Month: April 2011

I must have been about five or six when this photo was taken behind Fire Dept. No. 1 at Frederick and Independence. That would have made it about 1952 or 53. I’m standing on the stone and concrete bridge over a fountain or lily pond.

Firefighters were different then

First off, they were firemen. Women weren’t added into the mix until decades later. Secondly, the old stereotype of firemen sitting around waiting for the alarm bell to ring was probably true. These guys didn’t do hazmat drills, run medical calls or worry about much other than squirting wet stuff on red stuff.

That’s not to knock what they did when the bell DID go off. I’ve always said that I didn’t care if a firefighter spent his or her whole career playing checkers. The first time they went running into a smoking building other folks were running out of, they earned every penny they’d been paid. Burning buildings are scary places.

Departments didn’t have fancy breathing gear. In fact, REAL firemen were proud of how much smoke they could suck and who could hawk up the biggest globule of black soot when the flames were out.

Marker dates back to 1944

I’m assuming this overgrown marker listing everyone in the department goes back to when the mini-park was dedicated. It says June 1944 on it.

Some things remain the same

Cape firefighters have moved on to fancier digs, better training, more sophisticated equipment and more complicated duties. Putting water on fires is probably the smallest percentage of what they do.

The old Fire Dept. No. 1 building has been converted into the Cape River Heritage Museum.

The old lily pond and bridge are still there, looking much like they did when I was wearing my shorts and Buster Brown shoes. I wish I had held up as well as the little park. Note the size of the tree that isn’t even in the old photos.

When Ernie Chiles and I were headed from Painton to Cape along Hwy 25 last November, we passed over Delta. I asked him to do a quick turn to see if I could shoot the abandoned quarry just west of town.

Light on the Hill Quarry was awful

We couldn’t have picked a worse time of day to try this. The quarry was in dark shadows.

What’s special about this place? Well, our family has many well-worn stories. I don’t think we ever passed by this location that Dad didn’t mention the bulldozer that went over the cliff there.

It’s like when the kids and I are driving on Hwy 61 about half-way between Wib’s BBQ and I-55. Someone will invariably say, “This is where that tire came off the car and came bouncing down the road toward us.” I don’t know if we are trying to imprint the memory or if we’re just filling dead air.

Bulldozer DID go over the cliff

A few years ago, I ran across one of Dad’s scrapbooks that proved that a bulldozer really DID go over the edge in 1943. The inscription says it happened at Delta’s Hill Quarry in 1943. (Delta’s spelled wrong, but that’s no big deal.)

I never remember him saying what happened to the Cat skinner (bulldozer operator). A quick search of the Google Archives didn’t turn up a story about it.

Train arrives in Delta with extra passenger

I DID stumble across a couple of interesting other stories, one relating to Delta. The Sept. 9, 1913, Missourian reported “Mrs. Frank Broadway leaves Cape for her home in Advance and just as the train is pulling into Delta a son is born. She asked the name of the kindhearted conductor. “Dobey” Timbs is the regular conductor, but he is on vacation. The mother said that would be her baby’s name. When informed, “Dobey” insisted that the name be Gene Burgess (Broadway), the conductor in charge.”

From my experience in editing stringer copy, this HAD to have been written by a freelance correspondent. They typically filled their stories with lots of details that left you more confused than enlightened.

Another Gene Burgess story

Conductor Gene Burgess was mentioned in an Oct. 12, 1920, story, when three armed men met his train in Lilbourn and asked for permission to search the train. “Gene Burgess, the accomodating conductor, told the men to go ahead and look the train over for if there was a bad man on it he would prefer they save him the trouble of removing the man.

“They failed to find their quarry.

“As they left the train, Conductor Burgess asked them what kind of crime had been committed and one of the men, who wore an extra large revolver on his hip, stepped forward and said, ‘See this bump on my head? Well that was put there by this man who struck me with the butt of his revolver. I won’t take such punishment from any guy – and beside swatting me like that, the scoundrel carried away my wife with him.'”

 

 

Most of these photos have nothing to do with much of the copy. Today was Interstate Day. Interstates, unlike the backroads we had been on earlier, are duller than dog doo. The first two shots were taken at the Kentucky Welcome Center on I-24. We didn’t bother to document Tennessee. It was so dull I stuck in an audio book.

Have you been watching the weather?

We were somewhere between Birmingham and Nowhere last night on Day Two of our Road Trip when Son Matt called to ask if I had been watching the weather. Since we had been hit with fewer than six raindrops on the whole trip, I said no. He suggested that I look because the Weather Channel was going nuts.

Yep. Big areas of reds and yellows right in our path. I told the GPS to look for lodging. Everything on the first two screens was behind us. Fortunately, when we got closer to Cullman, AL, things started looking up lodging-wise. Sky-wise was starting to look menacing.

Cullman Comfort Suites had it together

There was what appeared to be a new Comfort Suites at the exit, so we ducked in there just as the wind was starting to whip around and the temperature was dropping precipitously.

After a little bargaining, we came to an agreement on a room. While Joy Pannell was writing it up, I mentioned that I was traveling with my nearly-90-year-old mother and asked where we should go if the storm got bad.

I was impressed. She whipped out a sheet that contained information about where to seek shelter and a list of the local TV channels. In addition, she said that we should expect a call if there was a tornado warning in our area. Then, because of Mother, she gave us a room that was two doors down from the stairwell that would be the shelter area. That kind of disaster planning is something I had never gotten from any hotel in all my years of traveling. I heard Joy deliver the same message to the folks who checked in after us.

Don’t go to a Wendy’s / Texaco combo

Mother, wisely, didn’t want to go out in the cold, horizontal rain, so I volunteered to go across the street to a Wendy’s.  Here are some hints:

• DON’T go to a combination Texaco / Wendy’s. I ate exactly one-half of what purported to be a chicken nugget. I think it must have been something from the Texaco side of the world.
• DON’T roll down your window to place your order if you’re facing west and the rain is blowing east. I’d have been drier if I had gotten out of the car and run through the monsoon.

How did she do that lighting trick?

I mentioned that Mother likes to get up early. This morning, however, she cut me some slack. What I’d like to know is how she managed to arrange a crack in the window curtain that would shoot a six-inch sliver of blinding sunlight into my closed eyes while leaving the rest of the room in total darkness.

Trailer on Kentucky Lake

She was concerned that the winds that hit a factory in Hopkinsville might have damaged her trailer over on Kentucky Lake. Except for a few limbs down, everything looked OK. She did say that she was going to have to take some black paint to the sign Dad put up in the early 70s.

We had a lot of happy times there.

Lincoln and the Land of Lincoln

Mother had her picture taken with Abe Lincoln on Day One. Today, she shows how happy she is to be back in the LAND of Lincoln. We would have dropped down into Ft. Defiance at Cairo to shoot her at the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, but the Ohio has been high and it looked muddy.

Brief Pause in Cairo

Cairo is where I shot Barry Goldwater campaigning for President and my first riot. I still go back to shoot what’s left of the downtown area. Every trip there are fewer buildings standing. She’s posing with the City of Cairo, Illinois, a caboose going nowhere.

Cape Girardeau, home at last

I felt a twinge of nostalgia when we passed where the old Mississippi River Bridge once stood. The new one is beginning to grow on me though. This was the final picture of our Road Trip.

It was fun. Mother was good company; the miles went by fast and we saw lots of neat things. I’m sure you’re getting tired of our series. Things will get back to normal tomorrow if I can get all my stuff unpacked.

I DID take one shot of myself.

Jane Neumeyer asked that I get an occasional photo of the two of us together. I don’t usually think of taking photos of myself – that’s why I hide BEHIND the camera. In editing the pictures, I DID find this one shot with me in it. Will this do, Jane?