the Bill Wheeler family raised cotton. Every day at a certain time Vesta would have lunch ready for the pickers. One day Gary wanted to go to the house early because he was so hungry and Bill Sr. kept telling him there was no use because dinner would be ready at the right time. Gary asked several times and was denied. Finally he asked his dad, "Could we just bow down here and offer thanks and then when we get home we can just start eating?" At that Bill went on to the house for dinner. Sam Wheeler was Bill Sr's brother. One time a bunch of people were at the dinner table and the jug of tea was sitting on the floor by Sam. One old boy kept saying, "Pass me the tea please."That bothered Sam a bit. After while Sam looked down at the tea jug and hollered, "Scat out of there!" He wasn't bothered by any more requests to pass the tea.

Barbara loved to pick cotton. After we moved to Swifton and Marty was a little boy, she would go to Bill Wheelers or Ira Ferrells and pick cotton. I had back trouble so I stayed home and took care of Marty, don't you know! Some years ago I wrote the following words as I recalled my cotton picking days:

IT'S LATE IN THE EVENIN' AND THE SUN'S GOING DOWN;

I'VE BEEN WORKIN' HARD ON THIS HOT, HARD GROUND.

THEN I HEAR MY DADDY SAY WAY UP THE LINE,

"COME ON BOYS, IT'S QUITTIN' TIME."

WHEN I RAISED UP IT NEARLY BROKE MY BACK,

IT'S BEEN A LONG DAY PULLIN' THIS SACK.

BUT IT WON'T BE LONG 'TIL EVERYTHING WILL BE FINE

CAUSE DADDY'S DONE SAID, "IT'S QUITTIN' TIME."

I GO UP TO THE WAGON, CLIMB UP ON THAT BED,

LAY BACK ON THE COTTON TRYIN' TO REST MY HEAD.

LEAVIN' ALL THEM COTTON ROWS WAY BEHIND,

GOIN' TO THE HOUSE 'CAUSE IT'S QUITTIN' TIME.

I SEE MOMMA OUT BACK WITH A SMILE ON HER FACE,

SUPPERS WAITIN' SOON AS WE SAY GRACE.

THEM BEANS AND CORN BREAD, THEY'LL TASTE JUST FINE,

THEY'RE ALWAYS THERE COME QUITTIN' TIME.

BUT, IT WON'T BE LONG 'TIL THE SUNS GONNA RISE

AND DADDYS GONNA HOLLER, "COME ON, YOU GUYS;

WE GOT A LONG DAY AHEAD, A GOOD NIGHT BEHIND,

AND A LOT OF COTTON TO PICK 'FORE QUITTIN' TIME."

Yes, Sir, everything is alright at Herman Junction tonight.

WALKING TO SCHOOL: POST #20

2008-11-16T17:03:00.001-08:00

Our house was exactly three miles from Bay and the bus to take us to school always made our stop last and so we got to school later than I wanted to. So, most days I walked to school even in the cold weather. There were some interesting things that happened on my journey to school.

One time we were having a gospel meeting at Bay and I was about 14 years old. I had already decided that I wanted to be a preacher and so I would practice as I walked down the road. Doyle Gilliam, brother of our regular preacher was preaching in the meeting. The next morning as I walked to school I was preaching his sermon because I remembered it almost word for word. I was laying back the hide and pouring in the salt as I approached the Big Bay Ditch bridge and suddenly a man came walking out from under that bridge and asked, "Are we have a baptizing?" Embarrassed me to death! I walked on until I got out range for him to hear and picked up where I had left off and finished that sermon. I either preached or sung nearly all the way to school.

I seldom had to walk all the way. There was a man in Bay who was a carpenter and he liked to drink. Almost every day he would go to the county line very early in the morning before he would go to work and he would get him a bottle. As he came back he would pick me up and just before we got in to town he would stop and drink a big slug of that drink and he would always offer me one and I never took it. He would take me on the school and then he would go on to work. If he didn't go for his bottle one day then likely someone else would be going to town and I would nearly always get a ride into town.

Many times in the afternoon I would stay later at school and play ball or something and then have to walk home. I have walked many miles on the railroad track walking on the rails. A classmate recently reminded me of that by telling some of my friends that I could walk on a rail as well as I could walk on a highway. Today I can hardly raise my feet high enough to step over a rail! I did walk many miles on the rails as I made my way home.

One night after church I walked Barbara to her sisters house a few blocks from the building and then ran back to the church building to go home with the folks. When I got there they were already gone. I went to Aunt Mollie's and they had stopped and picked her up and took her to our house because a bad storm was coming I couldn't stay with her. I had to run home that night because of the storm and Dad told me that I needed to manage better. Can you imagine that? He left me and I was the one that needed to manage better. I never heard!

I've always loved to walk and still do. For almost 30 years now I have walked almost every day between three and five miles. I love it! People used to stop and try to give me a ride and other people are always wanting to walk me. No, I just want to walk. It's just me and the Lord and I sing, pray, meditate and watch out for the dogs and crazy drivers talking on the cell phone, putting on makeup, or garage salers trying to get to the next one as quickly as possible. One lady calls me the 'singing man' when she sees me walking. But, those walks to school are memorable ones and they make Herman Junction such a pleasant place and all is well there tonight.

OUR BLACK FRIENDS: POST #19

2008-11-16T04:45:00.000-08:00

Between our house and Bay, and across the tracks from where we lived, there was a settlement of black families. On our side of the tracks was the graveyard for them and we had to walk right by it every time we walked to town or back from town. I was scared to death of that graveyard at night. It wasn't because they were black, it was because they were dead! I could imagine all of them rising up from those graves and trying to catch me so I walked by a little faster and tried to be as quiet as possible because I had heard Mom and Dad say that we were so noisy we could wake the dead and I certainly didn't want to do that!

I remember those families as clearly as if we were all still there today. There was 'Hay' and his family and right now I cannot remember his last name. James Davis and his family lived there too and had several kids. Hay was a mighty strong man. He was built like a brick outhouse as we often said and folks that was a strong outhouse. In spite of his muscular build he was one of the most quiet and gentle people that I have ever known. He drank a lot but he was never rowdy and loud to my knowledge. Then, there was James Davis. I have picked a lot of cotton with James Davis and his kids. Do you know what he called himself and everyone else called him that too? "N----- James." I didn't know that there was anything wrong with that then but I wouldn't call him that today. I did wonder why his kids and the others didn't go to school with us at Bay and had to ride a bus all the way to Jonesboro. When James would pick cotton he would say, "Watch them fingas, watch them fingas" and he could pick a lot of cotton. He really picked fast. His son was named Eugene but James called him Lugene. He would stand up about dinner time and yell and say, "Lugene, you want a BANONA?" He didn't say banana like we did. Lugene would say, "Ah, Hah" because he didn't say "uh, huh" like we did either. That's about all that I ever heard Eugene say was "Ah, Hah!" James lived right near the bridge that went over the Little Bay Ditch and every time it would come up a storm he would run as fast as he could, leaving his wife and kids at the house, and crawl up under that bridge. One day someone asked him what he left his family behind. I will never forget what he said: "I can get myself another wife and some mo' kids, but I can't get myself no mo' James!" One day James disappeared and to my knowledge was never heard from again. Some thought that he went to Chicago to work but we never knew. I'll bet that he got himself another wife and some mo' kids!

I cannot write about our black friends without mentioning "Big Boy" Bill Poindexter. He was equal to several men when it was time to work. So kind and good that I will not forget him. Dad went to work on the railroad as a scrawny youngster and he worked with Big Boy. Dad told me that Big Boy would tell him to go sit down and rest and Big Boy did the work for both of them until Dad could get back to work. The last conversation that I had with Dad he talked nearly all night and I finally got a pen and piece of paper and just took notes. One of the things that he talked about was his relationship with Big Boy Poindexter and how much he loved him. Before Big Boy died he was in bad health and his wife, his second one, was mean to him. Dad told me that he would go to Jonesboro, get up on Big Boys back and massage him to make him feel better. Then, he would put a belt around Big Boys waist so he could hold him up good and he would walk him around the house to get some exercise for him. Dad said that it was a sad, sad, day for him when Big Boy died. There was another black man whose name was Early Hughes that was loved by everyone around the area. One Sunday night he kind of went out of his mind and came to Bay and was out in the street yelling and hollering and waving a shotgun. Dad took us on home and came back to Bay because he thought that he could help calm Early down but when he got there Early was already dead. The town marshal got behind the theater and shot and killed him. When they got to Early his gun was not loaded. But, the marshal didn't know that. I have always thought that there could have been another way.

I am thankful for our black friends. They made life better and made Herman Junction a better place to live and they contributed to Herman Junction being well today.

RAYBURN LEO (SMILEY) KNIGHT: POST #18

2008-11-16T04:15:00.001-08:00

I wonder where that Leo came from? I never did know. Anyway, on OCT. 28, 1936 he made his appearance into the Knight family, the fourth boy in a row. I would be boy number five a few years later and Barbara says that Mom probably wanted a girl so bad that she should have set me in the trash basket. But, Ray was number four. He was affectionately called "SMILEY in his high school and college days because he had a smile on his face almost constantly.

Since Ray was the closest one to me in age he was the one that I always tried to pattern my life after. I did a lot of the same things that he did and he had a pretty powerful influence over me. He used that power sometimes to my chagrin. It was a very cold, snowy, day when he needed to walk about two miles to see someone for something and he wanted me to go with him. I may have been younger but I wasn't stupid! I told him 'NO' a couple of times. I learned later that he went in the kitchen where Mom was and told her, "Watch me make him go with me." He came back to me in a minute and said, "I wouldn't let you go with me if you wanted to!" I didn't take the bait. So, he came across again with a little more fervor that I could not go with him for anything in the world. He said the wrong thing for me that time. I walked FOUR miles and nearly froze to death but I showed him!

I love to hear him tell today about Principal Arthur Cooper taking him to the 'sweat room' one time and threatening to thrash him for something. Ray had no idea why he was accusing him of something that he knew nothing about and continued to deny any guilt. Then, it hit him what was wrong and he told Mr. Cooper that it was me! Boy, I wish that Ray had gotten that whipping. Ray helped me out more than a lot of times. Older brother Harvel owned a service station at Truman and he always had a pocket full of change. I would get up very early sometimes and get me a few cents out of Harvel's pants and put them in my pants and then go back to bed. I knew that Harvel didn't know how much change he had and he wouldn't miss a few cents. One morning early I got up and got my stash for the day and put it in my pants. The next morning I walked to school, stopped in the 'the station' as we called it for a soda pop and a bag of peanuts and discovered that I had no money. What in the world had happened? I figured it out. I had put my money in the wrong pants. I went to Ray's class later in the day and asked the teacher if I could speak to my brother. Ray came out in the hall and I asked him to check and see if he had Twenty cents in his pocket. He did and he did! He gave me my money, didn't ask where I got it and never told on me because I think that he knew how I came by those two dimes. I quit stealing right then and asked Harvel for some money from then on and he would always give me some. Wonder why I didn't think of asking in the first place?

The best thing that Ray ever did for me happened when I enrolled at Harding College and he had already been there a couple of years. He was in the SUB-T 16 club and I wanted to join it. It was the most popular club for men on campus. The initiation was a bit tough in two or three ways. When you had to stand, bend over and hold your ankles, and let each member come by and hit you with a belt it was pretty awesome because some of those guys would nearly lift you off the floor. But, the one thing that challenged me more than any other was sucking a raw egg. I had never eaten an egg and still haven't. Mom said that when I was a baby and she would try to feed me an egg, cooked in any fashion, I would throw up! Now, here I am a big boy at Harding and I've got to suck a raw egg. Ray was the guy to hold the egg in my mouth and do you know what he did? He held his finger over that hole and I didn't have to suck that egg but nobody knew it. I sure was thankful for that.

Ray entered Harding College upon graduation from Bay High School and graduated from Harding in 1961. He joined General Electri Credit Corporation where he worked for 25 years.

Ray married Rachel Hamley in September 1968 in Laporte, Indiana and they live now in Nashville, Tennessee and are in poor health. The three remaining children, Terri, Todd, and Tammy live there and see after them. Their oldest son Tim died in a motorcycle accident in 1982 and that hurt me really bad because Tim was one of my favorite guys from the day that he was born. It's been good to visit in my memory back at Herman Junction today and all is well there still.

(Ray lost his beloved wife Rachel on September 11, 2009. She had suffered for a long time and battled courageously against several different health problems. We all miss her so very much.)

(Ray passed away on January 1, 2011 and is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in Nashville, Tenn. beside his beloved Rachel.)

JAMES LOUIS KNIGHT MARCH 17, 1934-MARCH 24, 1978: #17

2008-11-15T07:28:00.000-08:00

Everybody needs a brother like James (Jamie) knight. He was the third son of Dad and Mom, born on March 17, 1934. He was one of the most gentle men that I have ever known. I never knew of Jamie getting into trouble at school, with our parents, or anyone else. He was a quiet guy and that may have been because he followed Harvel in the line of boys and it paid to be quiet when Harvel wanted you to.

One of the funniest things that I remember happening involving Jamie, and probably the most mischievious thing that he ever did happened one night after everyone was in the bed. I have mentioned that in the 'big house' we had three bedrooms. Dad and Mom took one, when Granny was with us she took one and Linda slept with her some, and then the boys had the other room. Most times there were two boys in one bed and sometimes three. One night Jamie and Rayburn were in bed and they were talking and cutting up. Dad kept saying, "You boys quieten down in there." But, Jamie must have been feeling too good to go to sleep or something and he just kept on. After about two or three admonitions from Dad and them being ignored, the boys heard Dad take the razorstrap off the nail and they knew what was coming. Jamie was the instigator of about all of the noise and when he heard Dad coming he just rolled off the edge of the bed between the bed and the wall. Dad came in and it was dark of course, he pulled back the cover and started whaling away and saying, "Jamie, are you gonna stop this racket and go to sleep?" Rayburn kept yelling, "I ain't Jamie!", but it took Dad a few swipes with that razor strap before he realized that he wasn't whipping Jamie. I guess Rayburn needed it anyway and he probably got Jamie out from behind that bed and he got his too.

When I first started preaching Jamie had already been preaching a few years and I needed help. I had four volumes of Hardeman's tabernacle sermons and a Bible and that was it. Harvel sent me a few outlines and I stole a few from him when I would visit, but James sent me a lot of help in addition to writing a lot of letters of encouragement and instruction. Until the day that he died he was a great help to me. His wife Elta gave me Jamie's library after he died and I have been blessed tremendously by it.

He preached in a meeting for us in Michigan City, Indiana, my first local work. He, Elta, and Cindy came up from Oklahoma and the church had very little money to help with their expenses. They came in a brand new car. One night we had a baptism and had to go to LaPorte for the baptism and croYsing over a railroad a bit too fast he ruined that car and had to trade for a new one to get home. He had only a few miles on his car. It was my great pleasure to preach in gospel meetings in Farmerville, La. where they lived. In recent years I have been back there to preach in meetings and many times people will tell me, "Your brother married us", or "Your brother preached my mates funeral" and many of them tell me, "Your brother baptized me." He has been gone for more than 30 years but is still deeply loved at Farmerville. I consider it a compliment when some of the people call me James before they catch themselves. Jamie really made sure that all is well at Herman Junction.

TRACTORS: POST #16

2008-11-14T10:23:00.000-08:00

I have loved tractors all of my life. When I was small my Dad traded our pair of horses to Lofty Preston for a big, Red, M Farmall tractor. Since that time my favorite tractor has been a Farmall although I like all the others as well. About the time that he traded for that tractor I got one just like it for Christmas I guess. It was Red too! It had two or three other pieces of equipment and I remember playing in the dirt with for hours. I have had three experiences with tractors including the one when Dad traded the horses for the big M, that I will never forget.

There was man named Poss Phillips who lived in our area and he drank quite a bit. One time he came into town, probably to bring a load of cotton to the gin, and while we was waiting for his cotton to be ginned he had a little too much to drink. When he started home he was driving across the big bridge over Gum Slough ditch and ran off into the ditch filled with water. He died in that accident. He was pulling the wagon and they got it and of course the tractor out of the ditch and my Dad bought that wagon. For many, many, years Dad kept that wagon and every time that I looked at it I thought of that tragic accident that took the life of one of our neighbors.

The most memorable tractor story that I vividly remember is one that involved me and Dad's little Allis-Chalmers tractor that he had bought. The wheels on the front were spread far apart. Dad had taken the tractor to a garage in town and worked on it and the day that we went to get it we had a problem. Dad had driven the truck and the tractor needed to be driven home too. So, he asked me if I thought that I could drive the tractor home. I was about 14 years old. I told him that I could do it.

When I left for home I knew that Dad was standing in the street watching me drive down the road to Herman Junction. When I got a pretty good distance from town and I knew that he wasn't looking, I began turning the wheels and driving back and forth from one side of the road the other ....back and forth, back and forth. One time I got the wheels turned so far to the right that I couldn't get them turned back in time and ran down a big embankment and turned over in the ditch. It threw me off in the railroad right of way and I was not hurt. It scared the thunder out of me. I jumped up on the road and took off running back to the garage where Dad was. I ran in there and told him that I had met a drunk man in a white car and he ran me off the road and I turned the tractor over. Would you believe that Clarence Rodgers came driving up and heard me tell that story and said, "Herb, I met that same SOB and he nearly ran me off the road too!" Do you believe in miracles? Here I had told the biggest lie of my life and had a witness to back me up! I don't know what or who Clarence Rodgers saw but to this day I have not seen that white car with a drunk driver. You know, I don't think that I ever did tell Dad the truth about that incident. If I had he surely would have taken the razor strap to me regardless of my age.

Mom's best friend from her childhood days was Gladys Bradke Cook from Enola, Arkansas. Glad and her girls came to visit us occasionally and they were there when I turned over the tractor. I had the biggest crush in the world on Allie Rae, one of her girls. But, she and my older brother Ray were the same ago and they had a crush on each other so I was just left out of the picture. That is until the day that I wrecked the tractor. I was lying on the bed after we got home and Allie Rae came and sat on the edge of the bed and rubbed my forehead. I thought that I had died in the tractor wreck and an angel was taking care of me! Allie is to this day a great friend and we love her children to death. By the way, she doesn't even know this story but it sure is the truth. See, that is one of the reasons why all is well at Herman Junction.

BARBARA JEAN EARLS BALDRIDGE KNIGHT: #15

2008-11-13T20:03:00.000-08:00

I received a message on email this week that showed a picture of a 1936 Ford car. It was one of only four of those cars produced and is the only one that is still in good running condition. It was made of pure stainless steel and is as beautiful as it was the day that it was made. It is insured for $1.5 million dollars! It would be wonderful to get to actually see that car.

But, I have something more unique and by far more valuable and I fell in love with her at Herman Junction, Arkansas many, many, years ago. Barbara Jean Earls Baldridge Knight is in a class all by herself. There was only one of this model made. She, like the unusual car is still as beautiful as ever and in good running condition. I had a shirt made for her once that said on the front, "This old gray mare is still what she used to be!" And she certainly is.

Barbara was raised in a family with two brothers and three sisters. She also had a half sister from a previous marriage of her father. Barbara would tell me through the years that she felt that she had a biological father somewhere that she didn't know. When she was 41 years of age she learned that she did indeed have a biological father and learned where he was and visited him. She learned that she had two more brothers and two more sisters. She contacted them in 1998 and since then has become very close to them. So, she is probably the only person in the world that had four brothers and five sisters but biologically is an only child! I have kidded her that many years ago two good people made a mistake and I married it!

I said that I fell in love at Herman Junction, Arkansas. When we were youngsters we didn't have a 'youth minister' but the parents attended to that task. We had a bunch of young people our age at church and the parents were great at entertaining and teaching us. We had parties in those days at our homes and we played games of all kinds, but usually played a game or two where the guy and gal would go walking as we called it. We would get in a circle and put a coke bottle in the middle and a guy or gal would spin it. When it stopped spinning the guy would go walking with the gal that it was pointing at or or the gal would walk with the guy it was pointing at.

One night we played that game and I gave the bottle a spin and when it stopped it was pointing at 'Bob' as we all called her in those days. We took our walk down the road a little while and on the way back we stopped and I took her in my arms and kissed her in the middle of the old dirt road. That was the first time. A few days later she came home with my sister for Sunday dinner and we had a great time all afternoon. That evening as we crawled into Dad's 1939 Ford car to go to church, somehow my hand and hers touched and we held hands all the way to church. There has never been a moment since then that I have not loved her. We were married at Herman Junction in the 'big house' on July 24, 1958 and someday I will tell you about that wedding. We enjoyed many, many, wonderful times at Herman Junction and still go back there to visit my sister and remember the beginning of our 50 plus years of being in love.

So, I have something far more beautiful and valuable than an old 1936 stainless steel Ford. I think that I will just keep her! Now, you surely understand why I say that all is well at Herman Junction.

HERBERT HENRY KNIGHT, APRIL 22, 1910-JAN.30,1994:#14

2008-11-13T15:04:00.000-08:00

I have often wondered why Dad chose Herman Junction to buy a small piece of land to build a house for his family. And, I have often wondered how in the world he managed to do it at all! He was working on the railroad and Mom said that he would buy some materials every time that he got paid until he got enough to get started. Then, there were some other men who helped him voluntarily and one or two that he had to pay some money for thier work. Most of you have never heard of 'swapping labor' where someone would help you in your crop or wherever you might need help and then you would return the favor. But, I remember that well

There are several things that always come to my mind when I think of Dad. He was one of the finest singers and song leaders that I have ever heard. I can hear him now as he gets ready to begin a song..."Do, sol, mi, sol, do.....On the first." He knew music and seldom got one too high or too low. My favorite song to this day is the one that I first learned sitting on his knee and singing with him as a child..."Each day I'll do a golden deed, by helping those who are in need." You remember that as "A Beautiful Life." I have some tapes of him leading singing and some of him singing at our family reunions. One time a cousin objected to us singing at our reunions but Dad said, "When the Knight's get together, the Knight's sing." And, we sill do.

I viewed him as the strongest man that I ever knew. When there was a horse that needed shoeing and no one could get it done, Dad would throw that horse just like he would throw a man and the horse had new shoes in a few minutes. I heard the story about someone stealing all the clothes off the clothesline and dad ran him down. The guy crawled under a cotton gin and it was at night, and dad crawled under and took away his knife, got the clothes, and crawled out. There is no way that you could get me under a gin in the dark. I would have just worn the drawers that I had on until I could get some new ones.

Dad and Mom would get the early morning paper, divide it, and sit at the breakfast table and read the news. I remember that My Lady and I stayed all night with them once and we laid and listened as they read things to each other. Dad said, "Well, I wonder what old Clinton is up to today?" Later Mom would say, "They have three loaves of bread for a dollar at Young's Big Star in Truman." It was like that until they got the whole paper read.

Among the very last words that I heard him say was when he had his last stroke. When he had suffered strokes before and then get better, he would say, "Let's go." "Where do you want to go Dad?" someone would ask. He would say, "Let's go out on the porch." The last time he had a stroke I went to Jonesboro and as I entered the room where several others were already there, he was sitting up in his bed and he looked at me and said, "I'm going!" I asked, "Where you going Dad?", expecting to hear him say 'to the front porch.' But, this time he said, "I'm going to gloryland!" That was on Thursday and on the next Sunday morning he went to gloryland. I suspect that when he arises from that rest, he will proably lead the saved creation in 'A Beautiful Live' and that will be a joy. Yes, all is well at Herman Junction tonight.

FLORA DESSIE KNIGHT April 12, 1912-July 25, 2004:#13

2008-11-12T08:46:00.000-08:00

The citizens of Herman Junction never knew a finer human being than Dessie Knight. I will never forget how blessed she felt when we moved into the 'big house' after moving from place to place in the first few years of my life. Now, we had our own house and we did not have to move again. Dad was working on the railroad and share crop farming too and so we made it fine. One of the reasons that we made it so well was the contribution of my blessed Momma to the family. I asked her one time shortly before she died, "How many biscuits did you make each morning?" She told me that she made FIFTY-FIVE big 'cat head' biscuits every morning and an equal amount of cornbread every night during school and at noon and night when we were in the fields. That is just the bread and there was all the rest of the meal to prepare as well. In between preparing those meals there was house cleaning, washing, ironing, canning, gardening, taking care of Grandma, and all the other things that came with having a family of 10-11 people. Of couse she was pregnant most of the time too. She always insisted that we get our lessons not only for school, but for Bible class at church as well. If there ever was an example of committment and dedication to the Lord, Dessie Knight was it.

During the last few years of her life Barbara and I were worked a lot in Romania and there was one time in particular that I was very uncomfortable leaving because she was having so much trouble. I told Laura how I felt and she told Momma. I went to see here just before I was to leave for Romania and as I was leaving her she said, "I hear that you are worried about going to Romania because of my health. You go on because you have a contract with God to preach the gospel and I will be alright." And she was. She sent me $50 once in memory of Dad to help with our work. I know she didn't have it but she sent it anyway.

But, with all of her busyness and raising a family she had a tremendouos sense of humor and would keep a person in the floor laughing, especially if you were part of the family. She told me once that her number one weakness was laughing at dirty jokes! I'd love to tell you some of those jokes but I am a preacher you know and other people read this blog from time to time. (I had one in here but I decided to delete it before I got in a bunch of trouble. You'll just have to wonder what it was).

I loved to tease and aggravate her and watch her laugh. I was the only person that she allowed to call her "DESS" and I loved calling her that. One time I was driving the truck to church and for some reason she got scared and grabbed the steering wheel and pulled us off into a fence and almost the bottom of the ditch. I was able to get out but she laughed about that forever.

She wanted to move into town when all the kids were grown up and gone and they did. She worked as a cook for the school for several years. She took care of Dad when he became ill. One day he was putting on his tie to go to church and he was having trouble and so Mom was going to help him. She had hold of the tie and he began to fall and she wouldn't turn loose of the tie. They both fell to the floor and laid there and laughed and Dad told everyone that she tried to choke him to death with his own tie.

Momma lived until she was 92 years of age and was in good mental health until about three weeks before she died. We all thank God for her and miss her so much. God has maybe washed her mouth out with soap and has let her rest in peace until He comes for her. She was a great reason why all is well in Herman Junction today.

RAINY DAY AT HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #12

2008-11-10T13:54:00.000-08:00

I loved rainy days at Herman Junction. For one thing it meant that there would be no work in the cotton patch if it was raining. I loved to lay in the bed and listen to the rain dripping off the house into a big wash tub sitting under the edge of the house catching rain water for Mom to wash clothes in. If I had been normal I could have slept late but I have never been able to sleep late in my life. The old saying, "Early to bed and early to rise" has certainly been true of me.

Since we didn't have a TV we had to manufacture something to do and that was not really a hard thing to do. We could always go to Booie's house and watch TV with the Woods kids and that was enjoyble. If the Burn's family happened to be there we could sit and listen to them play music and I loved that too. The big house was built high enough off the ground that sometimes we could crawl under the house and sit and play marbles. It was a great time to have corn cob fights because the cobs were good and wet. We could always put on our roller skates and have fun skating and trying to figure out new moves. That is, if they weren't already worn out. It is amazing what can come out of the head of a youngster who has no TV to watch or electronic games to play. If someone had said 'Nintendo' in those days Harvel would have probably popped him thinking that he was trying to speak Mexican.

One of my favorite things to do was to just watch some of the older brothers and some neighbor guys draw a big circle on the ground and all of them get in there and see who could stay in the longest with all the others trying to throw the rest of them out. Now, that was quite a tussle. Or, they might get on top of that storm celler and see who could stay up there the longest and be declared the King Of The Hill.

We had a big front porch and a big back porch so we could sit on the porch and be sheltered from the rain and just watch it rain or play some game or another. Of course, it wasn't long until I was out in the rain jumping in mud puddles and making a mess of myself. Mom was standing yelling at me to stay out of the mud but I was already in it! We have gone out in the road between our house and Booie's and the mud was just right to slide barefoot in it. You could back up a little distance and run and slide for a good ways in the mud. I wonder now what would have happened if we had hit a piece of glass or a splinter off an old piece of a board. I hurt just thinking about that.

Of course when Linda and I got a bicycle for Christmas to share, one of us could ride the bicycle up and down the road. Every time that I got on it she wanted it too. Ain't that just like a little sister?

If it had rained a lot, the ditch in front of our house was full of water and Booie would bring his fish net down and throw it in the ditch and catch fish. I cannot imagine now us eating those fish but we did. The fish had come up that ditch out of the Big Bay Ditch about a quarter of a mile from the house.

I've always loved a rainy day but there is none better than the days at Herman Junction and that is what made everything well at Herman Junction.

HERBERT HARVEL KNIGHT: POST #11

2008-11-08T08:40:00.000-08:00

I wrote a little about my oldest Brother C.W. earlier. Well, I have to tell you about the next brother in the litter and that is Harvel. Nowadays a lot of people know him as Herbert and that is his first name, but we always called him Harvel because Dad's name was Herbert.

Harvel was one tough guy. He would fight anyone that he encountered IF HE COULD SEE HIM. He was known as a guy that could whip about anybody, but as tough as he was he was afraid of the dark. I am told by some of his kids that he still is. I remember stories about him and the dark, like the night he was walking home by himself and something made a noise in the weeds in front of the cemetery and he ran completely by the house. One night he and some of the other brothers and a neighbor guy was walking home and a car full of guys from somewhere stopped and asked if they wanted to fight. Harvel told them to just come on, but when he looked around all the other guys were a quarter of a mile down the road and he stood there by himself. I don't remember for sure but I think that he got out of it someway. One of the funniest stories that I remember from my childhood at Herman Junction involves Harvel and his close buddy Charles Bratcher. The family had all gone somewhere and brother James (Jamie) came home from Freed Hardeman College. Since nobody was there Jamie just went on to bed. Later that night Harvel and Charles came home and after coming in and turning on the lights decided to go to the wood pile and get some wood for a fire. While they were outside Jamie got up and turned the lights out! The story as I heard it was that Harvel and Charles walked back to Truman instead of going in that house.

Harvel had a little green 1937 Ford couple. I really liked that car. One time he and old friend Charles Bratcher were driving down the street in Truman, Arkansas and they noticed a rattle in the back of the car. They devised a plan to find it. They got out and Charles climbed in the trunk and Harvel slammed the lid down and took off to see if Charles could find the rattle. But, an older lady had seen all this and called the police to report a kidnapping that she had just witnessed. If I remember right, brother Gib McCord who may have been the police chief caught them and of course when they explained he knew that everything was fine.

I also remember the time in the cotton patch when Rayburn was trying to speak Spanish. We had a lot of mexicans come to our country then to work in the fields. Ray kept trying to speak spanish and Harvel told him to shut it up. Ray said, "Si, Senor." Harvel kept telling him to stop it and Ray kept saying, "Si, Senor." It wasn't long until Ray was knocked about five rows across from where we were working. I'll tell you this, "you haven't lived until you have Harvel Knight for an older brother."

Harvel was the first of my brothers to preach the gospel. I guess that by now he has been preaching for nearly 60 years and is still going. He and his wonderful wife Bobbie produced seven fine children. His beloved Bobbie died Nov. 7, 2001 and we all miss her. She sure brightened things up when Harvel brought her home and she helped to make everything well at Herman Junction.

C.W. KNIGHT: POST #6

2008-10-31T04:29:00.000-07:00

My oldest brother C.W. was called to go to the service of our country. I didn't understand much of that except that he was having to leave home and I didn't like that. The first time that I was ever out of the state of Arkansas was to go with the family to take him to Memphis to leave for Ft. Chaffee, Arkansas. That was 7,000 miles from Herman Junction I thought and I really felt bad about his going there. You see, C.W. was a fine big brother. When he would be away from home working at the cotton gin at night, he would walk home when he got off the next morning and you could hear him singing when he came around the curve about a quarter of a mile from the house. Or, if he came in during the night and you happened to still be awake you could hear him coming home and singing at the top of his voice.

After he got in the service for some time and had saved up some money he bought the most beautiful car that I had ever seen and he left it at home for Dad to take care of for him. It was a beautiful chevrolet with a black top and burgundy body. It was really was a beautiful car. I wanted us to drive it everywhere we went but we took Dad's old car and left C.W.'s car at home.

When I began preaching full time in Michigan City, Indiana guess who the song leader was? Yep, it was C.W. Knight and he could really lead singing. He not only was a great singer but he could motivate others to sing as well and in that little concrete block building with a concrete floor, the singing just bounced everywhere and it was wonderful. C.W. was a hard working man. He got me a job working with him in a factory when I got out of high school and before I went to Harding. He worked at several different kinds of jobs and was appreciated by his superiors at every one of them.

In 1953 he got out of the Army and married Emma Ishamel and they moved to Michigan City, Indiana where they lived for 16 years. They brought two red headed boys into the world, Charles, Jr. and Robert. Mom always wanted a red headed child but didn't have one. Those two boys were both red headed. At least they were until they lost it!

One never forgets older brothers like him. Herman Junction never turned out a nicer man and great song leader. I will always carry those memories with me as long as I live. I wish that every person could have a brother as fine as C.W. is. He is one of the reasons that all is well at Herman Junction.

(C. W. paseed away on November 3, 2009 in Hensley, Arkansas. He was buried in the National cemetery at Sherwood, Arkansas. It was my privilege to speak at his funeral service and remember many, many, good things about him and share them with our family and friends. The world is not as good a place as it was before we lost him.)

HELLO FROM HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #5

2008-10-28T05:21:00.000-07:00

I am back in Herman Junction today, at least in my mind. I come here quite often and the older that I get the more often I visit. In my heart I even have some good visits with the ghosts of the family and friends that I have carried with me through the years.

Herman Junction was a place where there were many children to grow up with. Of course, there were the eight Knight kids and then there were the Norwoods, the Woods, and many others. In addition to those who lived there, there were many others who came there to visit often. If you tried to drive down the old highway you would find the road full of roller skaters or kids just walking, running, batting rocks off the railroad with a stick, or playing king of the hill on top of the storm celler. At times you could get right in the middle of a wet corn cob fight or mud ball fight. If you have never been hit in the head with a corn cob that had laid in the barn yard for days and soaked up all of what was in that barn yard, you have never really felt pain. You might see a bunch of guys with an old car that they had built out of the remains of an old wagon. It had four wheels, one seat, and a rope to guide it with. It had no motor with horse power but it had plenty of man power with several guys pushing it and one trying to pull the rope to guide the thing down the road. It has been the experience of more than one guy to run the thing into the ditch in spite of doing all that he could to keep it on the road. There may have been a basketball game going on. Of course we didn't have a basket ball but we had a wadded up toe sack tied into a basketball like thing and we would bounce it in our hand instead of bouncing it on the ground and it worked about the same. Our goal was a post with a big, round, TEXACO sign that my Dad had picked up when he replaced the old sign with a new one and we nailed it to the post with a hoop from a keg on it. Kobe Bryant and some of his friends would have had thier hands full with the Knight boys.

I learned to roller skate on the old highway. If I had a dollar for every mile that I have skated I would be in pretty good shape. I have no idea how many pairs of roller skates that we wore out there. I have fallen hundreds of times but never broke a bone. My Barbara even learned to skate on my skates.

Not long ago we visited with one of the kids that had grown up in Herman Junction and she told about my Mom inviting all the kids into the warm house while they waited for the school bus to come pick us up. What a great bunch of young people. We never thought about shooting each other except with a rubber gun, BB gun, or a sling shot. We never thought about stealing anything because we all had the same things and there wasn't any need to steal something that you already had.

Well, it's been nice to visit Herman Junction to begin this day but now I must rush on. My busy day beckons with things that must be done NOW, but all is well in Herman Junction.

DERICK MARTIN HARLESS:POST #4

2008-10-27T03:52:00.001-07:00

I have often thought about how far reaching the influence is of those who grew up at Herman Junction like I did. There were several families that lived there and many children in those families. We are all now scattered all over the United States and some of us have traveled all over the world. Not long ago a good friend of ours was talking to some other people about how she and her brothers and sisters as well as some of the other kids in the neighborhood would all walk out to the highway to our house to catch the school bus each morning. There was quite a brood of them and we had some fun together waiting for the bus and then when we got off the bus in the afternoon.

Today is October 26, 2008 and My Lady and I have just come home from the hospital where our first Great-Grandson was born a few hours ago. His name is DERICK MARTIN HARLESS and he is a healthy and big young man. I have mentioned before that we moved to Herman Junction when I was just a small fellow whose middle name is Martin. Today, our son whose first name is Martin has become a Grandfather to this strapping young man whose middle name is also Martin. His mother and father are Daniel and Brittany Harless and we are so thankful for them.

I wonder how many people there are whose roots go back to Herman Junction to the time when we lived there? Of course, there were many people there before us when the community was called by some other name. But, it was Herman Junction when I was there and still is to the people who grew up there during those years. I wonder where they all live and how much they have contributed to the world today? I am convinced that there is indeed a lot of good that came from Herman Junction through the families that made that their home in years gone by. I wish that all of our descendants could have lived there for some time like we did and I think that their lives would have been richer.

Yes, I believe that all is well at Herman Junction and may those who have come from its' citizens of long ago be a compliment to their heritage.

NEWS FROM HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #1

2008-10-25T06:13:00.000-07:00

You do not have a clue where Herman Junction is. There are not many people who are still living that even remember that there ever was a “Herman Junction.” But, I remember it well.

There was indeed "news" in Herman Junction in the days when it was alive. There was never a dull moment to me at least. I suppose that when you have five brothers and two sisters there are not many boring days anywhere.

Herman Junction was a community exactly three miles south of Bay, Arkansas on "old" highway 63. It was called the "old" highway because a new one had been built that ran about one mile across the fields from where we lived. So, we had a "new" highway and an "old" highway. Now there is even a newer four lane highway a little further across some more fields, so I guess maybe my "old" highway would be called the "oldest" highway.

We moved to Herman Junction when I was about seven years of age. My Dad had bought three acres there and had spent several months buying the materials and building what my Mama would always call the "Big House" until the day that she died at the age of 92. Our house had a living room, kitchen, and 3 bedrooms with a front and back porch. That was it! Dad, Mom, and eight kids lived in that house and part of the time Grandma Halfacre lived with us, too. It did really seem like a big house, but according to 21st century standards it was very small. It was a grand place and stands to this day with James and Ann Ritchie being the only owners of the property except the Knight family.

I will tell you more of the news from Herman Junction as soon as I get my new "Blog" going where I can write all that I want to. If someone had mentioned a "Blog" at Herman Junction we would have all thought that it was a swamp somewhere or something of that kind. But, we know what a Blog is and I am supposed to have one soon and I’ll come blogging into your computer with the news from Herman Junction. There is no set time because you see the news came in spurts from Herman Junction, so it will not be like your newspaper and come every day to your front porch.

I sure have a lot to tell and I may even have a guest editor or two now and then as one of the other Knight kids wants to share a thing or two. Just be ready and enjoy the News From Herman Junction.