Electrocuted! - A Story About My Dad

As you look at this front page of the Daily Quill, what catches your eye first? What do you immediately scan for? Do you lock onto the pictures? The headlines?

When I see a newspaper or a clipping from a newspaper, my first thought or question is; "What's the date?" "What era is this from?" This grounds me and I can relate it to the span of my life or a history timeline.

Then I look at the pictures to see if, by a quick scan, I can recognize any of the faces. Then I scan the names associated with the pictures for a name I recognize to put with a face.

The headlines are last. I scan them for a word or phrase that I can relate to events in my life.

There are several articles on this page that gave a brief glance into events that impacted many lives. Some in a good way. Some in a bad way. There is a celebration of a fifty year marriage with all the family getting together. A date is set for a murder trial. The Zizzer "B" team wins a grudge football game. Jefferson Avenue gets new blacktopping.

However, it is one of the smaller articles on this page that made the biggest impact on my life.

The date is September 21st, 1960; Fifty-seven years, one month and five days ago. (I wasn't even born yet!)

The headline: "Leahmon Riggs Suffers Severe Burns Here Today" (And first of all, let's make a correction. My Dad's name was spelled "Leamon".)

Here is the article enlarged for ease of reading:

Down through the years, the statement of facts in this article have been repeated and confirmed by my Dad and Mom, and others in the family. Ralph was only nine months old at the time so his memory of the events is like mine, from the telling of the tragedy and from seeing the effects on my Dad's body.

Let me just start with where the accident took place. From my understanding, the Kilkenny Limestone Co. was east of the old depot building in West Plains, on the north side of the tracks. I think the shell of the building is still there but I haven't been able to confirm this. If you are on St. Louis Street going south, just before you cross the railroad tracks, look to your right and you will see the old Kilkenny Limestone Co. building (I think).

Then, there was the 30,000 volt Ark-Mo electric line that he contacted. I talked with my Grandpa, Elmer Riggs (Popo), about this. From my recollection, he said that the line ran directly over the building and was (obviously) low enough to touch when you were standing on the building. Popo said that he had tried from the beginning of the job to get Ark-Mo (Arkansas-Missouri Power Company) to move the electric line away from the building. Ark-Mo delayed, lollygagged and drug their feet about moving the line. The building had to go up so the construction crew, including my Dad, was trying to "work around" the line to finish construction. I'll say more about Ark-Mo's delay later.

The metal decking they were putting on the roof was just long, narrow sheets of corrugated steel, probably 4' wide and anywhere from 10'-16' feet long. As Dad was carrying a piece of the metal over his shoulder, and using both hands to balance it; the end behind him tipped up and made contact with the high voltage line.

When contact was made with the 30,000 volt line, the electricity traveled through the metal roofing to Dad's hands, through his hands, arms, torso, legs, and finally out the bottoms of his feet to the metal he was standing on. When the electricity left his feet, it created a arc or a weld to the roof and when this happened, it burnt holes in the bottoms of both feet. Basically, he was welded to the roof by his feet. Also (and I'm not sure if or how this would have happened) but the electricity also blew out the soft parts of his armpits. I do know that to his dying day, one of his arms, (probably his right arm) had a dark brown ring just right above his bicep that was caused by this accident.

The shock knocked my Dad unconscious and he almost fell off of the roof. I assume by reading this article that he regained consciousness by the time he was transported to the hospital.

The recovery process was nothing more than one long drawn out nightmare for my Dad. They were going to graft skin onto the bottoms of his feet and that skin had to come from someplace on his body that the bottoms of his feet could touch.

Just try to touch the bottom of one of your feet to some area on your body where you would like to lose some skin! It ain't easy! They started by cutting a square of skin on the calf of one leg and leaving it attached by the lower side so it would flap down.

Then they sewed the flap to the bottom of his other foot where the electricity had burnt and blown out the skin, but leaving it attached to the calf.

After Dad's foot was sewn to the graft on his calf, they put a stick across from one bend of his leg to the other, to keep from putting too much pressure on the graft.

After the stick was in place, the entire area of Dad's right and left legs were encased in plaster of paris, up his thigh, close to the groin, down to the ankle on one leg and below the knee, just above the graft on the other. Both ends of the stick were encased in the plaster so his legs were immobile.

If you think this would be as bad as it could get... Think again.

Because the doctors could only do one foot at a time, the hole in his other foot had to be kept open and not allowed to scar or heal. Every day, the medical staff would have to scrape, scrub, and cut out the dead and dying flesh from the wound. I have to admit, even as I'm typing this, I get tears in my eyes thinking about the pain and suffering that my old Dad went through.

After the skin graft began to grow onto Dad's foot, the piece of skin that attached the graft to his calf was cut off and the process was began all over again on his other foot. I'm not real sure of the time span between the accident and when he was dismissed from the hospital but I do know he was home for Christmas in 1960. Mom told me that they had the Riggs' Christmas at their house and they had bought Dad a new recliner so he could be somewhat comfortable while he was recovering.

This ordeal brought a lot of changes to the Riggs household. Again, I was not there for many of them but I saw and experienced the effects; and actually am STILL feeling the effects from this accident. Some of the effects were bad. But there was at least one effect that was good.

When this accident happened, my Dad was not a Christian. He went to church with Mom and Ralph, but he had not surrendered his heart and life to God. When he was able to walk and then sit for an extended period of time, Dad went back to church at the Victoria Mission Pentecostal Church near Cull, Missouri. I have heard Brother Harold Essary, the pastor at the church at that time, repeat the story of Dad's conversion many, many times.

"When Leamon came up to the altar that Sunday morning, he couldn't kneel down to pray. So he just sat on the altar and prayed through to old time salvation!"

Like he was in everything in life, Dad was a quietly spiritual person. He couldn't kneel to pray so he sat at his seat at prayer time with his head bent into his hand. The few times that I remember when he was asked to pray publicly, was obviously uncomfortable for him. And I never remember seeing him participate in our Pentecostal style of worship.

But... We went to church. We did not miss regular services on Sunday, Sunday night, Wednesday night, Saturday night youth service, revival meetings (sometime two or three weeks long... or longer), youth rallys, fellowship meetings and revivals at neighboring churches. We went to church!

My Dad LOVED sports. Basketball, college football, baseball... He would sit for hours with his old radio (they got rid of the television when he got saved) and listen to the games. He allowed Ralph and I to play some sports in grade school. But nothing that would interfere with our church going. Since high school sports would require us to miss some of the regularly scheduled church services, the Riggs boys didn't play (and besides, he kept us too busy working to worry about football or basketball!!).

There were some bad effects. Looking back from a fifty-plus-year perspective, I really think my Dad had or came close to having, a nervous breakdown while he was in the hospital. I say this because of one of his peculiar irritations. 

He could not bear to hear anyone chewing on potato chips, ice, popcorn, anything that had a crunch.

Many is the time when he would say to us (as we were crunching away...) "If you're going to eat them, you go outside or to another room." Dad said that to him, the crunching was like someone scratching their fingernails down a chalk board.

Dad said (or my Mom told me), that it stemmed from when he was in the hospital and had the casts on his legs. He was basically immobile and could only move with assistance and a traction bar over his bed. One night when my Grandpa, Popo, was sitting with Dad, he brought in a big bag of potato chips. Popo sat and crunched his way through the bag and Dad was never the same. Popo never knew about this and it would have caused him a lot of grief if he would have known about it.

The strange thing about this whole "crunching/munching" thing is, I seem to have inherited the same irritation that my Dad had. My family thinks I am crazy but I cannot stand to hear loud crunching of potato chips, celery, carrots, etc... I have to leave the room or turn the music up!

Another thing that was never allowed in our home was small toys: marbles, hotwheels cars and such like, to be left in the floor where they could be stepped on.

On the calves of my Dad's legs, there was a rectangular, sunken-in scar, where the graft had been taken out.

Right now, I want you to look at the calf of your leg... and then take your fingers and push on it. Pretty soft and tender isn't it?? Think about that skin being on the bottom of your foot, right where the arch is at. That area of your foot is tender anyway but it was made extra sensitive on Dad's feet because of the graft. When he did step on something in his sock feet (I never saw him walk bare-footed) he would almost go into orbit! He didn't cuss or get loud, but he let us know, in no uncertain terms, that we need to PICK UP THE STUFF OUT OF THE FLOOR!!

Because of the nature of a graft like Dad had, scar tissue would form around the edge of the graft, where it met the natural skin of his feet. I would guess that now-a-days, you go to the doctor to get this scar tissue cut back in a sanitary room, with a local anesthetic and a hefty bill to boot.

Not my Dad! In my mind I can see him right now, sitting down in a kitchen chair, pulling his foot up into his lap, and going to work on the scar tissue... with his razor-sharp, Case pocket knife! Every couple of months or so, this ritual was performed.

If I haven't grossed you out by now... As Columbo would say "Just One More Thing."

When you looked at your calf a few minutes ago (men and hopefully not women), what did you see? Hair? Uh-huh... My Dad had HAIR on the bottom of his feet!! Yep! The hair on the graft continued to grow, even though it was on the bottom of his feet.

There was a somewhat positive development or you might say, outcome to Dad's accident.

When he was recovering, Dad was obviously not working. I'm really not sure if he had some kind of worker's compensation insurance or if it was unemployment pay but the family survived. His family and community turned out to help in so many ways. I do remember one  person that Mom mentioned many, many times.

James Bales ran the little store and gas station at County Line near our farm house. When James found out about Dad's accident, he said to Mom, "Helen, you come get anything you need from my store and gas when you need it. Don't worry about paying for it 'til you're able." You don't forget people like that.

The medical bills were piling up though.

After Dad was recovered to the point of being able to function somewhat normally, he contacted an attorney. An up and coming younger man in his mid-thirties, Harold L. Henry, Esq. Popo always claimed that the Henry's were some kind of shirt-tail relation. And they might be... Popo's mother's maiden name was Sally Parthena Henry, daughter of George Mumphry Henry.

Mr. Henry took the case and sued Ark-Mo Power for negligence, in not moving the electric line from across the Kilkenny Limestone Company building, in a timely fashion. I don't know a lot of the details about the Circuit Court trial but in the end, the jury found in favor of Dad and awarded an $80,000 settlement. My brother, Ralph, was visiting with Judge Don Henry a few months ago and Judge Henry (Harold Henry's son) gave this little tidbit of information about the case.

It seems that when the jury found in favor of Dad, they asked the judge if they, as the jury, could increase the amount of the settlement. They felt that it was not enough for the suffering that Dad endured. The judge informed them that that was not possible but it goes to show the amount of evidence that was presented in Dad's favor.

Ark-Mo appealed the jury's decision and the case was sent to the U.S. Court of Appeals 8th District in Springfield, Missouri. An additional attorney was retained for the appeal, Mr. B.H. Clampett, Esq of Springfield.

After the evidence from the circuit court was presented, the Appeals court upheld the decision and dismissed Ark-Mo's appeal.

Although this accident affected my Dad in so many ways, he did not wallow in pity and allow the injury to control his life. He continued in the construction business until the early 70's and then in roughly this order, he was: a real estate salesman, real estate broker, ran a tax preparation service, was an auction clerk, ran a moving and storage business, ran a used furniture store, repaired tractors and various other farm equipment, and built tandem axle trailers.

My Dad and the way he handled adversity, has kept me grounded in the few little problems I have faced in my lifetime... And, I hope you have enjoyed this small glimpse into the history of my family.

(If you have questions about anything that is unclear or can clarify something in this story, PLEASE comment.)

This is a picture of my Dad and Mom, taken in February of 1985. Dad was 52 and Mom was 53. Dad passed away in December of 1985, when he was 53. As of this month, I have out-lived my Dad by two months.

The Solar Eclipse Saga

Viewing The Eclipse - "The Riggs Method"

Star Date: August 21st, 2017

Location: Parking lot west of Riggs & Associates office

To view the eclipse, I used an old vernier reading theodolite - a Lietz TM6 - with a solar filter that fits over the eyepiece. We used this filter many moons ago to make solar observations to determine true north by the position of the sun. This was referred to as the hour/angle method and you used a "Timecube" to get the horizontal position of the sun at a specific UTC. With this filter attached, you can focus in on the sun and it will not damage your eyes or the instrument.

There was a problem though. When we performed solar observations, we had to do them in the early morning or  in the late afternoon. In the middle of the day, the scope had to transit so far vertically that we couldn't see through it. The base would be in the way. Well... the eclipse was at 1:17PM in West Plains and the sun was too high in the sky to use the instrument setting on the tripod.

Have I mentioned that I am a genius?

I put the instrument on the tripod, put it through the lowered back window of my truck, wadded up some padding on the top of the tripod so it would break the plastic rainguard and rolled the window up! Now the instrument was steady on the tripod and wouldn't move around and mess up my viewing.

All I had to do now was use the locator on top of the scope to site on sun and then use the motion knobs to fine tune it.

Then I used my old Fujifilm FinePix A340 digital camera, which fit snug, right up against the eyepiece, and started snapping pictures!!

You can't see it in these pictures but through the scope, you could actually see the mountains in profile of the edge of the moon! And you could see the sunspots on the sun very clearly.

Chris Webster, our draftsman, fixed up a pair of binoculars on a tripod and you can see the sun projected on the paper I'm holding. Just another method of viewing and it was pretty cool!

"The Crack At The End Of The Wall"

I grew up reading "Hardy Boys" books. The adventures of  brothers Frank and Joe, and their sidekick, Chet, filled many hours of my growing up years. After my brother, Ralph, introduced me to the books at the old public library on East Main Street, I never looked back. Who can forget "The Secret Of The Old Mill"? or "The Wailing Siren Mystery"? and "The Disappearing Floor"? Good, clean, wholesome reading!

I know my little story will not come up to the standard of *Franklin W. Dixon but let me tell you the true story of: "The Crack At The End Of The Wall"...

I began my school days at the Junction Hill C-12 Elementary School. I did not attend Kindergarten, but in 1970, when I started first grade, it looked exactly as it appears above. My first grade class, with Mrs. Beulah Story as teacher, was the one right behind the basketball goal in the picture.

When the school was built, there was not a separate classroom for each grade. There were six classrooms, so some of the grades had to share a room. I confirmed with one former teacher, Mrs. Nondes Good, that she taught 3rd and 4th grade in one room in 1963. She also said that the 7th grade was divided between the 6th grade room and the 8th grade room. I also visited with former teacher, Mr. Bobby Vonallmen, who started teaching at Junction Hill in 1961. He said that the 1st and 8th grade had their own classrooms with the other classes being divided between the remaining rooms and he taught 4th and 5th grade together. (And as a side note: He was also the boys PE teacher for all the upper grades!)

Taking all this into consideration, it seems that some of the rooms were larger than others. And then sometime, in the years before I started school, they divided the larger rooms with a wall...

And a few years down the road, I made a discovery...

When they built the wall dividing the room which would house the 6th and 7th grade classes, they did almost a perfect job. "Almost" being the key word. The end of the wall, opposite the windows fit perfectly against the inside block wall. The end that was against the outside wall where the windows were... not so good. At the end of the wall, about three or four feet up from the floor at the bottom of the window, there was a crack...

This crack was between the end of the wall and the window, and it reached all the way to the ceiling.

I discovered this crack at the end of the wall by mere accident. Our teacher, Mr. Herndon, had moved me to the very back corner of the classroom so I was not directly under his gaze every moment of the day. I was forever more looking for ways to occupy my time in class. Besides studying.

I kept hearing the teacher lecturing in the 7th grade class, very clearly. So I knew there was some kind of opening into the class next door. Upon further investigation (at intervals when Mr. Herndon wasn't watching) I discovered the small open space between the window and the end of the wall. "The Crack"!

Well... I had a good friend, Eric, who was in 7th grade, so we conspired to fix a method of communicating using this secret passage. After all, adolescent boys have so many important messages that they need to send back and forth to each other...

I brought a long, thin piece of copper wire to school, and while the teacher wasn't looking, threaded it through the crack, into the 7th grade classroom.

In the 7th grade room, where the wire came through the crack, was right on top of a row of book shelves. So... Eric found some excuse to go back to the bookshelf and attached a note to the end of the wire. I pulled it through to my side, read it, attached an answer back and sent it back through the crack.

This worked famously for a couple of days. Then, things got even better. Eric somehow persuaded the teacher to move him to the back corner, right across the wall from where I sat!

This made it so much easier and faster to send our important missives.

So we sent our messages back and forth, back and forth and enjoyed the fact and we were getting away with secret, high level communication, right under the teacher's nose.

We might have gotten away with this clandestine communication until the end of the school year....If I hadn't been so slow. Alas! It was impatience that brought the whole surreptitious operation down in flames!

Eric had passed a note through to me and I was attempting to answer it. Before I could get a reply written and passed back, Mr. Herndon stood up and started lecturing on some important (I'm sure) 6th grade subject.

I figured, "No Problem". Surely Eric can wait until Mr. Herndon finishes.

How wrong I was...

A few minutes into his lecture, I began to hear a rustling behind my head. Now, I didn't dare turn around, because the teacher's eyes were roaming back and forth across the class as he talked. And all of a sudden... He stopped talking, his eyes bugged out and he was looking RIGHT AT ME!!

Actually, he wasn't looking Right at me. He was staring at something right above my head and right behind me!

It seems that, in his extreme impatience, Eric had decided to get my attention. He had found a HUGE sheet of paper. Rolled it up into a long tube. Flattened it out until it would fit through the crack in the wall. Stuck it through the crack until there was about two foot sticking out on MY side... And was WAVING IT UP AND DOWN!!! LIKE A HUGE, NARROW WHITE FLAG!!!

Uh Oh!!!

Mr. Herndon had this quirky habit. He was left handed, so he would snap the left thumb and forefinger then make a fist and smack the heel of his left hand into his right palm. Over and over, while he was lecturing.

Here he came, slowly down the aisle between the desks, snapping his fingers and smacking his palm.... He walked right back to the corner where I sat, reached above my head, grabbed the still waving paper banner, and jerked it all the way through the crack and right out of Eric's hand!!

Then... He just stood there... Wadding up the paper... Staring at me with his black beady eyes... Not smiling... His mustache twitching... "Mr. Riggs! Get your desk and move it right up in front of my desk. It seems I need to keep an eye on you."

I moved my desk to the "honored" place, right in front of his desk. The front of my desk was actually touching the front of Mr. Herndon's desk!!

Almost immediately, he went next door and informed the 7th grade teacher of our covert activity... And guess what? Eric also had the honor of being moved to the head of the class!!

We didn't receive any other punishment, but the humiliation was enough.

The school year ended. I attended West Plains Junior High my 7th grade year. But I have never forgotten the rush of excitement, the thrill of danger, the humiliation of discovery, in the undercover case of: "The Crack At The End Of The Wall"...

*Franklin W Dixon, "author" of the Hardy Boys Books, was actually a pseudonym for Edward Stratemeyer the original creator of the series.

The Day That Dad Popped A Wheelie

In my "growin' up years", bicycles were the preferred mode of transportation. No Skateboards or Scooters for us! Besides the fact that we lived on a DIRT ROAD, which was not commodious to skateboard or scooter riding; there was a certain manly stigma associated with riding a bike.

I was still in the "slightly less manly" tricycle stage when we lived on the farm at County Line. My older brother Ralph, however, had already graduated from "Tri" to "Bi" so Dad and Mom purchased him a brand spankin' new Bike!

If I remember correctly, it was a hot, muggy summer evening, when Dad decided to "strut his stuff'. Ralph had been riding around the back yard at the farm house for a while, when Dad posed him the question... "Ralph, can you pop a wheelie??"

Now... Knowing my brother like I do, I would say that "wheelie popping" had already been attempted. And I am also sure that he attempted to perform the feat for Dad.

It must have fallen way short of Dad's expectations. Because the next thing out of his mouth was "Here. Let me show you how to do that!"

So... My Dad climbs on the bike.

You know how, when you're young, everybody is old? At this time, in the late 1960's, my Dad was old. At least in his middle thirties. I had never seen my Dad on a bicycle... And I don't believe I ever saw him on one again...

Dad sashayed around the yard while Ralph and I watched with anticipation for the big wheelie. I think Mom was just watching with with a sense of foreboding...

On one of his trips around the yard, Dad must have figured that it was Show Time! He pulled up on the handle bars of the bike, pulled the front wheel off the ground and Popped A Wheelie!

....Only the "Wheelie" kept "Popping"! The front wheel kept coming up, up, up... Until Dad slid off the back of the banana seat and hit the ground, Ker Thud! Right on his Bohunkus!!

Now Ralph and I knew better than to laugh. But Mom had no such inhibitions. While she was running over to see how badly Dad was hurt, she was laughing, snorting, giggling and trying to act concerned, all at the same time! Ever been there?!?

After we found out that the only thing really damaged was Dad's pride, we all had a good laugh!

In the next few days, a patch of dead grass appeared in the yard... In close proximity to where my Dad performed his one and only bicycle exhibition. Now I'm sure it had nothing to with my Dad's derriere hitting the terra firma with the force of bunker buster bomb...

But it was forever a reminder to our family, of "The Day That Dad Popped A Wheelie"!!!

*I'm pretty sure that the bike Ralph is riding in the picture above, is the one that Dad popped his wheelie on. And...this picture is taken at the Conklin House, at Junction Hill, in the summer of 1969.

Ivory Soap Memories

I've been having some sort of irritation in my eyes. I wash them out with my regular soap, Irish Spring, and everything is fine for a little while. Then, it starts to feel like I have something in my eyes. The best I can explain it is this... It feels like morning "eye boogers" but you can't rub them out. Sometimes (Gross Alert!!) I can even wipe white sticky "boogers" from my eyes... The other symptom is that direct sunlight seems to make it worse.

I decided to try a new kind of soap.

So... I went to Wally World and bought a three-pack of Ivory Soap. When I opened the soap up this morning to begin my face wash, Tami happened to be in the room. So I stuck the bar out to her and said "Here. Smell this and tell me what it reminds you of."

She took a whiff of the Ivory Soap bar and then said "At school...."

I interrupted with "EXACTLY!!!  It reminds me of School!" More particularly, it reminds me of art classes when I went to the Junction Hill Elementary School.

It seems like every year, we had an art class that included carving "something" out of a bar of Ivory Soap. The teacher would announce that we needed to bring a bar of Ivory Soap to school for an art project.

Our family used Zest...

Zest would not work Dove wouldn't either. Even "Clean As A Whistle" Irish Spring would not work. It had to be Ivory!

So the bar of Ivory Soap would be procured, taken to school and readied for the future Michelangelo's to sculpt. As I am typing this, I am wondering... Did they let us use knives to carve with?? Third and fourth boys with sharp knives? I'm lucky to still have my fingers! My old school friends are lucky to still have their fingers. And other appendages...

Every one of us started out with confidence and a determination to carve the best "whatever" that anyone had ever seen. A Turtle? A Dog? A Fish? The best I can recollect, the teacher had only a few patterns and we had to choose one of them. Otherwise, some smart alack like me would have tried to carve the Statue of Liberty or The Eiffel Tower.

As it turned out, I would start carving... Let's just say a turtle. After working on it for a few class periods, I would despair of caving anything remotely resembling a turtle and try to convert it into a fish... or a snail... or an egg... My high hopes would descend into low expectations.

What I usually ended up with was something that faintly resembled Quasimodo... with no teeth, missing an arm, both legs and an ear, complete with the wart over his left eye...

How did the teacher keep a straight face when she complimented us on our masterpieces? And not break out in hysterical laughter??

I do know this; when I stuck that bar of Ivory Soap up to my nose, and breathed in... I was transported back to a simpler, uncluttered little world of good memories....

You can read more about Ivory Soap Here

"I Have A Dream"

Our beautiful "Heart of the Ozarks" was not always the laid back, friendly, peaceful place that it is today. During the Civil War (or the War of Northern Aggression... depending on what side of the Mason-Dixon you were on) our area of the Ozarks was basically deserted. It became a violent battleground of Union and Southern sympathizers, with brother against brother, neighbor against neighbor and family against family. This resulted in guerrilla bands burning the courthouse and most of the buildings in West Plains and causing the residents to pack and flee north or south, depending on their ideological leanings. I have heard the arguments that this war "was not about freeing the slaves!" And I would agree, that it was not fought totally over that issue. But the Emancipation Proclamation and the slaves being freed at the end of the conflict tell me, that it was not an insignificant, little happenstance at the end of a bloody five-year war.

I was born four months after Dr. Martin Luther King gave his famous "I Have a Dream" speech at the "March on Washington" on August 23rd, 1963. I was a child during the civil rights upheaval of the sixties and early seventies and it seemed far away and unimportant in my "world." Most of the black people in our town were well respected, hard working people like the white folks... with a few bad apples... just like the white folks. However, the people of color all lived on the "Hill", had their own church and their own cemetery.

I do remember the "N" word being used in jokes in my elementary and high school - although there were no black children in my elementary school and only two in my high school. I am deeply ashamed to admit that I also joined in on some of this talk but I couldn't have told you the names of more than than three or four black people.

When I consider the presence of racial prejudice in the West Plains of today, I am really clueless. I still do not have a lot of contact with the people of color in our town. I have a couple of friends I swap howdys with when I meet them but no close relationship with them. Our West Plains college campus has increased the number of African Americans and other people of color in our city, but again, I have no real contact with them. Maybe I should work on that?!?

This brings me to the real purpose of my post. When Dr. King gave his "I Have A Dream" speech; I'm sure, in a small way, he had this in mind... An annual tradition of my great niece, Claire Riggs.

Every Memorial Day for years, even decades, our family has went to the family cemetery plots and decorated the graves of our ancestors. For many years, (at least the years she has been aware of the significance of it), Claire has decorated the grave of Aunt Mime, in Ledbetter Cemetery near Crider, Missouri.

Aunt Mime's Gravestone

Why is this so significant?

Aunt Mime was a former colored slave.

Sometime around the 1850's, Turpin Goode Scoggin* moved from North Carolina, into the Ozarks near the settlement of South Fork. In addition to his family, he brought with him, two female slaves. In the years that followed, according to certain accounts, one of the slaves "became unruly" so he set her free. This left her homeless so she had to find someone that would take her in. Scoggin had family near Crider, Missouri, so one of these kind-hearted souls took her in. She established her place in the household and became "Aunt Mime". From my recollection of comments of people that knew her, (such as my Grandma Fox) she was a kind, sweet lady and not "unruly" at all. 

Considering that Aunt Mime passed away in 1921 and was set free in the late 1850's, she lived quite a long life! Even in death though, she never gained the status of "all men are created equal". They buried Aunt Mime in the southwest corner of Ledbetter Cemetery, away from all the "white folks", and marked her grave with a large rock. An unceremonious end for a life of labor, heartache and trouble. In later years, a small granite stone replaced the rock with the words, "Aunt Mime - Died August 1921

This story of "Aunt Mime", I have heard since my childhood. This was the story, in the fine oral tradition, that was repeated to Claire. It touched her heart and made her want to "do something" for Aunt Mime. So every year, at Memorial Day, Aunt Mime gets flowers on her grave. Some ninety-odd years after her death, she is remembered and mourned by a "white" young lady.

It just may be that Dr. King's "Dream" is coming to pass. Not with marches, protests and riots. But with the telling of a story that touches the tender heart of the younger generation...

Claire Riggs at Aunt Mime's grave

Claire Riggs and "Pawpaw" Ralph Riggs decorating Aunt Mime's grave. You can see how isolated it is, in the far corner of the cemetery (although there is a new grave nearby)

*As an aside - Turpin Goode Scoggin was appointed the first County Surveyor of Howell County in 1859.

Folks I Have Met - Rev. & Mrs. James Suits

Some folks have been around for quite a while but for some reason, our paths never crossed... until fairly recently. Two such people are Rev. and Mrs. James (Jim) Suits. Brother Suits has been preaching many years but it is only in the past ten to fifteen years that I have been able to become acquainted with them. Where have they been all my life?!?

My wife Tami,  remembers Brother Suits preaching youth camps and special meetings when she was a teenager. I have heard the name "Brother Suits" all of my life but the opportunity never arose to meet him or Sister Suits.

I have had that opportunity for a few years now and whenever I can, I go to be in their presence. They are two of the most down to earth people you will ever meet. Their singing, his preaching, the humble spirit they possess and present, is truly refreshing.

Recently, when the Suits were in revival meeting at the Hilltop Holiness Church in Willow Springs, Missouri, I was able to attend and took this picture.