Brother Mac

There used to be a small scraggly blackjack tree in the southeast corner of the Junction Hill Pentecostal Church parking lot. And sometimes of a Sunday evening, when I pull up into the parking lot, it seems there ought to be an old, green, late 40's model, Chevy truck, parked facing south under that tree. That truck belonged to W. Chester "Chet" McDowell or as we respectfully called him, "Brother Mac".

This is the only quality picture that I could locate of "Brother Mac". I found an email of one of his relatives on the Findagrave.com website and she sent me this photo from a newspaper article. Thank you Leilani Mcdowell for responding and sending me this picture!

Chester McDowell hadn't always been a church goin' man. As a matter of fact, his spiritual awakening came rather late in life. If I have it figured right, it was somewhere around 1959-1960 when he was in his middle fifties.*  As told by Rev. Harold Essary, Brother Mac showed up one day on the doorstep of the **Victoria Mission Church parsonage. He had been drinking and had "ambeer" or tobacco juice running out of both sides of his mouth and down into his beard. Brother Harold brought him into the living room and proceeded to ask him what he needed. Chester informed Brother Harold that he wanted to "get saved". To parlance this phrase, Brother Chet wanted to repent of his sins, receive salvation, receive Christ... be "Born Again". And that is exactly what happened! This big, rough, bearded, old reprobate was adopted into the family of God! According to Brother Harold, this was quite the spectacle to behold, especially for the Essary children!

When Brother Mac appeared at the next service, not only had the inside man been cleaned up, but the outside also. He was scrubbed to a fare-thee-well, had on clean clothes and instead of washing the ambeer out of his beard, he had just shaved it off! Right from the start, he was faithful to church and sat right on the front row.

When Brother Essary left Victoria Mission and plans were underway to build a new church, Brother Mac had a visit with him. Brother Mac lived on eighty acres west of Victoria Mission and since he no longer farmed or pastured it, he had a proposition for the new church project. He would sell seventy of the eighty acres, keeping ten acres including his house. With the money from the sale of land, he would buy land for the new church and pay for the fencing around it. This was certainly acceptable to Brother Harold and the church, so the land was sold and property purchased from Leo Nolte at Junction Hill. As I sit here and type this out, I get tears in my eyes, thinking of the reward that Brother Mac is STILL receiving in Heaven because he had a vision and a generous heart!

When I remember Brother Mac, he was up in years. He still drove to church, sat on the front pew on the right side of the sanctuary and clapped to the music with a slow (out of time!) rhythm. Did I mention that he sat on the front pew on the righthand side? Yes, that was His place! If someone visiting happened to take his hallowed place, it took him a couple of service to get over it! He would sit farther back and "pout" but eventually "get over it" and all was well again.

One of Brother Mac's unique talents was whittling and wood carving. He had a little building just west of his house that he used for his hobby. Most everyone in the church was at one time or another, a recipient of one of his crafts. It seems the most popular one by far was a little fan. It was carved out of a single piece of wood, with separate "fins" and a little handle with a hand carved chain attached. The fins were sewn together with a neat stitch and also sewn at the base of the handle. The ends of the fins were carved with a decorative pattern. I had one of these fans years ago but like a lot of things that you don't think are too important in your childhood, it was lost. The picture below is of one that was given to my sister-in-law, Lisa Riggs. It doesn't have the little chain on the handle but the rest is like I just described.

When you ask any of the children that were around when Brother Mac was alive "What do you remember most about him?". Almost invariably the answer is "He handed out candy to us kids!" When the kids from the area churches would visit, they always would make their way to the "Candy Man". We never called him that but perhaps they didn't know his real name. My Mom told about Brother Mac giving my brother Ralph a piece of candy one day, and he got choked on it. Mom slapped around on Ralph, stuck her finger down his goozle and finally dislodged the..."Lifesaver". Brother Mac was looking on and commented in his gruff way, "Well, he could still breath cause that Lifesaver had a hole in it..." That was just Brother Mac!

One day Brother Mac came to Brother Essary with a scripture he had read. The verse was Genesis 2:18 and this was the part that caught his attention; "It is not good for man to be alone." Brother Mac was a lifelong bachelor but figured since he was now a Christian, he should follow the scripture commands...and get married! I don't think Brother Essary was too keen on the idea and tried to talk him out of it. But evidently, Brother Mac had already been spying out the land because it wasn't but a few weeks and he had found "Birdie". Brother Harold married them (very hesitantly) and for awhile they lived in wedded bliss. But sadly, it didn't last too long. In just a few months, they separated and divorced. Brother Mac kept coming to church and didn't lose his faith over the whole ordeal.

When Brother Mac passed away, one of his funeral requests was quite unusual.

Every Sunday at Junction Hill, we had (and still have) the "Booster Band". All the children from walking age to seven or eight years old, would line up by the altars (boys on one side, girls on the other) and someone would lead them in simple children's songs. It started with; "We are the Gospel Booster Band. We come to you each Sunday Morn. We extend to you a welcome hand! So won't you come and join our Gospel Booster Band! We're gonna fight! fight! fight! all sinfulness. Until we prove to you our usefulness. Were gonna push the De-vil in his grave! In his Grave! and Shout! Shout! Shout!" There were other songs like "Root Them Out", "I'd rather be a little thing climbing up (than a big thing tumbling down!)" and the old standard "Jesus Love Me".

The Booster Band was the highlight of Brother Mac's life. He would smile and clap and for a few brief minutes, perhaps become a child again... So...At his funeral, all of the children that could (myself included even though I was ten) lined up in front of the casket, and sang Booster Band songs! It seemed to fit just right...

Brother Mac has been gone for well over forty years, and most folks, even at Junction Hill, do not remember him. But I hope this little blog post gives someone a little more information and appreciation for the "Un-sung Heroes" of our church. I am a blessed man to have the memories that I do of Chester "Chet" "Brother Mac" McDowell.

*All of my information is from conversations through the years with the first Pastor of the Junction Hill Pentecostal Church, Rev. Harold Essary. With memory being the fickle thing it is, feel free to comment with your memories and I will make corrections as necessary.

**One other thing. Brother Essary pastored the Victoria Mission Church at Cull from 1959 until he was asked to leave in 1963. It was then that he and most of the congregation left to form the Junction Hill Church.

Joy Barnett Collins kept the little fan that she received from Brother Mac. It is shown in the picture above with the little ring carved at the end of the handle.

If anyone else has a "Brother Mac" fan, send me a picture and I'll add it to this post. thebigparson@gmail.com

My Dad - "The Barber"

My Dad did not abide the hippie philosophy or styles. If anything, my Dad was the poster child for the "Un-Hippie." And he intended for his boys to be the milk carton face of clean-cut American youth. When we left the barber shop, we had "whitewalls" above our ears, a blinding white "taper cut" on our necks and a "part" with a comb-over that Donald Trump would envy!

In the mid 1960's, when haircuts went up two bits from $1.50 to $1.75*, my Dad had had enough. With two growing sons and himself to keep sheared, it was more economically advantageous to buy a pair of electric hair clippers and just "Do it yourself!"

In the southwest corner of the basement of the new farm house at County Line, my Dad set up shop. And for a couple of years, every few weeks (when we started looking shaggy) we would trudge downstairs and Dad would "lower our ears."

Sometimes, even the trip back up the stairs was memorable...such as the time I "fell up" the stairs, hit the metal strip on the top step and had to get six stitches to mend my chinny chin chin!

After a couple of years, Dad must have tired of hair cutting because the clippers were put away and we went back to Squires Barber Shop on Washington Avenue. It was quite a few years before they were brought (however briefly) out of retirement...

It was a hot summer day at the Farley House when they came out for one more meteoric flash of duty...

Our old dog, Sandy, was really miserable in the summer heat. She was a German Shepherd, Collie mix and had a heavy coat of hair. Dad decided to remedy this situation and rousted out the old electric hair clippers from days gone by.

Dad put a bench to sit on out in the driveway in front of the shop and ran an extension cord for the clippers. After testing them out to see if they would still work, he told us boys to "bring her on over." Sandy was a pretty docile old dog, and she didn't really put up a fuss when we led her up to Dad. She had NO idea what the result of the the next few minutes would be...

Dad started at her neck, right behind her ears, and began the shearing. He must have had a gauge on the clippers because from what I remember, it was a pretty even, smooth cut. He proceeded down her neck to her withers, down her chest and front legs and then started shaving down her back, sides, and belly. Ever so often, we would have to turn Sandy around so Dad could make sure he was getting both sides evenly.

When Dad had worked his way back to Sandy's loins, right in front of her thighs, the unthinkable happened... THE CLIPPERS QUIT WORKING!!

Try as he might, Dad could not get them to working again. And, when you think about it, they had just done the equivalent of about seventy-five men's haircuts in the space of about thirty minutes! No wonder they quit.

But now, Ole Sandy was an interesting spectacle. She was shaved from her head down to her "waist line" and the long hair from there on down made it look like she had a little pair of pants on!!

Now us boys thought this was just about the most hilarious thing in the world! But Mom...not so much so... Mom felt so sorry for Old Sandy that she even pleaded with Dad to "cut the rest of it off." I believe Dad would have if he could have but the clippers were shot.

To Ole Sandy's credit, it didn't seem to bother her too much. In fact she seemed quite pleased with herself. I don't know if it was the stylish trousers she now had or just that she was much cooler. Anyway, the image is firmly etched into my mind and I'll never forget the "Summer of Short-Britches Sandy!!"

*From my limited research, this is about what a haircut cost in 1966.

Of Tractor Axles and Hacksaws

I really can't say that my Dad was stubborn (any more than is usually present in the human male species.) But he was ingenious and tenacious.

In the last few years of his life, Dad bought and sold tractors. In our little shop, we would weld-up, fix-up, sand-down and paint-up every kind of old tractor you can imagine. John Deere, 8N and 9N Fords, Minneapolis-Moline, Allis Chalmers, Case, Massey-Harris, Farmall...

Somewhere along the line, Dad bought a John Deere MT Row-Crop Tractor. If you're not familiar with this kind of tractor, I'll try to explain and then look at the pictures below. The Row-Crop tractor (usually) had a tricycle front-end (single or double tire close together). The back tires were adjustable, in and out, to match the "rows" between the crops. If it was wide rows, the tires would be way out on the end of the axle. Narrow rows? The tires would be close in to the tractor body with the axle sticking way out past the tires. And this is where the problem began for Dad.

Since we didn't have any crops that needed worked, he moved the tires in real close to the tractor body. And... since he didn't sell it right away, he started using it around the place for bush-hogging and other tasks. However...he would forget about the long piece of the axle sticking out past the back tire and when he would "Hug" some object... such as a tree... a gate post... the shop building... KER-BLAM!! The axle would catch the tree, gate post or building and "Tear Up Old Jack"!!

Finally Dad had had ENOUGH! He announced to us boys that "We're gonna cut them axles off..."

We backed the tractor into the shop and he commenced to cutting the axles off with our cutting torch.

Let me say that he TRIED to cut the axles off with a cutting torch.

These axles were at least 2½" - 3" in diameter, made of carbon steel and our little cutting torch wouldn't even get it hot enough to make a "cut". You might as well have been spitting on it!

Dad was not deterred... His next statement was "Go Get The Hacksaw"

If this seems laughable to you, believe you me, it wasn't to us! Ralph and I just saw our afternoon disappear into a little pile of metal hacksaw shavings!

We began "hacking" on one of the axles. After about fifteen minutes, we had made some progress but were down to nubbins on the hacksaw blade. With no replacement blades to be found in the shop, Dad says "Boys, let's go to town."

We drove to Western Farm and Home (or as we called it.."Fester's" which was short for "Fester's Worm In Hole") to buy more blades. Now... Dad didn't just buy a couple of blades. This was a serious undertaking... He bought a WHOLE CASE! Forty-Eight Hacksaw Blades!!!

And then we drove back home...

And began "Hacking" away at them axles... Dad would hack awhile, Ralph would take over and hack awhile, I would take over and hack awhile and then back to Dad. We thought of giving Mom a turn but she was busy supplying us with iced tea!

After about four hours of hacking, a couple dozen blades wore out and a couple of gallons of tea...Both ends of the axles were cut off! Dad used the grinder to grind off the sharp edges and he now had a tractor with a much narrower rear-end!!

Never let it be said that my Dad was faint of heart when it came to matters of Tractor Axles and Hacksaws!

(As an aside... I was visiting with my friend, Danny Yarbrough about this and he said he had seen this very tractor with the axles cut off and wondered why and how someone would do such a thing. He said this particular model was a collector's item, but with the axles cut off, was basically worthless.)

After visiting with Danny today, 09/07/16, he said it was a John Deere 40 and not a Farmall like I thought it was.

Jesus Take The Wheel!

Carrie Underwood's 2005 hit song seemed to be the only appropriate title for this blog post. You can judge for yourself...

In the early eighties, I purchased a 1967 Chevelle from my cousin, Edwin Earls. It had been sitting for a few years but it didn't take me long to get it "road ready." The engine was a 400 Chevy small block with a Rochester Quadrajet carburetor and a three-speed automatic transmission. I replaced the original coil springs, front and back, with heavy ones which "raised" the car. This was the "muscle car" style and I still prefer it. Somehow it just looks "tougher" compared to those wimpy lowered trucks and cars.

One afternoon, as I was driving out of West Plains on Highway 160 East, a little foreign car had the audacity to try to pass me. Right at Howell Avenue, when you start down the hill to the straight stretch out of town, he pulled out to go around me. Now... with a car that would run like a scalded dog and my natural male ego, this wasn't about to happen!

I let him get even with me and then I "put the pedal to the metal"! In approximately 2.4 seconds, he was nothing but a speck in my rear view mirror! I cruised past the KWPM radio station and by the time I topped "Radio City Hill" I was doing well over 100 MPH...

It will take about one hundred words to write and about forty seconds for you to read what happened next.

But in real time it took about three seconds...

When I topped out on Radio City Hill and could see the other smaller hill about 800 feet away, a car was pulling out of the crossroad between the two hills INTO MY LANE!! I immediately slammed down on the brake and locked the wheels... I didn't even slow down. I just started skidding at 100 MPH! When I saw that I wasn't going to stop, I let off of the brake, stomped on the gas and swung into the left lane to pass. Somehow, I passed the car and was back in my lane before I hit the top of the smaller hill!

I slowed down to a reasonable speed and continued on to the Homeplace. When I pulled into our driveway, I was shaking so badly I had to sit for a few minutes before I could pull up the lane to the house. While I sat there, I solemnly promised the Lord that that would never happen again. And by His grace, I have kept that promise... and kept my speeds below 100 MPH!!

I am a firm believer in God's mercy and I know his angels were looking out for a seriously stupid teenage boy. The "what if's" were all too clear.

If there is any truth to Carrie Underwood's song, I certainly experienced it that day when for all intents and purposes, "Jesus Took The Wheel"!!

If you want to get a feel for how much time I had to pass, ride along with me HERE

"Bones" - The Original Series

From what I gather, there is a popular television series called "Bones". This crime procedural drama has just concluded its eleventh season and is slated for a twelfth and final season. Having neither television or Netflix and not subscribing to Hulu or any of the other video on demand sites, Wikipedia was consulted and trusted for this information.

Although "Bones" seems to be a very popular series, I must let my millions of blog readers in on a little known fact. It is not an original series...

In the early 70's, for some strange reason, I became interested in bones. Archaeology has always intrigued me and since it really is a short step from Archaeology to Osteology... My "Ologys" may have become somewhat muddled!

This phase of my life was probably a real shock to my Mom...when she started to clean and straighten up my closet... The top shelf was dedicated to my bone and teeth collection! To her credit, she didn't get hysterical and think that a dog with three heads, four ribs and seventy three teeth had died and decayed in her youngest son's closet. She took it in stride and let it remain as long as it didn't stink.

It so happened, that when I was in this chapter of my life, my Dad bought the old Oak Grove schoolhouse. Oak Grove was a one-room schoolhouse that was closed when it was consolidated into the Junction Hill school district. Its location was on Highway 160, right across the road from where my brother Ralph now turns off to go to his house.

The school building had been converted into a house but was in such a state of disrepair that Dad decided to just tear it down. After we had torn it down to the floor, which was setting on rock pillars, things got very interesting.

As we began tearing up the floor and exposing what was beneath, a virtual "animal graveyard" was brought to light! Bones of every shape and size...Skulls, teeth, little mouse bones, big raccoon bones... I collected bones until it was time to quit and go home! Another shelf had to be cleared off and my new collection moved in! My poor Mother....

A real life mystery happened during this "Bony" phase of my childhood. Late one Sunday evening after church, we came driving up to our house at Junction Hill... And right in the middle of the driveway, where we parked the car, was an honest to goodness, bleached out white, teeth still intact, COW SKULL! Glory Be!!

Now... Mom drew the line at the cow skull... No! Not in the house!

It took us an hour or so but we finally unraveled the mystery. It seems that my Uncle Marion and Aunt Janice Riggs had gotten wind of their nephew's budding aspirations to be an Anthropologist...and decided to advance my career! That afternoon, they had been driving around on some property they owned, found the cow skull, knew we would be in church, and placed it right where we would be sure to find it!

To this day, I vividly remember our puzzlement in finding a cow skull in our driveway, the boneyard at the old Oak Grove schoolhouse and my foray into "Bones" (The Original Series!)

The Country Boys That Went To Town

When I was a boy and we lived at the Farley house, we were exactly three miles east of the West Plains city limits. It might as well been thirty.

I was "country-fied" to the core and to be called a cityslicker would have been more of an insult than I could've endured. The city did have its allure though.

There was the Dairy Princess Drive-in, Mo's Drive-in and Kinder's Burger Inn for starters. For things non-food there was Western Auto, Otasco, Firestone, Sterlings and... Aid Hardware. And there was another draw toward the big city, Momo and Popo's house on West Main!

My big brother Ralph and I had been asking Dad and begging Mom to let us "ride our bikes to town". There was and still is a wanderlust in both of us and to hit the open road on our bikes was just the height of adventure. Dad wasn't hard to convince (we get our wanderlust from him I suppose.) But convincing Mom? This was a tad more difficult and just like most things in life, required compromise.

We were prepared to take the paved county road west to U.S. Highway160 and follow this highway right into town, thru town and finally wind up at my Grandma and Grandpa Riggs' house on West Main... Take the High Road so to speak.

When this plan was broached to Mom, she immediately saw us splattered out on the highway by a speeding semi truck... Adolescent road-kill that would have to be scraped up off the pavement, placed in a closed casket and properly mourned and buried.

So... We compromised...

Dad and Mom mapped us out a route that would require us to ride a minimal amount of time on the highway and would take us down less traveled, lonely back roads. Please note that in that day and time (early 70's) no consideration was given to the possibility of being abducted by some crazed, deviate person along our "road less traveled by."

We were to take the paved county road, west to Highway 160, Ride-Down-The-Right-Of-Way...Not-On-The-Pavement, to the gravel crossroad. Go south on this gravel road to the first gravel road to the west. Go west to the first gravel road south and take this road south 'til it turned west and then just follow it west toward town. Once we were on East Olden Street, by the High School, we were to go to the intersection and turn south on Howell Street and follow it straight to Grace Avenue (This was before the Broadway extension made a bend in Howell Avenue.) When we got to Grace Avenue, we were to turn west and go to Walnut Street, go south to Leyda Street and follow it west, over the big hill and down to Arkansas Street, go north on Arkansas to Garrett Street and then west to Harlin Drive. Once we were on Harlin, we could ride north a block to West Main and then we were in sight of Momo and Popo's house! (You can see the map of our journey here )

We sallied forth, fairly early in the day... "Don and Sancho" on our "Rocinate's", ready for the open road!   I had a single speed "Moto-cross" bicycle and Ralph had a three-speed with curled racing handlebars. We followed the pre-planned route and just took our time. It was a pretty uneventful trip and for some reason, the only part that I really remember is the leg of the journey that took us down Grace Avenue. We made it to Momo's kitchen in time for lunch and then out the door to ride bikes with some of the kids on West Main.

Inevitably, our play soon turned into full scale bike racing. The "Country" vs. the "City". I didn't fair so well but Ralph pretty well whupped everybody on the street, even the ten-speed racers! This continued until it was time for supper and all the neighbor kids had to go home.

Our plans were to spend the night with our grandparents, so Mom and Dad were going to bring our "overnight things" later that evening. After supper, while there was still daylight, we decided to go visiting.

We jumped on our bikes and rode up Garrett Street west, to the top of the hill, turned south down Pine Street and went to the house on the west side of the street, at K highway. This was where my Uncle Marion and Aunt Janice Riggs lived. Again, for some reason this part of our adventure just sticks out in my mind. We stayed long enough to get a drink, visit a few minutes and then back down the hill to Momo and Popo's house.

We spent the night, (loudly entertained by Popo's snoring) and woke up the next morning, ready to go home. We didn't make the return trip on our bikes though. Dad came by, picked us (and our bikes) up and we traveled home in style...already planning our next traveling adventure!

A Porcine Phenomenon

An equinox occurs every spring and autumn. The plane of the equator, passes directly thru the sun and every person in the northern and southern hemispheres has a perfect day - an equal amount of sun and darkness. There are other celestial wonders that occur only once in a lifetime, like Hally's Comet.

Sometime though, the terrestrial powers that be, wield their influence, and you have an honest to goodness "Porcine Phenomenon".

We were traveling home on 160 highway from a long, hot summer day of surveying in the "Big Woods" in western Oregon County. My brother Ralph, Rolan Norsworthy and I, had been following an empty cattle trailer, (traveling very slowly) for a few miles and had made it over "Radio City Hill", when everything started going south.

About the time we made it to the flat, past the little hill in front of the radio station, the back gate on the cattle trailer swung open... And Behold!, we discovered that the cattle trailer was not empty!

While all of us watched with utter amazement and amusement, a huge Yorkshire sow came wandering back to the now open gate! She stood at the edge of the trailer and looked down at the highway speeding past her nose at 40 miles per hour...

Hold on! There's more... While the old sow stood placidly looking out the back of the trailer, about six or seven little piglets wandered back and lined up right beside Mammy!

By this time, our driver, Rolan, had begun to flash his headlights and honk at the truck pulling the "Piggy" trailer, trying to get him to stop. And the pigs continued to be blissfully unaware of the catastrophe lurking mere inches from their snouts!

The driver of the truck finally figured out that something was amiss and pulled over at Allen street, right at the city limits. And that was where the fun began...

When the truck and trailer stopped rolling, we were right behind it to try to keep the pig and piglets IN the trailer. It worked really well... with the piglets. The old sow however? She saw the open gate for what it was... FREEDOM!!!

The very second that the trailer stopped rolling she was out and makin' tracks for Arkansas!

We piled out of our truck and were joined by the pig's owner and some other men that had stopped, in an impromptu (un-greased) Pig Scramble! Whoa Nellie! We chased her down the street, across yards, through business parking lots, all the while trying to keep her from going across the traffic on Highway 160. In a few minutes, there were enough of us to corner her and then, (if it were possible) things got even more exciting.

It was time to decide how best to get her back into the trailer. We had already seen how herding her went down. So we decided just to CARRY her back to the trailer... Remember, this is a sow and she will weigh 500-600 pounds!

We didn't want to get bit so the handiest thing at the front end was ears. So two men latched onto an ear apiece. The rear end provided three handholds... two legs and the tail. The only person I vividly remember with a hand on the pig was Ralph...he had a back leg.

Did you know that pigs squeal? Did you also know that a pig's squealer goes into overdrive when they are picked up and unceremoniously carried?

Did you also know that a pig can kick with it's back legs? The very instant the old sow went airborne, she started kicking! Not little, slow, soft kicks... But rapid fire, bone jarring, honest to goodness piggy kicks! Poor ole Ralph's teeth were chattering, his head was rattling, his arms were being jerked a-mile-a-minute and all while trying to hustle toward the back of the trailer!

When we got her to the back of the trailer, another problem arose. How do you put her in without her immediately turning around and escaping again? The little piglets had been herded behind a cross gate in the trailer so there was no danger of them escaping... So we decided a "Bacon Launch" would do just fine.

We stood at the of the trailer and did the old "One-Two-Three!" and sent old porker sailing into the trailer and quickly slammed the back gate shut!

The pig's owner thanked us, we climbed back into the truck and continued on to the office... Tired but satisfied that we had done our good deed for the day...