In the late 1990s, while working at the North English Record, I heard about a new book, “A High Porch Picnic,” an autobiography of Hayden Fry, the legendary University of Iowa football coach.
         “A High Porch Picnic” is a Texas expression for an exceptionally good time. Based on Fry's glorious career as one of college football's most unique coaches, that's a good way to describe his life. Ranked 10th on the all-time collegiate list for Division 1 victories, Fry successfully combined his football coaching savvy with a down-home charm to make him one of the game's most colorful personalities.
           He was also known for painting the visitor’s locker room pink at Kinnick Stadium.
Hayden co-authored the book with long-time Iowa Hawkeye sports information director George Wine. The book details Fry’s 20-year career, 1979-1998, rebuilding the Hawkeyes, his coaching philosophy and personal life. I reached out to Wine and was able to secure an interview with him. Wine grew up in North English, where he graduated from high school. 
         It just happened that on the day of our interview, Fry was at the Coralville Mall near J.C. Penney signing autographs and Wine asked if would like to meet him. Of course, I said yes. There was no need to stand in the long lines that stretched outside the mall. Wine just took me up to the front of the line where he introduced me to Fry. I shook Fry’s hand and received a free signed copy of the book. The book covers Fry’s childhood days in Odessa, Texas, his time in the Southwest Conference and his 20-year tenure at the University of Iowa.
         Wine was inducted in the Iowa Athletics Hall of Fame in 2000. He died on June 5, 2012 at the age of 81.
         That reminds me of a few other sports personalities from our area. Mace Brown, the son of a custodian at North English schools, enjoyed a long major league baseball career. After graduating from North English, Brown attended the University of Iowa on a track scholarship, starting in 1927. He left college to pursue professional baseball, beginning his career in 1930. He was a prominent pitcher for the Pittsburg Pirates, Brooklyn Dodgers and Boston Red Sox. He appeared in major league baseball largely as a relief pitcher over 10 seasons. Brown posted a 76-57 record with a 3.46 ERA and 44 saves in 387 appearances (55 as a starter).
          Brown became known as one of the first full-time relief specialists in the Major Leagues. In 1938, he led the Pirates with 15 wins (all in relief), led the National League with 51 games pitched, and became the first reliever to play the All-Star Game. In 1943, with the Red Sox, Brown also led the American League in games pitched with 49.
      Brown was born May 21, 1909 in North English and died on March 24, 2002 in Greensboro, N.C.
         Following his playing career, Brown served as a coach and North Carolina based scout for the Red Sox organization from 1947-1989. He was the major league pitching coach for the 1965 Red Sox team serving on the staff of manager Billy Herman. As a spring training coach for the Red Sox, Brown worked with both the pitchers and catchers. Among the later was Carlton Fisk who credited Mace with teaching him technical and leadership skills that stayed with him throughout his career. He was 92 when he died. 
      Another area major league baseball pitcher with Iowa and Poweshiek County ties was Jackie Collum, who was born in Victor, and graduated from Newburg High School. He played for eight different teams - St. Louis Cardinals (2 times), Cincinnati Red Legs, Chicago Cubs, Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers, Minnesota Twins and Cleveland Indians - between the 1951 and 1962 seasons.. Collum served in WW2 with the United States Army Air Forces in the Pacific Theater of Operations where he was stationed in the Philippians. Following the war, he returned home and married Betty Bells on Feb. 28, 1948. 
        He pursued his major league dreams after going 24-2 in 1948 for Class A St. Joseph Cardinals of the West League. Primarily a reliefer, Collum also served in starting roles. Collum’s most productive season came with Cincinnati in 1955 when he recorded numbers and wins, earned run average 3.63 and complete games, 5, while pitching 134 innings. His last major league season was 1962 with stints playing for the Minnesota Twins and Cleveland Indians. 
          Following his baseball career, Collum worked in the automotive business and was owner of Grinnell Pioneer Oil. The building is located on the Southwest side at 4th and West Streets and dates back to the 1920s when it was associated with a local farmers’ cooperative. One of the services they provided was selling gasoline. The building was expanded in 1931 in a more traditional filling station as selling fuel became a more prominent part of the operation. The building attained its present appearance in 1937 when the service bays and brick veneer were added. It attained its original name, Pioneer Oil Company, throughout its time as a service station even though it became affiliated with Mobil Gas in 1936. That affiliation ended in 1962. During WW2, it became an inspection center under the wartime tire rationing program. The service station ceased operation around 2004. Later, the building was repurposed into the mobile wash and watch, an automotive detailing business. It was also home to Candyland Café. It currently is home to Maria’s Fresh Mex. I’m not sure what is located in the old filling station garage bays.
         A more recent ball player with Montezuma ties was Jamie Arendt, a 1990 Montezuma graduate and five sport athlete, who played minor league baseball while attending Central College. His brother, Brad, a 1989 Montezuma graduate, who played football at Central College has two sons, Jayson and Bryan, both who play baseball.
       Jayson plays and performs on the Savanah Banana Texas Tailgaters entertainment baseball team based in Savanah, Ga. He recently tried out for America’s Got Talent, where he made it to the second round. His younger brother, Bryan, is currently attending training camp and will suit up and play major league baseball with the Oakland Athletics this year. The brothers were raised in North Carolina and attended and played for the University of North Carolina-Wilmington Seahawks.
         And another minor league ball player with Montezuma ties is Rich Grife. As a player in the mid-1990s, Grife, a right-handed pitcher, was a minor league pitcher for the Burlington Indians and Watertown Indians, as well as the Columbus Red Stixx and Sioux City Explorers. He went on serve as the head baseball coach for the Marshalltown Community College.
         If you know of others who played professional sports from Poweshiek County and the surrounding area, send me a note and I will share their stories. 
        Editor’s note: Much of the information for this column came courtesy of Wikipedia and other baseball internet sources.

         I enjoy relaxing in the Lazy Boy chair and watching old television shows. The other day I was watching the first episode of the Andy Griffith Show, which aired on Oct. 3, 1960.
      In that show, Andy invites Aunt Bee to Mayberry to help raise Opie after the former housekeeper, Rose, gets married.
       In the early going, Opie struggles to accept Aunt Bee, as he missed the way Rose did things.
         Rose would play ball and fish with him and he wanted Aunt Bee to do the same. It wasn’t Aunt Bee’s thing. So, Andy tries to teach her how to play ball and fish, all with no success.
       They all go fishing together and Aunt Bee is holding her baited fishing line out of the water. When Opie questions what she is doing, Andy explains that where Aunt Bee is from, that is how people fish.
        So Opie and Andy encourage Aunt Bee to put her line in the water and when she does, she catches a fish.
         That leds to Aunt Bee deciding to leave until Opie realizes how much he needs her. It was the beginning of a family bond that touched hearts for generations.
Watching that show brought back a lot memory of camping and fishing trips I went on with my folks.
         My dad loved to fish and after my parents were married, they would spend most summer weekends at Lake Oologah northeast of Tulsa.
      My dad loved to fish off the rocky banks below the dam. I remember as a youngster watching Vietnamese families using cane poles and catching fish by the basketfuls.
         I would sleep in the back seat of my dad’s 1959 Chevrolet Impala, which later became my car in high school. On one fishing trip, I heard a commotion in the middle of the night. I learned later that my mom had gotten up and found a big snake hanging from a tree at our campsite.
        One of the most memorable fishing trip was in the summer of 1969 (not the Bryan Adams song).
        I was age 10. My mom was pregnant with my brother, Tom, who was born in October that year.
         We were camping at Grand Lake northeast of Tulsa at a campsite near the water.
        Dad and I went fishing and I snagged big ole fish. I got so excited that I started jumping up and down and then dropped my fishing pole before reeling in the fish.
        I was thankful as my dad reached down and grabbed my pole to keep the fish from getting away.
         Dad helped me reel the fish in, which was a four-pound carp.
        That’s not my favorite fish to eat as it’s boney and tough. But my mom gutted and skinned the fish and we all ate it.
         I couldn’t have been happier to enjoy fish and fried potatoes cooked in an iron skillet on a Coleman camp stove.
        Many years we camped and fished at Greenleaf Lake, a man-made lake near Braggs, Okla. Braggs is about a 12 miles from Muskogee, Okla.
         I’m sure you’ve heard the Merle Haggard song, “Okie from Muskogee.”
        The lake featured a heated dock, as many Oklahoma lakes had back in the day. Fisherman could enjoy fishing inside a bait dock. Some of the featured bait shops sold pizzas, deli sandwiches and cold drinks.
      For a few dollars, you could fish on the dock all day. On one particular trip, I caught somewhere in the neighborhood of 80 crappie.
          I cleaned some of them and we ate them for supper.
When I got older, I used to fish a lot with my friend, Rob. Everyone called him Rob Bob and he knew how to catch fish.
        His family had a large pond southeast of Tulsa near the town of Coweta. Rob’s dad had a 17-foot boat that folded in half. Large bolts with rubber plugs and wing nuts were used to seal the boat once it was open. We’d row out into the lake and fish.
         I caught my biggest bass, a 3.5 beauty, in that pond. That area now is a golf course.
I brought the fish home and cleaned it and my mom cooked it for me along with some fried potatoes.
      We used to swim there some until the time I got out of the water and saw a big snake swim past. That was end of that.
       Rob had an uncle who had an A-Frame house on Grand Lake.
       We’d fish off the family boat dock several times during the summer and enjoyed a deli sandwich and cold Pepsi’s.
        Those were some great trips and times of fellowship.
      When I worked for the newspaper in Tulsa, there was a fellow I worked with that lived north of town. He had a huge pond and I often fished there and would catch some nice bass. And when I was in college at the University of Missouri-Columbia, a family near where I lived let me fish their pond. I always caught a mess of fish.
        I have lots of great memories of fishing good times.
         I’m looking forward to trying my hand at fishing again. It’s been way too long.
        Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

         Debbie and I watched Hollywood Week on American Idol on Monday night.
     As we watched the various performers and listened to the judge’s comments, I started thinking about how hard that would be to be a judge on show of that caliber.
     Some of the performers knocked it out of the park while others struggled and faltered.    What I noticed is some performers make too many excuses and then beat themselves up for missing it or not going on to the next round.
        Folks, that is life.
        Sometimes you have try again.
     Sometimes you have to go back to the drawing board and reevaluate and give it another shot.
        I pray for those folks that they find their purpose and fit in life.
       Anyway, I judge 4-H photography. I don’t begin to claim that my judging skills are on the same level as American Idol judges, because they are not.
       But they are important to the young people whose I judge.
       My goal in being a judge is to help young people improve.
      Some years ago I was asked to meet with 4-H’ers at the Grinnell Drake Library for a pre-county fair photo judging session.
       I worked with extension staff to give 4-H’ers tips on making better photos.
      This young 4-H member from Jasper County, who was in a Grinnell 4-H Club, brought me a photo of a herd of cows next to a barn.
     I scanned the photo with my eyes before turning to the young man and asking, “What is your focal point or subject?”
       I explained that he had a photo of all these beautiful cattle, but what makes it a good photo? What draws your attention to the cattle?
       I asked a little more about the cows and where he took the photo. Then I asked him to return to the barn and get close up of one of the cows and focus on that animal.
I could see that a light bult went off.
      He returned and brought home a beautiful photo of a cow chewing its cud, almost with grace.
      That photo won a blue ribbon at the county fair and then went on to win blue at the Iowa State Fair.
       It was a proud moment for me as a photography judge.
     Sometimes the key isn’t being the best or having the best, but giving your best in everything you do.
      It may not make the final cut, but what a proud feeling it is to know that you gave it your all.
Moving on
       I’ve been struggling with a number of health issues for almost a year now.
       To be honest, I’m getting kind of tired of it all.
    First, it was colon cancer and then I had a blood clot in my right leg during the summer months. And since last fall, I’ve been dealing with some back issues.
      Somehow I developed a bulging disk in my lower back and that has put pressure on my sciatic nerve. I’ve had a couple cortisone shots and I am currently going to physical therapy in Grinnell.
       It’s been slow going and I’m doing my best to push through the pain.
       I know that this too will pass.
       Better days are ahead.
     I encourage you this week to go out and give your best. Don’t settle for seconds. Learn from your experience and challenges and make the best of every day of your life.
And while you are at it, smile and encourage those around you.
       And if you have a few extra dollars, do something nice for someone else.
     Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

             My elementary school, Sidney Lanier, turns 100 this year and a birthday celebration and open house was held on Saturday, Feb. 7.
            I wasn’t able to make the trek to Tulsa town to tour the school or attend the reunion event.
            Still, I have lots of fond memories of attending Lanier. One is playing baseball for the Lions in second grade where I just stood in the outfield as I was afraid of getting hit by the ball.
            I enjoyed participating my sixth grade year in the Christmas play as a snowman. 
I made lots of friends who I have stayed in connect with through Facebook and social media. 
            I played cornet in the band, even though I only knew three songs, and ran foot races and played T-ball on the blacktop playground along with many other fun activities.
            Yes, the school playground was all blacktop.
            In fact, the school featured two blacktop playgrounds, one on each side of the building.
            I don’t know what bright mind thought it was a good idea to have a blacktop playground.
            Anyway, I posted this on Facebook about the playground and I had two classmates share stories of breaking bones while at play. I’m sure there were more through the years.
            Another classmate said much of the blacktop has been removed and replaced with grass. That is good news.
            Probably one of my most memorable events was when I had a painting I did in art class on display in the school hallway. I was quite proud of that accomplishment.
            And I can’t forget about a few fist fights and being sent to the principal’s office for correction through the years. 
            And at the end of my sixth grade year in 1972, I had the  opportunity to spend the afternoon with my classmates at the now former Bells Amusement Park at the Tulsa Fairgrounds, just a few blocks away. The park featured Zingo, a wooden roller coaster that was my first to ride. A trip to Bells was sort of rite of passage for sixth graders at the school.
            According to historical information on the school, construction of the building started in 1925. The school is considered one of the oldest operating school buildings in the Tulsa School District. The TSD oversees 45 elementary schools, 10 middle schools and nine high schools in the city. That does not include the Catholic and independent school districts scattered around Tulsa.
            Looking at photos, the building has gone under numerous renovations. When I attended, it featured a large gymnasium with a stage, a library that doubled as the cafeteria, an art room, science room and band room. And the speech room featured a second and smaller wooden stage.
            At the time of its construction, only farm fields surrounded the school.
            A unique feature of the school is an 8.5 foot scale replica of the Statue of Liberty on a rock base.
           The statue is located on the northwest corner of the school at 17th and Harvard, a mile or so south of Route 66.
           It was dedicated on May 7, 1950 as part of the Boy Scouts of America “Strengthen the Arm of Liberty” project during the organization’s 40th anniversary.
           A plaque at the bottom of the base states the following:
With the faith and courage with their forefathers who made possible the freedom of these United States
The Boys Scouts of America
Dedicate this replica of the Statue of Liberty as a pledge of everlasting fidelity and loyalty
40th anniversary crusade to strength the Arm of Liberty
1950
           According to a Tulsa World article, the local Boys Scouts and other organizations raised $612 needed for the project, including the stone base. The statue itself was made of stamped copper and weighed about 290 pounds without the rock base.
          Between 1949 – 1952, approximately 200 replicas of the statue were made by Friedley-Voshardt Co. of Chicago and purchased by Boy Scout troops across the country at a cost of $350 and donated in 39 states in the U.S. and several territories.
          At present, many of these statues have been lost or destroyed, but preservationists have been able to account for about 100 of them, and BSA Troop 101 of Cheyenne, Wy. has collected photographs of more than 100 of them.
          In 1995, Bama Pie, a Route 66 and Tulsa institution famous for its pecan pies, restored the statue at the school with a $5,000 grant.
          Growing up, I didn’t think much about a statue of liberty at my school or the history behind it all. The memories are still there.
          If you are ever in Tulsa, exit 244 on the Crosstown Expressway at Harvard and make the two or so mile trek south to see the Statue of Liberty. And less than a mile east is the Driller Man, a 76-foot tall statue of an oilman standing next to an oil derrick in honor of Tulsa’s deep history of the oil boom. It was originally built for the International Petroleum Expositions (IPE) held in Tulsa back in the day. The statue stands in front of the former IPE building and has two levels covering 10.3 acres. The Chili Bowl is held annually in the former IPE building.
          And while in Tulsa, enjoy some good southern food such as real chili with no beans and tomatoes and fried okra. And top it off a cold glass of Cain’s brand ice tea. It’s worth its weight in gold.
           Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

        It seems we have 450 television channels and somedays there’s nothing worth watching.
       I do enjoy some of the crime shows, especially the cold case crimes and OP (On Patrol) Live on Friday and Saturday nights.
        I also enjoy some of the oldies such as Gunsmoke, Bonanza, the Waltons and the Andy Griffith Show.
In later years, I enjoyed shows like Eight is Enough, Vegas, Incredible Hulk, Little House on the Prairie, CHiPs, Wonder Woman, Bionic Woman and Bionic Man with Lee Majors as Col. Steve Austin.
      There was Police Woman with Angie Dickinson and Stanford and Son, Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley, Brady Bunch, Dukes of Hazzard, Dallas, WKRP in Cincinnati, Fantasy Island, Three’s Company, Beverly Hillbillies, Happy Days, the Love Boat, Columbo, the Equalizer from the 1980s and more.
        Growing up, we had four channels to watch – NBC, CBS, ABC and PBS – on the family 19-inch Zenith black and white console. It included modern futures of the time such as a dial to change the channels and push button to switch the television on and off.
         It wasn’t until 1974 that I first got cable television.
        My Tulsa neighborhood was one of the first test markets for cable television in the city. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to be in junior high school and have cable television. I went from four stations to 32 just like that.
         It cost $5.45 per month and I was billed every two months.
         I used my paper route money to pay the bill.
         Nowadays, it costs 10 times or more a month for all the extras. It is ridiculous.
       And then there is the internet at $120 plus a month and cell phones. How much more can you spend to buy a cell phone? And it’s not just the phone, it’s all the fees to set up a new phone and then the taxes and service fees each month on the bill.
         I don’t know how people afford an apartment, utilities, a car payment, food and a cell phone.
         Anyway, I got to watching golf the other day.
        What better sport to watch on a cold winter day than a round of golf from some summer resort? There can be snow and ice storms, cold blasts, hurricanes and the such. Still, there is a summer paradise tucked away somewhere in the states where professional golf players can hit the greens.
        Some of those fellows are quite good. They might be able to hit the hole standing on their head. How many of you remember Arnold Palmer?
        The first time I tried my hand at playing real golf was in the early 1980s. A good friend of mine and I decided to try our hand at a 9-hole lighted all-night golf course in Tulsa.
         My friend had a set of old golf clubs and we tried our luck. If you call it that.
        I pulled a club out of the bag and proceeded to warm up. I was swinging away when I hit a divot of dirt and slapped this fellow in the head.
         I was apologizing profusely and as he cleaned the dirt away from his shirt.
         I was not only embarrassed, but scared he might take me out before the evening ended.
         I don’t remember my final score. It wasn’t good!
         I’m more keen to playing miniature golf.
        We had several mini golf courses in Tulsa. The most notable were two side-by-side mini courses at Bells Amusement Park at the Tulsa Fairgrounds.
         A visit to Bells on a weekend night was the best.
     There was Zingo, a big wooden roller coaster, built in the mid-to-late 60s. Other rides included the Phantasmagoria, Scrambler, Himalaya, Ferris Wheel, Tilt-a-Whirl, White Lightnin’ (Log Flume) and the mini golf courses.
       My last time playing mini golf was a few years ago at the Lake of the Ozarks with the family. I was leading the pack into the 18th hole, only to miss the mark and finish in fourth or fifth place.
       I also enjoyed playing pinball. There was a pool hall across the street from my boyhood home in Tulsa. I enjoyed spending time with my Uncle Ron playing pinball. He was quite good.
       Back in the day, I used to enjoy bowling. My Aunt Alice, my mom’s younger sister, taught me the sport at age 12.
        I participated in several leagues through the years, giving it up in the mid-1980s. I joined a league at Star Lanes in Montezuma in August 2015.
       I bowled there for one year, then moved to Grinnell for one year. I finally gave up the ghost and the sport, at least for now.
         I don’t hunt, but I do enjoy fishing.
         I haven’t been fishing in years. I have a nice rod and reel and I’m sure before long, the fish will be biting.
         Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

        I believe it was January 1988.
     I was working for the Newspaper Printing Corporation (NPC) in Tulsa. NPC was the joint operating company who printed and distributed the two Tulsa newspapers at the time.
     A family member had died in the Bootheel of Missouri and my mom asked if I would take her to the funeral in New Madrid, some 425 miles away.
       New Madrid, which runs along the Mississippi River, is the name given to the New Madrid Fault Line and where the Mississippi River ran backwards in the 1811-12 earthquakes.
       We left Tulsa that evening and drove east on the Interstate, taking the MM Junction shortcut on the west side of Springfield, Mo. where we connected with Highway 60 east.
       We stopped for the evening near Van Buren, Mo., where my mom graduated from high school in 1955. We enjoyed breakfast at the New Madrid Café the next morning and my mom ran into a classmate from back in the day.
       We made the 100 mile trek to New Madrid and attended the funeral. I didn’t care too much for funerals, so I stayed in the car while my mom attended the service.
        My mom was born in New Madrid in October 1936, and lived in various shacks in that part of the state.
     Her grandparents on both sides of the family, the Jacksons and Hortons, had migrated to southeast Missouri from northwest Alabama.
     The Hortons where the first to arrive in 1924 after my great-grandfather had been caught making moonshine in Alabama.
          The Jackson side of the family arrived from Alabama in 1932.
       The families knew each other. My grandparents were married on Oct. 30, 1932 in the New Madrid County Courthouse.
        I’ve visited that neck of the woods many times as a youngster.
       We always took a family vacation in August and many times a stop in New Madrid was on the agenda. My mom loved to visit her old stomping grounds and share her many stories of growing up there.
        She had many photos from those days along with many stories she shared.
      Some years before that trip in 1988, we were packing up for a trip to the Bootheel. We left way too late, which was a usual trait in our family.
       My uncle Leon, my mom’s younger brother, had a summer cabin east of Van Buren and we stopped there for supper. It was dark and my dad was ready to stay the night. Mom said we were going on to the Bootheel. We probably should have stayed, but I wasn’t in charge.
      We arrived in Bertrand, Mo., on Highway 60 and stopped at the Raymond and Margaret Morrow house. Margaret was my mom’s cousin. We slept in our camper the rest of the evening. The next morning we got up and enjoyed a huge breakfast. 
      The Marrow family were big time farmers in that part of the country. Nearby their home was Wolfe Island, which is owned by Kentucky but assessable from Missouri.
      The Marrow’s farmed the nearly 10,000 acre island and had much of their farming equipment in sheds on the island.
      At one time there was an old river house on stilts on the island. A flood in the 1970s washed the house down the river.
      I remember one year riding with my dad and Raymond Morrow. We stopped at a hardware store near Charleston and picked up hoes for the workers they hired to clean weeds.
      The next day, I went to the island and hoed a few rows of soybeans. I got paid $10 by check from the Marrow’s oldest son.
       My mom’s aunt and mother of Margaret was remarried and her husband had a tackle box he wanted to sell me. He offered to cash my check if I would buy the tacklebox. At the urging of my dad, I bought the tacklebox and still had $7 in change.
     It was in the Bootheel in 1948 that my mom got sick. My grandparents didn’t have vehicle, so my grandfather would make a bed on the plow and pull her to town with tractor.
     The doctor was ready to carry her to the Mayo Clinic, but wanted to try one more medicine. My grandparents said they didn’t have the money to travel to the clinic.
         The doctor gave my mom penicillin and it cured her.
         I remember hearing the stories of my mom and family taking bathes in a #7 wash tub and how they took care of their business in an outhouse.
        It had to be a hard life. My mom often talked about picking cotton on hot summer days. Each kid was required to pick 100 pounds of cotton by hand each day. 
         Their reward was a cold Pepsi on the Fourth of July.
       My grandmother was a long-time cook in schools and nursing homes and my grandfather worked as a sharecropper.
        In 1951, my mom’s family moved from New Madrid to Van Buren. She shared a story once of an ice storm hitting New Madrid. Not wanting to break her perfect school record, my grandfather carried her to school in his old pickup and when they arrived, school had been closed.
       After my mom moved to Tulsa following graduation, my grandparents along with a sister and brother, followed in the early 1960s, moving to Oklahoma.
        Another time on a trip to the Bootheel, we decided to stop for the evening at a campground. We pulled in and my dad told my mom that we were not cooking supper on the Coleman stove. Instead, we stopped a small restaurant where I enjoyed a large pizza. I ate the whole thing.
       In the late 90s, we enjoyed many Jackson family reunions in Van Buren on the Current River, a popular floating destination in the area. And around that same time, the Horton side of the family started gathering every other Labor Day for a reunion.
       Those reunions and family get-to-gathers have since gone to the wayside, as much of the family has since passed.
        But the memories of hearing my mom tell stories of the hard and good times will live on forever.
        Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

​        I’ve had the privilege of interviewing gubernatorial and political candidates through the years. And some years ago, I interviewed the now late Fred Thompson, who was running in the 2008 election for President. He made a campaign stop in Montezuma shortly after Christmas 2007 and at the Republican newspaper office where I did the interview.
        A stately and polite man, he took a seat at the desk across from me where he placed his 10-gallon cowboy hat and crossed his legs.
      The Republican office quickly filled up with Thompson campaign folks. It was so quiet during the interview, that I could hear a pin drop. 
        But my best interviews have been talking with every day Iowans who are following their dreams, sharing their lives and their talents.
         Take for instance, Brian Abeling of West Des Moines.
        Known as the man behind the camera on his Facebook page, Iowa Road Trip, Abeling has been traveling around the state for years photographing state parks, attending parades and festivals, promoting small town businesses and taking photos of unusual and interesting features in Iowa.
      Abeling, 54, who grew up in Monticello, became interested in photography in the ninth grade. He didn’t do much with the art in the early going.
       After attending and graduating from UNI, Abeling landed in Peoria, Ill.
      Seven years later, he returned to West Des Moines, where he works as the director of technology at West Des Moines Schools.
         He is married with two grown kids.
       Abeling renewed his interest in photography and in the early years, took photos on family vacations.
       It was in 2013, that Abeling realized he didn’t have to wait for a vacation to take great photos.
       “I had always wanted to take photos around Iowa,” he said. “I started shooting more photos that were close to home.”
          He posted his work on his own personal Facebook page.
          In 2018, he started Iowa Road Trip.
        Abeling has visited all 99 Iowa counties, but not all the cities and towns in each county. When asked how towns he has visited, Abeling said he doesn’t know.
         His Facebook page features about 10-12 places a day.
         “I’m not at all those places every day,” he said. “It’s places that I have already visited.”
      He takes an average of 1 – 2 photo trips a month and covers 7,000 miles a year for photography.
        He started with a Pentex 1000 camera in the early days. Today, his cameras of choice are Canon, Sony and a drone.
       His trips are labeled under three different categories. Wife trips, mother-in-law trips and solo trips.
       The wife trips include traveling to places where his wife can shop and dine. The mother-in-law trips are catered toward her interests. This includes visiting many of the beautiful Iowa churches, especially those in small towns.
        And then there are the solo trips. It’s just him and his camera.
        “I’m up for a road trip anytime,” he said.
       In some cases, he might photograph 20 – 30 things in one town. It just depends on what is available.
       Those who follow Abeling often recognize him in the communities he visits. For instance, he was recently in Orange City in northwest Iowa covering a Dutch festival.
      “My first time being in Orange City, people recognized me from Iowa Roadtrip and wanted to talk,” he recalled.
        A few years ago, he met a couple at a state park and they started visiting. He learned that they were at the state park after seeing his photos on Facebook.
         “I have been in places where people have told me that the reason that they are there is because of Iowa Roadtrip,” he said.
         With all the miles and time away from home, I asked Abeling how he funds the trips. He doesn’t get paid. Instead, he does freelance work and sells his photos to Iowa magazines such as “The Iowan” and “Our Iowa.”
        He also runs a stock photo business and sells his work to tourist organization and similar companies.
       Abeling is branching out more these days promoting small businesses and restaurants  and telling their stories.
   He encourages owners of small business or destinations, to email him at [email protected] and share about what their business or destination has to offer.
          “I work with the owners to help promote their businesses,” he said.
         Sounds like a win-win for Iowans and Iowa businesses, restaurants and tourism. And it all started with a love of photography.
          Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

         I just finished reading the book, “God Stories” by Courtney Dailey.
        The book was a Christmas gift from my mother-in-law.
       Dailey, a Christian author from far eastern Tennessee, wrote the book about rebuilding the homes of 16 families and helping them cope after Hurricane Helena struck western North Carolina in September 2024.
        It all started after Dailey and her 9-year-old daughter went to visit their friend, Jerry, who lived in the damaged area. Seeing Jerry and his badly damaged home led Daily, her husband and church to reach out and help those hit by the storm.
        In her book, Daily shared about how God provided labor from around the country along with building supplies, appliances, campers for people to stay in while their homes were being repaired and newer vehicles to drive after the families lost theirs in the flooding.
         I enjoyed it so much that I read the 240-page book in three days. 
      I admit, it is the first book that I have read since reading my wife’s first novel, “The Auctioneer,” during Covid. And probably the fourth book that I’ve read in the last 10 or so years including “Mercy Shot” a political thriller by Grinnell native and North Liberty realtor Steve Sherman. 
        Prior to that, I’ve read a couple books about the Oklahoma Girl Scout murders, regarding the deaths of three young girls killed at Camp Scout in June 1977. I went to Boy Scout Camp just down the road from where the girls were murdered.
        The case was never solved and remains that way to this date.
         I’ll share more on that topic in a future column.
         Now that I am retired, my plans are to read more books.
         First on the agenda is reading my wife’s other four novels.
         I admit, I’ve been a bit lackadaisical in my reading efforts.
        Another Iowa author that I’m interested in reading her work is Ruth Suckow, author of at least a dozen books, including “Country People” her first book published in 1924.
        I first learned of Suckow in the fall of 2024 when writing a story about Drake Community Library Assistant, Veronica Ruse, who at the time worked in Local History Archives at Drake, a position she held since March 2022.
        I became interested in Suckow after learning that Ruse garnered the top prize of a $1,000 scholarship for an essay she wrote entitled “August and Emma Kaetterhenry: A Farm Marriage Examined” based on the characters in Suckow’s first novel, “Country People.”
      The novel “Country People,” follows the Kaetterhenrys, a German-American clan that works to build both a farm and family, while navigating the tensions between individual desires and community expectations.
          It just happens that Suckow has a deep connection with Grinnell. 
        Suckow was born in 1892 in Hawarden, a small town in Sioux County on the Big Sioux River in far northwestern Iowa, where at the time her father was the pastor of the Congregational Church.
       After leaving Hawarden in early 1898, the Suckow family lived in a number of towns in northern Iowa before her father landed a position at Grinnell College in 1907.
      Suckow graduated from Grinnell High School in 1910, and entered college that fall at Grinnell College.
         Suckow left Grinnell College early to study at the Curry School of Expression in Boston 
From 1913 to 1915. Her novel, “The Odyssey of a Nice Girl” published in 1925 reflects that experience. She left Boston to join her mother and sister who were living in Colorado for health reasons and enrolled at the University of Denver. She earned a B.A. in 1917 and an M.A. in English in 1918.
     Outside of “Country People,” and “The Odyssey of a Nice Girl,” Suckow’s other titles include “Iowa Interiors,” published in 1926, “The Bonney Family,” published in 1928, “Cora,” published in 1929, “The Kramer Girls,” published in 1930, “Children and Older People,” published in 1931, “The Folks,” published in 1934, “Carry-Over,” published in 1936, “New Home,” published in 1936, “A Memoir,” published in 1952, “Some Others and Myself,” published in 1952, and “The John Wood Case,” published in 1959.
      The Ruth Suckow Memorial Association, founded in 1966, is located in Earlville, Iowa where she and husband, Fenner Nunn, lived for a time. The RSMA sponsors the essay contest that Ruse won.
         Suckow died on Jan. 23, 1960.
        There is so much more about Suckow and her contributions to the literary world that is worth mentioning, but time and space limits it in this column.
        The important note is that reading can be fun, especially if it about subjects you enjoy. I’m somewhat fascinated with stories that take place around the early part of 1900s, especially about the Amish and farming with steam engines during the early days.
        But first, I need to dig into my wife’s novels and reread the first one followed by the other four.
         My advice this week is to turn off the daily news and pick up a book.
          Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.

         I’ve met a lot of characters in my life. One of them that comes to mind is Vernon Mack “Booger” Ray. He was a beloved Oklahoma local known as the last of the pioneers for traveling the countryside in his covered wagon. What makes Booger Ray unique is that he appeared on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson in 1987 and shared some of his rustic adventures, including a story about being chased by a mountain lion. A few years before that, he had been featured on a show called Real People which was a weekly prime time news magazine that profiled funny human-interest stories instead of featuring celebrities. 
          Booger Ray spent a lot of time in Oklahoma but also traveled to various other states in his handmade wagon that featured an iron cook stove and feather bed.
          Earlier in his life, Booger Ray had been a bull rider and that was where he had earned his nickname.
         It was sometime in 1988, and I heard that Booger Ray was going to be camping out at Mohawk Park in Tulsa. Mohawk Park is on the north side of Tulsa and is home to one of Tulsa’s two water treatment plants and the zoo.
          I hadn’t been dabbling in photography for too long and thought this might make a good opportunity to capture a unique Oklahoma character. I drove my Chevrolet Caviler up to the park and found Booger Ray’s camp site. We visited for a while and I asked if I could take some photos. He welcomed me to do so.
        He was a crusty fellow with a white beard and was wearing a cowboy hat, a pair of bib overalls with a red bandana around his neck. I took a few pictures, then told him I was going to run up to the local convenience store to get something to drink. He asked if he could ride along. I told him sure and watched as he strapped on his six-shooters before climbing in the car.
        It wasn’t until I was back in the car sitting in the parking lot of the convenience store, sipping on a Pepsi and waiting for him to come out, that it dawned on me that I’d just given a stranger with guns a ride to a gas station. As it took him a while to come out, I started to wonder if I had just made a huge mistake. But before long, he came out with a six-pack of beer. As he climbed in, he mentioned that the clerk had wanted to look at his guns but said he told him he didn’t have time for that as someone was waiting for him.
         We chatted as we drove back to the campsite. I took a few more pictures of Booger Ray, his mules, mutt and campsite. He gave me a postcard with his picture and signed it “Booger Ray”. Then we parted ways. I still have that postcard to this day.
          At the time the Tulsa Tribune, one of two daily papers in my hometown, was featuring an amateur photo contest known as KINSA. It referred to Kodak International Newspaper Snapshot Awards. It was a large international amateur photography competition running for decades with local newspaper involvement. I entered a photo I had taken of Booger Ray and won second place in the fourth week of the six-week contest. I received a certificate for my winning photo. 
           That was the first award I had ever won with my photography. I have always cherished that award and took great pride in that. 
          Of course, I’ve gone on to take thousands of pictures since my encounter with Booger Ray. I’ve met many characters along the way and have enjoyed meeting them all. But my memories with my Oklahoma friend, Booger Ray, hold a special place in my heart.
           Booger Ray died in January 1999 after celebrating his 85th birthday.
          Life gets busy. Make sure you take the time to meet new people, listen to their stories, and enjoy time with family and friends. 
          Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day and that making memories is one of the things that makes life so special.