Memorial Bricks Have Story To Tell

“How many Germans did you kill in World War II,” I asked my father once.

I was disappointed that the answer was none. In fact, he was pretty sure that he never fired a gun in combat even though he had followed George Patton across North Africa and up through Italy. I
Lt. William J. Carroll was actually a member of the Army signal corps and had responsibility for a small unit that operated radar equipment from the back of a truck.

Lt. Carroll met Lt. Mary J. Lynch, my future mother, in the officer’s mess on a ship somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean. He admitted that he had volunteered for watch because he’d get to eat first and more importantly he’d get to eat with the nurses. The plan obviously worked.

Lt. Lynch enlisted in the Army out of nursing school and spent the next year working under extreme conditions in operating rooms in places like Algiers, Palermo and Naples. A family friend observed that my mother saw more action than most GI’s because the nurses were needed most where the fighting was the worst.

“I’d be rich if I had a nickel for every marriage proposal I heard during the war,” she once said.
John A. Brownrigg, an aviation machinist third class and my future father-in-law, enlisted in the Navy in 1944 at the age of 17. He bounced around naval air stations and land bases from late 1944 – 1946 eventually ending up at Orote Point, Guam.

“I showed up looking for my unit and they had shipped out,” he told me one night. “I asked the Marines at the base what I should do and they suggested I look busy so I kept busy.”

The war had ended and the Marines were obviously more fixed on getting home than keeping Navy machinist third class John Brownrigg busy. He shipped home shortly after that.

Besides military service, these three relatives of mine have one more thing in common…they all have an engraved brick placed in their honor at the new Allen Veteran’s Memorial.

The memorial, which is located at Bethany Lakes Park, will be dedicated on Memorial Day starting at 11:30 a.m.

The project was first proposed in 2002 by the Leadership Allen Class XV, according to Larry Nordgaard, a member of the class and also a member of local VFW Post #215.

“We found a lot of people who liked the idea but funding was difficult to find,” he explained. “The CDC (Community Development Corporation) Board first funded the architectural work and later stepped forward with funding for the whole project in 2008.”

The memorial includes five 17’ obelisks representing branches of the Armed Services along with a flagpole, benches and a brick wall. Families may purchase engraved bricks for the wall or the patio surrounding the flagpole.

The Allen Veterans Memorial Committee has sold 21 larger bricks and 47 smaller ones which have been installed for the dedication. Bricks will continue to be sold for installation by Veteran’s Day in November.

“Our purpose is to preserve the memory and honor those who served,” says Nordgaard. “The bricks honor some currently serving in the military and others who served as long ago as World War I.”

There are currently 68 engraved bricks in the Allen Veterans Memorial. There is a story behind every name on those bricks and we appreciate Larry Nordgaard, the Leadership Allen Class #15, the CDC Board and the City of Allen for giving us a place to remember them.

Safety Patrol Boy To The Rescue

“Thanks to you Mr. Carroll, St. Thomas The Apostle Elementary School is a safer place,” said Sr. Adrian, our principal. “Your behavior as a safety patrol boy is a model for our younger students to follow.”

Like Theodore Cleaver, I imagined donning the white belt and ultimately winning the praise of our principal and admiration of my fellow students.
The reality of being a patrol boy didn’t live up to my expectations. I earned the safety belt and had many conversations with Sister Adrian.

Unfortunately they sounded more like this.
“Mr. Carroll, once again you were not at your post. I shouldn’t have to remind you that your post faces the rectory and Monsignor O’Brien could walk through that unattended door at any moment.”
I guess you could say I was easily distracted. After a few months of standing guard in the side stairwell, I had not seen much action. I could boss around a few bus kids who exited my door but I was basically hidden from view each afternoon. School dismissed through the main doors and only the best (principal’s favorite) patrol boys / girls got that assignment.

Speaking of corners, the best assignments were a block or two away from the school at busy intersections. The older kids (girls) always lingered there and you were far enough away from the nuns. Those assignments would be labeled as patronage jobs in today’s vocabulary. The principal probably selected them based on grades, maturity and their knowledge of the Catechism.
The coolest part of the safety patrol gig was the belt and badge. When rolled up, it could be used for a game of catch. Once opened, it could be snapped like a wet towel except the metal clips left a more lasting impression.

The familiar white belt’s history goes back to a British army officer named Sam Browne. Browne was serving as an officer in India in the 19th century and had trouble holding his sword in place after he lost his arm in battle. He created a second belt that held the sword in place as well as his pistol and binoculars. The idea was carried forward by officers on both sides in World War I.
The safety “patrol boys” were created by the American Automobile Association in 1920 “to direct children, not traffic and model good safety practices.” They wore an AAA safety patrol badge with the white Sam Browne belt which was later replaced with orange safety vests.

Like most volunteer assignments, the safety patrol job lost its appeal as the year wore on. The weather turned warm and watching other kids walk home with the girls was probably the distraction Sr. Adrian referred to.

I posted a comment about the safety patrol on our grammar school’s Facebook page this past week. The best response out of many came from a former patrol boy.

“I can’t believe they trusted us,” he said. “I mean, give a 12 year-old a badge and it goes to his head!”

It’s hard to argue with that.

It All Starts With Kindergarten

Graduation is a time to look forward but it is also a time to look backwards. As my son John approaches graduation from Allen High School next week, I can’t help but look back to his first day of school – to the day that Kathy Ellis came into our lives.

Her official title was kindergarten teacher at Vaughan Elementary School but Mrs. Ellis meant more than that to us as we hovered at the door that first day. She was the most important teacher in the world because she had our child in her care. As she had done for hundreds of parents before us, she gave a nod and a knowing smile that meant things would be ok. She was right.

More than thirteen years later, John and Mrs. Ellis are both looking at the end of their school careers in Allen. John is looking ahead to Texas Tech and his kindergarten teacher is looking ahead to retirement.

It is no surprise that Kathy Ellis became a teacher. Her parents, her grandmother and her aunt were all educators. Her husband Zach is a teacher in Plano and both of their sons, Tyler and Jeremy, have chosen teaching careers. She taught kindergarten for 22 years and second grade for another 9 years

“I began teaching right out of college (Stephen F. Austin),” she says. “I then taught kindergarten for 22 years and second grade for another 9 years. I’ve been on a school schedule my entire life.”
Every grade is important but kindergarten is such a unique part of school, according to Ellis. “It’s where children learn how to work with others and figure out how school works. It all begins here.”
“The children are so hungry to learn. They want to please and they are so excited just to be in school,” she adds. “They are so involved in the hands-on play activities that they don’t realize they are learning.”

Teachers use a term called transitions to explain how students wrap up one activity or task and move on to another. In kindergarten, it’s about learning the routines and procedures for things older kids take for granted, says Ellis. Trips to the library, the cafeteria, the bathroom and even the water fountain require planning with a class of five year-olds.
Ellis has enjoyed her time in second grade as well. “The students are more independent and they know the routine. They are still excited about school and are easier to communicate with. They are a pleasure to be with.”

What older kids remember most about kindergarten, according to Ellis, are the special days such as western day and the 100th day and mud pie day and field day. A favorite for many Vaughan students was the wedding day each winter when Mr. Q and Mrs. U got married.
“You just have to love kids to be a successful teacher,” explains Ellis. “You have to enjoy being with them; you have to care about their families and be willing to nurture their learning. It can be a challenge at times but it is so rewarding.”

“Teaching at any level requires a lot of energy and giving. Good teachers pour themselves into their work at school and at home. It’s all about creating great learning experiences for children.”
It’s also about knowing when to give a nod and a knowing smile to some nervous parents.
Best wishes to Mrs. Ellis and all of our Allen ISD family members who will be retiring at the end of this school year.

Remembering The Green Monster

For something so important in my life, it seems hard to believe. I don’t have a single photograph; I don’t know the year it was made or even how I acquired it. But I sure remember my Schwinn Typhoon bicycle.

The green monster as it came to be known was actually my third bicycle but it was the first one I bought with my own money. Using $50 I had received as a confirmation gift, I bought a used green Typhoon from some guy whose kid left for college. It was probably the first “big” purchase I’d ever made.

In car terms, the Schwinn Typhoon was more like a Pontiac while the Roadmaster was more like a Cadillac. Kids that had Tuffy bikes in the 60’s probably drove Plymouths later in life.
Anyway, my bike was a shiny green cruiser with wide chrome fenders, a headlight, fat tires and dual baskets in the rear.

I imagined delivering newspapers or carrying groceries in those big baskets like the kids in the commercials. Instead, they were usually full of baseballs, gloves and bats. Friends also found them useful for hitching rides straddling the rear fender with feet in the baskets.

I am not exaggerating when I say that the green monster changed my life. I could ride across town to visit friends and cruise the park for a pick up ball game. By seventh grade I was also cruising the park for a different reason but that’s a column for another day.

My friend Gary had a black version of the same bicycle and we would take road trips during the summer to exotic locations like Nutley and Montclair (NJ). Our favorite trip that was repeated often led to Garrett Mountain in Clifton. Including a stop at the candy store and a picnic lunch, it took most of the day to get there and back. We figured it was about 20 miles away but MapQuest says it is exactly 4.8 miles one way. The route must have gotten shorter since we were kids.

The green monster was no sports car but its wide tires and heavy frame made it a breeze to drive. It could be easily ridden with a basketball under one arm and even with no hands when necessary. The bike and I also survived a collision with a car (Don’t Tell Mom I Got Hit By a Car, 4-24-08). Luckily I wasn’t riding one of those modern Stingray models.

Somewhere around eighth grade, Gary and I stripped our bikes down to resemble dirt bikes which were just becoming popular. We pulled off the fenders and baskets and gave them new paint jobs. Our reward was a back full of mud every time it rained but at least they didn’t rattle as they rolled down the street.

With a driving age of 17, bicycles were an acceptable form of transportation through most of high school but the old Schwinn had become uncool. I bought a used English racer bike in 10th grade and retired the green monster.

According to Schwinn’s corporate history, over a million bicycles a year were being produced in the 1960’s but only one was called the green monster.

What Are The Odds Part 2

When we left the New Jersey vacationers last week, they were recovering from a 3 a.m. arrival and the river outside the hotel was rising from 10” of rain.

Despite the weather, my son John, his friend Pierse and I drove 13 miles into Manhattan to attend the Big East Basketball Finals between Georgetown and West Virginia. The odds favored the Mountaineers 3-2 which matched the odds of being blown off Route 3 with 60 mph gusts of wind.
As locals will tell you, the odds of driving straight into New York City through the Lincoln Tunnel without stopping are slim to none but there we were cruising into the Port Authority parking lot feeling very smug.

We caught the subway to Penn Station which is conveniently located below Madison Square Garden and were smug once more that we had avoided the driving rain (hold that thought).
Following a great game, we discovered that the subways were shut down due to power outages caused by flooding. We were less smug as we walked 6 blocks against the cross town winds in the rain.

Meanwhile back in the swamps of Jersey, the busy Route 3 was closed due to downed power lines. We worked our way around that problem and headed back to the hotel – the one with the rising river. What are the odds that our evening was not over yet?

As we reached the crest of a long hill that leads into Little Falls (NJ), we noticed that the stores, diners and yes, hotel, was completely dark. The storm had knocked out power almost everywhere. Power is not a necessity when heading to bed late a night.

It was about 1:30 a.m. when I heard shouting in the parking lot 4 stories below. The odds of a fight breaking out between drunken wedding revelers may be 25 – 1. But even Jimmy the Greek would have a hard time predicting a fight between members of the same wedding party during a blackout in the rain. It made for great late night theater if we could see beyond the headlights of the wedding party van and the police lights.

I could only assume that the “Welcome DeRocco Wedding” sign I saw the next morning was placed in the foyer when the DeRocco’s were still on speaking terms.

The odds of the nearby Willowbrook Mall being closed outside of major holidays are 1000 – 1 but there it was, surrounded by the Passaic River up to aisle B-4. The entrance ramps were under water. We heard it made national news that day but we, of course, did not have electricity.
The rain continued as we waited in line outside the Ed Sullivan Theater on Monday. The odds of being chosen for the front rows at Letterman diminished with age and fashion sense. Those people with “the look” got numbered tickets while we were placed out of the camera’s view upstairs. The odds of Jennifer Aniston being Letterman’s guest were at least 300 – 1 but there she was clowning with Dave.

Our final shot at beating the odds came when we heard that the NIT (National Invitational Tournament) basketball pairings had Texas Tech playing in Newark (NJ) against Seton Hall the next night. The odds of two future Tech students being in Newark for the game were probably 3000 – 1 but there they were proudly wearing their Red Raider shirts and cheering with the other 22 fans who made the trip. Coach Pat Knight personally thanked them after the win because he couldn’t figure the odds of 22 people from Lubbock making it to Newark with one day’s notice.

The odds of the sun breaking out as our plane flew away were even because for once, it just what we expected to happen.

What Are The Odds?

What are the odds? It’s a question we may toss out in a moment of surprise but we rarely bother to answer it.

More than once last week I found myself asking just that question as I traveled with my eighteen year-old son John and his friend Pierse.

I could say that we went to New York City for spring break but I’d be stretching the truth. We were actually holed up 12 miles west in Totowa, New Jersey but New York has more cache. I figure the odds of a north Jersey resident claiming he or she grew up in New York City are about 4-1.

Our improbable vacation began on Friday afternoon at 2 p.m., five hours before our scheduled flight. I received a call from Jamie at The Late Show with David Letterman. She had received my request for tickets to the show (from early January) and was offering three seats to the Monday afternoon taping. The catch was that two of us had to answer a Letterman trivia question first to prove we were fans and not just tourists.

I correctly named the deli that Dave regularly visits (Ruperts) but someone else needed to answer the second question. John passed the honor to Pierse who correctly named Al as the floor manager at the show. What are the odds? I’d say about 10-1 on answering the questions but about 1000-1 on getting a phone call in the first place.

Anyway, our travels began on a frantic Friday night at DFW airport. Our early arrival allowed time for dinner until the long check-in line ate up 40 minutes. The odds of a delay caused by a person checking four large cardboard boxes at the self check-in are about 75-1.

Literally, as we walked through security, I received a notice that our flight was delayed by 60 minutes due to bad weather in the New York area. The odds of a counter agent giving us an honest estimate were about 50-1 so we weren’t surprised that the delay would be closer to 2 hours. In all fairness to the airline, the storms in New Jersey were record breaking.

The time zone change plus the two hour delay dumped us in Newark Airport at 2 a.m. More hungry than tired, we stopped at the famous Park West Diner in Little Falls, NJ. The odds of a waitress there calling you “hun” are 3-1 and the odds of hearing some colorful Jersey dialect at 3 a.m. are 2-1.

The odds were excellent that it would be a rainy weekend. There was a 100% chance of rain through Sunday. The odds were somewhat less that we would get 10” of rain but local optimists were just glad it wasn’t snow again.

The next morning (afternoon for the teenagers) I noticed that the Passaic River, which runs alongside the hotel, was reaching its limits. I would not have wagered that the same river would make national headlines on Sunday as the towns of Little Falls, Totowa and Fairfield were flooded. We are looking at 500-1 odds that our Holiday Inn Hotel would provide a view of the 2nd worst North Jersey flooding in 75 years.

The odds of telling this story in less than 1000 words are not good either so I will ask our Flipside readers to tune in next week for “What Are The Odds Part II.”

City Bus Time Travel

The wheels on the bus went round and round and round for me as a child. My mother didn’t learn to drive for many years

They went by numbers instead of names but everyone knew when and where the number 2 arrived. They knew the 28 would pass across the street minutes before the eastbound 28 did. They also knew that the 33 and the 88 were the same unless you fell asleep and found yourself in West Caldwell instead of Bloomfield.

I am referring, of course, to the city busses that criss-crossed the main streets of every town in north Jersey either rushing commuters in and out of New York City or just running across town.
It’s been a long time since I rode a city bus though so you can imagine my delight when I spotted an old transit bus at an Allen service station. I pulled in behind it and met Tim Logan, an Allen resident who collects and restores transit busses as a hobby.

“I grew up in Mobile, Alabama riding the busses around town most often with my grandmother,” explains Logan. “I just fell in love with those busses and rode them around and around town getting to know the drivers and routes.”

Logan earned his CDL (Commercial Driver’s License) at the age of 21 and has been driving busses on and off ever since. He has driven almost every variety of bus since that time including the Dallas McKinney Avenue Trolleys. He currently works as vice-president of Pacific World Corpration, a cosmetics company, but also drives school busses part-time for Allen ISD to keep his hands on the wheel so to speak.

Unlike cars, city busses have only changed style three times since the early 1950’s, according to Logan. Almost all busses were manufactured by GM and they had the “old look” busses which resemble bread boxes with the rounded corners. Then the “new look” busses were introduced by GM in 1959 with their modern sloping windshield and split windows down the side. The ADB-design busses, which are still commonly used in cities and airports, replaced the new look busses in the 1970’s.

Logan currently owns 5 busses and owned up to 14 at one point. His current collection includes a 1988 Chance bus (the only one of its kind), a 1977 Flxible bus (yes that is the correct spelling), a 1971 Flxible, which is the actual bus that he and his grandmother rode through Mobile and his favorite, the 1954 GM shown here. This bus was operated as the #1364 city bus in Minneapolis its entire career.

“This is a hobby so my goal is not to find busses that are valuable,” says Logan. “I am more interested in busses that have nostalgic or historic appeal. Once I restore a bus I might keep it for a few years and then sell it to fund another project. It’s not quite like stamp collecting but I sure enjoy it.”

Logan does not hire his busses out for passengers but they have often appeared in television commercials and parades. An old bus immediately sets the time for a movie or commercial. His 1954 bus was recently used for an American Airlines ad that will appear later this spring.
Logan is not alone with his oversized hobby. There are regional and national associations of private bus owners and museums that share stories and occasionally swap parts.

“Most of the busses I start with are in rough shape but finding ones in running order is getting harder. I figure there are about 50 old look busses in running condition and several hundred new look busses,” adds Logan.

One of his recent acquisitions was hauled down from Ketchikan, Alaska and another was found abandoned in a field. Once restored, they can fetch a good price. Logan says that Jay Leno, Jim Lehrer and Bill Clinton own antique busses. The most valuable one he has seen was used for storage on a farm for many years until it was restored as the original Rosa Parks bus in Montgomery.

Stepping on the old bus was like traveling in time. I could almost hear the clinking of change and see the stares of elderly ladies with their foldup shopping carts. The only thing missing was the familiar smell of bus exhaust rising through the back seats.