Vince Staten

Cherokee Park 1925 - 1930???

2012-01-24T08:57:00.004-05:00

June 24, 1925 ad for Grand Opening of Cherokee Park

Did the 1935 flood wipe out Cherokee Park? Or was it already gone by then?

Yes, children, if Eastman wants a river moved, it will move a river. This is from Dec. 30, 1959 and it wasn't even front page news that Eastman had moved a river!

Kingsport Bakeries - 1919-1978

2012-01-10T14:31:00.003-05:00

City Bakery was one of the first bakeries in Kingsport and made a hit with local kids in 1920 by creating Cookie Day. We need Cookie Day again.

Modern Bakery began on Market Street as Kingsport Model Bakery in 1931, changed its name to Haun's Home Bakery in 1932, became Dixie Maid Bakery in 1934, moved to Cherokee St. in 1938, changed its name to Modern Bakery in 1955, and moved to Eastman Road in 1968. It closed in 1978.

Dizzy Dean in Kingsport April 9, 1953

2012-01-03T10:30:00.003-05:00

Christmas 1948 - Kingsport Amateur Radio Club Sponsors National Radio Party for Holston Methodist Orphanage

2011-12-23T08:35:00.011-05:00

This photo ran on the front page of the Kingsport News on Christmas Eve 1948. Here is the newspaper's caption:

GIFTS FOR GREENEVILLE ORPHANS—Among Christmas gifts that will be presented children at Holston Methodist Orphanage in Greeneville at a national hook-up amateur radio party tonight are these from Kingsport. People in the picture are, left to right, seated: Mrs. Bill Armstrong, Winston Jackson, Forrest Pilgrim, Mrs. Bob Delius, Mrs. Winston Jackson, Mrs. Ward Lantis; standing, Scott Delius, with one of dolls, Ed Shaulis, Jim Litton, Amateur Radio, Club president; Jim We1ch , Bill Armstrong, Ward Lantis, Dan Delius and Mrs. Jim Litton.

The photos are from John Barrett, who found them in his father-in-law Harold Pardue's papers.

Griswold Tours Past

2011-12-18T06:09:00.004-05:00

2009 Christmas Lights tour:

It was one of my favorite Christmas traditions growing up. A week or so before Christmas, the family would pile in the car and drive around, looking at everyone’s Christmas decorations.

I passed the tradition on to my son. Every year when he was small we’d drive to certain destination neighborhoods known for their extravagant Christmas displays. I can remember being in a long line of cars snaking our way through Louisville’s Lake Forest subdivision, where every house tried to outdo the next one.

But after your kids grow up and move away, the tradition seems to fade. I hadn’t done a Christmas Drive By in ten years.

Till Monday night. That’s when I gathered three of my young-at-heart friends. The four of us piled into Dick Cartwright’s, uh, vintage station wagon and began our Christmas Decorations Tour.

Now let’s be honest here. No one drives around looking for tasteful door wreaths or understated window candles.

You go for lights, bright lights, colorful lights, and lots of them, icicle lights dangling from gutters, multicolored strands outlining a roof line, lights around doors and windows, encircling trees and engulfing porches. Throw in a few holiday figurines, a nativity scene or three, and you have the makings of, what? Kingsport’s answer to the Griswold’s!
So, yes, we were looking for a house that lit up the nighttime sky, much like the home of the Griswold’s, the Christmas-light-happy family in “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.”

In Gibsontown we found a house where it looked as if Picasso had hung the lights on the trees.

On Watauga we found homes decorated to look like gingerbread houses.
We found folks who incorporated basketball goals and birdbaths into their holiday decorations.

And yes, we even found the inevitable: Santa watching over his flock by night. A few folks do indeed position their nativity scenes a tad too close to their Santa and his sleigh figures.

Overall we were a little disappointed at the paucity of Christmas lights. Dick commented, “I think there are a lot of lights in the closet this year.”
Years ago it seemed every house decorated for the season.

We were about ready to give up for the night, with no Griswold casa in sight.
And then we hit the intersection of Bloomingdale Pike and the John B. Dennis By-Pass.
“Wow!” said Margy Clark.

“We have a winner,” exclaimed Jo Zimmerman.

There on the hill side were snowmen and reindeer and Snoopy and Scooby Do, Santa sitting on a John Deere tractor and in an airplane, and scores of lights and figures spread over a couple of hillside acres

I later discovered that this particular Christmas extravaganza has been written up in the paper twice before, in 2004 and 2006. But I had never read about it.

It’s put on by the Sam Click family. Sam and his late wife Theda began it some 25 years ago with a simple nativity scene. Every year they added something new. Slowly it grew and grew. Boy, did it grow.

We found what we were looking for: the Christmas spirit in colored lights.
We all went home to nestle up all snug in our beds, with visions of sugar-plums dancing in our heads.

Except maybe for Dick, who went home wondering how they would find the burned-out bulb in those miles of cords.

(2011 addition: Sam's relatives have put out the lights again this year.)

2010 Christmas Lights Tour:

If you believe in good omens – and who doesn’t want to believe in good omens at Christmas? – then we had the best of omens Wednesday night when the Griswold Gang began its second annual Christmas Lights Tour.

We were careening down Reservoir Road in the tour bus and party wagon – Dick Cartwright’s vintage station wagon - heading toward our first stop, Matthew Strickler’s light show at 3300 Reservoir Road, when suddenly the tour bus and party wagon came to a screeching halt. And before anyone could say “Spilled my damned eggnog,” all five of us were peering out the window at two giant red eyes.
And in unison, all five of the Griswold Gang exclaimed, “A reindeer!”

As Rudolph scurried back up Bays Mountain, unharmed by his encounter with five holiday revelers, we knew it was going to be a good Christmas Lights Tour.
The Griswold Gang is so named in honor of Clark Griswold, the star of the movie “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” and perpetrator of one of the world’s most dazzling Christmas light displays - 25,000 lights in all when he finally gets it up and running.

Each year we load up and head out in search of Kingsport’s most spectacular Christmas light displays and report back to my readers.

Last year the Griswold Gang was composed of me, Dick, Jo Zimmerman and Margy Clark. Kay Newell heard it was so much fun that she asked to join us this time.

We aren’t searching for tasteful door wreaths or understated window candles. We want houses with bright lights, colorful lights, and lots of them. We want houses that proudly light up the nighttime sky. And we found them, thanks to reader suggestions.

The Strickler house on Reservoir Road was a good place to start, especially when you have an up close and personal with Rudolph.

Over the course of the evening we traveled from Bays Mountain to Bloomingdale, from Fairacres and Greenacres to Borden Mill Village and Gibsontown.

Here are our highlights:

Dave Gostomski’s display, complete with Santa in the window, at 383 Grandview Court, on the other side of Warrior’s Path.

Megan and Nathan Hensley’s hillside display at 2229 Stuffle Heights. There’s so much illumination you can see the house from Bloomingdale AND Wadlow Gap Road!

Bill Roberts’ Christmas display at 460 Westfield Place just off Rock Springs Road. It’s a beacon in the midst of farm country.

Paul and Marsha Carter’s corner of light at Conway and Clover Street.

The house on Tri-Cities Crossing road at the intersection with I-81 that was brought to my attention by Rick Heppert. The Interstate exit ramp is in their back yard. Blowups surround three sides of this house!

There were two absolute “must see” Christmas light displays on our tour.
The first – and last year’s winner – is the Sam Click house just off John B. Dennis at Bloomingdale. Don’t worry, you don’t need an exact address. Just get in the neighborhood and you will see it.

The Griswold Gang voted and it was unanimous: the Click house gets our Griswold Lifetime Achievement Award. No other Christmas light display in Kingsport comes close. It’s not even fair to compare any of the others to this one. The Click family starts putting it up the day after Halloween and it takes till Thanksgiving to assemble the entire display. It’s no coincidence that Sam Click and Santa Claus shared the same initials, SC.

Now the sad part. This is probably the last year for the display. Sam died in September and the family is unsure what they will do next year.

So race, don’t cruise to see this display. (Just watch out for those pesky red light cameras.)

But the good news is we have a worthy successor, an heir apparent, Bill Rhoten’s house at 1425 Plainview in Litz Manor near KFC. From Warpath turn on Sanford and drive a short ways. You’ll see it.

It even looks a lot like the Griswold house.

Bill told me, “I love doing lights. When I was a kid, my family would load up in the car and go looking at lights. There was always one that stood out every year and I knew even then, if I ever got the chance, I was going to try to be ‘that’ guy.”

And now Bill is that guy.

Bill is a single dad so it’s more than just a light show for him.

“It's taken me a long time to realize that it wasn’t all the neat stuff under the tree, waiting on us when we walked into our living room on Christmas morning, but the time I had spent with my family that made the holidays so special. Before my Mom passed away, she ask me to never let my two children Clay and Olivia forget her, and if I could, never let them forget our traditions we celebrated at Christmas because this is what they will remember as they get older, and maybe they will pass it on.”
Bill, Clay and Olivia welcome your visit.

“The way I look at it, if driving by my house at Christmas can make someone smile and forget their problems, even for five minutes, I’m going to keep doing it. Who knows, there might be a kid in one of the cars driving by that will remember looking at lights with his family and might want to be that ‘light’ guy someday.”

Biff Burger in Kingsport 1964-1974

2011-12-15T15:11:00.008-05:00

A Silence in the Stands - Dec. 7, 1941

2011-12-06T08:51:00.006-05:00

The Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor.

Americans were in a panic.

Except in Washington's Griffith Stadium, where the Redskins were playing the Eagles in a meaningless end-of-the-season game. Team owner George Marshall forbid the public address announcer from telling the crowd about the attack.

Kingsport's D.A. Henderson, Jr. was in the stands watching two fellow Kingsporters on the field, the Redskins' Ed Cifers and the Eagles' Sam Bartholomew. He would later tell his children it was eerie how general after general, admiral after admiral, corps commander after corps commander, would be called to report to their stations. But no one knew why.

They wouldn't find out till the game was over and they exited to an army of newsboys hawking Extras: U.S. At War!

Here is the box score for that game.

Here is the story when Sam Bartholomew left his Eastman job earlier that year to play for the Eagles.

Tilly Walker, THP trooper who patrolled Bloody 11-W in the fifites, was baseball star in the teens and twenties

2011-11-24T15:38:00.010-05:00

The 1916 World Series Champion Boston Red Sox - pitcher Babe Ruth is fourth from left on front row, Tilly is sixth from left on middle row.

Where Elvis and Billlie Mae Smith Ate in Kingsport in 1955 - Jimmie's Steak House

2011-10-25T10:46:00.005-04:00

This ad ran in 1945 when Jimmie's opened as Jimmie's Diner.

This ad ran in 1947 when a remodeled Jimmie's reopened as Jimmie's Steak House.

This ad appeared in the Kingsport Times News on July 28, 1954. This is what the place looked like when Elvis and Kingsport girl Billie Mae Smith dined there after his Civic Auditorium performance.

Toy Trains at Dobyns Taylor - Christmas 1949

2011-10-20T08:19:00.000-04:00

Don Spivey R.I.P. 1955-2011

2011-10-13T15:37:00.003-04:00

What if Jay Leno and David Letterman were brothers?

And what if they told the same jokes?

Meet the Spivey brothers, Don and Rick.

They're not comedians - well, Don isn't anyway - but they are rivals going head-to-head two or three times a week and using the same material.

Don broadcasts Dobyns-Bennett basketball games on WKPT-AM; Rick for WKIN-AM. They broadcast the same games at the same time.

Different brothers, different stations, different approaches, same games. And that's games plural: D-B football, basketball and baseball games, home and away, regular season and playoffs and tournaments. There are high school basketball teams all over the country begging a local radio station to broadcast their games - believe me, my son played on one in Kentucky.

In Kingsport, the local high school has an abundance of radio coverage, and it comes on competing stations, and features competing brothers. What is it they say about sibling rivalry?

It started with Cain and Abel. But it hasn't gotten to fratricide yet, and the Spivey brothers insist it won't.

"We are not competitive at all in this," says Don.

No sibling rivalry, Rick agrees. "Not in this anyway."

"I do it totally different," says Don. "He does color. I'm not very colorful."

Don is in his second year calling D-B basketball. Rick is the veteran of the two. He has teamed with Tom Taylor for the past 14 years, providing commentary on D-B athletic contests.

And that's the big difference: Rick does color, Don does play-by-play.

The Spivey brothers are Kingsport natives. Rick graduated from D-B in 1969, went on to Carson Newman and Cumberland Law School. Don graduated from D-B in '73 then got a degree from ETSU.

Don has been in the insurance business 22 years, currently with BB&T/KDC. Rick is well-known locally as an attorney.

They had pretty much been going their own ways - one in insurance, the other in law - until a little over a year ago when WKPT asked Don to take over its basketball broadcasts.

"I had been the public address announcer for D-B football for I don't know how many years. But this was just something I wanted to try. It was truly a leap of faith."

Don's current partner is Steve Kilgore, a former Gate City High School athlete. Eddie Durham had been the color man until a month ago, when he had to return to coaching. Rick has been working alongside Tom Taylor for all of his 14 years.

If Don doesn't do color, then Rick is all color. And on an occasion or two, a little off-color.

"A few times I have been overexuberant," he admits.

The story everyone tells on Rick doesn't involve a broadcast. It's about a broadcast he missed. He even tells it on himself.

"It was the Science Hill game. I went to the rest room, and they locked the door on me and nobody could find me. I stayed in there from the beginning of halftime till the middle of the last period."

Tom Taylor remembers a time he maybe wished Rick had been locked in the bathroom.

"It was the girls' state tournament. We were playing Beech, which was really good, and it was like David versus Goliath. But D-B was ahead after three quarters. Holly Harwood comes down and makes a shot, and Rick pumps his fist, ‘Yes! Yes!' You weren't supposed to cheer on press row. They tried to throw us off, but I talked them into letting us stay."

And then there was the time Rick brought the wrath of a fan down on the WKIN team. It was at Heritage, and Rick had been flipping his cigarettes out the press box door. Unbeknownst to Rick the Quarterback Club was cooking up hamburgers and hot dogs down below. The next thing Taylor knew a wild-eyed fan was racing up the stadium steps toward the press box door with his shirt on fire. "Rick was at the other end of the press box. He saw the guy coming, and he just stayed down there. Meanwhile this guy wants to whip me and I'm trying to broadcast a game." Cooler heads eventually prevailed.

There are no stories like that about Don because, well, Don is Don and Rick is Rick. Same job, different brothers.

Both say they love their second jobs. Rick adds: "This has been one of the better experiences of my life. Very stress-relieving. And I'm not paid to do this. It's strictly for the kids."

You have to admit, it is unusual, a town Kingsport's size, with competing radio stations broadcasting local high school sports. And with competing brothers.

Rick says the Oak Ridge fans always jeer D-B's TWO radio stations. But Rick says, "It's a tradition of Kingsport sports. People support us passionately."

Except ones with their shirts on fire.

Dobyns-Bennett Band performs at halftime of UT-Buffalo football game

2011-10-03T11:17:00.002-04:00

Click HERE for YouTube video.

Hoople History!

2011-09-28T15:11:00.007-04:00

Major Amos B. Hoople makes his first pigskin prognostications in the Kingsport Times 1944.

The Old Boy hard at work at the Hoople typewriter in 1950.

Hoople's short-lived replacement in 1955.

Hoople returns in the fall of 1956.

A 1960 column from the Old Boy.

Ebbing and Flowing Methodist Church Cemetery in Rogersville

2011-08-11T15:23:00.006-04:00

Secret Ingredients from the Sixties and Fifties!

2011-08-09T09:54:00.012-04:00

The Magnificent Monzas!

2011-07-22T15:49:00.002-04:00

Click here for Monzas videos on the internet.

Gay-Ola, The Improved Cola

2011-06-21T10:34:00.007-04:00

Gay-Ola was bottled in Appalachia, Virginia and other sites from 1910 until the early 1920s.

Coke sued in 1911 because of the striking resemblance between Gay-Ola's logo and Coca-Cola's logo. The suit was settled out of court but Coke eventually won the battle of the grocery store shelf.

The First McDonald's In Kingsport - May 22, 1962

2011-05-17T08:20:00.002-04:00

Photo was taken days after the first McDonald's in Kingsport opened.

The following missive arrived unannounced in my email box one day, begging for an answer. It was from Homer Marcum, whom I don’t know, and it went like this: “My in-laws, who are very fine people and who reside out in Colonial Heights, have a really sore spot that I've seemed to rub the wrong way. A few years ago, they told me that Kingsport was such a hip place that it had one of the very first McDonald's restaurants. In fact, they said they specifically remember that its sign declared, ‘Over 1 Million Sold.’ Well, I hadn't fallen off of a turnip truck, and spent summers of my college years working in Chicago, in Oak Park, matter of fact, the corporate home of McDonald's. I thought their claim of having a Kingsport McDonald's with a sign declaring ‘Over 1 Million Sold’ to be a little early in the franchise chain.”

So Homer wants to know who’s right, him or his in-laws?

It sounded like a challenge and a challenge I was up to because I remember watching that McDonald’s on Fort Henry Drive go up.

I needed to find someone who’d worked there in the early days.

I remembered my high school classmate John Frazier worked there when we were in high school. He lives in Atlanta now but he was in town recently and I talked to him. He couldn’t remember what the original sign said but he knew someone who would, his old manager Jerry Kleven, who had opened the store.

So earlier this week Jerry and I sat down in the current Fort Henry Drive McDonald’s to talk about the arrival in Kingsport of the giant burger chain and also to settle the dispute between Homer and his family.

Let’s settle one item of the dispute up front. Jerry thinks the Kingsport McDonald’s was store number 312 when it opened on May 22, 1962. The company numbered restaurants in the order they opened so Kingsport was a very early store. The chain now has 13,609 stores in the U.S. alone. Kingsport got a McDonald’s a full five years before Bristol and six years ahead of Johnson City.

Jerry knows about those other local openings because he opened all five stores in the Tri-Cities.

So I think we can safely conclude that Kingsport was “hip” enough to get an early McDonald’s. The sign? We’ll get to that.

“My wife’s uncle Mac Houkom bought the franchise. Mac was in the dairy business in Galesburg, Illinois. I was working in a factory in Onalaska, Wisconsin.”
Landing a McDonald’s franchise in the early years involved a little luck and a lot of cash. “You put your name in a pot. The franchise was only $1,250 - that was the price for years - but you had to have serious money and you had to have it in cash to get a franchise.”

Jerry says Houkom was offered one of four locations. “There were two stores available in Detroit, the one in Kingsport and a fourth in Anderson, South Carolina. He drove and looked at all of them and picked Kingsport because he liked the town.”

Kingsport was technically not big enough for a McDonald’s. “It was borderline. You needed 24,000 people to qualify for a McDonald’s and Kingsport was a little less than that. But with the metro area it qualified. And McDonald’s got such a good deal on the property that they took it.”

So in the spring of 1962 Jerry Kleven quit his Wisconsin factory job, packed up his car and moved to Kingsport sight unseen. His wife and four sons would follow later, after they sold their Wisconsin house.

The McDonald’s he would open in Kingsport was a step up from the previous 311 stores. “We had what they called a winter front.” The ordering area was enclosed, protecting customers from the elements. But there were no tables or seats. You ate in your car or took the meal home. Most folks ate in their cars.

But in every other way it was the same formula that had made the chain the hottest franchise in America: a limited menu served up fresh, quick and cheap. QSC was the McDonald’s credo at the time: Quality, Service and Cleanliness.

You knew how clean the kitchen was - and it was sparkling - because, unlike most restaurants at the time, you could actually see inside.

“We operated on the fish bowl principle. You could see in everywhere, the store was all glass.”

And that meant constant cleaning. John Frazier remembers, “You couldn’t just stand around; you had to have rag in your hand.”

Says Jerry, “It was: You got time to lean, you got time to clean.”

There were only three food items on the menu - hamburger, cheeseburger and one size of fries - plus six drink choices - either Coke, root beer or orange soda, or one of three flavors of shakes. The menu was limited and cheap. When the Kingsport McDonald’s opened, burgers were 15 cents, fries were 12 cents and a Coke was a dime.

“You could get a burger, fries and a drink for 38 cents including the penny tax.”
If you could go back in time, you might be surprised at the sizes of the items McDonald’s sold. “The Cokes were ten ounce. And the original hamburger patty was 10-1, ten burgers out of one pound of meat.” Tiny by today’s Quarter-Pounder and super-size it meals.

And there was another thing that would strike modern customers as different. The entire staff was male. “That was McDonald’s rule. We weren’t allowed to hire girls. We didn’t hire our first girl till 1969 and that was for the Johnson City store.”

Jerry smiles when he talks about the early years of McDonald’s in Kingsport. “Those were exciting times.”

It was a sort of golden age for the golden arches.

“You could be innovative. We had trouble with lunch service because the Robinson and D-B kids got out for lunch at fifteen till twelve and they were followed shortly by Eastman workers.” The atrium ordering area got really stacked up. Jerry saw he needed more lunch help. He solved the problem by offering kids a free lunch if they would work one hour.

Innovation bred success. McDonald’s was a huge hit in Kingsport. “We were the number one store in the south - by volume - for several years in the sixties. Johnson City was number two.” Six managers from the Kingsport store would go on to own their own franchise.

Jerry couldn’t remember what the sign said that opening day. But he had a picture, taken by Mr. McMillan, who owned the antique store next door. Jerry thought the photo dated from the first week McDonald’s was in business. There under the golden arches are franchise owner Mac Houkom flanked by his two managers, Jerry Kleven and Carl Hanson. And above them the now world famous sign:

“McDonald’s
“HAMBURGERS”
And then this:
“Over 600 million sold.”

This column was originally published Oct. 24, 2004.

Why the Railroad Bypassed Kingsport in 1858

2011-04-29T15:57:00.003-04:00

Click on image to enlarge.

Lady and Her Chick-uppies

2011-04-26T18:22:00.005-04:00

This series of photos appeared in the Times News on May 22, 1958.

Easter Chicks in the Fifties

2011-04-02T18:36:00.004-04:00

It's amazing what you could buy at the grocery store in the fifties: live chickies, live ducks, live bunnies.

Bozo Show WKPT-TV 1969

2011-03-26T11:52:00.002-04:00

Click here to see a clip from the Bozo Show on WKPT in Kingsport circa 1969. Rusty Curry was Bozo.

1981 Kingsport Mets radio broadcast

2011-03-10T20:00:00.004-05:00

This is the first ten minutes of the last game of the season, the Mets vs. the Bristol Tigers.

One of the most memorable regional basketball tournaments in East Tennessee - 1961

2011-02-24T13:04:00.002-05:00

Have You Seen This House?

2011-02-18T13:52:00.006-05:00

This drawing appeared in a 1922 book. Was the house ever built in Kingsport? Where?

This photo of architect Louis Kurtz is from a 1921 issue of Pencil Points, a magazine for draftsmen.

TEC News - Kingsport's other newspaper for 51 years - 1946-1997

2011-02-12T12:42:00.011-05:00

J, Peterman catalog offers Kingsport Pirates warm up jacket!

2011-02-08T08:04:00.006-05:00

Straight out of 1963! (Click here to go to catalog page.)

Why?

Because the real John Peterman played for the Kingsport Pirates in 1963. And he wasn't bad either.

World's Oldest Person Was Born in Piney Flats in 1896

2011-02-01T13:49:00.004-05:00

And here's the census record to prove it, from the 1900 U.S. Census.

Besse Brown Cooper now lives in Monroe, Georgia, 45 miles east of Atlanta.

Besse became the world's oldest person on Monday when Frances Sanborn, reputed to be 115, died in Texas.

Charlie Louvin 1927-2011

2011-01-27T17:22:00.004-05:00

The Louvin Brothers, Charlie (left) and Ira, circa 1955, when they performed in Kingsport as the opening act for Elvis and Cowboy Copas.

Below, the newspaper story when Ira was shot by his wife in 1963.

Eddie Roberts 1946-2011 RIP

2011-01-24T09:35:00.004-05:00

Eddie fighting ninth ranked middleweight Willie Taylor at Civic Auditorium in 1979.

Eddie died over the weekend when he was hit by a car in Surgoinsville. I wrote a column about his inspirational life in 2006 on the occasion of his 60th birthday party.

Eddie Roberts surveyed the crowd gathered in Club Room 1 at the Civic Auditorium last Friday night to help him celebrate his 60th birthday. There were his old buddies from the Robert E. Lee Apartments. There was his daughter and her family, his sisters, a brother-in-law, 70 people all total.

No, he said as he scanned the group, there was nobody in attendance that he had fought…in the ring. “There’s lots here that I fought in the back alley.”

Eddie Roberts was a fighter, both in the ring and out. He grew up on the mean streets and back alleys around the Robert E. Lee Apartments, where fighting came naturally. So naturally that he turned it into a hobby - three times he won the Southern Golden Gloves championship - and then a profession - he fought 20 professional bouts, including his most famous fight, across the hall in the Civic Auditorium’s main auditorium. That was in 1979 when he dueled the ninth-ranked middleweight in the world, Willie Taylor, for twelve rounds, losing on points in a hard-fought match. Eddie had a career professional record of 14-5 with one draw, all his fights against legitimate opponents, no “tomato cans.” “I didn’t pad my record.”
He came out of retirement at age 39 - “I said I was 39; I was really 48” - to knock out a fighter half his age before retiring again.

But the toughest fight of his life may have been fighting his way out of public housing.

And that’s why these friends and family were gathered around pots of soup beans and plates of cornbread. To celebrate a life well lived.

After watching a video about Eddie, one by one his old friends stood up to toast him.

Earl Carter jokingly took credit for launching Eddie’s boxing career. “I was one of his early victories.”

Bill Hargrove talked about their shared tough childhoods. “Growing up in Lee Apartments we didn’t have much. But we had heroes. When he started boxing, half us in Lee Apartments wanted to box to be like Eddie.”

Earl seconded that idea of the family of Lee Apartments. “We had a bond you can’t understand unless you lived there. We went out in the world and when anyone succeeded, we all swelled up with pride.”

In turn the other middle-aged men stood and talked about Eddie the role model: older brother to every fatherless kid in Lee Apartments, then Eddie the boxer, the college graduate, the teacher, the coach, the Boys Club volunteer.

Eddie put himself through college then taught at Church Hill High School and Cedar Grove Elementary, working with boys from circumstances much like his own. “Eddie’s the one who taught me to give back,” said Wayne Taylor, who volunteered at Boys Club with Eddie. Wayne wanted the crowd to know something else about Eddie. “Something that hasn’t been discussed, Eddie’s other side. Eddie is a poet, a songwriter, a Civil War buff, a guitar teacher; he’s just a universal man. He went back at 50 and got his Masters. I remember he said Grandma Moses didn’t start painting till she was 80.”

Eddie took no credit himself, instead crediting his family and friends and his late trainer Jackie Wilson, a one-time athlete at Ketron High School, who trained out of a wheel chair after a car accident left him crippled.

Eddie didn’t express bitterness about the Willie Taylor fight, which many in attendance thought should have gone to Eddie. A win over a ranked contender would have put Eddie on the map in the middleweight division. And he almost won with a crunching body shot - Eddie calls it the hardest punch he ever threw - that lifted Taylor on his toes and sent him reeling. “But the ropes caught him.” One judge scored the bout for Eddie, but the other two voted for Taylor. Eddie says modestly, “It wasn’t to be.”

The keynote of the 60th birthday celebration was a letter that daughter Carol Roller wrote and read. She spoke about Eddie not as a boxer but as a father, a dad who taught her the lesson he had learned on the mean streets and in the ring.
“He taught me that we all get knocked down but we get back up.”

Deja Vu - Alabama player comes off bench for tackle in 1954 Cotton Bowl

2010-12-14T16:53:00.005-05:00

Click to watch the video of the play.

Pratt's Big Indian in his younger days

2010-12-08T10:33:00.004-05:00

Honest John's gift shop, restaurant and gas station was on Bristol Highway. It was built by cabinetmaker John Barker who built the Indian himself. He later moved to Stone Drive when the state widened the road and widened him out of business. The Big Indian now stands outside Pratt's Barbecue.

April 11, 1954 - Most Boring Day in History?

2010-12-01T10:15:00.010-05:00

A search engine company has analyzed its database of 300 million items and concluded that fewer significant events occurred on April 11, 1954 than any other day in modern history (since 1900).

Was it just as boring in Kingsport? Here's the next day's paper, which was pretty boring....

Christmas 1955

2010-11-26T08:38:00.002-05:00

No, as an eight-year-old, I was not what we used to call a “touch typist.” I typed using the Biblical method: seek and ye shall find.

John King 1947-2010

2010-10-29T16:17:00.003-04:00

Kingsport native, and my high school biology lab partner, Johnny King, died Tuesday after a short illness. John was a great drummer and great friend. He played drums on the platinum award winning Steve Miller album "The Joker" and during his career played with everyone from Elton John to the Beach Boys.

John went to the doctor Oct. 3 with a chest cold. X-rays revealed he had stage 4 kidney cancer. He died three weeks later without suffering.

Here is a link to The Joker video.

There's been controversy over the years about the word "pompatus" in the lyrics. John told me he thought Steve Miller just made it up. I found this online story about how actor Jon Cryer tracked down the meaning in the nineties after starring in a movie called "The Pompatus of Love."

The Grand Ole Opry Comes to Kingsport - 1935

2010-10-16T16:11:00.007-04:00

Click here to see what the 1935 Opry show might have been like.

Here are the Fruit Jar Drinkers from 1955.

And here are Sam and Kirk McGee from a 1967 show.

Here's another act that may have performed in Kingsport that night, the Crook Brothers, from 1966.

D-B Teacher Caricatures - from Class of 1960's 50th Reunion

2010-10-12T10:48:00.021-04:00

How many can you identify?
(These are life size! Click to enlarge)

1953 Kingsport News (the morning paper) comics

2010-10-05T13:37:00.001-04:00

The Andy Griffith Show premiered Oct. 3, 1960

2010-10-02T11:44:00.001-04:00

Everett Greenbaum and his writing partner Jim Fritzell wrote three dozen scripts for the show. Everett essentially created the character of Gomer Pyle.

Gary Morse - Kingsport Radio Legend - 1945-2010

2010-09-27T14:29:00.010-04:00

Gary on the front page in August 1965 - he got his picture taken with the Beatles!

From 1961

Also from 1961.

Here's Gary in 1971 when he was the morning newscaster on Houston's KPRC-TV.

And here's Gary doing two TV commercials for Timmerman Toyota in Aiken, S.C. in the seventies.

Click to hear an air check of Bouncin' Gary on WKIN-AM in 1963:

Kingsport Comics

2010-09-25T20:19:00.006-04:00

The very first comic strip in the Kingsport Times, The Gumps, which debuted Oct. 1, 1924.

The first full comics page: March 4, 1935.

Vote for your favorite comics: 1951.

Fallout Shelter Phenomenon - circa the sixties

2010-09-12T08:06:00.007-04:00

Happy 60th Birthday, Beetle Bailey!

2010-09-02T07:14:00.006-04:00

Welcome to Kingsport, Beetle. The Kingsport Times was one of only 12 newspapers to carry Beetle when he first began in syndication.

Here's the first Beetle Bailey strip to appear in the Kingsport Times on Sept. 4, 1950. He was a very different Beetle, a college freshman!

Here's how the comics page looked on the day that Beetle debuted.

Beetle didn't catch on until he joined the Army on March 13, 1951.

Winky Dink and You - Kids' TV in Kingsport

2010-08-31T16:22:00.006-04:00

Jack Barry hosted Winky Dink. (Click to view the show.)

Below is the kit you could order from the show or buy at a local store.

Ads in the Kingsport Times News for Winky Dink kits.

Bobby Cifers - D-B's Greatest Football Player AND Greatest Athlete?

2010-08-28T17:22:00.010-04:00

Bobby Cifers scored 490 points during his four years on the D-B football team:

1936 - 32 points
13 points against Jonesboro
6 points against Chattanooga Central
7 points against Nashville Humme Fogg
6 points against Tennessee High

1937 - 59 points
16 points against Jonesboro
2 points against Saltville
12 points against Chattanooga Central
1 point against Bradley County
2 points against Johnson City
9 points against Tennessee High
6 points against Elizabethton
1 point against Morristown
10 points against South Port Ind.

1938 - 235 points (35 TDs and 25 extra points)
This broke the national scoring record.
27 points against Rogersvllle
13 points against Peoria Manual Ill.
22 points against Pennington Gap, Va.
39 points against Jacksonville Landon, FI
32 points against Morristown
33 points against Johnson City
14 points against Erwin
33 points against Tennssee High
9 points against Knoxville
13 points against Chattanooga Central
0 against Elizabethton (next year scored five in five carries in second half)

1939 - 164 points
l4 points against Bradley County
6 points against Asheville, N.C.
8 points against Chattanooga Central
12 points against Louisville Manual, Ky
27 points against Erwin
7 points against Knoxville
14 points against Tennessee High
34 points against Elizabethton
22 points against Morristown
20 points against Jacksonville Landon, Fl.
1,753 yards in 195 attempts

Among his many honors was being named to the All South team twice.

He broke the national scoring record for a single season during his junior year. It was reported in newspapers all across the country. Here is the story from the Billings Montana Gazette:

He was held scoreless in 1938 during a state playoff game (!!) against Elizabethton. D-B lost 39-0. He atoned the next year in a big way, with 5 touchdowns and over 300 yards.

Here is the game story for that 1939 game:

He was even the subject of a cartoon that was published in sports sections all over the country. This is from the Charleston W.Va. paper:

His picture was also published in numerous newspapers. This is from LaCrosse Wisconsin. He was a handsome kid and after one photo was carried by the Associated Press he received over 400 letters from girls all over the country.

Bobby was more than just a football star. He was a member of three D-B track state championship teams 1936, 1937 and 1940 and won ten separate state championship trophies:
1936 Shot Put 50'0" State Champion
1937 Discus Throw 115'1" State Champion
1937 Shot Put 49' 11" State Champion
1939 Long Jump 21 '2 1/2' State Champion
1939 120 Yd Hi Hurdle 16.0 State Champion
1939 200 Low Hurdles 24.7 State Champion
1940 Discus Throw 147'10 1/2" State Champion
1940 Shot Put 52'11 1/2" State Champion
1940 120 Yd Hi Hurdle 15.5 State Champion
1940 200 Low Hurdles 24. 7 State Champion

Howdy Doody Arrives in Kingsport in the Fifties

2010-08-24T18:44:00.006-04:00

The Howdy Doody Show arrives in Kingsport in 1951 from Charlotte's WBTV.

Kingsport merchants discover Howdy sells!

Howdy mask for Halloween 1953.

1954 ad for cable uses the Howdy Show as a selling point.

Kingsport Makes 'Official Detective' magazine - 1946

2010-08-21T20:24:00.008-04:00

From the December 1946 issue of 'Official Detective Stories'

And here's how the Kingsport Times News covered the story.

Mr. Fanslow Honored - Posthumously Selected for Yankton College Hall of Honor

2010-08-16T15:25:00.004-04:00

Here's a column I wrote about Mr. Fanslow in November 2003.

The Teapot Dome Scandal had just broken and President Harding’s Secretary of the Interior Albert Fall was feeling the heat when Bob Fanslow ended his American History class last week.

When class resumes at the Kingsport Institute for Continued Learning in March, he’ll pick back up for his roomful of avid students, a few of whom were born during the Harding administration.

Bob Fanslow started teaching American History to senior citizens a decade ago. Eight years ago he asked the class, “What would you think if we started at the bottom and worked our way up?”

The class agreed and so he backtracked to the voyage of Columbus. A hundred or so classes later he is up to the Harding administration and the jazz age. With any luck, World War II may arrive this spring. If not spring, then maybe next fall.
When it comes to the teaching of American History, Bob Fanslow is a Kingsport institution. He began teaching American History here in September 1950. Except for a two-year time out for the Korean War, he’s been teaching it ever since. He retired from Dobyns-Bennett in 1991 after 39 years, then a couple of years later he picked back up at the Kingsport Institute for Continued Learning.

After his wife and his children, history is his love.

But I probably didn’t have to tell you that. Not after a half century of teaching in this town, some 6,000 students in all. You probably learned history from Bob, er, Mr. Fanslow.

He admits that his current class may “take as long to teach as the period itself. We flow from one period to another; we’ll work eventually to the present day if we’re all around. And I don’t wear out.”

There’s no chance of that, Bob Fanslow wearing out on history. “I do enjoy doing this sort of thing. If you don’t use it you lose it, as they say. I may be a stimulant to the class but the class is a stimulant to me.”

He’s been a learning stimulant in Kingsport for half a century and his former students still give him credit.

“Mr. Fanslow was my Mr. Chips and John Keating of Dead Poet's Society,” says Paula Bennett-Paddick, a D-B grad and retired teacher in Birmingham, Alabama. “He always caused me to study and learn more than I ever thought possible. And, the miracle of it all was that he made me want to do my best.”

Bruce Haney remembers, “I took Mr. Fanslow's class because my cousin Jack Windle told me what a good teacher he was. He was the first ‘college lecture’ quality teacher I can remember; one who was interesting enough you wanted to show up in class and actually listen instead of goofing off.”

Kingsport native Betty Hyder Stone, who now lives in Montgomery, Alabama, says, “I owe him a huge debt of gratitude for awakening in me some sense of the world! I began taking Time magazine during his class and still am a subscriber.”

He did more than stimulate, he also inspired. Dominick Jackson, a Kingsport native who now lives in Greeneville, says, “My Masters Degree in history is in many ways derived from the inspiration and support I received from Mr. Fanslow.”

Bennett-Paddick believes, “His model of teaching was evident in my career as a teacher. I worked hard at not just handing out challenging assignments, but dancing, cajoling, and nurturing my students to have a desire to learn. I found there was a massive difference in requiring an assignment and having students become excited and involved in their learning.”

The curriculum is a bit different in the senior classes. It’s mostly lecture. The unique aspects of teaching these classes are not lost on Mr. Fanslow. “No tests, no written work. People who want to be here. All the advantages of teaching and none of the disadvantages.”

Stone says wistfully, “Since technically I'm a ‘senior’ now, I'd love to take his class again. I'm so impressed that he continues to impart knowledge and to inspire. Wow.”

Mr. Fanslow's General American History Test and key (don't peek!)

Skateland building bites the dust

2010-08-05T20:52:00.008-04:00

Skateland building in 2004

Grand opening in 1946:

Thimble drome races, whatever they were, in 1949:

Ad from 1960:

Before there was Skateland...

1924 skating rink in Kingsport

And Kingsport's skating rink in 1927:

Kingsport's Bowling Boom - 1960

2010-07-31T17:43:00.007-04:00

The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight

2010-07-20T10:48:00.003-04:00

In 1973 I wrote a story for Saturday Review magazine about the Friendsville Academy boys basketball team, the worst team in the history of high school basketball. They had lost 119 games in a row when I began following them. The losing streak would eventually reach 138. Here is that story. I'm posting it on the occasion of the death of David Dick, the CBS News correspondent who flew in to cover the team's first victory in six years. I chauffeured him around Friendsville as he reported the story.

There is no joy in Friendsville. The local high school basketball team, the Friendsville Foxes, has lost 119 consecutive games. More than six years have passed since Friendsville defeated Clinch High School, 65-50, on Valentine's Day in 1967. Two classes have graduated without ever seeing their team win.

Loss number 88 in the streak, Greenback High won that game, 45-43, --after a confused Friendsville player scored on the wrong end of the floor.

The streak stood at 102 games when the Foxes' ace guard, Johnny French, hit a desperation shot from midcourt at the final buzzer and the scoreboard read:

Friendsville 65, Glencliff 64.

While the crowd erupted into a minor riot, the opposing coaches held a heated discussion with the official scorer. It turned out that the scoreboard was wrong the game was really tied. And with four of the Friendsville starters already fouled out, Glencliff won easily in overtime, 77-70.

``Snake bit'' is the word they use in Friendsville to describe that kind of luck.
More than six years have passed since Friendsville defeated Clinch High School, 65-50, on Valentine's Day in 1967. Two classes have graduated without ever seeing their team win.

The school has only 26 boys in grades 7 to 12; it's too small to field a football or baseball team.

As the team went into the current season, coach Joe Fink had retired, leaving as his legacy a 119-game losing string, shared with two predecessors. The new coach, Rick Little, a recent college grad, was optimistic about ending Friendsville's long sojourn in the jaws of defeat. All five of last season's starters were returning, and a hotshot transfer student would become eligible in January.

Lanier, November 14. This is the first game of the season, but the excitement is not on the basketball court. Charles Kuralt of CBS News is filming an ``On the Road'' segment about the Foxes' woes, and the distracted Lanier fans alternate between intense interest in the TV crew and half-hearted attempts to act natural when the cameras are turned their way. The Friendsville fans are not self-conscious they've already appeared on NBC's Today show. I talk with a Friendsville student, Frank Arr. ``Sure I want to see them win,'' he tells me. ``It'd be a new experience.'' Will they win tonight? ``Naw, we want to give ABC an equal opportunity to cover us first.'' Final score: 66-30, loss number 120.

Copperbasin, November 18. The Friendsville cheerleaders never give up. The game is down to the final minute, and their team is behind by 30 points, but they're still shouting, ``Foxes are best'' and ``Beat Cougars.'' I talk to Patty Walsh, who's been a cheerleader for four winless years. ``Sure it gets discouraging,'' she says, ``But we've got to keep trying. We can't lose forever.'' But they lose tonight 76-44, loss number 121.

Webb, November 21, at Friendsville. The Friendsville gym is freezing for the Foxes' home opener because the boiler isn't working. Webb's coach wears a heavy winter coat during the game, and team members who aren't playing keep their warm-up jackets on. Back for the game is former coach Joe Fink, now a forester at Big Ridge State park. I ask him what he said to the team before each game during his tenure. ``I used to give them a pep talk to get them aroused,'' he says, ``but I found out I was just making them nervous. So I quit saying anything.'' Webb wins, 86-41, loss number 122.

Walland, November 28. I drive to Walland, but the gym is dark and the door is locked. The boy at King's Texaco and Market in Walland tells me that the gym has been condemned. I hurriedly drive to Friendsville and arrive just as the game is beginning. Walland wins, 92-21, loss number 123.

Greenback, December 1. Greenback takes out its first string with three minutes to go in the first quarter. At half time the Friendsville cheerleaders do their ``Hello from Friendsville'' cheer. I listen closely as they give their names and hometowns, but I can't believe my ears. At half time I talk to DeDe Shimizu from Maryland. ``We never give our right names or anything,'' she sighs. ``Tonight Liz Davis said she was Charlie Chan from New York. And I told them I was Sarabelle from Detroit.'' Final score: 84-26, loss number 124.

Washington College Academy, December 2, at Friendsville. One of Friendsville's star players is out with a bleeding ulcer. Frank Arr says it's from too much moonshine. Final score: 69-33, loss number 125.

Tennessee School for the Deaf, December 5. The kid who usually plays the Foxes' mascot is in regular school clothes. He tells me someone stole the suit after the last game. Final score: 74-25, loss number 126.

Tellico Plains, December 9. There is no game tonight. Tellico Plains dropped Friendsville from its schedule at the last minute.

Townsend, December 12. I arrive during half time of the girls' game. A few members of the girls' team are outside smoking. The boys might as well be. Final score: 84-32, loss number 127.

Clinch, December 15. Snow is falling on Clinch Mountain as I drive to the game. Inside, the gym is bare brick, and an echo resounds from wall to wall. Frank Arr says the game has to end before 9 so the cows can come back in. Tonight could be the night. Clinch hasn't won in 57 games, and one of its starters is so fat the has to wear cut-off blue jeans. But there's bad news, too: the Friendsville team is down to eight. Two more players, both starters, have quit the team since the last game. Friendsville takes an early 8-2 lead, but it doesn't last. Final score: 64-41, loss number 128.

Cleveland Day School, January 12. I arrive at half time of the girls' game again, and Friendsville is behind, 23-0. They finally lose, 54-8. I ask Janie Lynn, one of the reserve guards, what their coach says to them before a game. ``Mainly, he tells us not to smoke on the bus. And at least to go out there and try. Put on a good show.'' I haven't spotted Frank yet, and I'm about to ask where he is when the boys take the floor. My God, Frank is now on the team! At half time I corner him and ask him why he decided to go out for a team that hasn't won in six years. He puts it in perspective: ``There's nothing else to do in Friendsville.'' Final score: 76-24, loss number 129.

Townsend, January 16, at Friendsville. Frank says that he and Robin Ingram, one of the starting forwards, went over to the visitors' dressing room before the game and caught two Townsend players smoking dope. I ask the Townsend manager about this, and he denies it. ``They don't even smoke,'' he reasons. Final score: 83-45, loss number 130.

Cleveland Day School, January 19, at Friendsville. The cheerleaders shout, ``Hello to the Trojans'' at half time, and DeDe introduces herself as Pisser from San Francisco. The boiler isn't working again. Final score: 85-39, loss number 131.

Harrison-Chilhowee Baptist Academy, January 23, at Friendsville. Friendsville's star center, Woody Profitt, has joined the army, and John French is out with a sprained ankle, but Glen Brue is now eligible. Frank scores his first 2 points, Glen scores 12, but the Baptists beat the Quakers, 92-33, for loss number 132.

Lanier, January 25, at Friendsville. Friendsville outscores Lanier in the second half, but Lanier wins, 79-55, loss number 133.

Walland, January 30, at Townsend. Since its gym was condemned, Walland has been playing its home games at neighboring Townsend. Final score: 91-28, loss number 134.

Washington College Academy, February 3. It’s Homecoming for Washington College. The president of the school tells me he’d like to have some publicity, but not for losing to Friendsville. Washington College leaves its first team in until the final two minutes in an effort to score 100 points for the Alums. I wonder how much more indignity they want to inflect on a team that hasn't won in six years and feel relieved when they fail to make 100. Final score: 98-54, loss number 135.

Tennessee School for the Deaf, February 6, at Friendsville. Tonight is the sixth anniversary of the Foxes' last victory. With seven minutes to go in the first half, Friendsville is leading, 15-13. Even the boiler is working. But it doesn't last. The boiler quits first. Then Glen gets into foul trouble, and guard Mike Jervey, weak from the flu, sits out most of the second half. Final score: 71-47, loss number 136.

Greenback, February 9, at Friendsville. The girls' game is canceled, since all but three members of the team are sick with the flu. The boys lose, 77-51. Number 157.

Webb, February 10. Cheerleader Kimi Julian has been steadfast all season in giving her real name and hometown. Tonight in the ``Hello to the Spartans'' cheer she breaks down and calls herself Wendy from Israel. I have been proud of her courage all season. I am also proud of the team for not giving up after it falls far behind in the first half. I catch myself standing during the ``All for Foxes, Stand Up and Holler'' cheer. And I call the referee a plumber. Am I getting soft? Final score: 78-10, loss number 138.

St. Camillus, February 15, at Friendsville. It's the biggest home crowd of the season 129 paid admissions. Art Masker, the headmaster of St. Camillus Academy, tells me it's only the third time this season they've made enough at the gate to pay the referees without having to dip into school funds. Friendsville coach Rick Little has a hunch that tonight will be the night, and says he'll shave off his bear if the team wins. I talk to the St. Camillus coach's wife, who asks me about Friendsville. I tell her they have two eight-graders on the team. She says St. Camillus has two seventh-graders. I tell her Friendsville has been beaten by as much as 70 points this season. She says St. Camillus has lost by over 100 points several times. A true battle of the giants is in the offing.

Friendsville gets the opening tip, takes a 6-0 lead before St. Camillus even gets off a shot, and leads at the half, 28-7. Other good omens appear: no one goes out to smoke at half time, and the cheerleaders even give their right names in their ``Hello'' cheer. Friendsville wins, 64-43!!! The streak is broken! (Naturally, the scoreboard is wrong it reads 62-43.) Friendsville fans celebrate with kisses and tears. Tomorrow the whole school will get a half-day off.

Friendsville sophomore Janie Lynn burst into tears and her classmate Terry Duffield fainted dead away.

While the Friendsville fans congratulate one another, I watch the St. Camillus team trudge to their dressing room. One player passes me, head down, mumbling, ``The laughing stock of the nation.''

Kiwanis Kapers - 1928-1977

2010-07-16T10:17:00.006-04:00

Ad for first Kapers in 1928

Review of 1937 show.

History, First Draft

2010-07-06T08:28:00.010-04:00

Here's an early dispatch about the Battle of the Alamo.

Here's the full page for readers who like to get context by reading other stories of the day.

The Gunfight at the O.K. Corral was already news three days later.

Here's a basic account of the events of the "eighteenth of April in '75," the night of Paul Revere's Ride. (In the Colonial period "s" and "f" looked similar.)

Here's the full page.

Coverage of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address

Early reports from the Battle of the Little Big Horn

Here's the full page.

The Greatest Fourth of July Ever - Kingsport 1926

2010-07-02T15:49:00.007-04:00

Coverage of the parade and festivities.

The program for the celebration.

Merchant's ad

Below is the story about Alvin York that the newspaper printed in advance of his visit. It was reprinted from Literary Digest.

Leave It to Beaver, the Entire Series, Arrives on DVD

2010-06-29T08:43:00.017-04:00

Vince and Eddie Haskell (Ken Osmond) were judges at the Jack Daniel's Barbecue Championship in Lynchburg, Tennessee in 1994.

Hugh Beaumont, Barbara Billingsley, Tony Dow and Jerry Mathers as The Beaver.

Cowboy Cleaver boys

Unctuous Eddie

Beaver. Larry Mondello and fireman Gus

Larry trying to talk Beaver into doing something that Beaver knows he shouldn't do.

Beaver and Larry at the dance. Larry is eating, of course.

BFF: Lumpy, Eddie and Wally

Beaver's class - that's not Miss Landers. Judy and Larry are in the first row. That's Whitey sitting in front of Beaver. Gilbert is in the third row.

Rusty Stevens played Larry Mondello

Jeri Weil was Judy Hensler

Ward and his not-BFF Fred Rutherford. Lumpy was Fred's boy.

Sue Randall played pretty teacher Miss Landers.

Max Showalter played Ward Cleaver in the pilot titled "Wally and the Beaver." Pat Sullivan, not pictured, was Wally. Sullivan grew over the summer and was replaced by Tony Dow.

Little Orphan Annie in the Kingsport News 1942-1963

2010-06-17T09:59:00.006-04:00

The arrival of Little Orphan Annie was announced in this full page ad on Sept. 20, 1942.

This was the first strip to appear in the Kingsport News on September 21, 1942.

This was the comics page on Oct. 10, 1942, just a few days after Annie's first appearance in the Kingsport News.

The last Orphan Annie strip in the Kingsport News on April 1, 1963.

The entire page of Annie's last appearance.

Stephen Strasburg vs. Juan Marichal

2010-06-14T20:32:00.003-04:00

I think Juan Marichal's major league debut in 1960 was every bit as good as Stephen Strasburg's recent pitching performance. Here is the box score for Marichal.

Mercury Blues

2010-06-01T11:22:00.004-04:00

Ford will announce the discontinuation of its Mercury line, according to Bloomberg News.

The first Mercury dealer in Kingsport was Tom Yancey. Here is his first ad, from 1948:

In late 1970 he sold the dealership to Don Billings, who changed the name to Kingsport Motors. Here is that dealership's first ad, from early 1971:

Here is Alan Jackson's 1992 hit about the Mercury, a remake of the old K.C. Douglas boogie.

7th Grade Time Capsule

2010-05-29T17:06:00.006-04:00

I found my seventh grade nerd notebook in the closet, still zippered up from the day I finished school that year. It would have been about June 3, 1960 that I tossed it in the back of my closet. Here are some of the contents including a diagram of the Robinson library circa 1960, in case you wanted to be reminded of how Miss Robinette had the room arranged. There's also my embarrassing reading list.

Wild Bill Hiccup as performed by Spike Jones and His City Slickers - 1950

2010-05-25T09:30:00.002-04:00

The Itty Bitty Beatles - Mountain View Elementary in Johnson City Performs "The Ed Sullivan Show"

2010-05-21T15:36:00.008-04:00

That's kindergarten teacher Ms. Angie with "The Beatles!"
To see video highlights, click here.

Ladies and gentlemen, Sonny and Cher!

Elvis!

And the Jackson 5!

Driving to Florida in the Fifties

2010-05-13T10:10:00.003-04:00

That meant Stuckey's stops and Burma Shave signs and speed traps in Georgia.

Here's a link to a 1970 story Time Magazine wrote about the speed trap in Ludowici Georgia.

I wrote about Burma Shave signs back in 2007. That column appears two posts below.

And here's a link to a number of Burma Shave verses.

R.C. Huff Lumber - only reference ever in Kingsport Times

2010-05-04T13:57:00.001-04:00

Burman Shave signs

2010-05-02T11:53:00.003-04:00

Friday's column about driving to Florida in the fifties reminded Joe Wallen of the old Burma Shave signs that were a part of the landscape for travelers in the fifties.

I wrote a column about those signs back in January 2007. Here is that column:

Church signs hark back to old Burma-Shave campaign

I'm used to church sign slogans. It seems every church I drive past has a clever little saying on the board out front:

"Don't Climb the Mountain Till You Get to It"

"Our Church Is Prayer Conditioned"

"A Little Kneeling Will Keep You in Good Standing"

"Happy Hour Here Every Sunday Morning"

So I was charmed by the simple familiarity of five little signs that dotted the shoulder of Orebank Road:

You can't compare

Our pews to theirs

Here's the reason

We use chairs

Preston Hills Presbyterian Church

If you're under, say, 40, it's just four funny roadside signs with a church name as the punch line.

If you're over 40, the signs will bring a smile to your lips because they hark back to the greatest roadside advertising campaign in history, the old Burma-Shave signs.

Beginning in 1925 and continuing until 1963, the shaving cream company erected miniature billboards along roadways all over the country.

The rhyming signs were funny and wise and - most importantly - effective.

You always remembered the last sign: Burma-Shave.

I can't remember jokes, but I've always remembered a Burma-Shave series I saw years ago on the road to the beach:

Henry the Eighth

Sure had trouble

Short term wives

Long term stubble

Burma-Shave

I must have been studying Henry the Eighth in school at the time.

The reader who first alerted me to the Preston Hills signs recalled another series from the era of two-lane highways:

Fellow speeders

Let's rehearse

All together

"Good morning, nurse!"

Burma-Shave

Burma-Shave cooked up thousands of those jingles over the years. I used to own a copy of the book "The Verse By the Side of the Road," which provides example after example. I can't find the book anymore, but there are numerous Internet sites offering examples of the shaving company's pairs of rhymed couplets:

A man - a miss

A car - a curve

He kissed the miss

And missed the curve

Burma-Shave

* * *

Dinah doesn't

Treat him right

But if he'd shave

Dinah might

Burma-Shave

As shaving cream declined in sales and interstate highways proliferated, Burma-Shave effectively wrote its own obituary in verse.

Those five signs now reside in the Smithsonian Institution:

Shaving brushes

You'll soon see 'em

On a shelf

In some museum

Burma-Shave

When Advertising Age magazine compiled its top 100 ad campaigns of the 20th century in 1999, Burma-Shave ranked 23rd, highest of any outdoor-only campaign. (Volkswagen's "Think Small" ads from 1959 topped the list, followed by Coca-Cola's "The pause that refreshes," "The Marlboro Man," Nike's "Just do it" and McDonald's "You deserve a break today.")

It's been 40 years since I last saw any Burma-Shave signs. Until I drove up Orebank Road earlier this week.

Preston Hills Presbyterian Church offers a second set of Burma-Shave-like signs on the reverse side of the eastbound set.

I could quote them in this column, but that would spoil the fun of driving west on Orebank Road.

Let's just say, the first sign reads:

Fear of water?

You'll have to drive Orebank Road yourself to read the rest.

French Pastry Mystery Solved!

2010-04-27T15:13:00.002-04:00

The French Pastry was made by Dolly Madison Bakeries.

Thanks to readers Calvin Lucy and Jackie Barker (who found this 1956 ad for the French Pastry snack cake).

Murderous Mary - Kingsport's Killer Elephant (Which Was Hanged in Erwin)

2010-04-17T10:10:00.010-04:00

Famous photo of Mary being hanged in Erwin on Sept. 13, 1916. The authenticity of the photo is in doubt.

Sparks Circus ad in Johnson City Staff newspaper for show on Sept. 14, 1916. The Kingsport papers for this period are lost but the ad in Kingsport would have been similar since the Sparks Circus was using this same poster in ads a year later (after Mary had been hanged!).

A newspaper description of the Sparks Circus parade in Richwood, Ohioi two weeks before the Kingsport show. The Kingsport parade would have been similar.

Story of Mary killing her trainer from the next day's Johnson City Staff. Kingsport papers for this period are lost.

Story of Mary's hanging from the Johnson City Staff. Story was "buried" on page 6!

Newspaper story about Sparks' elephants most famous trick, a baseball game.

Johnson City Staff story about Sparks Circus performance held in J.C. Sept. 14, 1916, two days after the "incident" in Kingsport.

Circus pass - this was a free ticket given to local officials, also to boys who helped erect the tent.

Kingsport Times looks back at the story of Murderous Mary 22 years later, in 1938.

Aruba, Jamaica, ooo I wanna take you - on Vince's Cruise

2010-04-13T19:26:00.008-04:00

Vince with the Panama Canal in the background.

Vince and the Carmen Miranda's in Colombia.

On the beach in Aruba.

The big old Fort de la Reese in Cartogena, Colombia.

That's Cuba in the background.

Ross N. Robinson Junior High School teachers in 1961

2010-04-12T07:15:00.002-04:00

How many can you identify?
Here's an i.d. list as provided by Miss McCammon and Miss Melton:
Row 1(l to r)
Tommy Hill, Hazel Stewart, Johnnie Wray, Rowena Johnson, Maude Dishner, Mildred Kozsuch, Mrs. Massengill, (?)Shirley Garrett, Don Stevens, Delbert Webb(principal)

Row 2
Jack Campbell, (?)Nancy Randall, Sarah McKee, Gerry McCammon(Frazier), Margaret Melton(Tunnell), Wanda Bledsoe, Lorena Hoover, Hope King

Row 3
Oscar Dalton, Nell(Jack) McLean, Bea Gilbert, Sarah Spracher, Mary Tuggle, Faye Neergaard, Madeline Thomas, Mrs. Sauer, Mary Erim Riley, Wilma Snyder(Bunting), Dolly Wallen (behind Mr. Webb)

Row 4
Reba Robinette, Jim Scott, Jo Ann Emmert, Sam Hicks, Charles Flanary, Bob Shepherd, Don Little, David Wise

Ghost Hunting in Kingsport

2010-03-28T08:50:00.005-04:00

Here are two examples of EVPs (electronic voice phenomenon) from my night of ghost hunting in downtown Kingsport.

Fess Parker - King of the Wild Frontier

2010-03-23T13:38:00.006-04:00

The Ballad of Davy Crockett as sung on the soundtrack of the TV show.

Click here for Fess Parker's version of the Ballad of Davy Crockett

Tennessee's Version of "Hoosiers" - Hampton 1960

2010-03-20T15:31:00.004-04:00

Vanishing Appalachia - Now Playing at Knoxville Museum of East Tennessee History

2010-03-18T16:02:00.005-04:00

Two of my college friends, photographer Don Dudenbostel and writer Tom Jester, have collaborated on an exhibit of traditional East Tennessee culture, including moonshiners (Popcorn Sutton, above in overalls and beard) and serpent handlers (above, Reverend Jimmy Morrow). The show runs through June 20, 2010.

Rod Irvin 1947-2010 RIP friend

2010-03-12T11:02:00.009-05:00

Rod Irvin, first row, second from right. (I'm on the back row, fourth from left.)

Rod and Vince in D.C. Sept. 23, 2008

Here is the eulogy that I delivered at Rod's funeral:

When (Rod’s son-in-law) Paul called and asked me to deliver this eulogy, he told me it would be in a church but because of my longtime friendship with Rod, he said anything I want to say will be appropriate.

So if I should say something that you find inappropriate…Paul is sitting right over there. Go complain to him.

Rod and I have been best friends since 1958.

Rod and I met in the hall outside Miss Larkin’s sixth grade classroom. We were waiting while the class voted on class president. We began talking, discovered we were both baseball fans, both loved the Yankees, both loved playing football and basketball and we were both fans of the Leave It to Beaver TV show.

Our newfound friendship was tested immediately. Rod won that election.

That began half a century of joking, teasing, and doing everything together.

What Rod and I discovered pretty quickly was that we could make each other laugh.

That’s not something you find often in life and when you do, you should cherish it.

I’m going to tell you some of the things we did to make each other laugh. Because Rod doesn’t want you crying tonight.

In high school we often double dated. And because I had the only car in our group, sometimes triple dated. If one of us didn’t have a date we might half double date, with the stag in the back seat. Or if another friend didn’t have a date either we might do one of those Three Stooges dates, you know, where the Three Stooges all went out with one girl.

After high school, as Rod used to say, we went to different schools together.
Children, this was in the days before unlimited long distance, before email and texting. We actually wrote letters back and forth.

Rod lived in an apartment at 710 Hill Avenue, which he dubbed the 710 Club. He also renamed himself, Rod the Surf Irvin. In later years his kids would be perplexed when I would call and ask for The Surf. Eventually they learned and I could hear them, Dad, Vince is on the phone.

I’m happy to say I don’t think we ever wrote a serious letter. I’ve saved many of those letters. In one Rod created an intricate psychedelic checkerboard that if you held it back you could read Rod the Surf.

Another time he wrote a letter, tore it up into little pieces, and mailed them. I spent about half an hour taping those little pieces together. Only to discover…well the missing piece arrived a couple of days later.

In another letter he asked how my girlfriend at Earlham College was doing. “Tell her I said hello. If I had her address, I might write her, ah forget it. I haven’t written my grandmother yet.”

In the summer of 1968, Rod, Tom and I had nothing better to do so we made a movie. It starred Bruce Haney. Actually it was supposed to star Bruce Haney but he had to go with his family to Michigan the week we were to start filming and production deadlines being what they were, we started without him. And I starred. It was a comedy. Or at least it was at the time. We had the world premiere at the Downtowner Motor Inn because one of the cast members worked at the front desk. Someone, okay, Rod, called the Kingsport Times News and told them something was going on at the Downtowner. They send a reporter over and the next day there was a story about us and our movie at the top of the front page. Newspapers didn’t have anything to write about then either.

It was about this time that Rod met a girl named Ann Hill. The best thing a best friend can do is know when to recede into the background. That didn’t mean we weren’t still best friends or that we didn’t double date.

Or keep making each other laugh.

In fact one night at the beach, Rod and Ann wanted a little together time and Rod asked if I would distract Ann’s 15-year-old sister Sue while they took a walk on the beach. I was 20. Today that would get both Rod and I indicted.

It wasn’t long till wedding bells rang. Rod asked me to be his best man. I remember as we stood in the atrium at the side of the church, I told Rod, “It’s not too late. My car is out front. Here are the keys. You can be in Mexico before anyone notices.”

But Rod made the right decision.

I was a columnist at the student newspaper at UT then and I wrote a column about Rod’s wedding.

A few years later when it was my turn to marry, I asked Rod if he would conduct the ceremony. By then Rod was working in public relations at Eastman and he was also an ordained minister. As we stood before Reverend Rod, I heard some familiar words: “If you find someone you really love, that you want to spend the rest of your life with, in Leave it to Beaver terms, someone you think is really neat, why would you want to spoil it all and get married. Rod was quoting back to me from the column I had written about his wedding.

Later when my mother told my cousin Lois that I had been married by a p.r. man from Eastman, Lois, who had worked at Eastman in the fifties and knew the sway the company held over Kingsport, said, “You mean p.r. men at Eastman can now marry people?”

Now we were both married, both raising families, living several hundred miles apart.

We still occasionally wrote and talked on the phone. I could go six months without talking to Rod but when we got together on the phone, we picked right back up.

In 2002 I moved back to Kingsport to take care of my mother who had suffered a stroke and was exhibiting unusual behavior.

I called Rod to tell him I was back and explaining why. I remember asking “Is your mother going crazy yet?” Rod said, “How could I tell?”

It was at this time that Rod was promoted to his Washington job. So I’m back in Kingsport and he is in Washington most of the time.

I spent three days there with him in the fall of 2006 and he told me it was the best job he’d ever had. Two months later Rod had his first seizure.

He called to tell me about it. He thought he had had one seizure in his office, come to, and gone down to the washroom, where he had a second seizure. He told me he remembers coming to, blood rolling down his cheek and looking up. There had been another man in the restroom at the time. Rod said, “This guy steps across me to get out and I remember thinking, Hey, you didn’t wash your hands!”

Only Rod could find humor in a tumor.

It was a difficult three and a half years as Rod fought against his cancer.

He told me after one of his surgeries the doctor was testing his consciousness and asked, Can you count backwards from 25? Rod said he told the doctor, “Can you?”

A year ago I started telling him what a fighter he was. “You are now in the two percent survival category.” I’d tell him, “Rod, for the first time in your life, you are in the top two percent of your class.”

He always loved that and would laugh loudly.

When I read Rod’s obituary, I had to chuckle. I knew he would. It says that I will be officiating. I know Rod would tell me I would have to wear a black and white striped shirt and bring a whistle if I were going to officiate.

I know that Rod doesn’t want anyone crying for him. He wants you to laugh.

I know that from now on anytime I think of Rod, I’ll laugh.

I’ll remember this story he told me not long ago.

He was in speech therapy the last few months. One day he handed a sheet to his daughter Emily and asked her to fill it out for him. She thought it was because he was having vision problems that day and dutifully filled it out for him. It wasn't until she handed it back to him that she realized: she had just done his speech therapy homework for him.

Same old Rod, to the very end.

War Brides in Kingsport - 1946

2010-03-06T21:26:00.002-05:00

The Oakwood Market Waterfall 1956-2010

2010-03-04T20:40:00.005-05:00

Oakwood Market on West Sullivan in 1953, before the addition of the waterfall sign. Courtesy City of Kingsport Archives.

The Agony of Defeat

2010-02-27T19:01:00.005-05:00

It was Yugoslavian "ski flyer" Vinko Bogataj who gave ABC's Wide World of Sports its iconic "agony of defeat" footage. For the intro theme click here.

Here is an ABC profile of Vinko that includes his complete ill-fated ski jump run.

Douglass High School To Get Historical Marker

2010-02-20T13:30:00.004-05:00

The Tennessee Historical Commission voted Friday February 19, 2010 to approve an historical marker for Douglass High School. The marker should be erected sometime this summer.

Here is the first reference to "Douglas High School" in the Kingsport Times of September 1927.

And here is a record of the school's athletic teams compiled for the 1965 Kiwanis Club annual.

The Scat Cats Early Days

2010-02-11T20:34:00.009-05:00

Their first appearance in the newspaper came in this 1958 ad:

Here's the full page for readers who enjoy checking out what else was happening on this day in history:

In 1963, they hit the big time...

How Much Did Your Teacher Make?

2010-02-09T04:54:00.001-05:00

The Mysterious Death of Guy B. Crawford - !961

2010-02-06T16:49:00.004-05:00

The Year Without a Summer, The Year the Holston River Froze - 1816

2010-02-04T11:37:00.002-05:00

Barney Pendleton says that with all the cold weather I need to write a column about 1816, the Year Without a Summer, the Year the Holston River Froze. Then I remembered I had already written that column, five years ago!

This column was originally published January 16, 2005:

Torrential rains in sunny Southern California?

A deadly tsunami in the South Pacific?

Reports of mudslides and volcanoes have been all over the news as the weather has moved from its little front-page box to take over the headlines.

In short, the weather has been crazy.

But nothing like 1816.

That was the Year of Hard Times, the Year Without a Summer. That was the year that ponds in the Kingsport area - it wasn’t called Kingsport yet - iced over in July.

Those who survived that crazy climate change would later refer to it as “Eighteen hundred and froze to death.”

It all began in 1812 when the Tambora island volcano in Indonesia awoke from a 5,000-year slumber and began emitting steam and ash. Then on April 5, 1815 Tambora exploded with such force that its volcanic column soared 15 miles into the sky. The blast was heard 600 miles away. But it was only the beginning.

Five days later Tambora really blew her stack, sending volcanic matter up 25 miles.

The superheated flows of ash, rock and pumice from the mountain wiped out the province’s entire population of ten thousand people. And the resulting 20-foot tsunamis swamped nearby islands. In the end the death toll reached more than 117,000.

The Tambora eruption has been assigned retrospectively a 7 on the 8-point VEI (Volcanic Explosivity Index), the only 7 since Baitoushan on the China-Korea border erupted in 1050 A.D. It was a whopper.

It would be a year before the effects of Tambora would be felt around here but felt they were.

As the late Muriel Spoden details in her book “The Netherland Inn Chronicles,” “All went exceedingly well for (merchant) George Hale until April of 1816 when all of the citizens in the Christianville Boat Yard area experienced the beginning of a very hard time.”

It was a very hard time, particularly in the Northeastern states. Adino Brackett of Lancaster, New Hampshire would later record in his diary 1816, “This past summer and fall (of 1816) have been so cold and miserable that I have from despair kept no account of the weather. It could have been nothing but a repeatation of frost and drought.”

Even Europe was affected. “A wet, ungenial summer” ruined a Swiss holiday for Mary Shelley, John Polidori and their friends but produced a happy outcome for readers. Forced to stay indoors Shelley wrote “Frankenstein” and Polidori penned “The Vampyre.”

The odd weather patterns resulting from sunlight being blocked by all that volcanic ash was felt as far south as northeast Tennessee. Locals noted an unusual red glow in sunsets.

Spoden writes, “Starting in April, (1816) severe cold weather, with snow, ice and frost became progressively worse through August…. People froze to death as snow and sleet fell for seventeen days in May. August was worse as ice coating killed everything green and ice covered ponds and rivers.”

There was even a frost on August 22. Spoden says, “Crops were ruined. Seed corn stored in 1815 sold in the spring of 1817 for $5 to $10 a bushel. To add to the farming and boating woes, the spring flood curtailed business throughout the area. These and other problems caused George Hale to lose the King Saltworks contracts, and many charge customers were unable to pay their bills.”

It was a very hard time indeed in east Tennessee

But the long-term effects of the Year without a Summer were even more profound for the country. Dave Thurlow of the Weather Notebook radio show says the impact is still being felt today, particularly the effect of one June cold snap that killed the vegetable crop across the Northeast and inspired many bankrupt farmers to pack up and move to the more temperate Midwest. “Had there been no reason for European settlers to head west at that time, the nation's distribution of farmland and manufacturing, and its balance of power, might have turned out much differently. You could say that our lives today are, in some ways, the product of a 5-day cold snap (189) years ago.”

Sky Rockets at Night - 1945

2010-02-03T14:55:00.002-05:00

Is this fireworks or just a kid with skills mixing gunpowder?

To view the entire video of the 1945 D-B - Knoxville high school football game, click here. Decide for yourself if there were fireworks or not.

The Amazing Nemar and His Blindfold Drive Through Kingsport in 1931

2010-01-30T17:12:00.005-05:00

Charlie Heffner R.I.P 1919-2010 - Kingsport's Mr. Umpire

2010-01-26T09:17:00.004-05:00

Click here to view Charlie's minor league playing record.

This is the first mention of Charlie in the Kingsport Times. He had just arrived from Pennsylvania to play for our Class D minor league baseball team.

After a successful season, Charlie was sold to Pensacola of the Florida State League.

Kingsport Times sports editor John Bloomer described Charlie's fielding prowess in one 1940 game:

"Heffner, whose short, stubby stature would never mark him as an outfielder, made two of the most breath-taking catches last night it has ever been this writer's privilege to see. They were such as to leave the spectators momentarily stunned when they finally realized that he actually had the ball. He raced 30 yards into right field to make the first one, a onehanded stab that nobody thought he had until he hurled it down to second base as he cut back on the dead run. The second came a few innings later when he raced again about 20 yards out of position to pick one up off the top of the grass on the dead run. Again, without stopping, he let fly, dead to the pin, at first base to catch the runner before he had time to get back and tag up for a double out. That comprised two of the most sensational catches that Kingsport Cherokee fans will see here this season, and makes us wonder again why the little Pennsylvanian didn't stick with Pensacola in his tryout."

By 1976 Charlie was the dean of local umpires and was profiled by Bill Lane.

Kingsport's Boys of Autumn - 1945

2010-01-15T14:04:00.004-05:00

D-B's 1945 team went undefeated and untied. You can watch film from the game against Knoxville High here.

Below is the newspaper story about the game.

Gumby creator Art Clokey died last weekend

2010-01-12T15:17:00.003-05:00

The Gumby bendable figure was hot Christmas 1966, witness this ad from J&M Wholesale.

Gumby was part of channel 5's kiddie show "Looney Tunes Club" in 1966:

Kingsport Snowfall Records

2010-01-10T06:12:00.002-05:00

Chart from the National Climatic Data Center

Elvis in 1955

2010-01-07T11:21:00.006-05:00

I've been searching for years for photos of Elvis performing at Kingsport's Civic Auditorium in September 1955 to no avail. The best I can do is direct you to the best website for early Elvis photos and stories, scottymoore.net, where there are pictures of Elvis from Cleveland three weeks after he appeared in Kingsport.

Click here for the link to the Cleveland photos.

Click here to see a silent home movie of Elvis, Scotty and bassist Bill Black performing in Lubbock, Texas in 1955.

Below are two screen shots from that video, Elvis performing and Elvis and Scotty clowning around.

Letters to Santa - 1927

2009-12-11T05:27:00.004-05:00

In 1927 the Kingsport Times published more than 1,000 letters to Santa from local children. Here is the final haul, printed on Christmas Day 1927.

Suction Cup - 1964 satirical (??) magazine from D-B

2009-12-04T15:58:00.006-05:00

In 1964 when the Dobyns-Bennett English department published a student literary magazine, Arrowhead, Steve Moriarty and I created our answer, a "trash magazine" called Suction Cup (the arrowhead on a little kid's arrow).

It was all handwritten and lost for more than four decades. But now, unfortunately, it has been found. And here it is.

Most Popular Christmas Songs

2009-12-03T05:16:00.002-05:00

1. "Winter Wonderland," Eurythmics
2. "The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire)," Nat "King" Cole
3. "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," The Pretenders
4. "Sleigh Ride," The Ronettes
5. " Santa Claus Is Coming to Town," Frank Sinatra
6. "Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!" Michael Buble
7. "White Christmas," Bing Crosby
8. "Jingle Bell Rock," Bobby Helms
9. " Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer," Gene Autry
10. "The Little Drummer Boy," The Harry Simeone Chorale & Orchestra
11. "It's the Most Wonderful Time of Year," Andy Williams
12. "Rockin' Around Christmas Tree," Brenda Lee
13. "Silver Bells," Kenny G
14. "I'll Be Home for Christmas," Amy Grant
15. "Feliz Navidad," José Feliciano
16. " Frosty the Snowman," The Ronettes
17. "A Holly Jolly Christmas," Burl Ives
18. "It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas," Johnny Mathis
19. "Blue Christmas," Elvis Presley
20. "(There's No Place Like) Home for the Holidays," Perry Como
21. "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus," John Mellencamp
22. "Here Comes Santa Claus (Right Down Santa Claus Lane)," Gene Autry
23. "Carol of the Bells," David Foster
24. "Do They Know It's Christmas?" Band Aid
25. "This Christmas," Gloria Estefan
This list is from the industry group ASCAP, which tracks radio play over a five-year period. This is the latest list, from November 2008.

Ken Murray Photos Now Offered Through Art Gallery

2009-11-26T10:26:00.008-05:00

Well-known local photojournalist Ken Murray is now represented by Up Against the Wall Gallery in the sale of his photos. Here is a selection of some of the prints that are available, framed or unframed.

You can get the details on the gallery here.

Santa Train from the Air - 2009

2009-11-25T03:24:00.008-05:00

Aerial photographer Richard Pike sent me these unique and wonderful photos of the Santa Train from the air. I'm publishing them here with his permission.

Fred Herr's Christmas present 2008

2009-11-20T17:06:00.005-05:00

Last year Fred Herr’s daughter Laura asked him what he had wanted for Christmas as a kid and never received.

On Christmas he opened up a package from her that contained a miniature working steam engine, “just like the one on page 356 of the 1958 Sears Wishbook. And it works!”

Where did Laura get the idea to get her dad a vintage Christmas present? Fred says, “Laura had always wanted an Easy Bake oven. We finally gave her one for her 21st birthday last May.”

Fred found his steam engine in a vintage Sears catalog that is posted online.

About this time last year I published the link to a website called Wishbook Web. It’s home to 32 old Christmas catalogs, beginning with the 1940 Sears Christmas Catalog (136 pages) and going on up to the 1988 Sears Christmas Wishbook (676 pages).

There’s also the 1933 Spiegel Christmas catalog (64 pages), the 1941 Lord & Taylor Christmas catalog (170 pages), the 1967 FAO Schwartz Christmas catalog (156 pages) and the 1976 J.C. Penney Christmas catalog (512 pages). Penney’s announced earlier this week that it will no longer publish its “big book” catalogs, focusing instead on the smaller specialty catalogs. But it will continue to publish its Christmas catalog!

The Christmas catalog website address is here.

You can relive your childhood one Sears Wishbook at a time!

1947 Teen Bowl - D-B vs. Atlanta Marist

2009-11-14T10:36:00.019-05:00

Kingsport's Gangland Slaying!

2009-11-10T09:44:00.002-05:00

Back in February 2009, I wrote a column about a local "racket man" and his dead wife. During his interrogation after the 1940 murder, accused killer Charlie Rice brought up, on his own, a Chicago gangland slaying, the murder of Jake Lingle. Chicago Magazine has just published a lengthy investigation in the Lingle murder. And apparently our boy Charlie really didn't have anything to do with it.

Here is a link to the Jake Lingle story. And below is my earlier column about Charlie Rice and his murdered wife.

He came to Kingsport from Chicago in the thirties and opened Club Belvedere on the Johnson City Highway, a hotspot best known for the number of times it was raided by police.

She accompanied him here, a small town Indiana girl who had hooked up with this self described “racket man.” She was his fourth wife although she didn’t know it.

That would come out at his trial but she wasn’t there to hear it. She was dead.

On the night of March 10, 1940 he was founding standing over her lifeless body, a smoking gun in his hand. Literally.

Her blood-splattered corpse was partially nude. The man in bed next to her was also nude. He was alive.

It happened in Room 4 of the appropriately named Elite Hotel at 132 East Main Street.

Had Peggy Rice been involved in what the newspaper delicately called the “eternal triangle?” Was her slaying at the hand of her much older husband Charlie a part of the “unwritten law,” as the newspaper suggested?

Or was it Kingsport’s first, and probably only gangland murder.

First the facts. The initial newspaper report said that “Mrs. Gladys ‘Peggy’ Henriott Rice, 26-year-old wife of Charles C. Rice, 43, well known former Kingsport night club operator and manager of the Kingsport branch of Tennessee Bonding Co., was fatally wounded about 7 p. m, yesterday in a Main Street hotel room.”

Rice and his wife’s lover, John Q. “Shorty” Rhea, 44, were arrested shortly after the slaying and bound over for first degree murder by Magistrate George E. Bradley.

But the story had an odd odor to it from the get-go. First, isn’t it generally the rival who is murdered? Rice didn’t fire a shot at the man he found in bed with his wife. But he shot her in the chest and calmly waited for the police to arrive. And second, there was Charlie’s background, as reported in a follow up story the next day, which also corrected Mrs. Rice’s age. She was now 30.

Rice admitted to the newspaper that he was a “racket man,” a common term for a gangster. “When questioned today regarding his connections in Illinois and Indiana, Rice said: ‘I know what you want with that. It’s that Jake Lingle case again. They tried to make me the payoff man in that case, but I was 4,000 miles away.’”

The newspaper explained parenthetically that Jake Lingle was a Chicago newspaperman who was killed in 1930, allegedly by Chicago gangsters “because he knew too much about the Chicago underworld.”

Rice said he had nothing to do with paying off Lingle’s convicted murderer Leo Brothers although he did admit he owned the Danville, Ill. hotel where the payoff took place. “I guess I still do.”

As for the slaying of his spouse, Rice claimed he had left her in Miami two weeks earlier and did not know she was back in town until the afternoon of the murder when he got a telephone call from an unknown woman. He told police he still didn’t believe his wife could be in a hotel room with another man until he opened the door and walked in on the couple. Of course he had conveniently brought along a .38 caliber pistol.

Mrs. Rice’s bedmate, “Shorty” Rhea, identified by the newspaper as the “alleged operator of the Hi-Hat Night Club,” said that he had gone to Mrs. Rice’s room about 4 p.m. after she telephoned him to bring her two bottles of beer. “’I had known her for quite a while,’ Rhea said, ‘and when I took the beer to her room I stayed to talk with her. After a while I got sleepy and lay down on the bed for a nap.’”

Sometime in the interim they both apparently removed their clothes, Mrs. Rice hanging her dress and fur coat neatly in the closet.

Shorty said he was awakened sometime later when Mrs. Rice shouted, “‘There's Charlie!’ I looked up and Charlie was standing at the foot of the bed. ‘Don't either of you move or I'll kill both of you,’ Rhea quoted Rice as saying.”

According to Rhea, the three talked for about twenty minutes, then Rice stood up, shot his wife, and refused to call an ambulance because “she isn’t hurt much.”

She was dead when an ambulance arrived.

Trial began in Sullivan County Circuit Court on Friday May 24, 1940 with Judge Shelburne Ferguson presiding. Rice was represented by T.R. Bandy, Shorty Rhea by John R. Todd. It was a short proceeding, a day and a half. Rice claimed on the stand that the gun accidentally discharged when his wife lunged for it. Police testified neither Rice nor Rhea made any mention of the pistol firing accidentally when they were arrested. Rice also admitted that Peggy Rice was his fourth wife, although he didn’t count the third because they had never lived together

After two hours of deliberations the Blountville jury returned a verdict of guilty of involuntary manslaughter, apparently believing the accidental shooting story, and sentenced Charles C. Rice to two years in prison. Rhea was acquitted.

Rice served eighteen months in the Tennessee State Prison in Nashville before returning to Kingsport, where he got in trouble again a year later for running a bootlegging operation at Circle Court Cottages, formerly the Hi-Hat Club, at the Upper Circle where Warpath intersects with Memorial Boulevard. He left Kingsport for good soon after.

In 1970 Times News reporter Bob Smith found Rice in Florida, where he owned a restaurant, a fleet of shrimp boats, a trailer park, a fishing dock and a hotel, from all appearances a successful businessman. Smith found Rice because he was in trouble, again, this time for swearing he was a U.S. citizen when in fact he had been born in Poland.

Charlie Rice died in Houston Texas in 1974. He left behind wife number five, or six, or who knows, and “several children.”

The Tams in Tricities 1976!

2009-10-27T15:43:00.001-04:00

Click on image to enlarge.

Bargains at the Five and Dime - 1919 Style

2009-10-20T18:50:00.003-04:00

Scroll down two posts for McCrory's 1950 ad.

Horse Krickers (Remember Horse Krickers, Eastman Kids?) Coin Purse

2009-10-20T09:43:00.001-04:00

Coin purse courtesy of Eddie Grills who says he got it from David Good.

Kingsport's Five and Ten Cent Stores

2009-10-18T06:48:00.006-04:00

What could you buy for a nickel in 1919? Here's an ad for Kingsport's first five and ten cent store, Hillman's which was located at 340 Broad Street.

The big chains started arriving in 1927 when Woolworth's opened on Broad Street.

The last big five and dime to arrive in town was McCrory's in March 1950. The building will soon be a Mexican restaurant. (Photo courtesy of City of Kingsport Archives)

Here are the specials for McCrory's opening day in 1950.