Early Memories of Church Services

    When I was young and up to the time I was about ten years old, we attended the little one cup Church Of Christ here in Menard.  This church is no longer active, because they all eventually died.  The building is still standing.  Mark and Lisa Blau bought the building and it is still being used as a church.  I have many fond memories of my childhood attending church services there.  We were a small group.  So, we were just like one big family.  Some of my fondest memories are centered around the summer meetings we had.  We would have guest preachers come every summer and hold a week long meeting.  The meetings were always late in the evening.  The preacher’s sermons were usually long and would last until it was dark outside.  We did not have daylight saving time then.  So, even in the summer, it got dark pretty early.  The preachers were usually young preachers that were currently training to be preachers.  They were some of the most exciting and charismatic preachers I have ever heard.  They preached the hell and damnation sermons all week, building up to a climax on the last day.  We usually had someone by that last night that had been convinced they were going straight to hell if they did not get baptized immediately.  So, they would go up to the front and tell the preacher they wanted to be baptized, when they offered the invitation song.  They would sometimes be real emotional and be crying on their way to the front.  Then, we would all get in our cars and go to the stock pen crossing to be present for the baptism.  It would be totally dark.  So, everyone would turn their cars toward the river so their headlights would light up the river, so the preacher could see to baptize the individual.  I remember as a child, it was very exciting and inspiring to see someone be baptized.  But, at the same time, it was a little scary to see them wade out into that dark, cold water.  The meeting would usually end with a sermon on Sunday morning and we would have Sunday dinner following the sermon.  It is hard to describe the feeling of adoration for the preacher after a week of hearing them preach the word of God. As a result, all of the members of the congregation felt  he was like a celebrity.  As for the Sunday dinner on the grounds, that was exactly what it was.  We had no fellowship hall to eat in.  But, it didn’t matter, because no one believed in eating in the church or anywhere near the church property.  So, Oscar Bradford would always BBQ a goat or two and we would have dinner in the park under the bridge.  All the women would fix side dishes.  The women would try to outdo each other  on their cooking to try to impress the preacher.  If the preacher was pretty good looking, by this time, most of the women had a crush on him and this was their last chance to impress him. As a child, it was funny that I noticed this.  I have such fond memories of this special time in my life. I can still smell the BBQ goat and potato salad.  

      As I have said before, we were a very small little church.  So, there were barely enough men to conduct the church services.  Women were forbidden to speak in church, and  that meant the men had to do everything.  I thought this was perfectly normal procedure for every church.  Now I realize just how conservative and narrow minded the one cup Church of Christ really was.  My dad would lead prayer and lead singing when they ask him.  One Sunday, our resident preacher, Jody Patterson, was leading singing.  After leading a couple of songs, he asked my daddy if he would like to lead a song or two.  He said to daddy, “ Frank, would you like to lead a song, you are a better song leader than I am.”  Before daddy could answer Jody,  “My brother Bill, who was about ten years old at the time spoke up and said,  “Yea daddy, you are a better song leader than he is.  So you lead the song.”  Daddy was so embarrassed he didn’t know what to do.  Everyone was laughing so hard, it took us a while to resume the services.  I honestly do not remember whether he actually got up and led a song after all of that.

     The last story I want to tell is a story about an embarrassing little episode, I was the star of,  one Sunday morning, in the little one cup Church of Christ.  I was probably about five years old and my brother Bill was about ten years old.  Now, it was one Sunday morning and we were right in the middle of the church service.  Even though I was only five, I was aware of my brother’s great love of motorcycles.  So, to make a long story short, a motorcycle cruised by the church.  As I said before, it was in the middle of the worship services.  All I could think about was,  there’s a motorcycle going by the church and I have got to let my brother know about it.  So, I jumped out of my seat and ran to the window and hollered, “Oh brother, there goes a motorcycle.”  The whole church gasped, and all of a sudden everyone was silent and looking right at me. I was so shy and I was so embarrassed.  I went back to the pew.  Instead of sitting on the pew, I crawled under it and stayed there for the remainder of the service.  Brother Bradford and Jody Patterson knew it wasn’t acceptable to laugh in church.  But, mother said they silently giggled throughout the remainder of the service.  They tried desperately to hold in their laughter.  But, she said she would look over there at them and their stomachs would be jiggling trying to suppress their laughter.  Although, I think back on those wonderful memories and wonder where the one cup Church of Christ came up with some of the strange beliefs they had.  I still look back on those years with great fondness.  Although they have all passed on,I still think they were some of the finest people I have ever known.  They will always have a special place in my heart.   

       

    

Car Trouble

 When Loveta and I first got married, Loveta worked at the Concho County Hospital in Eden.  She drove back and forth to Eden every morning to work until our son, John Carol, was born.  One morning she couldn’t get her car started.  I checked the battery and it was totally dead.  It had been raining all night and it was extremely muddy where Loveta’s car was parked.  I couldn’t get my pickup in the right position to jump the car off.  So, I decided I would get a chain and pull the car out into the road.  I got my old 1963 red Dodge truck positioned behind Loveta’s car. I hooked the chain on to it and I had Loveta get in the car to steer it. When we got it in the street.  I began the process of pulling the car out into the road.  I couldn’t figure out why it was so hard to pull.  I was revving the motor and I could smell the tires burning and spinning.  I was beginning to worry about burning the clutch out.   The car was literally skidding on the mud.  It was as if all four wheels were locked up.  I kept wondering why the tail lights were on.  I thought maybe this is the reason the battery had run down,  Maybe the tail lights were stuck in the on position.  I finally got the car out into the street.  So, I got out of the pickup to unhooked the chain and I checked to see if Loveta was doing ok. I thought maybe we had left the parking lights on and that would account for the tail lights still being on.  That is when I noticed Loveta still had her foot on the brake pedal.  I asked why she had her foot on the brake and she said she was afraid the car would get to going too fast, and run into the pickup.  I now knew the reason  the car was so hard to pull.  So then, I circled the pickup around and got in position to jump the car off.  I hooked the jumper cables onto the car battery.  Whatever was wrong with the car battery shorted out the battery on the pickup.  There I was with both the pickup and car stuck out in the middle of the street.  Now we both needed batteries.  It goes without saying, money was tight.  But, some way, we managed to go buy a new battery for the car.  I think my pickup had to wait a few days before I was able to buy a battery for it.  We can look back on this day and laugh now.  But, it sure wasn’t fun then.  

Funny Short Story About My Brother and His Wife

       For over fifty years, the Pierce family had a yearly family reunion here in Menard.  As my father”s generation started to die off,  we gradually quit having the reunion every year.  I had promised daddy and Uncle Nick I would try to keep it going after they were gone.  I tried my best to keep it going.  But, the younger generation seemed to lose interest.  I have many wonderful memories of the Pierce family reunion.  This is one of those funny and wonderful memories.  The Pierces would just show up the last weekend in June.  We didn’t have to send out invitations, they would just show up.  We would always get together on a Saturday and have a big lunch for whoever was here.  At supper time, we would all meet for a picnic in the park under the bridge.  At that time there was no walking trail.  There were picnic tables scattered throughout the park. You could drive anywhere you wanted to in the park.  Then, on Sunday morning, some would go to church and some would stay home cooking.  We would then meet somewhere, like the community center or Club Victoria for a huge dinner.  This particular year we met at the old community center by the news office.  My brother and sister-in-law were always late getting to the dinner.  My sister- in-law always brought something like a noodle salad.  She would always wait until the last minute to prepare the dish.  So, they arrived at  our house after everyone had already left to go to the community center for the big dinner.  They finally arrived at the community center.  We did not see them come in and we did notice what they had brought to the dinner.  We had a blessing for the food and everyone lined up to get our food.  Then, I saw it.  They had apparently had trouble finding a container to put the noodle salad in.  To my amazement and I might say horror, there was their noodle salad in our mop bucket.  Needless to say, Loveta, our children, and myself did not partake of any of that noodle salad that day.  We couldn’t afford to tell anyone.  So, we just pretended to not know.  We still have that same mop bucket today.  Every time I see that mop bucket, I think of that funny story.  I would not take for that wonderful memory.  I will have some more stories about the Pierce reunion, at a later date.  

Big Joe Baker and the Alligator

       Joe Baker told me this story several years ago.  Now Joe Baker was always a very truthful person.  If someone else told me this story, I might have some doubts about the truthfulness of this story.  If Joe Baker told you something, you could depend on it being the truth.  A lot of evenings you would see Joe and his wife riding around town just to get out of the house.   If he saw someone he  knew and liked, he would usually stop and visit for a while.  Joe was always really good to me. He helped me out several times and I always tried to help him when I could.  So, I always considered him a good friend.  One evening he was driving around town and he saw me out in the yard. We got to talking about the pet alligator Willy and Sadie Wilkinson used to have.  They had it in a pit located in the shaded lot across from their house.  I used to go look at it occasionally when I was growing up.  Joe told me,  “I made twenty dollars off that alligator one time.”  I ask him how he did that .  He said it was back in his drinking days.  He said he had been to Louisiana on a fishing trip.  When he got back, he said he was in a bar across town.  He was telling everybody about the fish they had caught.  So, some smart mouth drunk asked him why he didn’t bring back an alligator.  Joe, told him, “I did.”  He told Joe that he did not believe him.  Joe said he would prove it.  The guy bet him twenty dollars that he was lying.  Joe told him he would be back shortly with the alligator and collect his twenty dollars.  So, Joe got an alcoholic by the name of Leo Meixner to go with him.  They drove to Willy Wilkinson’s house to get his pet alligator.  Joe told Leo to get down in that pit and bring that alligator out of the pit.  Leo did not want to do it.  But, Joe made him.  You did not tell Joe no.  Leo reluctantly did as he was told. That alligator did not give him a warm welcome.  He violently snapped at Leo,  almost taking an arm off in the process.  Leo came out of that pit scared to death.  So, Joe said he crawled down in that pit and he wrestled that alligator until the alligator finally got tired and gave up. He said he had to get a piece of wire to tie the alligator’s jaws together to keep him from biting them.   He then drug that alligator out of the pit and put him in the back of his pickup.  They then drove back across town to the bar.  They collected their twenty dollars and then took the alligator back to Willie Wilkinson’s house.  Instead of being in trouble,  Sadie Wilkinson had already called Joe’s house wanting him to keep the alligator.  Of course Joe said no.  I don’t remember what happened to the alligator.  They eventually got rid of the alligator.  I know it was a lot of trouble to take care.  But, I know I still miss those occasional late evening visits by my friend, Joe Baker.       

Uncle Dude and the Barrels of Silver

    Before I begin this story, let me give a little background.  Where my carport now stands, there was a super old house.  This house was put together with square nails.  Even the shingles were installed using square nails.  I still find  square nails in my driveway from time to time.  When grandpa Keele moved to Menard somewhere around 1908, he bought this place and moved into this old house.  At that time, there were no other house’s around, except the old Napier house where Dr. Nixon now lives.  Grandpa Keele was living in Llano before he moved to Menard.  His wife passed away suddenly when she was about thirty seven years old.  So, he moved to Menard.  He had several kids still at home.  The youngest was Floyd.  He was about four years old when they moved to Menard.  Grandpa Keele also had a younger daughter named Zeller.  She was an infant  when her mother passed away.  So, Grandpa let some of his kinfolks take Zeller to raise.  Therefore, she grew up without a relationship with her siblings.  They only met  her once when she was grown.  She was very successful and had a nice family.  But, she died pretty young.  She was the only one of the Keele siblings that didn’t live to be at least  eighty years old.  Floyd was only about four years old when they moved to Menard.  The Napier family lived in the house where Dr. Nixon now lives.  They did not have any children.  They took a liking to Floyd.  Grandpa Keele was trying to work and he had all of these small kids to take care of.  So, the Napier's offered to keep Floyd some while Grandpa Keele was working.  They fell in love with Floyd and they wanted to adopt Floyd.  Grandpa Keele felt like it would be in the best interest of Floyd.  So, he agreed to allow them to adopt Floyd.  My grandmother, Lydia, was next to the oldest child. She was already out on her own. She had recently married John Garvin from Eldorado, Texas.  She had already taken my aunt Mary or “Mamie”, as we called her, to raise.   She was probably about eight years old at the time.  So, grandma came to Menard to get Floyd.  But, it was too late.  The Napier's had already adopted Floyd.  Grandma was so sad.  She tried her best to get Floyd back.  But, the Napier's wouldn’t give him up.  Floyd grew up to be a big strong young man and was successful in life.  He was probably the longest living Menard resident ever. He was one hundred and six years old when he died.  His family always thought he was born in 1904.  My grandmother always said that he was born in 1903, which would have made him a hundred and seven years old when he died.  He was always bitter that Grandpa gave him up for adoption.  He told us, later in life, that the Napier couple that adopted him, were mean to him and that he would go to sleep crying many nights.  That bitterness he carried all of his life.  He virtually had nothing to do with us.  I don’t think his children ever knew we were kin to each other.  We did not develop any kind of relationship with his children, until a few years back after Floyd had been dead several years.  

      So, back to Uncle Dude and the Barrels of silver.  After Floyd was adopted by the Napier's, he still had Uncle Dude and Uncle Paul living here with him.  Uncle Dude was probably about eleven years old and Uncle Paul was about thirteen years old.  Uncle Dude said Uncle Paul and him were always running all over the hill where the old water tank is.  They were always hunting for something  to kill and eat, like cottontail rabbits.   He said that Uncle Paul was so accurate throwing a rock that he could kill a rabbit with a rock, virtually every time.   So, one day they were chasing a rabbit and he got separated from Uncle Paul.  He said he kept chasing the rabbit until it disappeared in a hole.  He was looking for the rabbit and he found a cave.  He went into the cave and there were three big wooden barrels full of silver.  Now, he did not say whether it was silver coins or silver ore.  I wish now I had asked him.  He said the barrels were made out of wood and he could smell the wood.  But, he felt like someone was watching him.  He said he felt the presence of danger.  He felt frightened.  So, he decided that he would go and find Uncle Paul, and show him the barrels of silver. When he found Uncle Paul, he told him about the silver.  They proceeded to try to find the cave again so Paul could see the silver.  They looked for hours and hours.  But, they were never able to find that cave again.  Uncle Dude said the large lot across from their house.  This would be the huge lot directly across from the house where I presently live. Uncle Dude said this was the place wagons would camp for the night when they were just traveling through Menard.  He said that night there was a wagon camped on that lot.  He always wondered if that wagon was camped there to pick up those three barrels of silver.  He kept roaming that hill looking for that cave and could never find it.  Almost fifty years later, he was working for Willy Wilkinson as gardener.   Uncle Dude’s wife, Aunt Nancy, was cooking and keeping house.  They lived above the garage in a one bedroom apartment. This is the beautiful rock house on Mears Circle that most of you would remember as the house where Ed L. Mears lived.  So, Uncle Dude was just messing around one day and he decided he would look for that cave.  Sure enough, he found it.  He said it was such a strange feeling.  He said it looked just like it did that day he saw the barrels of silver.  But, there was no silver.  He said it still gave him a creepy feeling to go back there. He said he would always believe that someone was watching him that day and that he was in danger.  He said he was glad that Uncle Paul and he were not able to find that cave that day.  He believed God was watching over them that day.  I have always wondered if this had something to do with the lost Bowie Mine.. I guess we will never know.   

Random Stories

      I have three different and very interesting stories that a good friend of mine told me several years ago.  I always said I was going to write these stories down if I ever got to retire from the Manor and had time to work on my blog.  Even though it has been almost two years since I retired, from the full time position of maintenance director,  I am just now getting to resume writing stories in my blog.  Now these are some pretty incredible stories, so hang on.  Now this friend of mine is a great guy and I do not want anyone to think I am questioning the truthfulness of these stories. So, I will let you decide for yourself.  I will start by saying that my friend is a Vietnam Veteran.  This story starts with him being returned to the states because he had been wounded in Vietnam.  He had a bullet lodged in his back next to his spine.  So, he was, I suppose, paralyzed from the waist down.  He was in the hospital, I believe, in Austin, Texas.  One day he was being transferred from a gurney to his bed and the nurses aide did not use the proper procedure to transfer him and she dropped him on the floor.  He said it was a hard fall and he was startled and hurting from the fall.  All of a sudden he realized that he was hurting because he was no longer paralyzed from the waist down.  He got up off the floor by himself and by that time the whole room was full of nurses wanting to know what had happened.  They could not believe he had regained feeling in his legs.  They began to get on to the nurse’s aide that dropped him and told her she was going to be fired for dropping him.  He told them not to fire her because, if she had never dropped him, he might have been paralyzed for the rest of his life.  So, they said they would not fire her since he felt that way.  He said I spent a few more days in the hospital and they decided they would release him from the Army.  But, they said it would take two or three weeks to process him out of the service.  They rented him a hotel room to stay in the meantime.  He said his hotel was close to the police station and he started hanging out at the police station. So, he got to know all the policemen and he quickly became friends with all of them.  The army was giving him some severance money, so he went and bought himself a new 1970 red Plymouth Roadrunner with a 383- V8.  He said it was a beautiful car and all of the policemen really loved his new car.  One day they approached him with a proposal.  They needed a really fast car to catch the drug dealers and they wondered if he would loan them his new car.  He told them he sure would.  So, they took his new car and they pulled the 383 V8 out and put in a 426 Hemi motor.  They then installed a hundred and fifty gallon fuel tank in the trunk.  So he would have something to drive while they used his car, they let him drive a 427 Ford Mustang.  He said he didn’t have anything to do so he drove down to San Marcos to see a friend of his that was going to college there.  He said this friend was a senior and only had one more final test before he graduated.  His friend had a big problem.  His wife was just about to have their first baby and he needed to be there with her.  But, he couldn’t leave until he passed this test or he would not graduate. So, being the great guy he is, he offered to help.  He told his friend that they were both about the same size and they looked a lot alike. Plus these were huge classes. He said for his friend to go home and be with his wife and he would take the test for him.  His friend agreed.  He took the test and passed it with flying colors.  His friend graduated and his friend was there when the baby was born.  So, my friend went back to Austin and by this time they had caught the drug dealers and put them behind bars. They gave him back his Plymouth Roadrunner.  I told him,”I guess that gave you a really fast car.”  He said,” No. They put everything back just like it was.  They took the 426 Hemi out and put my 383 V8 back in.  They removed the hundred and fifty gallon fuel tank and put my car back just like it was before. “  

     The next story that he told me was when he was in Vietnam.  He said they had this killer gorilla terrorizing the country. The gorilla was going into these villages and killing men, women, and children.  So, they came to my friend and said “What do we do?”  I am not sure why they singled him out for this mission. He must have had quite a reputation.  Anyway, he told them to get him a fifty foot rope and a helicopter.  They did.  He got in the helicopter with the fifty foot rope and they set off to find this killer gorilla.  They soon located the gorilla.  He told them to hover as low as they could over the gorilla.  They did as he told them.  When things were just right, he took the rope and he roped the gorilla.  He then gave them the signal to start going up.  He said when they got to about five hundred feet, he took out his pocket knife and cut the rope.  End of the killer gorilla.  I was telling someone about this story and they told me that Vietnam does not have gorillas, unless they are in a zoo.  I googled it and they were right.  Vietnam is in Asia and gorillas are only in Africa.  Not sure what the explanation is.  Oh well.  

     The next story my friend told me involves a freak snowstorm that came late in the early part of the spring.  Now, I believe this happened in the late seventies or early eighties. He said he was driving a bulldozer from Junction to Sonora and he was driving in the bar ditch because he would tear up the road if he was on the pavement.  He said because of the heavy snow they had closed interstate ten for through traffic.  He said they had a barricade set up on the road to keep traffic from going any farther.  But, he noticed a truck ignored the warning and went on around the barricade.  In a little bit, a Volkswagon Beetle ignored the warning,  and went around the barricade also. In a minute, he thought to himself. Where did that Volkswagon go?  Then he looked again and he realized that the Volkswagon was stuck under the back of the truck trailer.  He immediately started to try to get the truck drivers attention.  He kept getting the bulldozer to go a little faster to try to catch up with the truck.  He said he finally got the bulldozer up to sixty five miles an hour and did a donut right in front of the truck and finally got the truck stopped.  The truck driver got out and was mad as an old wet hen.  He said, “What are you doing stopping me?”  He told the truck driver, “You have a Volkswagon stuck under your truck trailer.”  So, they went to the back of the truck and there was a Volkswagon stuck under the trailer.  They called the police. When the police arrived, they proceeded to remove the Volkswagon from under the trailer.  When they finally got it out, it was just a big gob of ice.  They took the car to a D.P.S. warehouse in Sonora and they all set around waiting for the car to thaw out.  He said this was one of the weirdest feelings he had ever had.  When the car finally thawed, the victim was a young lady.  I ask him if she was deceased?  He said, “Of course.” End of story.

  The last story is a short story and it involves my friend and a black racer snake.  He said he was living and working on a ranch and I am not sure where this ranch was.  He was on his way to his house, after a hard day’s work.  He said he had to get out and open several gates on his way home.  So, he was extremely tired.  The last gate he came to, he got out and there was a big black racer snake. He said he decided he would just stomp the snake to death. This made that black racer snake so mad that he started to chase my friend.  He said he couldn’t get away from the snake.  He finally jumped up in the back of the pickup. The snake proceeded to crawl up in the back of the pickup and continued to bite him.  He said he was so tired and almost in shock that he finally jumped out of the back of the pickup bed and got in the cab and drove off leaving the snake there.  When he finally made it home, he realized that the snake had bitten him multiple times.  So, him and his wife counted the bites.  He had been bitten one hundred and twenty seven times.  He said he stripped off all of his clothes and poured a gallon of bleach all over his body to kill all the germs.  He said he would never pick another fight with a black racer.  I can see his point. There are more stories, but I will end there for now.

A Funny Story About our Alcoholic Neighbors

     I am not going to give the names of these two individuals that are the subject of this story, because one of them is still alive, and this is not a very flattering story of their behavior that evening. We knew they were having some problems getting along with each other because we had seen the police over at their house several times lately.  This story begins with a phone call one night at about eleven o’clock.  So the phone rang one night somewhere around eleven o’clock.  I had already fallen asleep.  So it startled me when the phone rang and I immediately thought it must be Menard Manor calling me about some maintenance problem.  So I answered the phone thinking it would be the manor.  But, instead some man shouted, “What the hell are you calling me at this time of night?”   At first I was startled and confused.  I even thought about apologizing for calling him before I came to my senses.  I said, “ Wait a minute.  I didn’t call you.  You called me”.  He said,“Who is this?”  I told him that this was his neighbor, John Pierce.  He said,  “ Oh, I did!  I guess I am getting off on the wrong foot with my neighbor.  I am sorry.for calling you so late”.  I told him that was alright.  But I could tell that he was drunk as a skunk and would probably never remember calling me or having this conversation.  

     So a few days went by.  At the time I was leveling my old house so I could remodel the kitchen for Loveta.  I had been working on the foundation all day.  We had just finished eating supper and we were getting ready to sit down and watch some television.  All of a sudden Loveta said that our neighbor lady was on our sidewalk coming to our front door and she was walking like she was totally plastered.  Like totally drunk.  She started beating on the door and yelling, “Let me in.  He is going to kill me.”  We let her in and locked the door.  She was scared to death.  She kept saying that if he gets in, he is going to kill her.  She told us to call the police.  We did.  About that time, Her husband started pounding on the front door.  I was afraid he was going to break the door down.  I ask If he had a gun and she said no.  So I went out the side door and confronted him and told him to quit beating on my door.  I told him not to bring his troubles over here.  He apologized and we sat down on the porch and started visiting.  I could tell he was extremely intoxicated.  But, the thing that shocked me the most was that he was barefooted.  Now this was right in the middle of the summer and that day it had gotten over a hundred degrees.  Yet he had walked about three hundred feet and across the extremely hot pavement to get to our house.  As drunk as he was, it was hard to believe that he had been able to walk that far.  Especially barefooted.  He was very upset because he wanted to use his pickup to go get some more booze and his wife would not tell him where the keys were.  About that time, the police got there.  He had been to their house several times in the past week or two.  He was extremely kind and patient with them.  So, the wife and Loveta stepped out on the front porch when they saw the police were there.  So, the policeman asked them what the problem was and he said he wanted to use his pickup and she would not tell him where the key was.  She said that was a lie.  She said I don’t even know where my keys are.  So, the policeman said let’s go home and they said, “How are we going to get home.”   He told them to get in his patrol car and he would drive them across the street to their house.  So, Loveta,myself and the policemen started leading them out to the car and the husband turned to us and said , “It’s hell not having no shoes on.”  After they finally left, Loveta and I began to think about how comical they were together.  We could never figure out how the husband could stand to walk across that hot pavement without burning his feet. It has been about eight or nine years since this happened and we still get a good laugh out of it. So, I just thought I would share this funny memory and I hope everyone enjoys it as much as Loveta and I have.

Addie Ellis

      First of all, I have got to admit that I am guessing how to spell Addie Ellis’s name. Now, Addie was the mother of Fred Ellis, who worked in the post office for many years.  She was a very colorful character and a fixture in Menard for many years. I never knew her husband.  He had passed away by the time I got to know Addie. She was a small woman and she had a rather wrinkled and freckled complexion. I hope no one thinks I am being hateful when I describe her in this way.  She had a very soft but raspy sounding voice.  I know that one time they had some ranch land. But, I don't know where it was or how much land they had.  It apparently qualified her to have a place in Menard's society circles.  Now, this was in the late 50’s and 60’s.  In this period of time,  there were a lot more local social parties for the women to attend than there are now.  So, Addie seemed to be a member of every woman’s club in Menard.  Her best friend was Clara Wilhelm.  Now Addie drove a red and white Ford Fairlane station wagon. It was not the fanciest car in town.  So, Clara Wilhelm would usually pick up Addie in her big fancy car.  Addie lived in the old Napier house, the house Dr. Nixon lives in the present time.  Clara must have been  impatient.  When she came to pick up Addie, she apparently wanted her to be standing outside waiting for her.  I spent a lot of time at my grandmother's house when I was a kid,  which is the house I presently live in now.  I would always know when Clara was coming to pick up Addie, because she would always start honking her horn about two blocks before she got to Addie’s house.  It seemed like there was a party every other day.  Then one day it all came to an end.  Clara lived about twelve miles out on highway 190 towards Brady.  So, she was running late for one of these parties and she had a cake for the party setting in the front seat.  In the last little valley before you get to the old drive-in theater, the cake started sliding off the seat.  Clara grabbed for the cake and she lost control of the car and rolled it.  She was critically injured, but she lived several days before she succumbed to her injuries.  I am sure this was devastating to her family and I am sure it was devastating to Addie.  I realize this is kind of a depressing little story.  But, it is a snapshot of the way Menard was in the 50’s and 60’s before we had so many forms of entertainment and social status was much more important then than it is now.  So, instead of watching T.V. or cruising the internet, they had little social events and parties to go to for entertainment.   

    But, even after Clara Wilhelm was sadly killed in a car wreck, life went on.  Addie sold her house and moved to another, smaller, house and lived several more years.  As I said before, She was a small lady.  She couldn’t see over the steering wheel of her car.  So, she just looked through her steering wheel.  She was famous for being a horrible driver.  So when you would see her coming, you made sure you stayed out of her way.  Pat Riley told me this story about her bad driving.  I thought it was a funny story and I have told this story many times down through the years and it is a true story.  He said he was in the post office one morning and he heard Addie and Curt Stockton arguing about something.  Now I am sure many of you remember Curt Stockton.  Curt was afflicted.  Not sure what happened to him, but he walked and talked like he was drunk, and a lot of the time he was drunk, in his younger days.  He rode a three wheeled bicycle because he was unable to drive a car.  A lot of times he would go to the bars on Saturday night.  So, when he was heading home from one of these bars on a Saturday night, he would get run off the road or he would lose control and end up in a ditch.  I don’t know how many times I would see flashing red and blue lights on Saturday night, and it would be Curt and his bike in a ditch.  So Curt and Addie were having an argument.  Curt told Addie, “You run over my bicycle.”  Addie said “Curt, I did not run over your bicycle.”  Curt kept saying “Yes you did.’  Finally, Addie said, “Curt, how do you know I ran over your bicycle?”  Curt said, “Because I was on it when you did it.”   

How I Learned to Play the Piano

                      

This is the first story I have posted in several years so I am having to brush up on my typing skills.  I used to be a pretty fast typist when I was in high school.  I even competed in U.I.L. competition and I did pretty good. Mrs. Halley told me that I was the fastest typist she had ever taught.  But, that was fifty years ago.  I also have to confess that I have already posted most of my best and funniest stories.  So, it may be a little dull from here on.  But, here goes anyway.

     This is the story of how I learned to play the piano. We were living in Abilene, Texas and I was in the fourth grade.  My mother wanted me to start taking piano lessons.  I look back on it and I wonder how we managed to afford it. So, she talked to Mrs. Springer, who was the music teacher where I was going to school, and she said she would be glad to give me piano lessons.  So, I started taking lessons from Mrs. Springer I believe in January of 1961.  After my first 30 minute lesson, I saw reading music was  simply counting spaces and lines up and down from middle C.  I got back to the house and started playing songs out of the hymnal after the first lesson. I guess you could say I was a natural born note reader. When the school year ended Daddy decided to move back to Menard.  Vernon Bates had offered him a job working at Bates food store in the meat market.  I was excited to be moving back to Menard, but I was not excited to leave Mrs. Springer.  I older brother William Franklin had taken piano lessons from Mrs. Tisdale before we moved to Abilene.  He was doing pretty good but he lost interest in the piano.  We went to see Mrs. Tisdale and asked her if she would give me piano lessons.  She said she would. But, she told my mother that “She would be glad to teach me, but I would never be as good as my brother was”.  I proved her wrong.  So, that was when I was in the first grade.  I soon became her star pupil.  Mrs. Tisdale believed in recitals.  Seems like we had a recital for every holiday.  I remember playing for a Halloween recital one year in the old Christian church.  I remember it was at night so it would seem a little spooky.  My mother took an old sheet and cut out a place for my eyes and I went as casper the ghost.  No one knew who I was until the recital was over. I played a recital, at the Baptist Church in the fellowship hall, and it was the only time I played a two piano duet.  I played it with Cheryl Westphall, who was Dr. Westphall’s daughter.  I remember being so nervous because I knew if I messed up it would mess her up too.  Thank goodness it all went smoothly.  I played at the Menard Manor almost every Christmas.  The piano was on the second floor of the old hotel building.  This was before they built on the two wings.  I remember playing” O Holy Night” and they liked it so well I had to play it twice.  I did not realize at the time that Menard Manor would be a big part of my life and that I would work there for thirty one and a half years.  I remember playing for, I believe, the Rotary Club and Mrs. Tisdale wanted me to give a little speech telling about the song's origin.  I refused to do it because I was so shy and stubborn.  I look back on It and wonder why I was so stubborn.  Before  I move on I just want to say what a fine women Mrs. Tisdale was.  My dad and I were in an automobile accident and my dad was unable to work for a while and we were unable to pay Mrs. Tisdale.  But, she kept teaching me piano lessons without charging me until Daddy could get back on his feet financially. I loved Mrs. Tisdale and she will always have a special place in my heart.

     I did not take piano lessons my senior year in high school because Mrs. Tisdale said I would just be too busy.  She said I could already play as good as her.  I did not think I could play as good as her because she was a very gifted pianist.  So, when I got to college I decided to go with my passion and be a music major.  This was probably not a good career move. But I did it anyway.  I soon realized that this was not an easy major.  Not only did you have all of your basic subjects to study and pass, you had to make time to practice the piano.  Not only did you have to play really hard music, you had to learn to perform in very stressful situations.  I remember playing on a nine foot grand piano on stage with a spotlight on me, playing a hard song without any music.  I was so nervous, it was like I was in a trance.  I remember starting the song and ending the song but nothing in between.  Someway I got through the  song and everybody thought I did good. But, even though I was scared to death, I loved it because it was my passion. 

I stayed in college for two and a half years and when I quit I was working on “Moonlight Sonata” by Ludwig Van Beethoven.  This was to be my senior recital song.  The first movement is not really difficult. But, the rest of the song is extremely difficult and it is thirty three pages long.  It has to be memorized and performed before a music major senior recital.  It can be performed any time you are ready.  But it has to be done before you graduate.  I was driving back and forth to San Angelo five days a week and I wore out every old car I could get and I wore myself out.  I decided I would take a break from college and I never made it back.  But, I didn’t give up music.  I started playing mostly popular music and I loved Dan Coates arrangements.  I was still a very good note reader and excelled on the level of difficulty of the arrangements.  I never played with a band even though they had asked me to play piano for the Angelo State Band right before I quit. But, I have never played with a country and western band and that is where my passion is. I have played for a few different events in my life.  I played several years in a row for the Menard Chamber Of Commerce but they got new chamber members and never asked me again.  I have played two or three weddings.  I often thought if I lived in a big city I would place an ad to play for weddings. I have only been paid one time for playing the piano in my whole life and that was for a wedding here in Menard.  I won’t mention who the person was, but he gave me a fifty dollar bill.  I didn’t ask for any money. But  it only lasted three weeks and they had the marriage annulled. So, I guess he thought that was not money well spent.

     So, even though I could read notes very well and I could play beautiful difficult music. I began to notice something.  Nobody thinks you are a real musician unless you can play some by ear.  So, I decided I would learn to play by ear.  It was not easy for me.  But, I worked hard and it has been one of the most rewarding things I have ever done.  I always loved Floyd 

Cramer's style of playing the piano.  So I set my goal to play like Floyd Cramer.  Floyd Cramer used the slip note to give piano playing that unique style.  So, anytime you hear me play the piano, you are going to hear some Floyd Cramer.  When I find a new song I want to learn, I first find out what key it is in and I try to learn it in the key it was originally sung in.  If it is a key I just don’t like, I will put it in a key I do like.  I try to learn a new song about every two weeks.  Some songs just come naturally and some songs I really have to work hard to learn.  Here I am at sixty eight years old and I still have that burning passion to become a better pianist.  But, I will never be as good as I want to be.  Well, that’s all for now.  Now that I am retired from the Manor, stay tuned for a lot of stories about my life in Menard.