Remembering Charles, John and Don

Three more men that I knew and liked have now left this life. Not close friends, but people I valued and was always glad to see. We know a lot of people like that, don’t we? People who have contributed to a better life for our community, but who joined us along our path of life only recently, and not often enough. I think of them as friends anyway.
When I needed footings dug for an addition to our little house (we were downsizing, but found that we could not, so we decided to add three rooms!) I asked friend Delbert Case to recommend someone else since he had gone out of that business. The backhoe is the tool of choice for footings, but is also the weapon of choice for demolishing buildings, so I sought someone who might do the one without doing the other. Delbert recommended Charles Halford, who brought another friend, Bill Burnette, to help when he came to dig and to take out some trees.
All went well and I had nice trenches that required little dressing by hand to be ready for the concrete, and a maple whose branches had rubbed the roof was gone, as were many overgrown shrubs in the path of the addition. Soon friend and neighbor Joe Waldrop said, "I see you had Crash Halford working at your house the other day." Well, now, I might have asked for a second opinion, or called some other people, if Delbert had called him Crash!
Of course, I had to ask how Charles got that nickname, and was told that he earned it by tearing up so many machines when he was in the Army. Some of his friends insisted that his destructive habits continued in civilian life, so the name stuck, but it looked to me like he had mastered his craft by the time he came to my house. He moved several shrubs by scooping them up with the backhoe, and they are thriving where we set them out again. I shall always remember the wide grin framed by his big round cheeks and twinkling eyes as he worked. Sorta reminded me of Santa Clause, up on that big toy of his…
If you have central heat/air in your house built here in the last half century or so, chances are good that John McGuinn had a hand in putting it there. He had his own business for many years, but was working with Harold Burrell when I built my dream house on Holly Hill. Harold asked whether I wanted a Cadillac system, or a Mercedes, and John grinned broadly when I suggested that they price the Mercedes first… That big house was cool at the same cost for electricity as my house next door less than half as large.
When I wrote about the big Bradley house off Skyuka Road at the foot of Tryon Peak, I called John to ask whether it was air conditioned. I left for the Air Force before the house was completed, so I did not know. John said no, but he added window units in the bedrooms later. So John’s whole life was devoted to making people comfortable. Not a bad legacy, it seems to me.
Don and Mary Sasser entered our social calendar shortly after we retired here. She later became a customer at Fran and Mary’s yarn shop, and she also cut my toenails for me when I was laid up after my heart surgery. We talked about their daughter who got her pilot’s license and began flying in Alaska, and other common interests. You know, what friends do when they get together.
Then one day Don told me calmly that he had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s… no sugar coating and no self pity, just acceptance. Don would stand by and just watch while Mary and I hugged, then he and I would talk quietly while the women visited. He did not just do yes and no, but offered thoughts and ideas of his own, which kept me from feeling that I was just doing my duty by "entertaining" him. What I am trying to say is that Don handled with grace and aplomb what could have been a more difficult circumstance for everyone. I salute him for that.
To you who knew these men better than I, may you accept my small tribute to their big presence in our community, as together we share our loss while cherishing their memory.

A ‘filling station’ to cherish

I have relished the sight of the little gas station at the foot of McClure Hill for some time now, and was pleased to see it restored to its former glory. When I learned that my friend Mack Henson was responsible, I asked him to meet me there so I could learn more about it directly from him. As always, I learned more than I expected to.
The "Filling Station" was built c.1914 and operated for many years by Mack’s grandfather, Sherman S. McClure. He was known as "S.S." and probably named the station "Silver Springs" because of his initials. Speaking of names, since "Jervey Curve" up near Melrose on US176 is called that because Dr. Allen Jervey’s daughter lost her life when a car full of young people went off the road and down into the rocky Pacolet River bed below, I wondered if that hill memorialized a similarly unfortunate McClure. Not so; it got its name because S.S. owned property on both sides of the present US 176 from the state line almost to the top of the hill.
The enclosed part of the building is original, but Mack replaced the canopy that extends to the original brick pillars because he thought it posed a danger to anyone walking under it. As the restoration proceeded, Roy Williams helped him find some of the artifacts that had disappeared, including the tall gasoline pump with the handle on the side. Roy also provided the light fixture that illuminates the big oval Esso sign on the post that is taller than the building.
The sign is oval because that was the shape of the gasoline tank on the semi-trailers that delivered gasoline to all the little Esso "filling stations." The trailers had the blue border and red "Esso" lettering on the back end of the tank. They also had a steel chain dragging at the back to discharge static electricity because the rubber tires insulated the truck from the ground. Nowadays, there is no chain; they clip a ground wire from the truck to the metal of the underground tank before draining gasoline into it.
The last year of my father’s life saw him taking this seven-year-old to the Filling Station with him on Saturday mornings. The owner became a friend, and he would cheerfully work the handle to pump maybe ten gallons of gasoline up into the glass tank, then put the hose nozzle into the filler neck of our car, and squeeze the handle to let the gasoline run into our tank by gravity. Then he would wash the windshield, check the oil and water levels, and even the tire pressures because the porous rubber "inner tubes" would lose several pounds of air pressure in a week. Sometimes he would put the car on the lift to change the oil or lubricate the chassis, and we’d have time for more visiting. I think the gasoline cost Dad about twenty cents a gallon then; imagine the station owner doing all that work for a lot less than a dollar in profit!
Many stations did not have a lift or even a pit for changing oil or lubrication. Instead, there would be a couple of wooden "piers," well supported and braced, spaced to accept the wheels of a car to drive out over sloping ground to allow room underneath for a man to work on the car’s underside. I missed seeing any of these means at the present Silver Springs station.
There is, however, a tank with a cranked pump on top for dispensing kerosene into the customer’s can. It is outside, because the smell of kerosene permeates the whole inside of a building. There is also a quart bottle with a metal spout screwed on it for adding a quart of oil to a car engine from a bulk oil tank similar to the one for kerosene.
There is a rubber container for battery water, with a well for keeping the "baster" used for transferring the distilled water to the battery cells. Rubber because if the cell were overfilled, water would be drawn back out of the battery, and since it would then contain battery acid, it would not eat a hole in the rubber container.
Someone brought Mack a Mileage device from Silver Springs, Florida, which now sits prominently on the counter. The die cast metal case has a lot of raised lettering on it lauding Silver Springs and local attractions, and has slots through which to view the drum inside which gives place names, miles from Silver Springs, and the routes to take to get there. Map-Quest without a computer — or even electricity!
Mack’s presence at the station brought several visitors. Roy Williams seemed to be as pleased with the little Filling Station as Mack is.
There is no telling what else Roy might contribute to bring it further to life. The pump had lost its prime, so I will have to go back down there soon and pump, not stale gasoline, but dyed cooking oil up and get some more pictures. Do you think maybe somebody else likes that place as much as Mack and Roy do?