November, 2014


30
Nov 14

Catching up

The post with extra pictures which scream for attention because they didn’t get enough of it earlier in the week. They should have screamed louder. Except they are pictures, and screaming photographs would just be weird. Best not to think of it. On with the pictures, then.

That’s a lot of nerds:

Nerds

I asked my grandfather about this, but he had no idea what it was. He knows most everything about everything, as grandfathers often do, but the purpose of this old tool remains a mystery for now. If I pull out my phone and ask you about it, please have the answer:

tool

My great-grandfather, in letters to his son, called him “Aub.” This is awesome:

Aub

I found several old magnetic reels with this famous Holt-Wallace gubernatorial debate on them. They were recorded in a north Alabama high school in 1959. There were notes on it. I knew the man that recorded them. Now I have to figure out if I can digitize it:

debate

Anyone need a conquistador on felt?

painting

Sunset on Thanksgiving:

gloaming


29
Nov 14

There’s no place like home

This postcard was dated July, 1912.

helmet

I bought it a few years back, put it on the wall right by the front door. The frame fell and the glass broke and that meant it had to be reframed. But it meant I could also read the back again.

It said the writer had arrived and that the Johnsons were doing well. It asked how Mom was and noted the writer would be heading home Thursday.

I looked up the last name and the village they lived in. There are still quite a few people, descendants perhaps, with the name living within 40 miles of there. I hope the writer made it home. There’s no place like it.

War Eagle.


28
Nov 14

One last thing about that toy helmet

It no longer fits …

helmet

And everyone loves the battle scars. Either I dragged it around a lot or I wasn’t any better at pretend football than real football.


27
Nov 14

Happy Thanksgiving

I wrote yesterday:

I’m pretty sure I developed my prowling and curiosity at my grandparents’ place. So many things you didn’t see all of the time, so many things that were different than what little you knew about anything. So many things that spanned ages of time — to a child at least. A lot of stuff got kept by my grandparents — and yet my grandmother also had a clean house.

But the storage building out back … well, I spent all afternoon in there today. We spent time in there as children, probably hide-and-seek and trying to figure out the boxes and stacks of things. I’m sure some of this stuff hasn’t been touched in years, or more. And today I glanced around a few rooms, but concentrated on the books.

I found a few other things too, but this was the first thing I found:

helmet

This was a pre-kindergarten gift I’d received. I could place that based on the sudden memories that returned. I hadn’t thought about this helmet in decades, and suddenly there it was in my hands. We were in the apartments at the time, so before I was in school. It explained why I liked guys like Art Monk and Gary Clark and why I’ve always found the Washington Redskins’ color scheme to be one of my favorite. Turns out I was programmed early. I believe this helmet, and some toy shoulder pads and a jersey and so on, were a gift from an aunt.

I’d literally walked into the outbuilding, turned right, stepped up into the first of two side rooms, walked through there and into the back room. You could walk a few short steps in before your path is blocked by boxes and such. I looked down in the first one and found that helmet.

“This was mine,” I said to my grandfather, “and I’m taking it with me … If you don’t mind.”

Of course he did not. I’d cleaned part of the storage area for him and took a few other things off his hands that he wouldn’t have to deal with, books and other things. I found some things he’d want and a few things my mother would like to have.

Later, she pulled out an old photo album, most of the contents inside being older than her. Inside were pictures of her grandparents:

photos

I have a few memories of him, but not her.

Here’s another photograph that was inside that albums, my mother, my uncle, their parents and my mother’s father’s parents.

photo

I found two letters from my great-grandfather, W.K., to his son, my grandfather, standing behind him in that photo. Aubra was away at college. In one note his dad was reminding him to write his mother. In the other letter he explained that he could not afford to give him a car and put him through school — the more things change, right? — and gently explained why he had said this or that about some choice the younger man was considering.

I found a book my mother and uncle gave to their mother when they were very young. They’d inscribed it for Mother’s Day. And Mom told me about the last birthday card she got from her mom, a little girl on a beach and the note she’d written in it, which fits pretty much everything.

And so on this Thanksgiving, difficult or joyous or perfectly routine, I suppose it isn’t enough to be thankful for what you have, but what you had and what you remember.


26
Nov 14

My family is now convinced I am a picker

Which is funny, because when I first saw American Pickers, which introduced me to that entire group of people, I immediately thought “That’s the job I should have.”

It’s like they invented it for me. You get to prowl and learn things? And there’s money to be made doing those two things?

I’m pretty sure I developed my prowling and curiosity at my grandparents’ place. So many things you didn’t see all of the time, so many things that were different than what little you knew about anything. So many things that spanned ages of time — to a child at least. A lot of stuff got kept by my grandparents — and yet my grandmother also had a clean house.

But the storage building out back … well, I spent all afternoon in there today. We spent time in there as children, probably hide-and-seek and trying to figure out the boxes and stacks of things. I’m sure some of this stuff hasn’t been touched in years, or more. And today I glanced around a few rooms, but concentrated on the books.

Here’s something that belonged to my uncle as a boy. You can buy My Name is Pablo for pennies on Amazon or a few bucks on ebay. But that cover art is great:

books

This is on the inside cover of the Book of Knowledge, an encyclopedia aimed at elementary and middle school students. My mom told me she would sit and read these for hours. It was one of three encyclopedia sets I found, but it obviously has the best illustrations:

books

This car art just jumps out:

books

This is the cover to another book you can buy online for pennies, Fifty Famous Americans. The dust jacket is gone, which is a shame, because it apparently featured a great Wright Brothers illustration.

books

That book was written in the 1940s and so, happily, there isn’t a single reality TV star listed. Here’s the inside cover:

books

My grandfather was a ham radio operator and owned an electronics store and was apparently a varied reader. This isn’t a book I’d ever read, but you could see he might have a reason to consult it, also, the cover is terrific:

books

My grandfather was so cool, he had things like this:

books

And this just scratches the surface. I learned a fair amount about my grandfather today, just digging through dusty stacks of wonderful old pulp. I’m glad to have the opportunity to see and hold and laugh over some of the things he read and wrote. Inside those many pages there will be plenty more to share. Clearly I’m going to have to revitalize his section of my site.