2nd Post "THE PAST IS MYSELF"

The year was 1928 and across the Southeastern United States poverty was a way of life. Only 63 years had passed since the great Civil War had ravaged the South and the reconstruction was not fully complete. In the state of Tennessee, “modern” utilities were only available in large metropolitan areas, Nashville, Knoxville, Memphis, Chattanooga and some smaller cities. The great T. V. A. (Tennessee Valley Authority) had not yet come into the region and was only a twinkle in the eye of some of Washington's Politicians.
A young man from the farmland of Middle Tennessee had gone to Chicago to seek employment and had started a career with the "Southern Cottonseed Oil Company", which later became what we know today as "Wesson Oil". The young man went home to Tennessee for a vacation and visited a neighbor who was working in his family's tobacco field. The sun was hot and the rows were long and this young man hated working in the tobacco fields.
"Floyd, I'm going back to Chicago tonight, if you want to come with me, I know you can find work there"!
Floyd retrieved the old "carpet bag" from the attic, filled it with what clothing he owned, took what money he had and climbed into the passenger side of the Hupmobile for his first ever venture outside his native county.
In Chicago Floyd worked for the Southern Cottonseed Oil Company for a period of time until a policeman neighbor told him about the “bus company” hiring. He went to the company's hiring garage and became a member of the work force of the "Chicago Motor Coach Company".
Floyd's fellow Tennessean later left the Southern Cottonseed Oil Company and found employment with the Pullman Company located in the Roseland Area of South Chicago.
Floyd's friend had a sister who migrated from Tennessee in 1929, became employed by "The National Tea Company" grocery chain and later became a store manager during the great World War II, when the "Rosie the Riveter" women of America made up the American Work Force.
Floyd and Mary Lee began courting, (as it was called in those days), fell in love, got married and after 7 years of marriage Floyd begat a son.
Being from the agrarian culture, it was not even a consideration for the child to be reared anywhere except in the Yellow Creek Valley from whence the parents had migrated. So, at age three the child was sent to Tennessee to be reared in the "family tradition".
Having shared some background information with you, I'll now get on with the entrance into your life, this classmate, "Dixie".
One of my mother's sisters was a rural school teacher, teaching in a one room school with all grades spread between the fourteen students from kindergarten through the eighth grade. One of her brothers operated the family farm and her mother was the old crippled matriarch overseeing everything.
There was no electricity, indoor plumbing, central heating nor any of the conveniences that were prevalent in the cities. The only luxury was a battery powered "Atwater-Kent" radio which only “picked up” one clear channel station out of Nashville, Tennessee. This was the entertainment for the entire hollow on Saturday Nights when neighbors would gather around the radio to listen to "The Grand Ol Opry" out of WSM in Nashville.
We had no automobiles, only 4 teams of mules and 2 steel tired wagons for farm work and travel to other communities.

When I reached the 8th grade, Floyd and Mary Lee decided I should come to Chicago and receive an education in the "Christian Schools" which had been recommended by the pastor of their church.
WOW, what a culture shock to arrive in a large city from a rural Southern Community. Live with parents who I hardly even knew, and be a stranger to fellow classmates, who through life and religious services had been to a large extent acquainted, at least in their culture.
I'm certain I was a strange duck in your pond.
The values placed on my life via parents was to go to school, go to work, go to church and go home. No band, no extra curricular activities, no sports; "if you have time for these then you have time to be working." The pay I received for after school and Saturday employment paid my tuition, purchased my books and bought my clothes. I never came to school with more than a bus token to ride to work and then home after work, no cash to jingle in my pockets as my peers seemed to have.
I really yearned to be a part of you and share in all I observed, but that was not to be.
Your Englewood Christian School and Chicago Christian High School taught me some values that I never would have received in the Tennessee Rural Schools in the late 1940s and early to middle 1950s. Only three other pupils who attended the one room school with me ever completed high school and only one other even went on to receive a college degree.
You taught me about the classics of the Masters in Art, Literature and Music. Mr. Robert Gosselink's Physics Class charged my interest in telephony, which became my lifelong career. Miss Gerda Bos gave such a delightful description of eating Kippers when in England, that even today when I have Kippers and tea I think of her. I can hear her now, in teaching about the great 6th century Scandinavian Warrior, "Beowulf", "With my grip will I grapple the gruesome fiend"! Mr. Rooze, during one of our chapel services read from a book authored by Henry Van Dyke and the story was "A Handful of Clay". I loved the story and because of Mr. Rooze's inspiration, I now own most all of the books authored by Henry Van Dyke, even the out of print copies.
Elmer Huizenga gave me the nickname of "Dixie" and in Englewood Christian School our class "drew names" for Christmas Gift sharing. Elmer drew me and gave me some magic trick components which are still with me; I passed them on to my son. My only regret during my tenure with you was not to have been available to know you better during that particular point in time, and for you to have known and understood me.
When I arrived to you, I was frightened, not knowing, in a strange world among nothing remotely identifiable to me. When I left you I was strong in my convictions and had received knowledge that would give me the ability to go forward and be successful in my endeavors. Anything I ever achieved in life I attribute to the education of the Chicago Christian School Experience.
My parents left Chicago in December 1955 and returned to Tennessee, only to return to Chicago a year later and stay until 1965.
I sought employment with Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company and was employed at age seventeen after having a minor's release signed by my parents. I received my college work through the Bell System's Tuition Plan and progressed in my career until I retired after thirty years of service. I spent three years in the U. S. Army from 1961 until 1964,




After my retirement I traveled for four years across this great United States, visiting all 48 contiguous states and most of our National Parks. One trip out in the motor home was for thirteen months straight. However, for me, retirement is a state of mind, and after the four years of travel, I was ready to get back in the harness and work. I was hired by the Raychem Corp. of Menlo Park, California as a consultant on cable splicing techniques and closing of various telecommunication cables, most especially fiber optic cables. My territory encompassed Eastern Kentucky, all of West Virginia and the Southwest Sector of Virginia.
My father came to live with me after my mother passed away and I took care of him until he passed at the age of ninety seven years. His father lived until the day before his one hundredth birthday, however, my own father did not quite make it to that length.
I yearned to come to your reunion and visit with all of you who attended, but having smoked cigarettes forty years, I have severe emphysema and the trip to Chicago was not an option. My wife Tina has a terminal liver disease, "Primary Biliary Cirrhosis" which is caused by a rare gene she was born with. The disease is rare and only rears its ugly head at middle age, there is no cure and eight out of every one hundred thousand women are susceptible of acquiring the disease.
I have a son who is a graphic artist in Atlanta and a daughter who is in the medical field in Delaware.
I have enjoyed reading the bios you have been forwarding to me and I just thought I would give you a little info about this stranger who alighted in your midst over fifty years ago. I wish each and every one of you the best God has to offer and thank you for having received me into your circle.
Robert Morris McClurkan (aka) Dixie
rmcclurkan@bellsouth.net