Making Memories

‘The most beautiful things are not associated with money; they are memories and moments."   Alec Wek

Memories are special and personal. My childhood is not like yours nor even my sister's. We often laugh about 'that's not how I remember it.'

Memories are also made for others to share and that is where parents, schools, and communities come together. My sincere applause to the community of Miami, Oklahoma and all who made dreams come true this year with spectacular lights, colorful globes, the tallest Christmas Tree on Route 66, hot chocolate, fresh cookies and sweets. and a main street filled with families making memories for another generation.

I have realized in the last few decades that some of my memories are more like souvenirs. The word parade elicits large floats with scenes of Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus; flat floats filled with children from the Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, and community churches singing; grade schools with scenes from a Christmas play. The floats were larger than life and skirted and covered with chicken wire stuffed with napkins / Kleenex. (I had some experience in decorating floats when I attended NEO.)  In my child’s imagination the floats were every bit as large as Macy’s Christmas parade. My eyes saw glittering shades of reds, greens, whites, yellows, pinks, orange, black, blues, all twinkling, or flashing like magic. Whereas our black and white televisions and newspapers only carried parades in black and white.

Wilson School

My heart filled with joy and giggles when I heard over the loudspeakers Holly Jolly Christmas by Burl Ives. These are the moments that connect their generation with my generation.

A recent "Family Circus" cartoon shows the little boy holding a string of Christmas lights, then handing them to his father, the child declares,

 "Christmas lights up the world." 

In my hometown, Miami, Oklahoma, we attended every Christmas parade from 1955--the 1970's on the first Saturday night of December.  Of course, my vision is in full color and always in my mind ready to roll. As a child, my point of view often caught the tires and lower levels of vehicles passing by pulling the radiant floats. Everything above me was giant in size. Looking up I saw astronomical golden yellow, blue, green, and red balls.  Greenery and streaming lights were as high as the sky and unreachable as a child. 

Vicki Martin, daughter of Russ Martin, recalls that their family had front row seats on the balcony of the Miami Hotel. Their dad announced the parade, for all at home who could not attend, from the KGLC station that was located on the second floor of the hotel. 

What older people and former residents forget is that our parents and community were Making Memories for us. Fifty-years later parents and community are still Making Memories for their children and the children of Ottawa county. They are different memories, and they will have cameras and photos to recall plus bags of candy to remember the sweetness of the night. 

Small towns still sent bands, cheerleaders, dance teams, "Shriners," shinny cars, fancy trucks, sleighs with toys and candy. The lights glowed overhead. People sang along, clapped and cheered for family and friends. 

The children in front of us caught my attention. They jumped and hollered with joy and giggled at the sights on which their eyes feasted.  A gray car, one I called the Bat Mobile drove by and I noticed the children's eyes and awes were thrilling. I wondered what a Bat Mobile would be doing in a Christmas parade? The truth of the matter is that it was a Tesla Truck, and didn't we have shiny new Mustang  convertibles in our parades?  I laughed out loud at myself and could hear in my head the lyrics to Rodgers and Hammerstein's song,

 "Everything's up to date in Oklahoma. They've gone about as far as they can go. They went and built a skyscraper seven stories high about as high as a building ought to go." 

What could be more joyful for a seventy-year-old woman than to hear the voices of children laughing, loving, and spirited in the moments...making memories. 

The highlight for me was to see that Miami honored its best, Jane Osborn, as the Grand Marshall of the 2024 Parade. Her artic white hair, her joyful face aglow, and bright red lipstick set off her genuine smile and love for her hometown. She waved and we waved back. We knew her love and commitment had helped to bring our small town back to life. 

Thank you Jane Osborn, Bill Osborn,  Colby Allen Sign Company, Mayor Bless Parker, Bobby Poole, Debbie East and members of the community who worked together to make this parade of 2024 the best ever for the children with new businesses and brick buildings clean and inviting.

Footnote: Jonya and I drove old Route 66 going home on that Sunday from Miami to Sapulpa. You can't go wrong on Route 66....

For a glimpse of the olden days of black and white in Miami click on this link: 1950's Christmas Parades

Listening in Silence

Like a child I sat in the sunlight

and played with the minutes as they went running by....

Like a child I would listen in silence

to the soft sound of evening as it caught up the day...   

                                            Rod McKuen, LISTEN TO THE WARM

As a child, I learned to listen to the trees, to the breeze, to the rustle of leaves and scurry of critters in the bushes. Shutting out the talk, the screaming, the motors running I could walk away and listen alone in my own silence.  

One warm summer day two eight year old girls, Diana, my neighbor, and I walked to Tar Creek behind the college football field, behind the college racket, and away from people watching. We found some stones in the middle of the creek where cold water bubbled up from underground. 

In the shade of the trees we sat on the stones and folded fallen leaves into cups to drink the fresh bubbling waters. Minnows swam around our bare feet, sometimes biting at our toes.

We didn't talk much, we were neighbors, not friends, but I knew her secrets from open windows on hot summer nights. No one came to check on us. We were in our own safe secret silent world of fairies, frogs, fishes, mice and birds. The gentle flow of water carried our wishes away on rafts of twigs and grasses. Fairies, after all, know how to live with nature. 

Silence is a true friend, who never betrays.  Confucius 

Over the years we left those memories behind. Our beloved retreat began to bubble red from the rust and blood of the old mines to our north. No children can drink that water now, nor sit and feel the nibble of minnows, nor listen in silence.  

The quieter you become, the more you are able to hear.  Rumi

The child in me still needs that silence, the quiet, the moments when my mind is alone with space and time. Alone, I find that silence in my long walks.

Listen to silence. It has so much to say.   Rumi

Last week my sister, Jonya, and I elected and to explore Norman and maybe a good sale on women's clothes. Instead, we ended up searching and finding silence.

Silence offers time for reflection.

We met for lunch around 2:00 after the rush. An hour later, our tummies full, we decided to visit the new library in Norman. How strange, I smiled to myself that two once athletic, competitive women would seek out the silence in walls of books. As children, we played outside constantly in our neighborhood. We grew up on a country club golf course, where we  played hours of golf, went swimming every summer day, best of all we explored from top to bottom the old four story Tudor style clubhouse, our second home, where we never met a stranger; where we learned to perform; where our lives were often in the spotlight, as the daughters of the golf pro, Johnie Stapp and his wife Helen.

Silence and Listen are spelled with the same letters. 

Yes, we are teachers. I spent decades working in libraries, Jonya spent decades studying and reading in libraries. So here were sisters, silently reading, looking pensively out the windows, walking up and down rows of books, smelling the warm aroma of paper, and relaxing. Our thoughts were silent, few words spoken, our walking gait felt older and slower, our greener years have passed by. The sale of used books grabbed our attention and pocket book. Then wondering around the stacks I looked at fiction and history books, Jonya looked at language, Christian themed, and self-help books.  We spent a glorious amount of time looking through pages of oversized and heavy "coffee table" books that took us away. Pictures from worlds we will never visit, but through those books we toured the world, not just the space between the walls of the library. 

Silence is a source of great strength.  Lao Tzu

The windows in our new library give a southern panoramic view of the Norman's downtown and the University of Oklahoma. Early spring vistas showed baren trees and brown grasses, yet in our blood we knew spring would arrive soon. We whispered a few words then floated away, lost in thoughts.  Later the sun told us it was time to leave, evening was catching up with us. 

Lost in a Flood of Images

My brain flies from one thought to another which is why I take Tai Chi and Yoga classes. After I left stretch yoga class this morning relaxed and focused:

1) I sat down to write about the flow I felt, and how important it is to stretch, relax, take deep breaths, lower my shoulders and smile as I look out the window and see the finches feeding. 

2) I sat down to write about the rabbit holes I've gone down in the last year and just yesterday. They make me laugh so much, especially the one in 1943 about the lady who flew through a bakery window.  (Wichita Eagle) In the best Hollywood "stunt girl" tradition Mrs. Francis Fayette, 532 East Harvard cycling on Broadway last evening struck a bump with her bicycle and sailed over the handlebars. She crashed through a plate glass window in a bakery shop at 718 East Broadway and emerged from the wreckage with nothing more serious than a tiny cut to her left forehead. (In the beginning before Facebook there was the news of the day.)

3) I sat down to write about the Flood of 1951 in Miami, Ok because it was on my mind from reading the News Archives on Miami in the early 1950's. Miami, Oklahoma History  It seems as though most of the newspapers were not saved, leaving a gap in my blog-- Miami Country Club, History   

Moments after I sat down my sciatic nerve pinched me without let up.  My head bobbed in pain. 

I fumed and kicked around like a child in a temper tantrum. Out loud I mumbled. "Leave me alone. I just want to write, not try out for a marathon. Let me relax..."  I stood and stretched with the right leg in front, bent myself to the knee, stood, repeated with the left and continued down the hallway, like a pigeon nodding and walking down the fence top (or a pigeon in heat, I call it), followed by downward dog, #4 standing stretch, and finally I could stand upright and not hurt." Ah, relief. Almost. My brain where did the thought train go?

“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”

“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat. 

Somedays I feel as lost as Alice in Wonderland.

Hours later, sushi for lunch, a load of laundry, a romp in the backyard with the dog, and I'm once again ready to write or not.

For the last two weeks I have been reading and collecting golf notes on my father's life between 1928--36, 1941--44 in the scrapbooks that he and his sister put together. This is my working station.

As I walked by it this morning while stretching in my pigeon walk, I noticed the framed plate in the background. Everyday for two weeks I have looked at those plates before I sit down. The rose patterned one on the left came from my Grandmother DeBacker's home, the two blue fishes were my mother's, the one on the far right is my plate with an attitude ("Give Into Temptation, It Might Not Come Again"), the framed one stumped me.

Godey Print, early 1930-1970's production by Salem China.

Was it the child bringing flowers to her mother? the child wanting attention? the stiff composure of the women?

I've carried this plate with me since my parents died and only this afternoon did I remember why and only this month did I find a way to display it.

We moved to Miami, Oklahoma in 1954, three years after the massive flood of 1951.  Now, I can remember seeing this plate hang on the green painted walls with faded flood lines wrinkled in the wallboards. In my child's mine of age six, I could imagine the fishes and how they must have slithered between the walls when the flood left this house in ten feet of water. Yet, my parents had hung this plate on the wall directly facing the stair case that I rumbled up and down daily. Did the water drip out of the nail hole? Did the fishes all die? I pondered these thoughts and many many more. 

Our home was 3 blocks north of the railroad tracks on the west side of Main St. We can see from the photo that those homes filled with water. 

I loved that old house on A St. Southwest. It held more stories than anyplace I have ever lived, and that framed stuffy plate is my reminder of the flood, I never saw.  My upstairs closet held a child's painting of "raw and bloody bones"; the beggar man and his children came by to eat trash from our garbage, unless mom saw them first and fed them food from our table; hobos from the train tracks walked by and begged food from our homes; before we moved in 'I was told' that the lady next hanged herself over the basement cellar and died; the sixes (Cantrell's) lived two houses up; the house on the north end burned to the ground one day while I was at school; and everybody had flood stories or river stories to tell except me. I often think I was destined to be a storyteller. A St. Stories Told and Retold is another collection of stories I wrote a few years ago. 

I missed the great flood and for the rest of my school years I heard those stories and never got tired of listening. During my eighth grade year Miami experienced another small flood while we lived on H St. Northeast. Finally, I had a flood story, but it ended with a tetanus shot and I didn't like the outcome one iota. 

Ironically, the flood of images and the floods of time all come back to me now. 

Although our roots may be flooded, washed away, burned to the ground, destroyed by tornadoes, earthquakes, volcanoes, and tsunamis we stoop, stop, look upwards for help and we cry, then carry on. Like in war and the images we are seeing that flood our hearts with pain, we see their broken roots but know that their spirits are strong. We pray for all mankind.  

Forever Memories

 

Letty, Katy, Jonya September 2021

Over the weekend my sister, Jonya and I, relaxed over lunch with my daughter, Katy at Kitchen 324 in downtown Oklahoma City. Thus began our daughter's fiftieth birthday celebration. Why not celebrate the entire month when you turn 50!

No matter how we start our conversations it seems that we eventually work in a memory of mom and dad. So began stories about our experiences on the farm East of Miami, Oklahoma. Each of us found humor in those moments that happened so many year ago, yet 'seem like yesterday.'   

 

Katy and Jonya, remembered how mom saved table scraps for the dogs and food for the worm bed near the wood pile. The dogs received a can of  “Ol' Roy” dog food and a heaping of scraps. The rest of the foods went to the worms buried under a black mat. I can see my city raised mother with make up on her face and an apron around her waist feeding, digging, and turning the worm bed, so that they had worms for fishing on Mondays. Mondays were dad's day away from work and routines. Mother was never a fisher woman, but truly a dutiful wife there to assist her husband, even with wiggling worms. 

I remembered the hidden toy in the flower garden. Somewhere in those years of six to ten Katy cherished her Incredible Hulk action toy.  He went everywhere with Katy around the farm and then quietly disappeared. Katy hit the teenage years and put the Hulk memories behind her, until one day my mother called explaining that she’d nearly had a heart attack and needed to talk to Katy right away! With both of us ears to the one landline telephone my mother explained:

"Today, I was digging up the flower bed on the North side of the house when suddenly I hit something with the shovel. It wasn't a root, so I kept forcing the shovel down until it gave way. Suddenly, green slime oozed from the hole in the ground. I screamed, my heart raced, and Johnie came running.        

Katy and I could barely breathe and she continued.

 

Available on eBay for $165, Happy Birthday

At last Johnie dug up the green slime and the filthy aged broken and
battered body of the Hulk emerged.  

 

By now mother was laughing so hard she nearly cried, and Katy and I could finally breathe. Then we began laughing out loud and continue to laugh to this very day over the green slime in the garden. 

Incredible stories most certainly take place on farmland. Dad named all of their cows the first year, then after selling some for market learned to stop giving them names. Mom and dad both cried the first time their pet calves were sold.

 

We all remember Charley the Bull, who my father adopted like a pet. Charley had a purpose and he produced healthy calves in the few years that Dad owned him, but Charley also visited the females on the other side of the fences leaving gaping holes in the barbed wire that dad had to fix. 

 

Jonya explained that Charley was best known for his love affair with Rosemary. Charley and Rosemary produced a mean steer named Rosemary's Baby! We weren't safe around the farm with Rosemary's baby in the herd.

 

 

Little Katy and Heidi

Mom and Dad bought the farm in 1970 before Katy was born in 1971. So all of her memories of my folks come from the farm. None of us could recall what kind of red bull Charley was, but Katy's description is best. 

"Charley the Bull was an Auburn colored bull with huge HORNS and was very big and scary. I helped Grandpa Moo feed Charley and Charley always blew bull snot all over us! 

 

I like Mr. Kay, he was the smaller nicer brown and white bull that Grandpa Moo bought after he sold Charley." 

 

 

Mother and dad were both children of the depression and the need to save and store objects never left. Dad was most famous for hiding money, mother just couldn't remember where she put things (rather like her two daughters do to this day).  After they died Jack and spent weekends on the farm cleaning and boxing up memories. One cool fall day we were in the north barn where Dad fed his bulls. We were tired and worn from the heartache and memories but carried on. Somehow we came across a flattened Folgers Coffee can buried under the straw. Our hearts raced, like mother's with the hulk. Jack found two shovels and we began to dig. We knew without a doubt there would be a buried treasure, more than likely coins that dad saved for decades and weren't in the bank vault. 

We nearly dug a hole to China, only to find more dirt. We laughed at ourselves and called it a day.

 

I've often wondered what notes or monies I must have thrown away or given to Goodwill. What did dad hide in the lining of his dress jackets or the heel of his golf shoes?  We can only imagine.  

 

Those treasures and memories are now stored within our hearts, and they may be the reason that I am a storyteller.  

 

Salute! to Bob Hope and Thanks for the Memories

(Click on the blue link to take you to listen to Bob Hope sing this wonderful old song.) 

 

Nomads

 

Jonya and Bill

Jonya 

         This summer my sister and her husband have traveled the north central plains states in their RV. Jonya retired from teaching after nearly forty years. To help her adjust to retirement they decided to travel with their cats to keep them company. I can tell from the photos that they send that Jonya and Bill have both taken time to unwind from the working world. Nomadic life looked pretty cool from my perspective. 

 
       

The story written below is of the Stokes family we knew who were real nomads. No cameras no pictures no cell phones were available to them. The atlas was their Bible.  They never owned a home and were on the move in an Airstream trailer after every job that Dale finished. I only wish I could  recall his stories of working from the great Southwest to the Northwest in the 1940's, 1950's, and 1960's.  

         

  One hot humid summer day on E street S.W. when I was seven years old, our house was rattled by the blaring blast of a cow horn coming from a car pulling up in front of our house.  Leaving dishes in the sink, then quickly drying her hands on her apron, Mom rushed to the front porch with Jonya and I following closely.  “They’re here already.  Dale and Elsie are here,” she joyfully pronounced, “I thought they were days away.”

            Jonya and I just stood in the screened in porch watching as a man and woman stepped out of a boxy shaped car that was pulling a sleek silver trailer.  Then we heard Elsie’s enthusiastic voice call out, “Hi girls.”

            “Elsie, “ I yelled, when I recognized her voice and her open arms.  Leaping down the steps I ran to her open hug.  Mom was right behind me giving Dale a hug and then Elsie.  Jonya tugged at me, I turned and said, “It’s Elsie and Dale, remember, mom and dad’s friends from Arizona.”   She was only three, so how could she remember, I suddenly thought.  So I tried to explain, “Remember, Elsie is the lady who loves to swim and play games with us when she visits.”  Just then Elsie stepped over to Jonya and knelt down on the ground eye level, “Hi little one.  My name is Elsie,” then turning and looking up she continued, “This is my husband Dale, and we’re friends of your mom and dad.  We’re going to spend some time with you this summer; playing golf, swimming, and fishing.”  Jonya seemed to catch on and shyly smiled, “Will you play dolls with me?”

 “I’d love to play dolls with you, since I don’t have a little girl to play dolls with anymore.” Elsie answered with a smile that showed her large teeth.

“You’re a few days early, your letter said middle of August to Labor Day.” Mom said rather flustered.”  Before she could continue Dale answered, “I finished my last job early, so we just took off.  Thought we hadn’t seen Johnie and Helen and the girls since their move to Miami, and that this would be a great summer trip.”  Just then I remember that I had slept in their trailer when we visited them in Arizona.  “Can I sleep in your trailer while you’re here?” 

Using a rather firm voice mom said, “Letty, let’s get settled and call Dad at the club before we do anything.  Dale and Elsie come on into the house and have some tea or a beer while we make plans.”

After a cold beer, Dale’s voice boomed, just like his car horn, “Helen, do you have room for our Airstream in the back yard?  We could park it there before John gets home from work.”  “Yes, yes we have a big backyard,” I chimed in, only to receive the stare from mom, that I was to be silent and let the adults decide.

After examining the alleyway and the unfenced yard, Dale pronounced that there was plenty of room.  Without any arguments or advice he drove the trailer around the block and up the alley.  Elsie directed him flawlessly into the yard where he parked the compact trailer.  Then the two of them went to work unhooking the car, balancing the trailer, rolling out the awnings, opening windows, and setting the wooden steps in place by the door.”  By the time Dad came home from work, they’d moved in. 

The neighborhood kids arrived in groups to see what silver bullet had just pulled through their alley.  The Bothwell’s, the Searle’s, and the Hammonds next door all showed up to see the commotion.  Holding Jonya’s hand, we proudly stood outside with them, showing off our newest addition, like proud owners of a new toy.  Since it was nearly dark, Dale and Elsie promised the neighborhood kids that tomorrow they could come back and take a tour of their trailer. 

The Flying Cloud 
Airstream design from the 1950's

That evening the lawn chairs were set up in the backyard, a red metal chest with cold beer set between Dale and Dad.  As they drank a few beers Mother took us inside and fixed our dinner early, as she did most every night in the summer when dad worked till dark.  When we’d finished our meal we were free to play till bedtime, while mom and Elsie joined the men for a few drinks.  Elsie drank beer like the men, but mother preferred Scotch.

  Dad loved to grill outside in the summer when we entertained company.  Pulling the homemade trash barrel BBQ grill away from the house to the gravel driveway away from trees and bushes made the fire breathing dragon seem innocuous.  I sometimes helped by placing the black dry charcoals in a coffee can. Dad would soak the coals in gasoline until he was ready to start a fire.  His fire starting method always scared mom, so she’d grab us by the arms when possible and yanked us back with a comment like, “I don’t want your eyebrows singed.” 

  At last he would place the soaked coals on the grill and surround them with dry coals from the sack.  With a warning cry, “Stand back,” he would light a couple of matches and toss them on the pile of gasoline soaked charcoals.  Like fireworks the flames leaped high above the grill lid and the smell of burning gasoline radiated through the air.  After another drink or two dad would place the steaks on the grill while mom prepared the salad with homemade vinegar and oil dressing, bread and butter,.  By then it was our bedtime and the adults finished dinner and drinks alone.

During the next few days we woke up to Dale’s jovial voice at the backdoor, “Stappie, you got the coffee ready yet?”  Then we’d hear the screen door open and bang shut.  Mother was the coffee drinker, not Dad.  “Coffee is served,” Mother responded.  After the adults finished breakfast, a cigarette and coffee, Jonya and I crept into the kitchen.   Dad left for work, then Dale loaded up his heavy car with tools and drove out to the club to spend the day fixing things for Dad.  

I loved our nomadic friends. Dale was an electrician by trade. He and Elsie traveled the west coast year round looking for jobs. They raised one daughter, and were like family to us. 

 

 

 

 

 

Hands in Time: Miami Memories

It was her hands that I saw today as I quickly stacked and sliced the sandwiches for our lunch. Slow, deliberate, and graceful were her pale white hands as she delicately sliced the toasted tuna salad sandwich. How often in my life I have imagined her hands, as I hurried from one task to another?

 

Delzel's Drug Store from 1958--1965, next to the Coleman Theatre.

  

She worked at the Delzel's corner drugstore, just south of the Coleman Theatre. During my freshman year in high school, my girlfriends and I would run downtown for lunch. The first students to arrive always ordered and saved a table for others. There we were, already training our bodies and minds to rush, organize, eat, and run. 

She was never in a hurry. Each order was written carefully as if by hands and nails that had just been painted. Then I'd watch as her soft, wrinkled hands slowly stirred the tuna or chicken salad. The mayonnaise, not ever mayo, was drawn by a rounded butter knife that made curved strokes across the face of the bread. She scooped up a perfect serving size and spread it on toasted white bread, as if it were frosting on a cake.  Rarely did we order lettuce, but when we did, the leaf was sure to curl like a lace between the slices. My mind was sparked by a stark contrast when those same soft hands picked up the butcher knife to halve the sandwich. The knife seemed awkward with its hard black handle resting in her soft flesh. But, like an artist, she placed the knife at just the right angle, corner to corner, then carefully, with her left hand on the tip of the blade, she applied pressure, and with the right hand, downward went the knife, slicing the sandwich neatly in half with no meat bulging from the side. 

No matter the number of orders or the time restraints we operated under, her schedule never varied--one perfectly-formed sandwich at a time, picked up like fragile glass, placed on a thick white plate, decorated with an even number of chips and one sweet pickle. She hand-delivered these sandwiches to each of us as a mother might prepare for a family she never had. 

After school we'd often stop at the drugstore for a cherry coke, and she'd tell us about her nephew who was about our age. We wondered if she had a husband, or if she was a spinster. Did we even know her name? 

Today, I saw my her hands in mine as I pulled out the lite mayo, relish, and celery from the fridge, opened the can of tuna in water, lunged for the bread in the cupboard, and then began an unmeasured mixing of flavors and colors to build my own tuna salad sand. Just then the phone rang and Murphy Doodle, our puppy jumped to help me find the phone. "Unknown" strikes again. I growled at the phone like a dog with a bone. 

 
Then I turned back to the tuna, washed my hands and took a deep breath.  "Slow down," I heard a voice inside of me whisper. I looked down at the counter and saw my hurried hands. They suddenly looked older, softer, but scratched and scared with time. Brown spots covered the back of my hands, blue veins stood out creating an unevenness in my thin skin. 

With a deep breath I found myself remembering and chuckling over time. . . seven grain bread on our plates, no white bread for decades. Lettuce fresh from the garden topped my husband's sandwich, and filled my salad bowl (no carbs, no bread). I stopped, smiled, turned to a drawer and pulled out the ice cream scoop. Slowly, I picked up the tuna and placed it perfectly on top of my salad, then I gingerly added sliced almonds and yellow banana peppers for taste and color. A smile crossed my face, and memories danced in my head. I saw her smile at me. 

She had watched us grow, graduate, and take on the world, but I don't believe we ever said good-bye, so I cherish her memory. 

 

The Timeline of building occupants connected to the Coleman Theatre. Thank you Ron Enderland at Miami Oklahoma History

 

Taking Center Stage: A True Story 1958

 

Tom and Virginia Lee Wilson’s Dance Recital memory

Miami Memories

 

View from the balcony (where the lovers used to meet).

        Before the floodlights and spotlights brush the stage, before the music begins and the plush burgundy curtains part, a world appearing in crisis is scurrying back stage, but the black and white photo of three future Rockettes shows childhood confidence and pride moments before the curtain call.  Three little girls are posing by the stage door, proudly grinning ear to ear in their colorful neon orange costumes, standing like Rockettes with an outside arm on the hip and the inside arm over shoulder, arm over shoulder, arm over shoulder and closed by an outside arm on the hip.

        Much of the excitement of that dance recital so many years ago is lost in the black and white shades of the Brownie Kodak camera photo (now lost on paper but not in my memory).   Our boots glistened pure white and silver tassels hung from the boot top.  Our white cowboy rolled hats were placed squarely on our heads with chins straps securely holding the hat in place.  Two blue eyed blondes adorned my sides while my shoulder length brunette hair hung to my shoulders.  No braces, no glasses, no earrings, no curves to our bodies, shapeless, yes, but lips flashed of Elizabeth Taylor red. Many of our mothers who never let us wear makeup allowed Virginia Lee and her mother to carefully line our lips and make us shine on stage.

        Our short dance dress costumes were sewn in the newest shiny neon material (never before seen on stage).  Mine a brilliant orange while my bookend friends are dressed in contrasting chartreuse green.  We could have passed for characters in Alice in Wonderland with those flashy colors.   The bodice of our costumes was fitted with darts and little puff sleeves.  I was mortified that I had darts, for I certainly didn’t own a bra, wear a bra, nor would I ever be caught dead in a bra.  Just the same I had darts up from the waist and arrowing across my flattened chest, but a giggle from some of us echoed that it was about womanhood.

        The twelve inch circular skirt was sewn to the bodice with a long zipper going up the back.  Unlike the surrey in the play Oklahoma our skirts had a fringe on the bottom.  Not just any fringe but silver glistening threads that sparkled in the flood lights.  When our dancing legs kicked in line our matching bloomers showed, and our conservative parents laughed.  The motivation to kick high came easily in our costumes.

        Now the Wilson Dance Recital was upon us.  A covey of nervous young girls huddled back stage awaiting the musical cue, but in the stilled silence of the dancers nervous breathing we could smell the stench of rotten fish emanating from a nearby unknown source.  Not a breath of air circulated back stage on that sultry June evening.  The sounds of “ Pee—ew” grew louder as the stench grew stronger the closer we all gathered.  Eyes scanned the area on the floor looking for the source of the sickening smell.  Mothering stage hands flew to our huddle to silence our fears, but nothing could silence the smell so strong that flowers could wilt and eyes could tear.   Suddenly, a whispered screamed and finger pointing explosion came my way.  “It’s you.  It’s you.  It’s on your back.” 

        “Smell it.  It’s on your back! Ugh, Letty.”

        “On my back,” I whispered in angry humiliated tones.  Nearly wrenching my neck peering backwards. I begged,  “Get it off whatever it is.”  All I could imagine was a dead stink bug stuck to my neon orange costume.

        No, the black and white photo does not show the oval tent shape of an iron left too long in place on the back of a costume from my mother's attempt to iron the wrinkles, nor the stench that arose from that never before used shiny neon material.  Nor does it show the disgust and moans of the dancers around a young girl when it was discovered that I was the source of the unusual odor only seconds before hearing our queue.  Before I could run and hide the music began.  My head snapped up and my heart dropped like a heavy bucket to my stomach.  The dance must go on. 

        Dancers pranced and giggled off stage and in seconds the three future Rockettes lined up proudly with hats squared.  Marching like well trained horses, one smelling of manure, we appeared on stage smiling ear to ear.  We strutted magnificently that night on stage at the Coleman Theater with tassels glistening making our parents proud.

        And yes, one little girl was made stronger that night by stepping onto center stage and kicking those tasseled boots high into the flood lights.

On stage about 1960. left to right young girls: ?, Lynette Rains Kemp, ? Nancy Owens, ? Letty Stapp Watt, Dottie Miller, Nancy Adams, Beverly Gaines. 

Letty Stapp Watt

I would love to hear your  memories or stories of the Coleman Theater or  in The Wilson Dance Recitals of the 1950's--1960's.  Please use the comment section below. 

*The original Coleman Theater was built by George Coleman and opened in April 1929. In my childhood the glory remained but had begun to fade. Now thanks to the Friends of the Coleman Theater it has been completely restored, and is the most magnificent theater that your mind can imagine.  Come travel Route 66 to Miami, Oklahoma and visit this stunning showcase. 

This photo of the replaced original carpet and shows the insignia of 
George L. Coleman Sr
Click on the link below for more information on the Coleman Theater
The Coleman Theatre

Awakened by Winnie-the-Pooh

"People say Nothing is Impossible

but I do nothing everyday."

Winnie-the-Pooh 

5 Mile Creek, NE Oklahoma, photo by Bobby Poole

Strange, how a photo can cause the mind to stir and swim in search of a lost memory, of a story, of a time, of a place where nothing often happened.  Motor boating flat rocks across a creek is like doing nothing, but having so much fun doing nothing that one forgets there is another world out there.  Was that yesterday that I played like that?

When I first saw Bobby Poole's photographs on a Facebook page called, "You Know You Are From Miami IF......" I knew they were of home and a time long ago. They represented the places and good times of my childhood, but now they meant more. How?  What was I missing?

 

To avert thinking about what was missing, or to avoid my Art Gecko room which holds so many playful ideas, I instead jump up like a cat and look for a chore to do. Something is wrong.

Ironically, that same week the photos captured my mind, I watched the movie "Christopher Robin," three times. A few tears trickled down my cheek, but I managed to smile through the story of Pooh finding his long lost friend. Finding myself identifying with the lost spirit of Christopher Robin, I began to look out the windows in search of something lost. 

Pooh filled my heart with glowing happiness, through his gentle love of life and playfulness. So I listened to the CD’s of Winnie-the-Pooh and disappeared into the Hundred Acre Wood with Pooh and Christopher Robin. Oh, how I giggled with the antics of that poor bear, with very little brain, always in search of honey, his shy fearful friend little Piglet, and the floppy glum old donkey named Eeyore who stayed at his side. No matter the trouble they found, Christopher Robin arrived in time to save them. 

Shoal Creek, photo by Bobby Poole

There it was, the picture of the land where I could still do nothing. Like the bridge that crosses the waters connecting our spaces my mind and heart connected.  Standing on the bridge in my mind I watch the surroundings; the hawks gliding, birds swooping, the couple kissing near the shore, the fisherman slowly floating downstream nearer and nearer the oblivious couple.  With my imagination I walk the shores and step into the cold flowing waters and do nothing, like a vacation where there's no laundry to wash, no deadlines, only time and scenic arrays, and all of this from my imagination.

"Rivers know this: there is no hurry.

We shall get there some day." 

Winnie-the-Pooh

*Winnie-the-Pooh by A.A Milne, CD Random House Listening Library, 2009 with Judy Dench's voice and other outstanding voices is a terrific way to listen to Pooh Bear's stories.

Route 66 -- The Mick

He stood bigger than life in the eyes of every child who'd ever heard his name. He'd always smiled at the kids as he autographed baseballs, golf balls, bats, and more. I stood near my father watching the commotion around us. Even though Mickey Mantle was nearly a household name for every American child in the 50's, seeing him in person and knowing his family made it special for many of us kids growing up in Ottawa County. 

My father, Johnie Stapp, with Mickey Mantle about 1956

One day he and his twin brothers, Roy and Ray, along with other Yankee players showed up at the Miami Country Club to play golf. It must have been in the summer because there were many people swimming, who suddenly jumped out of the pool and began to gather around the large and loud group of men. What I recall and what the facts are sometimes become twisted, but that day with a gallery of people we watched "The Mick" hit a tee ball off the first tee and fly it over the green (a par 4 about 360 yards), across Elm street behind the golf course, and into the fenced horse stalls owned by Mr. Lou Newell.  The gallery roared and the teasing and bets were on. "Johnny Dial" was the stud horse owned by Lou Newell, and for only a moment someone worried that he might have hit the horse, which made the golf shot even more lavish to retell.

My memories of Mickey seem quite colorful, when I recall my dad coming home from work sharing episodes of the days when Mickey and his friends came to the club to get away from the crowds and feel at home.  Billy Martin, Mantle's manager, asked my dad to give him golf lessons. Dad suggested that Martin come back often,  "so we can get that slice fixed." Martin just laughed. 

The Yankee players who came to Miami along with Mickey, George Coleman, and other celebrities sometimes played what dad called "destruction derby" with the golf carts.  I'm sure it wasn't what my dad liked to see, but Mickey and his friends always paid for the damage they imposed, and the men loved to retell the stories.  

Along the way, decades pass and memories grow fuzzy. This summer on my way to a golf tournament in Joplin, Missouri, along with my friend Kay Dalke, we took a sideways trip along old Route 66, and stopped at the Dobson Museum in Miami so I could take care of "burden and worry" that wouldn't leave my mind. As I talked about my problem with Jordan Boyd, Kay noticed the display on Mickey Mantle. Jordan suggested we locate the Mantle home a take a peek at history along the way to Joplin. 

With map in hand we headed north on Route 66 to
find his Commerce home.  Kay regaled me with her love of baseball and childhood family memories. Her grandmother's brothers were Paul and Lloyd Waner from Harrah, Ok. They are both in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. The Baseball Hall of Fame treated her family as special guest when they visited. She, like so many of us, remembers meeting Mickey Mantle, so finding his home was very special to both of us.

We were humbled by his small home. The plaque read: At the age of 5 or 6 his father started teaching him how to hit, they used the tin barn as their backstop. Mutt, his father (a miner) would pitch righty and Mick's grandfather would pitch lefty while teaching him the fine art of switch hitting....


Kay said, "Seeing Mickey Mantle's home was so exciting. It is hard to imagine the life of simplicity some of the greatest athletes of our lifetime have come from." 

Along the way, there's just so much to see and think about. 

Letty Stapp Watt
Johnie Stapp's daughter and historian

*Please leave comments below.