THE PLEASANT GARDEN YEARS

INNER TUBES AND YELLOW JACKETS 

When I was in the fifth grade I attended the Pleasant Garden Elementary School in Pleasant Garden, North Carolina. My parents had bought a large two-story house near town but they were doing some major renovations to it, so we lived with my Tinsley grandparents for a few months until the new house was ready.

 Grandma and Grandpa Tinsley lived a couple of miles out of town and had a large yard for us Cheek kids to play in. The back yard sloped away from the house and down a fairly steep hill toward a shallow creek that ran along the back property line. We had an old tractor inner tube that our dad had gotten for us to use on vacations at the beach. It was great fun to float around on the inner tube and then ride a wave in to the sandy beach. I don’t remember who came up with the idea to ride inside the tube as it rolled down the hill in my grandparents’ backyard but it was fun! We would hold the tube up in a vertical position as the rider climbed in and grabbed the protruding tube inflating valve so as not to get stabbed with it as the tube rolled and bounced rapidly down the hill. When the rider was ready, they would usually exclaim “let it go” and get a strong starting push to start their ride down the hill. It was generally agreed that no rider should ride down the long hill more than three times in a row as early on the neighbor boy got sick on his fourth run and we had to hose off the tube afterwards.

 There was also an older teen aged boy that lived next door who was usually friendly to us younger kids. One day we were taking turns riding the tube and the older teen aged boy came by and commented that it looked like a lot of fun then asked if he could take a turn. We said “sure” and proceeded to get him loaded into the tube for his ride. He was a good bit taller and weighed more than the rest of us so it took a bit of creative leg and arm bending to get him to fit inside the tube. Once securely stuffed inside the tube he exclaimed the launch code of “let it go” and we all started pushing him down the hill away from the starting point.

 As he rolled down the hill, we noticed that he was rolling a lot faster than we had seen before and the height of his air born bumps were much higher as well. When he got to the bottom of the hill to the spot we usually stopped rolling, he kept going. Not only did he go past the usual stopping point but now he was picking up more speed. The terrain at the bottom of the yard flattened out for several feet then started sharply down again ending up at the creek. We watched as our hapless tube rider rolled all the way into the creek, fell sideways into the mud then climbed out rapidly yelling loudly. At first we thought he was yelling with glee at setting a new tube ride distance record but then realized his screams were not of the happy variety.

 As we ran down to see if he was hurt, he ran past us headed back up the hill screaming “yellow jackets, run for your lives”. It seems that in setting the new tube ride distance record he had ended up flopping over onto a large yellow jacket nest in the ground on the edge of the creek. We heeded the poor rider’s warning and hastily departed the area as angry yellow jackets swarmed around the, now muddy, tube. The teenager ran screaming into his house but his mom immediately made him run back outside to keep any yellow jackets from getting inside the house. She then grabbed a garden hose and began spraying the teenager with water to knock off the stinging insects. In spite of numerous yellow jacket stings the teenager survived but never asked to ride in our tube again. We waited until the next day to carefully retrieve our tube, wash it off and start rolling down the hill again. We did add a board across our stopping spot to be sure we stopped well short of the creek just in case.

BAND BEGINNINGS

It was at Pleasant Garden Elementary School that I started playing trumpet in the school band.  Mr. Grant, the Southeast High School Band Director, came to our elementary school and made a presentation for joining the band.  He played a short musical piece on each instrument then polled the group on which instrument we would like to play. Being the son of a trumpet player who had played trumpet during his school years then gone on to play in 1940's big bands guided my decision to choose the trumpet as my instrument. That and the fact that we already had a trumpet at home and my dad had already taught me some basics about how to play it.  After joining the school band I went on to enjoy many years of trumpet playing performing in many musical events.

One of my less memorable trumpet performances was when I was a sophomore at Southeast High School. It was homecoming weekend complete with a huge pep rally, bonfire, and grand entrance of the school’s football team bursting through a big paper banner. The senior trumpet player who usually played at this type of event was not available, so the cheerleaders had asked me, a lowly sophomore, to play instead. All I had to do was play six notes that led up to the crowd yelling “charge” three times with the last note played higher to send our football team off to a certain win! The time for my solo performance came as the head cheerleader gave me the signal to play “charge”. The first two trumpet volleys came out great as the excited crowd responded loudly with “charge” after each volley. On the last volley I was supposed to play the last note higher but instead of a clear high note coming out of my trumpet a “squawk” sound emitted followed by a sharp glance from the cheerleaders and laughter from the crowd. As embarrassing as that was, I also found it humorous and laughed along with everyone else.

Music has always been a very enjoyable part of my life and my years in school bands, church music choirs and other musical opportunities have enriched my life. It was in high school band at Edmunds High School in Sumter, SC that I met the love of my life. A clarinet player named Becky Lowder. We have made beautiful music in our lives together for over 50 years!

 

CHEEK’S BI-RITE GROCERY STORE

The Bi-Rite grocery store in Pleasant Garden was actually named "Cheek's Bi-Rite" as it was owned by a gentleman named N.B. Cheek who, oddly enough, was not related to me. The Bi-Rite grocery store was the only grocery store in town back then so we went there often and always saw people we knew while shopping. My newspapers were also delivered on the sidewalk in front of the store so I was there every day to pick up my newspapers and start my paper routes. It was at this store where I first learned about buying candy in bulk to save money.

 

There was a large candy display case with a glass top located near the front of the store. Behind the glass were all sorts of sugar laden candies to choose from. One of my favorites was Boyers Mallo Cups. These were small chocolate cups filled with a marshmallow and coconut filling. Each cup came individually wrapped and had collectible play money printed on a cardboard piece under the candy. The printed play money values ranged from five cents to a dollar. The included instructions stated to “stick on tape - avoid delay”. The idea was that if you bought enough of this candy and collected enough play money you could mail it in and get more candy free. Several of my friends also liked Mallo Cups so we decided to pool our play money to expedite the process of getting free candy. It was at this point that I asked the candy counter lady how much a whole box of Mallo Cups cost and discovered what buying in bulk at a wholesale price really meant. To my delight I was able to purchase a whole box of the candy for a lot less than buying the same quantity individually. I was then able to pass on a portion of my savings to my friends when reselling the candy and we collectively achieved the amount of play money needed to order the free candy. When our free candy arrived in the mail a few weeks later we met up and divided the two free pieces among us. It wasn’t much free candy but we had fun collecting the play money and our motto became “stick on tape – avoid delay”.

 

N.B. Cheek’s father lived across the street from us and was a kind old man who was friendly and a good neighbor.  He was also a newspaper customer of mine, always paid promptly and could be depended on to give a nice tip at to the paper boy at Christmas. N.B. Cheek, Sr. had grandchildren who lived in Bradenton, Florida that visited from time to time. One grandson was my age and he would spend summers with his grandfather. The grandson and I would ride bikes together all over the community, build and shoot off model rockets, fly model airplanes, play with his grandfather's wire recording machine and catch fireflies at night. The fireflies, or lightning bugs as we called them, were easy to catch and put into a Ball Mason jar with holes poked into the top so they could "breathe". We tried using them for flashlights at night but found that the bugs needed to be shaken every so often to make them light up again. Unfortunately for two young boys, as well as several dozen lightning bugs, the constant agitation of bugs inside of a Mason jar resulted in less and less light for the boys and more and more death for the bugs. I guess it was a good thing that the lightning bugs were prolific at reproducing additional bugs.

 

Another of our across the street neighbors were Dr. & Mrs. E.D. Idol. They were retired educators and Dr. Idol had also been the Guilford County School Superintendent.  The E.D. Idol building at the Pleasant Garden School was named in his honor. He was a masterful chess player and taught me how to play the game. I spent many afternoons after school visiting with them and playing chess with Mr. Idol. After teaching me the basics he would remove almost all of his game pieces and still win in a few moves. Mrs. Idol would usually bring us some fresh baked cookies and milk to enjoy while we played chess together. They showed me pictures of him playing and winning chess tournaments from over the years and seemed very pleased to have an interested young boy to share these good memories with. 

PLEASANT GARDEN DRUG STORE

The local drug store was the Pleasant Garden Drug Store where "Bill" the pharmacist dispensed medicines to help cure various ailments of the sick and infirm in the community. Bill was also a member of the church I attended, Pleasant Garden Baptist, and even sang in the choir there. Mrs. McGinnis also worked at the drug store and between assisting Bill with medicines and stocking the shelves with interesting items she also ran the soda fountain counter. She was always quick with a smile and the usual greeting of "what will you have today" to me as I would stroll in to purchase some delectable, sweet treat after delivering my afternoon newspapers.

 

My soda fountain purchases always seemed special when Mrs. McGinnis made them and there was usually a flourish of whipped cream and a cherry on top of whatever I was having that day. I prided myself on the creation of a unique drink I called the "suicide" which was made by Mrs. McGinnis starting at one end of the soda counter and putting a squirt, pump, scoop, or spoonful of every item available into the tall soda fountain glass then presenting it to me to eat and drink. She always seemed amused and a bit entertained to watch me consume the unusual concoction that was actually quite delicious. I tried to limit myself to one "suicide" a week but would occasionally have two if Mrs. McGinnis would greet me with "having a suicide today?" upon my entrance into this wonderful establishment.

 

I remember buying my mom a Christmas present from the drug store one year. For some reason I thought she would enjoy a handheld electric mixer. Mom had a large Sunbeam stand mixer and a manual eggbeater so I thought I would get her an electric hand mixer to complete her kitchen’s mixing devices.  It seemed like a new space age thing to have so I bought it for her Christmas present and got Mrs. McGinnis to wrap it for me. Mom was very appreciative of the gift and used it for several years. I think the reason this memory stands out so much for me is it may be the first time I can remember using my own earned money to buy her a gift.

THE TEXACO GAS STATION

The Texaco station in Pleasant Garden was across the street from the grocery store and was run by a portly man who was usually friendly.  He didn't seem to enjoy young boys hanging around the station using his free air to pump up a bike tire unless you were buying something to go with it or your parents were with you.  When I started my grass cutting job at the church and would buy a lot of gas from him then he seemed to be more receptive to giving away free air for my bike tires.  They also did car repairs and when the portly owner was not there the mechanic would let me raise and lower cars on the hydraulic lift to "help him out". I liked the smell of grease and oil in the service bays at the gas station. It reminded me of the smells I was familiar with from the many construction sites I had been around with my dad back in Unadilla. To this day whenever I smell diesel fuel, heavy grease or red clay I think about the many times I was around construction sites as a youth.

 

The air machine at the Texaco station was the type where you would turn a handle to crank the gage up to the pressure you wanted then press the air hose onto the stem of the tire. As air pumped into the tire the machine would ring a bell to indicate air was being pumped into the tire. When the bell stopped ringing the air in the tire was at the set pressure.  The price of gas back then was around 32 cents per gallon and almost all of the gas stations were considered full service. Full service meant they would pump your gas, wash your windshield, check your tire pressures and check your oil for free while you sat inside your car.

 

Just down the street a bit from the gas station was the volunteer fire station. My father, William Cheek, was among the founders of the Pleasant Garden Volunteer Fire Department. In earlier years he and other men in the community got together and solicited funds, secured equipment and got official sanctioning to organize it. This was when I was a much younger child and I only heard an occasional comment about how it started.

THE GUNSLINGER GRANDMA

One of my more interesting memories of my Tinsley grandparents was the time they had a disagreement with a neighbor, Mr. Lippard. Apparently there had been a previous issue between them that was unresolved to their satisfaction which led to the confrontation I am about to tell. I think I was about 10 years old when this event happened.

Grandpa Tinsley liked the Pet Dairies brand of butter pecan ice cream and on this day asked me if I wanted to ride to the store with him to get some. I said yes so, we climbed into his Buick to go get the ice cream. The Lippards lived down the road from my grandparents and had three young boys who were of the rowdy type. They had been known to throw things at passing cars and yell insults to go along with it. The Lippard parents did not seem to mind their offspring being anti-social and aggressive toward everyone that passed so their family was generally known as troublemakers in the community. As Grandpa Tinsley and I passed the Lippard house one of the boys threw a rock at the Buick and yelled some curse words at us. Grandpa T. took that opportunity to yell back that the boy should “go to h***” and we continued to drive past.

After buying the ice cream we headed back to Grandpa’s house where we saw both Mr. Lippard and the insult & rock hurling boy standing at the end of their driveway. Mr. Lippard yelled another insult at us as we passed by, and Grandpa responded with an impolite finger gesture. Upon arriving at Grandpa’s house, he calmly got out of the car, put the ice cream into the freezer and walked down to his workshop in the basement. I followed him downstairs curious as to what he wanted to make before eating some of the ice cream. He was whistling as he carefully picked out a board from his lumber stack and turned his table saw on. Grandpa Tinsley was a house builder and had bunches of building equipment and tools in his large basement.

He made a few cuts on the board then ran a sander over it and headed back upstairs. I followed him back upstairs and he and Grandma calmly spoke to each other as Grandpa walked out into his carport. To my surprise Mr. Lippard was walking up the driveway toward Grandpa yelling more insults and cursing. Grandpa held up the paddle he had just crafted and told Mr. Lippard that if he came any closer, he was going to hit him. Mr. Lippard, not wanting to back down, continued advancing while continuing his profane verbal barrage. Grandpa had told me to move back so I had walked to the rear of the carport.

As Mr. Lippard continued his advance my grandma walked out of the porch holding their 32-caliber pistol and leveled the gun at Mr. Lippard and said if he didn’t leave right then she was going to shoot. This seemed to get Mr. Lippard’s attention and he stopped walking toward us. He cursed a few more times and Grandma cocked the pistol as she repeated her warning. Mr. Lippard then began backing away but continued yelling abusive insults about my grandparent’s ancestry and his opinion of all of them. As Mr. Lippard slowly walked down the road toward his house he continued mumbling and gesturing with his hands. Grandpa then turned to Grandma and took the pistol from her as they made their way back into the house. It was then that Grandpa looked at the pistol and said, “you didn’t have any bullets in the gun”. Grandma replied “yeah, but he didn’t know that”. We went back into the house, pulled out the ice cream and all had some. They never mentioned the incident again and I never brought it up either. As far as I know the Lippard boys never threw rocks or yelled insults at my grandparents again.

HAIRCUTS AND P.O. BOX 456

While we lived in Pleasant Garden we used a post office box with a combination lock inside the post office for our mail deliveries. The Pleasant Garden Post Office was located near the barber shop where I went to get my haircuts. For some reason I really enjoyed going to both the post office and the barber shop. The fresh smell of stacks of paper envelopes and the sweet smell of the after shave the barber splashed on my neck after my haircuts combined to make a pleasing aroma to me. I can remember falling asleep in the barber chair on many occasions with the hum of the clippers and the whirring of the fan lulling me to sleep. The barber would usually laugh out loud at my sleepy head bobbing around as he finished up my haircut which would then wake me up. The loose hair that fell down my neck and into my shirt would make me squirm around until I could get home and wash it off.

Our post office box number was #456 and it was located about half way up the wall near the center of the wall of boxes so was easy for me to reach. The box had a small glass window on the front of it where you could see if you had any mail inside the box without opening it. Our combination was right to “B” then left to “H” then right again to “I”. For some reason this box number and combination has remained in my memory over the years. So much so that many, many years later when I was married and had children we had occasion to drive through Pleasant Garden and stopped at the old post office which was still in operation at the same location. I had told my children the story of the box and combination so we walked in and went over to box 456. I spun the dial around to the B, H & I and the box opened easily! There was mail in the box but since it was not mine and tampering with the mail is a federal offence I quickly closed the box, spun the dial and walked out with my giggling children. I think a new post office building has been built since then and they probably got all new boxes but if you are ever in Pleasant Garden and go inside the post office check out box 456.

A FOWL DEED

I don’t know how many thousand newspapers I delivered during my paper route days in Pleasant Garden but having both early morning and afternoon routes I’m sure it was a lot. My early morning route required the most effort as climbing out of my nice warm bed and riding my bike through the cold morning air was not always fun. However, the thought of how much money I was making by delivering those papers helped warm me up a bit. 

 

I would usually arrive at the paper drop off place near the front door of the Bi-Rite grocery store slightly damp from the morning fog I had pedaled through to get there. My stacks of newspapers were held together by metal bands. Cutting the metal bands that held the stacks of papers together I would roll them and place rubber bands around some. If it was an especially damp morning I would also have to put many of the papers into plastic bags to keep them dry. I knew from memory how many rolled up and rubber banded papers I would need, how many needed just plastic bags and, for my pickiest but usually biggest tipping customers, how many to leave unfolded to be placed in a dry location near their front door. Being one of my picky customers did not necessarily mean that they were hard to deal with.

 

One of my favorite picky customers lived on the edge of town and was at the end of my route. They wanted the paper placed on a table next to the front door with a weight put on top of it. The reason being was that the lady of the house had physical limitations and could not bend over easily hence the specific delivery request. They always paid me a little extra and were especially generous with a tip at Christmas time. Their house was set off of the road with a long driveway winding across a pretty yard with lots of flowers and flowering bushes. The home and grounds were accompanied by a large pond that started in the rear of the house and extended to the side. This aquatic feature, while picturesque, was also home to a large number of cranky ducks and geese who would lie in wait for an unsuspecting paperboy to ride by.

 

On one particular day the geese had apparently decided that no one would be allowed through their territory. Unfortunately, word of this "fowl curfew" was not disseminated to the previously mentioned paperboy who, when pedaling through, found himself facing a large group of angry geese. These same geese were known to have earlier launched an attack on two large German shepherd dogs with the result being a complete humiliation of the dogs hastily departing the area with their tails between their legs yelping in pain as the geese chased and pecked them. Finding myself face to face with an unruly gaggle of large geese I was forced to stop and dismount my bicycle.

 

Using the bike as a shield to fend off the repeated attacks I was able to slowly keep moving forward until a break off group of geese observed an unprotected area and decided to make a rear attack. By "rear attack" I literally mean a "rear attack". The breakaway group of geese half flew half ran around my bike shield to my "exposed area" and wasted no time in utilizing their new advantage in position. After determining that my defensive position was precarious at best and failing fast I decided to abandon plan "A" and move quickly to plan "B" which meant trying to outrun the geese on my bicycle. Mounting my bike with great haste I began pedaling furiously. With great "honks " of geese insults being hurled at me and multiple pecks to my now exposed ankles I slowly began putting distance between me and my tormentors. Rapidly reaching the crest of the hill behind the pond I left the last of the marauding geese behind to regroup for their next victim and decided it was a good day to go see Mrs. McGinnis at the drugstore soda fountain for a drink.

SKIPPER

For a short but memorable time during my Pleasant Garden paper route days I had a canine buddy I named "Skipper". Skipper, a medium sized dog with dirty yellow and white fur, just showed up one day and began trotting next to me as I bicycled through our community delivering my newspapers. I'm still not certain where Skipper came from or where he moved on to a few months later but our time together was unique. During those months together Skipper would just show up at a spot about halfway through my route, run along beside me with a carefree "dog smile" on his face, accompany me for a couple of miles then disappear until the next day when the routine would be repeated.

 

Many of my newspaper customers had dogs at their houses and most of them, but not all, were of the friendly variety. Two notable exceptions were a pair of German shepherds near the end of my route and a grouchy bloodhound in the middle of my route. This grouchy and aggressive bloodhound belonged to a very pleasant lady named Mrs. McGinnis. Mrs. McGinnis had a large 2 story house with a wide front porch with steep steps leading up to it. Since I prided myself on customer satisfaction and since Mrs. McGinnis was such a sweet lady, I would always place her paper on the porch for easy access when she came home. Unfortunately for me her dog, the grouchy bloodhound, chose the front porch as his favorite place to lie around and bark at anyone passing by, especially paperboys trying to put a newspaper on the porch. In fairness to the bloodhound, he never actually bit me but did get close a few times as he snarled and snapped in my direction.

 

When Skipper first started running with me, he would avoid this house, mysteriously disappearing and then show up a few houses later still "smiling" as he caught up with me again. One day as I turned into Mrs. McGinnis' sidewalk to deliver her paper and face the bloodhound again the bloodhound suddenly stood up and began running down the porch steps toward me snarling. I was alarmed that the usually grouchy dog had ratcheted his aggression up several notches and was quickly approaching me with bared teeth. Just as the bloodhound got close enough to bite me a dirty yellow and white blur appeared between us blocking the bloodhound's path. Skipper to the rescue! It most likely would have been a disastrous fight for Skipper had the two dogs gone into combat as the bloodhound was twice Skipper's size and also had the home field advantage.

 

At this point Skipper had successfully distracted the bloodhound away from the paperboy to himself and began barking furiously. The bloodhound moved quickly away from me and began to chase Skipper across the front yard, the side yard and out of sight into the backyard. While concerned about my canine buddy I took this opportunity to put the newspaper on the porch and quickly peddle back out to the street to go find Skipper. Back on the street I could only hear the distant barking of both dogs. Skipper's excited "yip, yip, yip" and the bloodhound's deep "aroo, aroo, aroo" so I knew they were still in motion. The barking grew softer then stopped altogether. A few houses later Skipper reappeared next to me unharmed smiling his big dog smile as if to say, "that was fun, can we do it again?"

 

And so it was that for several months Skipper would run beside me as I delivered my papers always moving in front of me just before we came to Mrs. McGinnis' house so he could have a good run with the bloodhound, and I could safely put the paper on the porch. After several months of this pattern Skipper stopped showing up at our regular meeting spot. I figured he had found someone else who needed some help so had just moved on. Skipper was a good "dog friend" and I enjoyed having him run beside me on my paper route for those days long ago. His sudden appearance then disappearance was like so many things in life where we enjoy them for a season, then they are gone but we are thankful for the moments we had to enjoy them.

HEAVY WEIGHT CHRISTMAS 

The Christmas of 1962 found me wanting to be a more muscle bound 10-year-old. To do this I thought I needed some workout equipment and a weight set. I had pored over the Sears Christmas catalog and had carefully circled the items I thought I needed in hopes that my parents would flip through the catalog and notice the items selected. Back in those days my Christmas morning routine was to get up early and run into the living room to see what gifts had been left under the tree for me. Years later my sweet wife would be appalled at the idea of anyone rushing in to the Christmas tree and gifts before everyone else was up but in 1962 that was my approach! I was the first one to arrive to the tree that Christmas but soon my sister Cathy followed and together we excitedly surveyed the stacks of gifts assembled for the four Cheek kids.

A punching bag, weight set, and exercise equipment were quickly set up and I began my training immediately. My barbell weight set was adjustable up to 110 pounds plus the bar and so I decided to give it a try at full load to see what it felt like. After loading all the weights onto the bar and locking them in place I grabbed the bar and lifted. Not surprisingly I was not able to lift the bar up very far but with Cathy’s help I was able to get 110+ pounds of barbell lifted up and over my head. I told Cathy that I could hold it and did, for about 5 seconds. Thankfully I was standing near the couch which helped to slow the weights falling down to the floor with me under them. I survived, the couch had only minor damage but there were two very large dents in our recently refinished hardwood floors. Everyone else in the house was suddenly awakened by the loud crash and came running to see what caused the noise!

I was more careful while using the weights from that time on but the large dents in our living room floor were still there when we sold the house and moved years later. I did get stronger and taller afterwards but attribute this to the natural growth of most young boys. I also learned the necessity of a spotter when exercising by lifting heavy weights.

COLOR TV AND MY BEST JOB EVER

The middle of the town of Pleasant Garden consisted of the Bi-Rite grocery store, a drug store with a soda fountain, a Texaco gas station, and the nearby volunteer fire station.  There was also a TV repair shop in a small, wooden building behind the grocery store that my friend Floyd Jones's dad ran. I remember that one time Mr. Jones had gotten in the latest in TV technology, a color TV with an "unbreakable" screen.  It was fun to watch guys line up to bump, hit or ram the TV with various objects just to see if it really was unbreakable. I did not see it, but Floyd told me that one man even tried ramming it with his head! Floyd said the man got down on his hands and knees, backed off a few feet then charged the TV screen like a goat butting into something. The result was that the man got a sore head, but the TV screen was unscathed by the whole experience. Mr. Jones eventually sold the TV to someone in the community who also inherited the bragging rights as owners of the first unbreakable TV screen in Pleasant Garden.

 

When Mr. Jones moved his TV business to another location my father used the same building for his land surveying office.  I enjoyed helping my dad to survey property and spent many delightful Saturdays working with him measuring land, cutting brush, and learning about how a surveying transit works. I also would get to use the blueprint machine in his office to print the large blueprints of the properties he surveyed.   Occasionally I would be allowed to carry the expensive instrument, the Gurley surveying transit, and set it up on the next point. This was a skill that I also used later in life as I worked with The Harwood-Beebe Engineering Company in Florence, SC doing similar work. My dad had purchased a Volkswagen minibus to use in his surveying business that was great fun to drive. The fact that I was under 16 years of age and did not actually have a NC driver’s license somewhat limited the places I could actually "drive” so I honed my VW driving skills around our yard, on farm roads where we were surveying and back and forth in our driveway.  

 

One winter we had a big snow and dad was helping me deliver my newspapers for my afternoon route. We were taking turns driving the VW van forward a few houses then running the papers up to the porches, move up a few more houses and repeat the process. We got to one stretch of road and all the houses were on the driver’s side of the van and so I scooted over to drive the van up a little farther while he ran the paper up to the porch. When he came back to the van, I handed him another stack of papers and he told me to just keep driving for a while and he would handle the porch deliveries. I was delighted at this opportunity to drive on a snowy paved road and thought about what it would feel like to drive around legally when I was older.

 

My dad and I had many fun times working together and I'm glad to have learned his work ethic of enjoying a job or project well done and the sense of pride it brings. He would often tell me that “anything worth doing was worth doing well”. The times I spent working alongside my father were some of the best times in my life. 

THE ALL-AMERICAN SOAP BOX DERBY

 I raced in the All American Soap Box Derby in Greensboro, North Carolina from age eleven to fifteen. My dad was always supportive and encouraged me in my many endeavors and when I was eleven years old he came home with information about the All American Soap Box Derby. One of the Chevrolet dealerships in Greensboro was sponsoring the local race and the Jaycees were helping organize and run it. The local winner would then go to Akron, Ohio for the National Soap Box Derby race and compete for scholarships and other prizes. This started an enjoyable five year tradition of us building and racing five different Soap Box Derby cars. These father and son projects were great times with him showing me how to use different tools to build our ever improving derby cars.

 

Our first derby car resembled a volcano painted red. The peak of the "volcano" was the opening where I could get into the car to drive. It was our first attempt at using fiberglass and I had done most of the application of the fiberglass. We had asked a friend, Eddie Dick, to give me a few pointers on how to apply fiberglass to a derby car as he and his dad had finished a few derby cars with it. When Eddie came over he spent more time talking with my older sisters who were his age than giving me fiberglass tips. The result being that I added the whole bottle of hardener into the whole container of resin which caused it to set up rock hard in a short amount of time. I ended up with a block of hard resin inside of a can instead of a smooth derby car and Eddie suddenly decided he needed to go home. Dad and I purchased more resin and hardener and tried again with better results, but it still resembled a red volcano.

 

On race day I completed my trial run okay and won my first race so we considered our efforts a success. Actually the success was being able to work on the derby car projects together and enjoy planning for improvements to be included the next car.

 

Part of preparing your derby car for race day was seating the ball bearings in your car’s wheels to make it roll down the hill faster. This was done by blocking the car up and spinning the wheels for hours in the forward direction. I remember having my car set up on special saw horses that dad and I had made and spinning my car’s wheels using a rag to spin them. I spent hours on the back patio of our house spinning wheels and talking with my friends about the race. On race day all of the racers would set their cars up on something and continuously spin their wheels until it was their turn to race down the hill. The maximum weight limit for the car and driver was 250 pounds and everyone aimed at having this maximum weight combination to help ensure a faster run down the track. One year one of the racing contestants had been using four bricks to block his car up when spinning his wheels prior to his race. When it was time for his race he just picked up the bricks and put them inside his car. Bricks weigh about five pounds each so he had been racing with a twenty pound advantage. After winning a few races someone noticed him pulling the bricks out his car between races and asked him about it. He said that he had not realized it would make any difference but left the bricks out of his car for his next race and lost.

 

I can still remember the sounds of racing the derby cars. There were four distinct sounds when you raced. The first was the loud “bang” sound of the starter’s pistol going off indicating that the race had started and the ramp gate was about to be released. The second sound was the “whump” of the ramp gate dropping away from the nose of my derby car. The third was the “bump” sound of front wheels coming off of the starting ramp followed closely by the fourth sound of the rear wheels coming off of the starting ramp. The next sounds would be the wind rushing past as I got faster and faster going down the racetrack.

 

My most successful year I won four heats only to lose out to the overall winner that year.  I was also awarded the Best Sport Award that year. I think it was for congratulating my friend on his victory over me in my last race. My winnings consisted of two $25.00 savings bonds, a silver award cup and a plaque with my name on it.  I think I still have the cup and plaque somewhere but I cashed in the savings bonds after I got married and had children.  A few years later my sister, Luanne, also got to build a couple of derby cars with dad and race. She did pretty good and also won several heats during her racing days.

 

 

After the Soap Box Derby race was over you kept your car. Since we had built several I would roll them out occasionally and give the neighborhood children a chance to drive them down the hill next to our house in Pleasant Garden, NC. On one such occasion a young boy got hurt by the derby car another boy was driving. He was actually hit by the car as it rolled swiftly down the hill. The boy’s leg was cut pretty bad so I picked him up and carried him over to Dr. Sisk who lived next door.  Dr. Sisk stitched him up and he recovered. That boy grew up and went on to become the principal of Parkwood High School in Monroe, NC during Ashlea’s senior year. When I was introduced to Ed at a school function he remembered me as the one who had rescued him and “saved his life” in Pleasant Garden many years before. Ashlea had a good senior year and Dr. Ed Davis went on to be the Superintendent of Schools in Union County, NC.

 

My son, Matthew, also raced one year in the Charlotte, NC Soap Box Derby. We enjoyed building the car together and he won a heat race as well. 

THE HEAVY CHEVY

I spent several of my formative growing up years living in the small town of Pleasant Garden, NC. The middle of the town consisted of the Bi-Rite grocery store, the drug store with a soda fountain, the B&G Variety Store, the Texaco gas station and the nearby volunteer fire department building.  

There was also a TV repair shop in a small wooden building behind the grocery store that my friend Floyd Jones's dad ran. When Mr. Jones moved his TV business to another location in Pleasant Garden my father used the same building for his land surveying office.  I enjoyed helping my dad survey property and spent many a delightful Saturday working with him measuring land, cutting brush and learning about how to measure angles with a surveying transit. This was a skill that I would also use later in life as I worked with the Harwood-Beebe Engineering Company in Florence, SC after Bec and I were married.

 My dad had purchased a Volkswagen mini bus to use in his surveying business that was great fun to drive. The fact that I was under 16 years of age and did not actually have a NC driver’s license somewhat limited the places I could actually "drive" so I honed my VW driving skills around our yard, on farm roads where we were surveying and back and forth in our driveway.  One winter we had a big snow and dad was helping me deliver my newspapers for my afternoon route. We were taking turns driving the VW van forward a few houses then running the papers up to the porches, move up a few more houses and repeat the process. We got to one stretch of road and all of the houses were on "his side/drivers side" of the van and so I scooted over to drive the van up a little farther while he ran the paper up to the porch. When he came back to the van I handed him another stack of papers and he told me to just keep driving for a while and he would handle the porch deliveries. I was delighted at this opportunity to drive on a snowy paved road and thought about what it would feel like to actually drive around legally when I was older! My dad and I had many fun times working together and I'm glad to have learned his work ethic of enjoying a job or project well done and the sense of pride it brings.

My early driving experiences also included driving my father’s Chevrolet Impala around in the back yard and getting it a little stuck.  Actually a lot stuck.  Actually buried up to the frame stuck! It all started when my parents went off for the weekend and I was left at home with my older sisters in charge of things. Before my dad left on this weekend trip with my mom he told me not to drive the car around the yard while he was gone (I was sure he said that for safety reasons).  A few hours after my parents had left that Saturday morning I “got an itch to drive something” so I got the riding lawnmower out and drove it around until it started raining at which point I learned that while sitting on a metal riding lawnmower in the rain the water gets on the spark plug wire and it turns the lawnmower into a riding electric chair, very painful!  I ended up jumping off of the lawnmower, shutting it off with a stick and pushing it back into the tool shed.

 My “itch to drive something” was still strong and since it was still raining and therefore dangerous to drive the riding mower around I deduced that driving my dad’s Chevy around in the yard would be safer therefore keeping within the assumed safety intentions my father had instructed me in prior to his weekend departure.  I figured my sisters would not appreciate my methods of deduction about it really being safer, therefore okay, to drive the car so decided not to bother them with my newfound direction of reasoning. Surely my father would not want me to risk getting electrocuted by riding around on the mower in the rain so I was sure it would be alright with him for me to drive the Chevy instead.  After I had settled this simple reasoning within myself, I set out to locate the keys to my new object of motivation, the Chevy.  

With keys in hand, I walked confidently to the Chevy parked in the driveway. In my mind I was already deftly handling the sleek, shiny car with its 327 cubic inches of engine power around in my backyard, dreaming of the day when I would actually be old enough to legally drive it on the paved roads around Pleasant Garden.  I cranked the engine and revved it a few times to get my adrenaline flowing, adjusted the mirrors (after all safety first) then put it in gear and slowly rolled forward a few feet.  Braking expertly to a stop I placed the Chevy in reverse and pressed the gas pedal a little farther down to move back to my original parking spot in the driveway. The car started backwards quickly and spun a few pieces of gravel as it jumped backwards. My race car adrenaline jumped up considerably as I expertly braked to another safe stop. With two passes in the driveway completed successfully I thought it was time to expand my driving range a bit and turned off of the driveway heading down the back yard.

 We had a large back yard that had plenty of room for a kid in a Chevy to drive around in without much danger of running into anything.  Not considering the fact that the continuing heavy rain made the yard soft I drove to the very end of the backyard, turned around and started back up the hill toward the driveway. About half- way back up to the driveway I noticed that the engine was revving faster than before but the car had stopped moving forward. I backed up a little then tried going forward again but met with the same results, engine noise but no forward motion. I tried to open the car door to see what was up but found that there was now mud and grass blocking the door from opening!  I rolled the window down (it was still raining) to take a look around and my eyes fell on a site that sent a chill up my spine. I had not considered that the same rain that caused me to get shocked on the riding mower had caused the backyard to become water saturated.  I then learned that when you drive a heavy Chevy on a muddy lawn bad things happen. Since I could not get the car doors to open I climbed out of the car window to survey the damage.

 Years later I would actually get to travel to the Grand Canyon and actually see how deep it is but at this point in time the deep, muddy ruts I had dug in the yard with my dad’s Chevy seemed to be deeper than any Grand Canyon I could imagine.  I had also, singlehandedly, managed to bury my dad’s car in mud so deep it was impossible to even get the doors open. And still it rained.  As I contemplated my previously well reasoned plan to safely drive around the yard in my dad’s Chevy several holes in my reasoning became crystal clear.  I had disobeyed a direct rule about driving without supervision and I had plowed large, gaping, muddy ruts in a large portion of our backyard. The same backyard we had family reunions in because it was so well groomed. The same backyard my dad and I would work in all day on a Saturday then walk around together and enjoy the results our combined efforts had produced, a beautifully groomed yard. The same backyard that now had deep, ugly, muddy ruts and a late model Chevy half buried in it. And still it rained.

 Being a resourceful and now highly motivated young man I took stock of what I had done and possible ways to resolve the issues at hand.  I could call our local tow truck man and get him to pull the Chevy out, wash the car then try to fill in the deep ruts in the yard before my parents came home the next day and hope they would not notice. There were several problems with this line of thinking. First it would be very dishonest and sneaky not to admit my disobedience, so I planned full disclosure when my parents got home. As for the tow truck, I figured that would be both expensive and would make additional ruts in the yard so also decided against that. My decision was since I had created the issue I should fix it as best I could.

After giving additional thought to my predicament I remembered helping my dad get a vehicle out of a muddy hole by jacking up the vehicle with a tire jack, putting rocks under the tire to lift it up out of the mud, lowering it back down then driving it out of the mud hole. I got a shovel and began digging. First I dug out around the driver’s door so I could get the door opened and roll up the window to keep additional rain from getting inside the car. Then I opened the trunk, removed the jack and began jacking up the rear of the Chevy one side at a time and put bricks, rocks and boards in the muddy holes under the rear tires to lift the car up. I also laid a “path” of bricks, rocks and boards in front of the rear tires so there would be something to provide traction as I slowly drove the car forward. After several hours of intense labor I was successful in getting the thoroughly muddy Chevy back up into the driveway.  After washing off all of the mud I could reach on the car I began repairing the damage to the yard.

 I am pretty sure there were still some ruts still visible in the back yard when we sold that house and moved to South Carolina a few years later and as for the Chevy it continued to run fine. Over the years I have had other “interesting driving experiences” but nothing quite as muddy as that one!  

THE RODENT’S DIET

My life in Pleasant Garden included many hours of attending school and school events in elementary, middle and high school. As with pretty much any educational experience some hours were fun and interesting and some not so much. My eighth grade homeroom teacher was Miss McDonald. She was a tall lady with thick glasses who lived with her mother. Miss McDonald was a pleasant enough single person, but I think she would have rather been married as she made continuous comments about having money rather than a husband.  My first school debate was in her class. I remember having my notes at the ready while presenting my view but as I enthusiastically built up to my main point I mistakenly said “in conclusion” before giving my final point and had to shorten my side of the debated subject leaving out my main point!

 

It was during my eighth grade year that an odd practice started in our school. Someone started the idea that if a girl pulled the locker loop (the small loop of cloth on the back of boy’s button up shirts) off of a boy’s shirt that was a signal that she had a crush on him. It started out as a funny thing with boys walking down the hall with their backs to the lockers on the sides of the hallway to keep the girls away from the shirt backs. When some popular boy got the idea of sewing a locker loop on his shirt with heavy fishing line and a girl literally ripped the back of his shirt off while trying to collect the locker loop the principal stepped in and banned the practice so we went back to just passing notes in class.

 

 When I was in Mrs. Kiger's eighth grade science class we had a class experiment with rats. The premise was that eating good healthy food would cause rats, and eighth graders, to be healthier. As a class we would take turns bringing some of the good healthy cafeteria food back for one rat to eat. The other rodent was to be fed a diet of unhealthy snack food high in fat, sugar and salt which was generally thought to be the normal diet of eighth graders. We all loved Mrs. Kiger and her friendly smile and out of respect for her initially agreed with her premise that rat A would thrive by eating the nutritious school cafeteria food and rat B would suffer the dire consequences of a diet full of candy, salty nuts and Kool-Aid to drink. The first few days we noticed no differences between our laboratory subjects but by week 2 some subtle changes began to emerge. Rat A began to look sickly in spite of all the healthy cafeteria food of lettuce, cornbread, green beans, cheese and milk while rat B was looking rather robust eating his candy bars, bubble gum and Kool-Aid.

 

At the conclusion of our class experiment we were never sure what caused rat A to expire but noticed that Mrs. Kiger began bringing her lunch from home every day and as for me, I bought a whole box of Mallow Cups candy from the Bi-Rite and continued my regular visits to the drugstore soda fountain with Mrs. McGinnis.

TEN MILES TO NOWHERE

One of the advantages of having two older sisters is that their boyfriends would come to our house for a visit or to pick them up to go out on a date somewhere. While they were visiting or waiting for my sisters to finish getting ready to go I would bug them to please let me crank up their car and drive it back and forth in the driveway while they were waiting. Not wanting to tarnish their nice guy images they would usually give in and hand me the keys.

Most of the boyfriends had really sporty cars with louder mufflers and fancier wheels than our family car so I always felt pretty cool as I climbed in and started the engine. Larry Coble, Cathy’s boyfriend, had an especially nice Chevrolet that was my favorite. The engine had a low rumble sound when it idled and a four-on-the-floor transmission with a shiny chrome shifter knob. I would get into the car, crank up the engine and enjoy the rumble sound as it idled. After enjoying the rumble for a bit I would rev the engine up several times and break out in a grin as the engine got louder and louder. I am certain that Larry could hear the noise from inside the house but he usually just grinned at me through the door and motioned for me to “hold down the noise a bit”. After I enjoyed the engine sound a while it came time for the actual driving. Since Larry always parked on the street in front of our house where the drive area was much shorter than the back I was somewhat limited in how far I could actually “drive” before I had to stop then back up to begin the sequence again. In retrospect I think that Larry’s choice of parking spots was part of his plan to help reduce the wear and tear on his car by his girlfriend’s little brother.

Easing the car into gear, usually without grinding the gears, I would rev the engine and let the clutch out quicker than necessary to get the rear tires to spin a little causing a “chirping” sound on the pavement. This was followed by the car lurching forward several feet then me applying the brakes to stop. If the tires slid a little as I stopped and made another “chirping” sound I considered it a successful run. Thanks to Larry’s patience and my parents usually being downstairs on the other side of the house and away from the noise I was able to enjoy this multiple times over many months. I’m not sure how many gallons of gas I used revving the engine or how far my repeated back and forth driving added up to but in looking back at those days I figure I drove his car about 10 miles to nowhere!

KITE FIGHTS AND EXPLODING CIGARETTES

Several summers of my teenage years, I got invited to go to Crescent Beach, South Carolina for a few weeks with my friend Tommy Callicutt and his family. Tommy’s Aunt Vera and Uncle Cornell owned a small beach front motel at Crescent Beach as well as a large house that they lived in across the street from the motel. Tommy and I spent most of our daylight time on the beach flying our bird kites, fishing, trying to impress teenage girls and generally enjoying the lazy days that summertime at the beach entails.

While flying our kites we experimented with ways to lift items by tying them to the tails of the kites and letting the strong beach breezes lift them high into the air. During this experimental kite flying process we also discovered that we could maneuver our kites in such a way as to make the heavy weights on the kite tails swing back and forth like a pendulum and have kite fights with them. The idea was to get both kites flying at the same height then maneuver them to make the swinging weight smash into your opponents kite sending it spiraling to the ground. It was great fun to us even though we had to get Tommy’s mom to drive us to the store several times to buy more kites and string. Another of our teenage genius ideas was to put seashells into a small sand pail, tie it onto the kite tail then maneuver the kites to make the shells fall out like bombs while up really high. This practice was short lived though because on one of our seashell bombing runs we overshot and narrowly missed pelting a family with young children nearby with large handfuls of rapidly falling seashells.  After apologizing and getting a few dirty looks from them we moved farther down the beach and deleted bombing runs from our schedule of kite flying activities.

Tommy’s Aunt Vera smoked cigarettes and was pretty much a chain smoker. On one of our trips to the store to buy more kites we noticed an interesting display of “tricks and gags” to play on people. The sign clearly stated that the items were “guaranteed to get a laugh”. Toward the middle of the display were small boxes of “cigarette loads”. These were small toothpick shaped objects that you could push up inside of a cigarette and when the glowing heat got to it a small explosion would occur. Tommy and I decided that his aunt would enjoy the gag after all it was “guaranteed to get a laugh” so we bought a box.  Arriving back at the house we waited for a long time for Tommy’s aunt to lay her pack of cigarettes down and walk away from them. When she finally did so we quickly and quietly placed a load into the first cigarette in the pack then left the room. Tommy’s mom asked us to take the trash cans out to the street to be picked up so we hurried downstairs and carried the cans out then quickly returned upstairs where his aunt was sitting. We sat down across the room from his aunt and feigned interest in some old magazines she had on the coffee table waiting for her to light up her next smoke. His aunt made some comment about what we were having for dinner that night then reached for her pack of cigarettes, pulled one out and lit it.

Tommy and I could hardly contain ourselves and tried not to look at each other to keep from starting to laugh. His aunt finished that cigarette, talked for a few minutes more then pulled out another one and lit it. We had assumed that the loaded cigarette must have slid back into the pack and had not come out as we planned but surely this next one was the one we had put the load into. We continued to feign interest in things around the room while waiting for the big bang to occur and the “guaranteed laugh” to emanate from his aunts lips. She finished the second one and still no bang. About this time Tommy and I were thinking we had bought a dud cigarette load when his aunt suddenly broke into hilarious laughter. She explained that while we were taking the trash cans out to the street she had lit up a cigarette and it exploded. She figured that we had been the culprits so did not say anything and purposely smoked a couple of cigarettes while we were watching to see our reaction. We enjoyed the laughter with her and decided that the advertisement of “guaranteed to get a laugh” was true after all.

Evenings at the beach that summer consisted of Tommy and I dressing up in our madras shorts, our Weejun loafers and our Sears and Roebuck shirts then applying copious amounts of Jade East cologne before walking over to the roller-skating rink nearby. Sometimes we would actually skate but mostly we just tried to look cool as we hung out at the rink and mingled with other kids around our age that also flocked there. We usually ended up flirting with pretty girls and making small talk with other teenagers that were on vacation.

One night we decided to walk all the way up to The Pad to see what we could see. The Pad was pretty much a biker bar closer to Ocean Drive Beach where people older than us would hang out drinking beer, smoking, fighting and cursing loudly. The local police were constantly going to The Pad to break up a fight and haul people off to jail. Tommy and I had not planned to actually get very close to The Pad much less actually try to go into the place but just stroll by on the opposite side of the street to see what we could see. We thought it would also sound cool to tell our friends back home that we “checked out The Pad” while we were on our beach vacation. As fate would have it a riot broke out at The Pad on the one night we decided to walk by. Apparently two rival biker gangs decided to have a go at each other and multiple fights broke out both inside and outside the place about the time Tommy and I were walking by across the street. We quickly decided we had seen enough and began running back toward Crescent Beach with the sound of police sirens and breaking glass right behind us. The next morning the local news reported on the riot and stated that there were many injuries to both bikers and police and several people were in the hospital. Tommy and I decided it would be much safer to just stick to our kite fights and roller skating rink visits for the rest of the summer.

THE RIDING LAWNMOWER

I do not remember how old I was when I first began mowing the lawn. My earliest recollections of pushing a lawn mower are of my dad helping me push my Grandmother Cheek’s old manual reel mower around her yard in Greensboro. At some point I graduated to using our gas-powered mower to cut the grass at our house and began mowing neighborhood lawns as well. Pushing a heavy lawnmower around for several hours on a Saturday was tiring work but seeing the neat results of a well-groomed lawn was rewarding. Many Saturdays my dad and I would work on our yard together trimming hedges, pruning trees, raking and mowing. Afterwards we would walk around the yard together and enjoy the beautiful results of our labors. He taught me that “anything worth doing was worth doing well”. He also taught me the importance of maintaining our lawn equipment by keeping blades sharpened, handles repaired and the lawnmower in good running condition. Occasionally we would get a new piece of lawn equipment or a new mower. Whenever the topic of purchasing a new lawn mower came up I reminded him about the many wonderful benefits of having a riding lawn mower. Easy to use, less work for me and fun to ride on. My dad would also add “and a lot more expensive”. I would take the Sears and Roebuck catalog opened to the page with riding lawnmowers, show them to him then leave it out where he would see it again.

My riding lawnmower dreams were finally realized when dad brought one home and surprised me.  To this day I don’t know if it was my persistent talk about a riding mower or a sale at Sears and Roebuck that caused him to finally buy that beautiful red and white piece of equipment but to me it was a beautiful sight sitting in our driveway.   

With the addition of the riding mower my lawn mowing business around the community grew to the point where I even got the contract to cut the grass at our church, Pleasant Garden Baptist. The church yard was large and took a few hours to cut. My arrangement with my dad for using our mowers and yard tools was that I would buy the gas I used for my lawn jobs and he would pay for everything else. Since gas was only about .30 cents a gallon in those days I had a pretty sweet deal.

It didn’t take long before I was using the riding mower for a go cart to travel between my mowing jobs. Dad and I built a wooden trailer to pull behind the mower which held the push mower and other yard tools I used. Folks around Pleasant Garden those days were accustomed to seeing me driving down the road into town and pulling up to the gas pump at the Texaco station on my way down the hill to mow the church lawn.

Even with the acres and acres of grass I cut with that mower as well as the miles I drove it around as a go cart it lasted a long time. When we moved back to Sumter a few years later I think we sold it to a neighbor. As I recall it was still running fine and could still outrun the other riding mowers in our neighborhood.